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OP - April 17, 2015, 03:22 PM

Anything to do with the the history of the Islamic world that doesn't really justify its own thread and doesn't fit in an existing one, whether or not it's about Muslims or has much to do with religion.

To kick off here's an article by Mohamad Ballan about an early Muslim state in the South of France:

Fraxinetum: An Islamic Frontier State in 10th-Century Provence

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Reply #1 - April 17, 2015, 03:38 PM

An article about early Muslim Crete from the same blog:

Andalusi Crete (827-961) and the Arab-Byzantine Frontier in the Early Medieval Mediterranean

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Reply #2 - April 17, 2015, 03:55 PM

The Ottoman 'Discovery' of the Indian Ocean in the Sixteenth Century: The Age of Exploration from an Islamic Perspective
Quote
Vasco da Gama's successful voyage around the Cape of Good Hope in 1497 and the foundation of the Portuguese Estado da India in the following decades has long been identified as a development of enormous global significance, marking as it did the beginning of direct and continuous contact between the civilizations of Western Europe and the Indian Ocean. Much less well known to modern scholarship, by contrast, is the rival and contemporaneous expansion of the Ottoman Empire into the lands of the Indian Ocean littoral, a process which began with Sultan Selim I's conquest of Egypt in 1517, and which would continue throughout the rest of the sixteenth century. Because the Ottoman state and the merchant communities of the Indian Ocean shared the same religion, most modern scholars have simply assume that they enjoyed a kind of de facto familiarity with one another as well. In reality, the early sixteenth century Ottomans were in many ways even less aware of the geography, history and civilization of the Indian Ocean than were their contemporary Portuguese rivals. The subsequent development of direct contact between the Ottoman Empire and the Muslim principalities and trading communities of the Indian Ocean thus represents a kind of Ottoman 'discovery' of an entirely new part of the globe, and one which corresponds in many ways to the much better documented European discoveries of the same period....

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Reply #3 - April 17, 2015, 08:30 PM

A bunch of cool articles on pre-Islamic Arabia:

https://www.academia.edu/4572291/Arameans_Chaldeans_and_Arabs_in_Late_Babylonian_Sources

https://www.academia.edu/5184769/Goddesses_dancing_girls_or_cheerleaders_Perceptions_of_the_divine_and_the_female_form_in_the_rock_art_of_pre-Islamic_North_Arabia

"In Nabataea, possibly under Levantine or Hellenistic influence, the stones were anthropomorphized by the addition of stylized eyes, nose and, in one case, a mouth, while retaining the exterior characteristics of the naṣb. But these types of anthropomorphized anṣāb are a feature of Nabataean religion, and we do not find them in the rest of North Arabia, either carved on the rocks or as portable objects. The question of how divine beings were perceived in pre-Islamic North and Central Arabia remains open. All we can say for certain is that, outside Nabataea and the Hellenized areas, drawings of the female form almost certainly depict women engaged in earthly activities, and are not representations of the divine."

Actually everything that Macdonald puts up is golden, he is a true beast. This may be the best single source for pre-Islamic Arabian awesomeness that I know of.

https://oxford.academia.edu/MichaelMacdonald
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Reply #4 - April 18, 2015, 12:12 AM

Annette Yoshiko Reed - Syriac Images of Asia and the Historiography of ‘the West'

https://www.academia.edu/243282/_Beyond_the_Land_of_Nod_Syriac_Images_of_Asia_and_the_Historiography_of_the_West_

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Reply #5 - April 18, 2015, 10:37 AM

On the Ottomans and India, I think this needs to be seen in the context of two other empires - China and Spain. Zheng He had been to Madagascar and South Africa at least, and the Chinese were very interested in a Silver mountain in South America!

This was one world since 1492 - the Columbian Exchange.

