Classical Arab civilization produced the most extensive and highly developed bacchic tradition in world literature, In this book, Kennedy traces the history of wine poetry from its origins in sixth century Arabia to its heyday in Baghdad at the turn of the ninth century. He focusses on the work of the great Ab=u Nuw=as (d. c.813), placing his wine songs in context with those of his contemporaries and with other poetic genres such as amatory, invective, ascetic, and gnomic verse.