| Tarafa | |
| Birth Name: | Tarafa ibn al-‘Abd ibn Sufyān ibn Sa‘d Abū ‘Amr al-Bakrī al-Wā’ilī |
| Birth Date: | c. 543 |
| Birth Place: | Bahrain, Arabia |
| Death Date: | c. 569 |
| Death Place: | Bahrain, Arabia |
| Occupation: | Poet |
| Language: | Arabic |
| Nationality: | Arabian |
| Period: | Pre-Islamic |
| Genre: | Panegyrics, Satire |
| Notableworks: | Mu'allaqat |
| Influences: | Tribal themes, Court life |
| Influenced: | Arabic poetry |
Tarafa (Arabic: طرفة بن العبد بن سفيان بن سعد أبو عمرو البكري الوائلي / ALA-LC: Ṭarafah ibn al-‘Abd ibn Sufyān ibn Sa‘d Abū ‘Amr al-Bakrī al-Wā’ilī; 543–569), was a 6th century Arabian poet of the tribe of the Bakr. He is one of the seven poets of the most celebrated anthology of ancient Arabic poetry, known as the Muʿallaqāt, however just one of his poems is included. His fellow poets preserved in this work are Al-Nabigha, Antarah ibn Shaddad, Zuhayr bin Abi Sulma, 'Alqama ibn 'Abada and Imru' al-Qais.
Ṭarafah was the half-brother or nephew of the elegist Al-Khirniq bint Badr.[1] He traveled with his uncle Mutalammis to the court of the king of Al-Hirah, ʿAmr ibn Hind, and there became companion to the king's brother. According to one legend, having ridiculed the king in some verses he was sent with a letter to the ruler of Bahrayn, and, in accordance with the instructions contained in the letter, was buried alive.[2]
While some of his poems have been translated into Latin with notes by B. Vandenhoff (Berlin, 1895), both Tharafa and the poet Imru al-Qais were not included by Theodor Nöldeke in his Fünf Moallaqat, übersetzt und erklärt (Vienna, 1899-1901).