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The Columbian Exchange or Grand Exchange was the widespread transfer of animals, plants, culture, human populations, communicable diseases, technology and ideas between the American and Afro-Eurasian hemispheres in the 15th and 16th centuries, related to European colonization and trade (including African/American slave trade) after Christopher Columbus' 1492 voyage.[1] The contact between the two areas circulated a wide variety of new crops and livestock, which supported increases in population in both hemispheres, although diseases initially caused precipitous declines in the numbers of indigenous peoples of the Americas. Traders returned to Europe with maize, potatoes, and tomatoes, which became very important crops in Europe by the 18th century. Similarly, Europeans introduced manioc and peanut to tropical Asia and West Africa, where they flourished in soils that otherwise would not produce large yields.[citation needed]

The term was first used in 1972 by American historian Alfred W. Crosby in his environmental history book The Columbian Exchange.[2] It was rapidly adopted by other historians and journalists and has become widely known.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbian_Exchange

When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and you Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it.

A.A. Milne,

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Reply #6 - April 18, 2015, 03:19 PM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4atu5YTwNX8

Hmm That is what is needed Open Discussion on early Islamic history...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=23&v=AYRi-iRNLNU

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Reply #7 - April 19, 2015, 10:37 AM

I just came across this - plenty of history to go at.

Ottoman history podcasts

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Reply #8 - April 20, 2015, 08:09 PM

Everything you wanted to know about Muslims and Jews and medieval Scandinavia and the Baltic - open access book

Fear and Loathing in the North - Cordelia Heß, Jonathan Adams et al

http://www.degruyter.com/viewbooktoc/product/247594
Quote
Due to the scarcity of sources regarding actual Jewish and Muslim communities and settlements, there has until now been little work on either the perception of or encounters with Muslims and Jews in medieval Scandinavia and the Baltic Region. The volume provides the reader with the possibility to appreciate and understand the complexity of Jewish?Christian?Muslim relations in the medieval North. The contributions cover topics such as cultural and economic exchange between Christians and members of other religions; evidence of actual Jews and Muslims in the Baltic Rim; images and stereotypes of the Other. The volume thus presents a previously neglected field of research that will help nuance the overall picture of interreligious relations in medieval Europe.

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Reply #9 - April 20, 2015, 08:40 PM

The travels of Abu Hamid Al-Garnati

http://www.aramcoworld.com/issue/201502/travelers.of.al-andalus.part.ii.abu.hamid.al-garnati.s.world.of.wonders.htm
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Muhammad ibn Abd al-Rahman ibn Suleiman ibn Rabi al-Qaysi, known more conveniently to posterity as Abu Hamid Al-Garnati and so named after his hometown of Granada (“Garnata”), sailed, caravanned, traded and trekked from the Arab West to the northern- and easternmost reaches of the Islamic world and beyond. Born in the year 1080 under the last of the Zirid kings, he was a merchant and a scholar who, in a 90-year lifetime, wrote on a variety of subjects in two works following the literary tradition called kutub al-‘aja’ib in Arabic, or “books of wonder”—a genre that he helped to define.

As one might expect from the name, a “book of wonders” is not only what one sees and hears on one’s travels, but also what one could not have possibly seen because it did not then nor did it ever exist. At the same time, these “wonders”—of legendary places, mythical people and wholly imagined events—make for good reading. Fusing the world of the impossible with the world of the merely strange-but-true, the style might best be filed under the words of one of his prologues: “Marvels are found in the most remote part of the sky and the earth. Our Lord has ordered us to contemplate the wonders of the world.”

His best-known book, al-Mu’rib ‘an ba’d ‘aja’ib al-Maghreb, (Praise of Some of the Wonders of North Africa), actually covers all of the lands he visited, and it seems only to skim the surface of an oeuvre rivaling the most outlandish of all the Ripley’s “Believe It or Not” stories ever told. His recent translator into Spanish, César Dubler, found it comprised of “casual data about the extraordinary.”
....
That he embellished what he saw and related clearly false and impossible tales in the same breath as perfunctory lists of his itinerary’s stages should not count against him. He was writing about ‘aja’ib—wonders—after all.
....

