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The kharja (in Arabic , meaning "final"), also known as jarcha (Spanish spelling), is the final refrain of a series of verses which comprise a moajxa (muwashshah), a lyric genre of Moorish Spain written in Arabic or Hebrew, commonly with five stanzas, each consisting of four to six lines. The final two lines of each stanza act as a refrain which is known as a kharja.
The kharjas were in a Romance vernacular, blended with some Arabic expressions and words, which has been called Mozarabic. These refrains were not composed by the authors of the muwashshahs: these authors listened to the songs of the Christian population, the Mozarabs, and added them to their own compositions, which were in fact often inspired by the jarchas. With examples dating back to the 11th century, this genre of poetry is among the oldest in any Romance language, and certainly the earliest recorded form of lyric poetry in Ibero-Romance. The jarchas were written in Arabic or Hebrew script, which creates difficulties in achieving an unambiguous transcription.
While the muwashshah descends from Arabic oral poetry traditions and its assonant verse is similar to that used in the Qu'ran, the kharja has its roots in popular lyric songs, in simple but emotive and graceful expressions of love. The kharjas were usually composed by women; the addressee is the habib ("friend", in Arabic). Contemporary Arabs from North Africa or the Middle East referred to the jarcha as a "little song in the Christian style."
The kharja is often read separately from the longer poem with which it was written down.
An example of a typical kharja:
Vayse meu corachón de mib: ya Rab, ¿si me tornarád? ¡Tan mal meu doler li-l-habib! Enfermo yed, ¿cuánd sanarád?
A rough translation:
My heart has left me, Oh sir, will you transform me? So great is my pain for my beloved! It is sick, when will it be cured?
This verse expresses the theme of the pain of longing for the absent lover (habib), a theme that was later developed in the Galician-Portuguese Cantigas de Amigo from the 12th to the 14th century. It had some influence on the mystic poetry of Saint John of the Cross in the 16th century.
Part of this article was translated from the Spanish article * of the same name.
See also
External links
- Texts of fifty-five kharjas, with different transcriptions and translation to English French and German. *
- Ten kharjas translated to English*
References
- GARCIA GOMEZ, Emilio, Jarchas Romances, serie árabe, ISBN 84-206-2652-X
- GALMÉS DE FUENTES, Álvaro, Las Jarchas Mozárabes, forma y Significado ISBN 8474236733
- NIMER, Miguel, Influências Orientais na Língua Portuguesa, ISBN 8531407079
"Kharja"