Dunash ben Labrat
920 CE–990 CE · Rishonim · Fez
Dunash ha-Levi ben Labrat (c. 920–c. 990) was a poet and grammarian who transformed Hebrew letters. Born in Fez and educated in Baghdad under Saadia Gaon, he was drawn to Córdoba by Hasdai ibn Shaprut. There he made his lasting innovation: adapting the quantitative meter of Arabic poetry to Hebrew, he founded the Andalusian school of Hebrew verse whose forms would carry through Ibn Gabirol, Yehuda HaLevi and beyond — and his Sabbath hymn Dror Yikra is still sung today. As a grammarian he advanced the analysis of Hebrew by triliteral roots, and his famous critique of Menachem ben Saruk's Machberet reshaped the field.
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FezפאסMorocco
What they did here
Born in Fez, Morocco, around 920.
About Fez
Fez (Fas), in north-central Morocco, was founded in the early 9th century by the Idrisid dynasty and became the political and intellectual capital of medieval Morocco, home to the Qarawiyyin mosque-university. The historian Ibn Khaldun (d. 1406) taught there for a period, and the Maliki jurist Ahmad al-Wansharisi (d. 1508), author of al-Mi'yar, was active in the city.
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In the same tradition
The world in their lifetime
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Islamic world
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