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Reply #10 - April 20, 2015, 08:52 PM

Sahar Amer - Medieval Arab Lesbians and Lesbian-Like Women

http://www.academia.edu/8475063/Medieval_Arab_Lesbians_and_Lesbian-Like_Women
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If the absence of a specific terminology to denote lesbianism in medieval Europe seems to have compromised the production of scholarship about same-sex love and desire among women, the existence of the label sahq and sihaqa, musahaqat al-nisa', or sahiqa (Arabic words for "lesbianism" and "lesbian," respectively) in medieval Arabic writings did not result in a richer critical production. In fact, if relatively little research has been conducted on female same-sex desire in medieval Europe, even less has been produced on homosexuality in the medieval Arabic literary or Islamicate tradition, and almost no research at all has been done on medieval Arab Islamicate lesbianism. This state of scholarship into alternative sexual practices in the Arab Islamicate world is especially astonishing considering the survival of a noteworthy body of primary texts dealing precisely with this topic....

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Reply #11 - April 25, 2015, 05:40 PM

Michael Bonner - Sasanian Propaganda in the Reign of Husraw Anushirvan

https://www.academia.edu/12102496/Sasanian_Propaganda_in_the_Reign_of_Husraw_Anushirvan

Other articles by Michael Bonner

https://independent.academia.edu/BonnerMichael

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Reply #12 - April 27, 2015, 07:16 PM

Marion Katz - Crones, slaves, and the caliph’s daughter: The complexities of gender in pre-modern Muslim legal texts

http://www.bu.edu/cura/files/2015/04/katz-paper-updated.pdf

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Reply #13 - April 27, 2015, 11:57 PM

Sabaic as NW Semitic [German]:
https://www.academia.edu/7131283/Sabaica-Aramaica_1_._In_T._Polanski_ed._Studia_Andreae_Zaborski_dedicata_Folia_Orientalia_49_._Krak%C3%B3w_2012_pp._503-522
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Reply #14 - April 28, 2015, 06:18 PM

Arietta Papaconstantinou - Administering the early Islamic empire: insights from the papyri

https://www.academia.edu/734660/_Administering_the_early_Islamic_empire_insights_from_the_papyri_in_Money_power_and_politics_in_early_Islamic_Syria_ed._John_Haldon_Farnham_2010_57-74

Arietta Papaconstantinou - Between umma and dhimma: the Christians of the Middle East under the Umayyads

https://www.academia.edu/734653/_Between_umma_and_dhimma._The_Christians_of_the_Middle_East_under_the_Umayyads_Annales_islamologiques_42_2008_127-56

Other articles by Arietta Papaconstantinou

https://reading.academia.edu/AriettaPapaconstantinou

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Reply #15 - April 29, 2015, 04:53 PM

Christine Baker on historical understandings of sect and sectarianism in Islam

http://ajammc.com/2015/04/26/emerging-scholarship-christine-baker/
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....
When I say a “dominant narrative” of sectarianism in Islam, what I mean is that we have a tendency — when there is anything going on in the Middle East today that involves Sunnis and Shi’is — to always want to trace it back to the origins of Islam. We always want to go back to ‘the event’ which occurred in the seventh century when the prophet Mohammed passed away, and there was debate over who should lead the Muslim community. This is the event to which Sunnis and Shi’is trace the difference between their sects; back to this core event.

However, when we always go back to this event we forget that it took centuries for different forms of Islamic identity to develop. You cannot talk about conflicts in the Middle East today — Shi’is in Iraq, the development of ISIS, Iran’s relationship with Hezbollah [etc.] — and draw some kind of straight line back to the seventh century and say “Aha! That explains what’s happening now.” It does not mean that there is no relevance, but it’s [more] complicated. These [sectarian differences] are things that developed over time.
....

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Reply #16 - April 29, 2015, 05:24 PM

Quote from: zeca on April 27, 2015, 07:16 PM
Marion Katz - Crones, slaves, and the caliph’s daughter: The complexities of gender in pre-modern Muslim legal texts

http://www.bu.edu/cura/files/2015/04/katz-paper-updated.pdf

Quote
6) AjamMC: That’s remarkable. So we’re discussing a particular time period here (the 10th Century) … you’re elaborating on the manner in which knowledge of this religion was circulating, and the processes by means of which people were beginning to identify. So here’s a question: why is it that we continue to look at this period of time through a sectarian lens when clearly sectarianism was not … on the minds of so many people. Or rather, to put it differently, the “ism” of sectarianism was not so politically heated and not cause for national politics?

