Brunettes are tropes of popular folklore music lyrics in the Middle East and Latin America. The English language has no equivalent for moreno (Spanish/Portuguese) or asmar/esmer (Arabic, Turkish, Kurdish, Persian), since it splits the concept between hair color (‘brunette’) and skin (‘dark’).
In medieval Andalusia, the morena, morenica, morisca, mora (all words originating from the Latin maurus, ‘black, inhabitant of Mauritania’) was the object of desire of many of ballads, poems, muwashshahs, in Hebrew, Arabic, and Spanish. The phenomenon continues in the traditions of Spanish, Portuguese, Sephardic and Levantine song lyrics after the Christian reconquest of Spain. In Arabic, اسمر asmar, someone of dark complexion, derives from the verb سمر to become brown/to chat in the evening (سمر the noun specifically means nightly chat, and the name سميرة means a woman who engages in nightly conversation, an entertainer).
Dark but…
Sephardic poems and songs about the morenas present certain patterns. The Sephardic morenika/schecharchoret was always marked by a certain degree of ambiguity for her color, going back to the Song of Songs, when Solomon’s lover, the daughter of a pharaoh, sings:
Dark (shechoret) am I, yet lovely, daughters of Jerusalem,
dark like the tents of Kedar, like the tent curtains of Solomon.
Look not upon me, because I am dark (shecharchoret),
because the sun hath looked upon me.
(Song of Solomon 1:5, 6)
This Biblical verse inspired popular Sephardic music. In many songs, in Ladino and Spanish, the morena presents herself in her dark beauty, with a condition: she was not always dark, but born white. The most popular song in this tradition, which has survived to this day in various interpretations by Sephardic artists, is Morenika a mí me llaman (translated to Hebrew as Shecharchoret, famously sung by Ofra Haza), with the first person voice exchanged being the dark girl and her admirer. It is a popular Sephardic wedding song. A version of the song was recorded using lyrics from the original Biblical text.
Morenica a mi me llaman They call me dark girl
yo blanka nasi. I who was born white
El sol del enverano The summer sun
a mi me hizo ansi. Made me like thus
Morenica, grasiosika sois Dark girl, you are lovely
tu morena y yo grasioso You are dark and I am lovely
i ojos pretos tu And your dark eyes
tu morena y yo grasioso You are dark and I am lovely
i ojos pretos tu. And your dark eyes
Many Renaissance-period Sephardic songs follow the same trope as the more well-known Morenika a mi me llaman. One text in this vein is found in the Cancionero de Uppsala, a 16th century collection of Spanish lyrics published in Venice, and discovered in the library of Uppsala. One of the songs has been interpreted as a Christmas song due to its reference to the Virgin Mary (lo moreno bien mirado/fué la culpa del porenecado/que en mi nunca fué hallado), yet the metaphorical content and language bear extreme resemblance to the Sephardic lyrics, specifically with its reference to the song of Solomon. It may well have been composed by a marrano (a crypto-jew, and yes, the term comes from moreno, which is etymologically linked to mouro, moor).
Yo me soy la morenica, I am the little dark one,
Yo me soy la morena. I am the dark woman.Lo moreno bien mirado The dark, handsome man
Fué la culpa del pecado; Was guilty of sin,
Que en mi nunca fué hallado, But sin was never found in me
Ni jamás se hallara. And never will be.Soy la sin espina rosa I am the rose without the thorns
Que Salomon canta y glosa…. Of which Solomon sings, and says
Nigra sum sed Formosa I am black but beautiful;
Y por mí se cantara. For me they will sing.
Many such texts are recorded in the Nuevo Corpus de la Antigua Lírica Popular Hispánica, Siglos XV a XVII (“New Corpus of the Old Popular Hispanic Lyric, 15th-17th centuries,” edited by Margit Frenk Alatorre). The following poem emphasises the ambiguity of darkness for the Sephardic woman; she could be morenika, depending on the viewer. Her darkness was thus a matter of perception, rather than of essence.
Morenica m’era yo: Dark was I
dizen que sí, dizen que no. Some say yes, some say no
Unos que bien me quieren Those who love me
dizen que sí Say yes
otros que por mí mueren Others that die for me
dizen que no. Say no.
