such tale al-Mubarrad says “One day Abū Muḥallim al-Shaybānī said to me, ‘I had never seen a mortar among the nomads, so that when I came across one, I was disdainful of it.’” He estimated that “Abū Zayd knew a great deal about grammar, but less than al-Khalīl and Sībawayh." He described al-Aṣma’ī as "equal to Abu ‘Ubaydah in poetry and rhetoric but more expert in grammar, although ‘Ubaydah excelled in genealogy." In another tradition al-Mubarrad read a poem of the poet Jarīr to a student of al-Aṣma‘ī and Abū ‘Ubaydah, called al-Tawwazī, in the presence of the poet’s great grandson Umārah, which began: The dove was happy in the trees exciting me; For a long time may thou tarry in the branches and the forest verdure, until he came to the line But the heart remaineth bound by longing For Jumanah or Rayya, the Barren Place (al-‘Āqir). When ‘Umārah asked al-Tawwazī how his master Abū ‘Ubaydah would interpret “Jumanah and Rayyā”, al-Tawwazī replied, “The names of two women,” ‘Umārah laughed saying, ‘These two, by Allāh, are two sandy places to the right and left of my house!' When al-Tawwazi asked al-Mubarrad to write this explanation down, he refused out of respect for Abū ‘Ubaydah. Al-Tawwazī insisted that if he were present, Abū ‘Ubaydah, would accept Umārah’s interpretation, as it was about his own house.’ Works Meaning of the Qur’ān; Al-Kāmil (The Complete) The Garden; Improvisation; Etymology; Al-Anwā' and the Seasons; Al-Qawāfī; Penmanship and Spelling; Introduction to Sībawayh; The Shortened and the Lengthened Masculine and Feminine; The Meaning of the Qur’ān, known as Kitāb al-Tāmm (Entirety); Proving the Readings [methods of reading the Qur’ān]; Explanation of the Arguments of the “Book" of Sībawayh; Necessity of Poetry; The Training of an Examiner; The Letters in the Meaning of the Qur’an to “Ṭā' (Ṭ) Ha‘(H); The Meaning of the Attributes of Allāh, May His Name Be Glorified; Praiseworthy and Vile; Pleasing Gardens; Names of the Calamities among the Arabs; The Compendium (unfinished); Consolation; Embellishment; Thorough Searching of the “Book” of Sībawayh; Thorough Searching of “Kitab al-Awsaṭ" of al-Akhfash; Prosody- An Explanation of the Words of the Arabs, Rescuing Their Pronunciation, Coupling of Their Words, and Relating Their Meaning; How the Pronunciations of the Qur’ān Agree, Though Their Meanings Differ; The Generations of the Grammarians of al-Baṣrah, with Accounts about Them; The Complete Epistle; Refutation of Sībawayh The Principles of Poetry; Inflection (Declension)