CB: As a Medievalist I’m not sure I’m comfortable with the term of “national politics” in the 9th and 10th Centuries. But I totally understand what you’re saying. I think that part of [the problem] is an issue of sources. For the 10th Century we don’t have a tremendous number of sources, and so traditionally when people study the 10th they will use sources from the 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th Centuries to augment the contemporary 10th Century sources. One of the things that I noticed that was really interesting — when I was studying these two states, the Fatimids and the Buyids — was that people who are writing during the 10th Century did not seem particularly with the sectarian identity of these states. Yeah, they were aware that they [these states] were Shi’i. And there were times, especially in really early Fatimid history where they emphasize their Shi’i identity much more. But then, as they make the transition from a missionary movement to an actual medieval state, they start to emphasize the sectarian identity less. In Shi’i accounts [and] in Sunni accounts of these states, they’re not [very] concerned with the fact they’re being ruled by Shi’is…

And what I realized [while] using sources from the 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th Centuries, those are the sources that recast the 10th Century [in terms of] a sectarian narrative; because after the end of “the Shi’i Century” you have the rise of an emirate called the Seljuks. They are a Sunni emirate. They take over Baghdad, and they say that they are “saving the Sunni Abbasid Caliph from the Shi’is.”

And this is also when you have the development of institutions to spread Sunni Islam, schools that spread throughout the Middle East specifically to teach about Sunni Islam. So [when] these sources write about the 10th Century, they present it as a sectarian narrative: as a period of incredible conflict between Sunnis and Shi’i, “when Shi’is ruled over Sunnis, and it was terrible!”

But that’s not the voice you’re getting from those actual 10th Century sources. What you’re getting [from them] is a picture of a Medieval Islamic world where Islamic identity was incredibly diverse, and that was OK

..........."they’re not [very] concerned with the fact they’re being ruled by Shi’is…".........

I don't think she gets that right., that statement is only true to those Muslim folks who were/are NOT in politics and in power game., but that is NOT true when it comes to rulers in Islam..

A close look in to the history of Islam and Islamic empires and dynasties tell you the different story..

http://www.councilofexmuslims.com/index.php?topic=22184.0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Muslim_empires_and_dynasties

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Reply #17 - May 01, 2015, 05:54 PM

Giancarlo Casale - The Ottoman Age of Exploration

Quote from: New Books in Islamic Studies
You've probably heard of the "Age of Exploration." You know, Henry the Navigator, Vasco da Gama, Columbus, etc., etc. But actually that was the European Age of Exploration (and really it wasn't even that, because the people who lived in what we now call "Europe" didn't think of themselves as "Europeans" in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but no matter…). There were, however, other Ages of Exploration.

Giancarlo Casale's wonderful book is about one of them, one you haven't heard of. It's called, appropriately enough, The Ottoman Age of Exploration (Oxford UP, 2010) and is about–you guessed it–the Ottoman Age of Exploration. Like their "European" counterparts, the Ottoman explorers were pursuing two interests: spices and salvation. The former were found (largely) in Southern Asia and the latter was of course in Mecca. To ensure access to both, the Ottomans built–nearly from scratch–an large, ocean-going navy and set out to dominate the Indian Ocean. And they almost did it, though they faced fierce competition from the Portuguese, Safavids, and Mughals. Read all about it in Casale's terrific book.

Listen to the interview: http://newbooksinislamicstudies.com/2011/03/18/giancarlo-casale-the-ottoman-age-of-exploration-oxford-up-2010/

pdf of the book: http://ir.nmu.org.ua/bitstream/handle/123456789/129196/2ed8a3baf4a317ee20115dc3e4f24b5a.pdf?sequence=1

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Reply #18 - May 02, 2015, 10:54 PM

Michael Alram - The Cultural Impact of Sasanian Persia along the Silk Road

http://www.sasanika.org/wp-content/uploads/Alram-esasanika14.pdf
Quote
The paper focuses on the Sasanian Empire’s impact on its surrounding world and explores the question of why its cultural achievements had such a long-lasting influence far beyond the borders of the Iranian lands, even after the decline of the dynasty. This relates to the role of the Sasanians in international trade and their political aim of controlling the land and maritime trade networks that connected Iran with the Mediterranean world, Central Asia, China, India, and the Arabian Peninsula.

