To our scanty information concerning the pre-Mohammadan ḥîrahs one other item is to be added. Mas’ûdi gives an account in the following terms of a palace built at Sâmarrâ by the khalif Mutawakkil (A.D. 847-861) in imitation of a Lakhmid ḥî ah: ‘Mutawakkil in his days raised a building such as no man knew, it is that which is called the _ḥîri_ and the two wings (literally sleeves) and the porticoes (_arûqah_). And that was because a companion of his vigils related to him upon a certain night that one of the kings of Ḥîrah, a Nu’mânid of the Bani Naṣr, erected an edifice in his capital, which was al-Ḥîrah, after the model of an army in battle. (The word I have translated by _army in battle_ is _ḥarb_ = war or campaign; Dr. Herzfeld suggests that it must be taken here to mean military camp--a somewhat hypothetical emendation)[71]. For such was his infatuation for war and his love of it; so that the memory of it might never vanish from him under any condition. In this edifice the portico was the audience chamber of the king, and this was the centre (literally the _breast_); and the two wings (_sleeves_) lay to right and left. In the two dwellings which formed the wings lodged those who stood nearest to him among his courtiers. In the right wing was the wardrobe, and in the left wing was kept such wine as was needed. The open court of the portico was common to the centre and to the two wings. The doors, three in number, led to the portico. To this day this building (i.e. Mutawakkil’s copy) is called the _ḥîri_ and the two wings in allusion to al-Ḥîrah. And the people followed Mutawakkil, imitating his creation, which is famous to the present time.’[72] The word _riwâq_, which I have translated ‘portico’, does not necessarily imply the existence of columns, though it is used for the porticoes which surround the court of a mosque. Its primary signification is a roof in front of a tent, supported by a single pole in the middle.[73] I shall have occasion to return later to this important passage (see below, p. 86).