Morenica m’era yo: Dark was I|
dizen que sí, dizen que no. Some say yes, some say noMorenica me llaman, madre,
desde el día que yo nací;
al galán que me ronda la puerta
rubia y blanca le parecí
From Juan Vásquez in Recopiliatión de sonetos y vilancicos (1560)
Blanca me era yo I was white
Cuando entré en la siega; When I went to the harvest
Diome el sol, y ya soy morena. I caught the sun, and now I am dark
Morenica, no desprecies Dark one, do not belittle
Tu color morena: Your dark color:
Que aquésa es la color buena. For it is the best color
From Cancionero de Jacinto López (1620)
In Arabic Song, Dark is Unambiguous
In contrast to Jewish songs, the asmar or asmarani, a term which is roughly equivalent to moreno, of Arab songs almost always refers to a male. Also different from the Jewish lyrics, there is no ambiguity in the asmar’s position: he is not dark *but* originally white, he is just dark, and that is a blessing. In 1922, Stephan H. Stephan collected Palestinian folkloric (in the hopes of proving a continuous culture to the Song of Songs; in fact, it proves just the opposite). Some of the songs allude to an asmar man:
اسمر و لابس قميص النوم و منززه بحب مرجان
A dark one, wearing a night shirt And buttoning it with loving coral
ساعه و يسكر و ساعه يشبه عود الريحان
Time and time again he’s drunk And resembles sweet basil
Meanwhile, females muses are unanimously white (bayda). The following song illustrates this duality by exchanging the thoughts of the man and those of the woman:
شفتها بتتمخطر حامله لجره بيضا وغريره حوطها بالله
I saw her walking gracefully carrying a pitcher White and fine, I watch over her, by God!
ماما يا ماما حبيبي برا لابس ومتلبس و مكحل عيونه
Mama, oh mama, my beloved in outside With his best clothes and his kohl eyes
اسمر سباني بغمز العيونا اسمر سباني و انا سبيته
A brown one has captivated me with the blink of his eyes A brown one has charmed me and I have charmed him
A dark groom for a white bride indeed seem to be the “ideal types” of poetry, going back to the legend of ‘Antar and ‘Abla, the asmar son of an Ethiopian slave pairing with his fairer Arab cousin. And art imitates life: in Palestinian Improvised-Sung Poetry: The Genres of Ḥidā and Qarrādī— Performance and Transmission, folklorist Ḍirghām Sbait recorded the following improvised refrains at a wedding in which the groom is praised for being asmar:
عريسنا هلأسمار Our groom is darkيابو زيد الهلالي Like Abu Zayd al-Hilali *زادت منه محبتنا Our love for him has increasedو فرحت كل الأهالي And the whole family rejoicedعريسنا هلأسمار Our groom is dark
Many asmar songs have survived to the modern day, my personal favorite being the Qudud Halabiya (traditional Aleppan song, but found throughout the Levant) Hal Asmar Al-Lown
هالأسمر اللون Oh, dark is his colorهالأسمراني This little dark oneتعبان يا قلب خيوه I am tired, great heartهواك رماني Where has your love thrown me?يابو عيون وساع Oh you with the wide eyes
حطيت بقلبي وجاع You have placed pain in my heartبعطيك سبع رباع خيوه I will give you seven quartersمن عين رسمالي of what is left to me
Esmer eman eman Dark one, oh,Dîlber eman delalê yeman Apple of my eye, oh charming and unrulyÇi kulilka dora çem an A flower by the riverXelk zewîcî ez û tu man The people are all married; you and I remainEsmer min dî sêlê tîne Dark one, I saw youDîlber min dî sêlê tîne Apple of my eye, I saw you
Buena es la color morena, The dark color is good
Pero la blanca es más buena; Yet white is better
Buena es la blanca color, The white color is good
Mas la morena es mejor. Yet dark is better
و ان كنك سمره عسل مخفيه بجرارناAnd if you are dark, you are the honey hidden in our potsو ان كنك بيضا اميره مشرفة ع دارناAnd if you are white, you are the princess honoring our house.
almanzali 