More articles on the same site

http://sasanika.org
Quote
Welcome to Sasanika

One of the most remarkable empires of the first millennium CE was that of the Sasanian Empire. Emanating from southern Iran's Persis region in the third century CE, the Sasanian domain eventually encompassed not only modern day Iran and Iraq, but also the greater part of Central Asia, the Caucasus, including at times the regions corresponding to present-day Syria, Turkey, and Egypt. This geographically diverse empire brought together a striking array of ethnicities and religious practices. Arameans, Arabs, Armenians, Persians, Romans, and Goths, as well as a host of other peoples, all lived and labored under Sasanian rule. The Sasanians established a relatively tolerant imperial system, creating a vibrant communal life among their Zoroastrian, Jewish, and Christian citizens.

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Reply #19 - May 05, 2015, 09:15 AM

Also by Giancarlo Casale

Global Politics in the 1580s: One Canal, Twenty Thousand Cannibals, and an Ottoman Plot to Rule the World

https://apps.cla.umn.edu/directory/items/publication/123495.pdf
Quote
....

At least on the surface, the limitations of political history appear particularly daunting for scholars of the sixteenth century: the first historical period in which the intercontinental reach of European maritime powers becomes impossible to ignore, but seems to have no obvious corollary in any contemporary non-Western state. And yet, if told from only a slightly different perspective, the history of sixteenth-century political relations can become infinitely richer than the simple (and tired) narrative of contacts with, or resistance to, Europeans. During these years, in fact, alongside the self-consciously global maritime states of Portugal and Spain, imperial competitors such as the Ottomans and Mughals also began to think in global terms and to formulate political ideologies and practical strategies on a similarly vast world stage. And over time, the rivalry between all of these competing imperial centers in turn drew a constantly expanding network of smaller polities, both voluntarily and involuntarily, into their widening political orbits. In this sense, it is precisely during the sixteenth century that political history first becomes “world history.”

In the following pages, we will examine one example of this process at work, involving a little-known Ottoman naval expedition to the Swahili Coast in the late 1580s. This expedition, led by the elusive Ottoman corsair Mir Ali Beg, has until now failed to attract serious attention from historians, to whom it has seemed little more than a case of single-handed adventurism by an opportunistic soldier of fortune. But, as we shall see, Mir Ali was hardly the rogue buccaneer he is often made out to be. Instead, his campaign was the result of a carefully orchestrated plan by a group of higher-ups in the Ottoman administration, who were eager to use it as a stepping stone for further expansion in the Indian Ocean. Even more importantly, their strategy was based on a complex political calculus with origins dating back to the late 1570s, when a series of nearly simultaneous events at opposite ends of the world upset the international balance of power from the North Atlantic to Southeast Asia.

....

More articles by Giancarlo Casale

https://umn.academia.edu/GiancarloCasale

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Reply #20 - May 05, 2015, 12:58 PM

Zaotor,zeca and others

Who do you think was buried in the tomb of Muhammad in Medina? I think there's a consensus in Islam that's where he was buried. And what about the companions and 4 caliphs who were buried in Medina,Iraq,Egypt and other places?
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Reply #21 - May 05, 2015, 01:14 PM

Quote from: Skywalker on May 05, 2015, 12:58 PM
Zaotor,zeca and others

Who do you think was buried in the tomb of ~~Prophet of Islam~~ / Muhammad in Medina ? I think there's a consensus in Islam that's where he was buried. And what about the companions and 4 caliphs who were buried in Medina,Iraq,Egypt and other places?

there is/there was NO tomb of Prophet of Islam in Medina., but it is possible that there were many TOMBS OF MUHAMMADS at that place .

The Green Dome at the alleged Prophet's Mosque

Quote
The Green Dome (Arabic: القبة الخضراء‎) is a green-coloured dome built above the tomb of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and early Muslim leaders, Abu Bakr and Umar. The dome is located in the south-east corner of Al-Masjid al-Nabawi (Mosque of the Prophet) in Medina.

