If you eat asparagus, or if you start your meal with soup and end with dessert, or if you use toothpaste, or if you wear your hair in bangs, you owe a lot to one of the greatest trend-setters in history who happens to be an Arab Muslim who lived more than 1000 years ago in Cordoba, Spain.

Abu al-Hasan ‘Ali ibn Nafi’ was born in about the year 789 in Iraq, perhaps in its capital, Baghdad. He arrived in Cordoba 822, (1185 years ago) and was nick-named Ziryab, his name means "blackbird" or "lark” because his skin was dark and he had a beautiful voice.

After meeting with this 33-year-old wonder from Baghdad, Khalifah Abd al-Rahman II who was about the same age, made him an attractive offer: Ziryab would receive a handsome salary of 200 gold pieces per month, with bonuses of 500 gold pieces at midsummer and the New Year, and 1000 on each of the two major Islamic holidays. He would be given 200 bushels of barley and 100 bushels of wheat each year. He would receive a modest palace in Cordoba and several villas with productive farmland in the countryside. Naturally, Ziryab accepted the offer; overnight he became a prosperous member of the upper class in Islamic Spain. The Khalifa wanted to make Cordoba modern and stylish, and this was the job of Ziryab, who served as a kind of “Minister of Culture” for the Andalusian court.

His Contribution to Style and Etiquette:
He brought to Cordoba everything that was chic and fashionable from the East, which was then the center of civilization. His clothes, hairstyle, and delicate manners were different. So, as soon as he arrived, everyone in Cordoba’s court began to copy him. He was his generation’s trendsetter of taste, style and manners, and he exerted enormous influence on medieval European society. He influenced how people dressed, what and how they ate, how they groomed themselves, and what music they enjoyed.

For example, one of the historical sources tells us that before he arrived, men and women of al-Andalus, wore their hair parted in the middle and hung down loose to the shoulders. Ziryab had his hair cut with bangs down to his eyebrows straight across his forehead, and pulled back with little spit curls coming out from the sides of his ears, which soon became the fashion of the time across Europe. His suggestions and recommendations became the popular fashion. Many of his new ideas gradually migrated into France, Germany, northern Italy, and beyond.

His Contribution to Music:
Ziryab knew thousands of songs by heart and revolutionized the design of the musical instrument that became the Lute by adding a fifth pair of strings to it, giving the instrument greater range and delicacy of expression. He spread a new musical style around the Mediterranean, influencing troubadours and minstrels and affecting the course of European music. He’s reported to have started Europe’s first music school.

His Contribution to Food and Table Manners:
Ziryab decreed that palace dinners would be served in courses according to a fixed sequence, starting with soups or broths, continuing with fish, fowl or meats, and concluding with fruits, sweet desserts and bowls of pistachio and nuts. He taught people how to produce fitted table cloths made of delicate material and decorated leather, and replaced the heavy gold and silver drinking goblets with fine crystal. Ziryab also introduced asparagus as a dinner vegetable and he is remembered today in an old dish of roasted and salted broad beans called ziriabí. He also developed a number of desserts, including an unforgettable treat of walnuts and honey that is served to this day in the city of Zaragoza, as well as the sweet Arab pastry known as zalabia.

His Contribution to Fashion:
Ziryab developed Europe’s first toothpaste (though unfortunately the ingredients are unknown to us today). He popularized shaving among men and set new haircut trends.

Before Ziryab, royalty and nobles washed their clothes with rose water; he introduced the use of salt to improve the cleaning process.

For women, Blackbird opened a “beauty parlor/cosmetology school” not far from the Alcazar, the emir’s palace. He created hairstyles that were daring for the time. The women of Spain traditionally wore their hair parted in the middle, covering their ears, with a long braid down the back. Ziryab introduced a shorter, shaped cut, with bangs on the forehead and the ears uncovered. He introduced new perfumes and cosmetics. Some of Ziryab’s fashion tips he borrowed from the elite social circles of Baghdad, which was then the world’s most cosmopolitan city. Others were twists on local Andalusian custom. Most became widespread simply because Ziryab advocated them: He was a celebrity, and people gained status simply by emulating him.

He decreed Spain’s first seasonal fashion calendar. In springtime, men and women were to wear bright colors in cotton and linen tunics, shirts, blouses and gowns. Ziryab introduced colorful silk clothing to supplement traditional fabrics. In summer, white clothing was the rule. When the weather turned cold, Ziryab recommended long cloaks trimmed with fur, which became all the rage in Al-Andalus.

As the first millennium drew to a close, students from France, England and the rest of Europe flocked to Cordoba to study science, medicine and philosophy and to take advantage of the great municipal library with its 600,000 volumes. When they returned to their home countries, they took with them not only knowledge, but also art, music, cuisine, fashion and manners.

References:
Flight of the Blackbird

13th Century Andalusian Costumes

Al-Andalus-Dwight Reynolds