The structure dates back to 1279 AD, when an unpainted wooden cupola was built over the tomb. It was later rebuilt and painted using different colours twice in the late 15th century and once in 1817. The dome was first painted green in 1837, and hence became known as the Green Dome

all that green pained dome is nothing to do with ORIGINAL PROPHET OF ISLAM..

Quote
Abu Bakhra: Abdullah ibn Abi Qhuhafah (Arabic: عبد الله بن أبي قحافة, translit.: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Quḥāfah), c. 573 CE – 23 August 634 CE, popularly known by his nickname Abu Bakr (Arabic: أبو بكر‎), was a senior companion (Sahabi) and the father-in-law of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. He ruled over the Rashidun Caliphate from 632 to 634 CE, when he became the first Muslim Caliph following Muhammad's death..

Visiting Caliphs tombs

In front of the sacred tomb of Allah’s apostle (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him), there are three sections of brass screens and all three have holes in them. If you stand in front of the middle section between the pillars, you'll see a big round hole on your left side. This is in front of the face of the Holy Prophet. Adjacent to it is a door that stays closed. Right after it on the right side is a round hole which is in front of the face of Hadrat Abu Bakr Siddique. On the right of it, there is another round hole which is in front of the face of Hadrat Umar.

In front of the sacred tomb of Allah’s apostle (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him), there are three sections of brass screens and all three have holes in them. If you stand in front of the middle section between the pillars, you'll see a big round hole on your left side. This is in front of the face of the Holy Prophet. Adjacent to it is a door that stays closed. Right after it on the right side is a round hole which is in front of the face of Hadrat Abu Bakr Siddique. On the right of it, there is another round hole which is in front of the face of Hadrat Umar.

So now dear Skywalker.. it is for you to search for the tomb of Ali... .. Tomb of Caliph Ali ibn Abi Talib ..

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Reply #22 - May 05, 2015, 02:20 PM

Quote from: Skywalker on May 05, 2015, 12:58 PM
Zaotor,zeca and others

Who do you think was buried in the tomb of Muhammad in Medina? I think there's a consensus in Islam that's where he was buried. And what about the companions and 4 caliphs who were buried in Medina,Iraq,Egypt and other places?

I've no idea to be honest. I very much doubt that the real historical Muhammad, whoever he may been, is buried there. As I'd also very much doubt that a real historical Arthur and Guinevere were buried at Glastonbury Abbey. The medieval world was quite creative about that kind of thing.

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Reply #23 - May 05, 2015, 04:06 PM

Yep I would interpret it exactly like every other medieval shrine ... 99.9% fabrication.

If you're still not convinced, I have a fragment of the True Cross to sell at deep discount ....
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Reply #24 - May 05, 2015, 05:42 PM

I wonder how many muslim tribes and families, from arab and non arab countries, have to revise their history of being descendents of the prophets family or Quraysh
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Reply #25 - May 06, 2015, 01:19 PM

Arabs vs. Vikings

A Hispano-Muslim Embassy to the Vikings in 845: An Account of al-Ghazal’s Journey to the North

https://ballandalus.wordpress.com/2014/09/11/a-hispano-muslim-embassy-to-the-vikings-in-845-an-account-of-al-ghazals-journey-to-the-north/

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Reply #26 - May 06, 2015, 04:22 PM

Quote from: New Books in Islamic Studies
In the current political climate it might be easy to assume that Muslims in the ‘West’ have always been viewed in a negative light. However, when we examine the historical relationship between Muslims and their non-Muslim neighbors we find a much more complicated picture. In Muslims of Medieval Latin Christendom, c.1050-1614 (Cambridge University Press, 2014), Brian A. Catlos professor of Religious Studies at the University of Colorado, offers the first comprehensive overview of Muslim minorities in Latin Christian lands during the Middle Ages. The book provides a narrative history of regional Muslim subjects in the Latin west, including Islamic Sicily, Al-Andalus, expansion in the Near East, the Muslim communities of Medieval Hungary, and portraits of travelers, merchants, and slaves in Western Europe. Here we find that Muslims often had great deal of agency in structuring the subject/ruler relationship due to the material and economic contributions they made to local communities. The second half of the book explores thematic issues that were shared across Muslims communities of the Mediterranean world. Catlos surveys ideological, administrative, and practical matters, including Muslim concern about legitimacy and assimilation, legal culture, and everyday social life in these multi-confessional communities. In our conversation we discussed the reign of Christian Spains, Norman rule, the adoption of Arabo-Islamic culture, Morisco hybridity, Islam in Christian imagination, the role of Muslim women, and everyday public religious life.

Listen to the interview: http://newbooksinislamicstudies.com/2014/07/08/brian-a-catlos-muslims-of-medieval-latin-christendom-c-1050-1614-cambridge-up-2014/

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Reply #27 - May 06, 2015, 04:38 PM

Infidel Kings and Unholy Warriors: Faith, Power, and Violence in the Age of Crusade and Jihad

Quote
In Infidel Kings and Unholy Warriors, the award-winning scholar Brian Catlos puts us on the ground in the Mediterranean world of 1050–1200. We experience the sights and sounds of the region just as enlightened Islamic empires and primitive Christendom began to contest it. We learn about the siege tactics, theological disputes, and poetry of this enthralling time. And we see that people of different faiths coexisted far more frequently than we are commonly told.

Catlos's meticulous reconstruction of the era allows him to stunningly overturn our most basic assumption about it: that it was defined by religious extremism. He brings to light many figures who were accepted as rulers by their ostensible foes. Samuel B. Naghrilla, a self-proclaimed Jewish messiah, became the force behind Muslim Granada. Bahram Pahlavuni, an Armenian Christian, wielded power in an Islamic caliphate. And Philip of Mahdia, a Muslim eunuch, rose to admiral in the service of Roger II, the Christian “King of Africa.”

What their lives reveal is that, then as now, politics were driven by a mix of self-interest, personality, and ideology. Catlos draws a similar lesson from his stirring chapters on the early Crusades, arguing that the notions of crusade and jihad were not causes of war but justifications.

http://www.amazon.com/Infidel-Kings-Unholy-Warriors-Violence/dp/0809058375

Brian Catlos - Ethno-Religious Minorities

https://www.academia.edu/5459336/Ethno-Religious_Minorities

More articles by Brian Catlos

http://colorado.academia.edu/BrianCatlos/Articles-and-Chapters

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Reply #28 - May 06, 2015, 07:10 PM

I believe the tomb of Arthur has an inscription (not the one in the picture which is typical 1950's civil service) saying this is the tomb of King Arthur - in typical 12C script....

When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and you Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it.

A.A. Milne,

"We cannot slaughter each other out of the human impasse"
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Reply #29 - May 06, 2015, 07:12 PM

Is the Indian Ocean easier to sail than the Pacific and Atlantic? I thought the Ottomans were at a technological disadvantage.

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Ottoman naval technology underwent a transformation under the rule of Sultan Selim III. New types of sailing warships such as two- and three-decked galleons, frigates and corvettes began to dominate the Ottoman fleet, rendering the galley-type oared ships obsolete. This period saw technological innovations such as the adoption of the systematic copper sheathing of the hulls and bottoms of Ottoman warships from 1792-93 onwards and the construction of the first dry dock in the Golden Horn.The changing face of the Ottoman Navy was facilitated by the influence of the British, Swedish and French in modernising both the shipbuilding sector and the conduct of naval warfare. Through such measures as training Ottoman shipbuilders, heavy reliance on help from foreign powers gave way to a new trajectory of modernization. Using this evidence Zorlu argues that although the Ottoman Empire was a major and modern independent power in this period, some technological dependence on Europe remained.

http://www.ibtauris.com/Books/Humanities/History/Regional%20%20national%20history/Asian%20history/Innovation%20and%20Empire%20Sultan%20Selim%20III%20and%20the%20Modernisation%20of%20the%20Ottoman%20Navy.aspx?menuitem=%7B93FC800F-5766-4C7B-B2B7-C6DB5FF3AFE3%7D

Yup, three hundred years.

When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and you Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it.

A.A. Milne,

"We cannot slaughter each other out of the human impasse"
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