Explores the history of Spain from the Roman province, through the Visigothic and Arab conquests, to the Christian Reconquest and reorganisation of society in the thirteenth century
The notion of Christianity as a religion of peace was severely tested during the Middle Ages, when killing in the name of God became a sanctified act. In this book, Tim Rayborn traces the development of the early Crusades, Christian views of war and violence, and its attitudes toward Islam, primarily during the turbulent period of the 11th and 12th centuries (with some attention to earlier centuries). A marked shift in Christian perceptions of its own identity coincided with a considerably more martial and aggressive approach to nonbelievers both inside and outside of Europe. This wide-ranging study includes such topics as the background to the First Crusade, the Knights Templar, Bernard of Clairvaux, the Cistercian Order, the works of Peter the Venerable, apocalyptic hopes and fears, and martyrdom in the context of Christian conflicts with Islam. Focusing on French monastic writings, the book also examines papal documents, Spanish polemics, crusade chronicles, and other works. This is a survey of research on these important subjects, and serves as both a reference work and a point of departure for further study.
This handbook offers an overview of the main issues regarding the political, economic, social, religious, intellectual and artistic history of the Iberian Peninsula during the period of Muslim rule (eighth–fifteenth centuries). A comprehensive list of primary and secondary sources attests the vitality of the academic study of al-Andalus (= Muslim Iberia) and its place in present-day discussions about the past and the present. The contributors are all specialists with diverse backgrounds providing different perspectives and approaches. The volume includes chapters dealing with the destiny of the Muslim population after the Christian conquest and with the posterity of al-Andalus in art, literature and different historiographical traditions. The chapters are organised in the following sections: Political history, concentrating on rulers and armies Social, religious and economic groups Intellectual and cultural developments Legacy and memory of al-Andalus Offering a synthetic and updated academic treatment of the history and society of Muslim Iberia, this comprehensive and up-to-date collection provides an authoritative and interdisciplinary guide. It is a valuable resource for both specialists and the general public interested in the history of the Iberian Peninsula, Islamic and Medieval studies.
This collection of essays by seven highly respected scholars is a straightforward narrative of real world—intellectual, commercial, spiritual, philosophical, scientific, esthetic—creative engagement among Jews, Muslims, and some Christians in daily life in Spain and around the Mediterranean. History as Prelude is a major contribution to the Israeli-Arab peace process because it undermines—in fact, blows away—the efforts of propagandists who serve governments or political movements to negate the reality of the Arab-Jewish relationship in the medieval Mediterranean. The contributors, in unassuming, well-researched scholarship have erected a wall protecting historical reality from distortion, providing irrefutable—and often delightful—examples of creative coexistence.
Archaeologists and the public at large have long been fascinated by monumental architecture built by past societies. Whether considering the earthworks in the Ohio Valley or the grandest pyramids in Egypt and Mexico, people have been curious as to how pre-modern societies with limited technology were capable of constructing monuments of such outstanding scale and quality. Architectural energetics is a methodology within archaeology that generates estimates of the amount of labor and time allocated to construct these past monuments. This methodology allows for detailed analyses of architecture and especially the analysis of the social power underlying such projects. Architectural Energetics in Archaeology assembles an international array of scholars who have analyzed architecture from archaeological and historic societies using architectural energetics. It is the first such volume of its kind. In addition to applying architectural energetics to a global range of architectural works, it outlines in detail the estimates of costs that can be used in future architectural analyses. This volume will serve archaeology and classics researchers, and lecturers teaching undergraduate and graduate courses related to social power and architecture. It also will interest architects examining past construction and engineering projects.
This is a revisionary study of Muslims living under Christian rule during the Spanish 'reconquest'. It looks beyond the obvious religious distinctions and delves into the subtleties of identity in the thirteenth-century Crown of Aragon, uncovering a social dynamic in which sectarian differences comprise only one of the many factors in the causal complex of political, economic and cultural reactions. Beginning with the final stage of independent Muslim rule in the Ebro valley region, the book traces the transformation of Islamic society into mudéjar society under Christian domination. This was a case of social evolution in which Muslims, far from being passive victims of foreign colonisation, took an active part in shaping their institutions and experiences as subjects of the Infidel. Using a diverse range of methodological approaches, this book challenges widely held assumptions concerning Christian-Muslim relations in the Middle Ages, and minority-majority relations in general.
James I "the Conqueror", king of Arago-Catalonia, conquered Mediterranean Spain from Islam during fifty crusading years (1225-1276). From his many surrender treaties, only two survive in their interlinear bilingual originals, both presented here. Each reflects the fragmentation of post-Almohad Islam, the warrior heroes of Islam carving recalcitrant principalities out of the confusion, the hard-fought local negotiations and the confrontation between two radically opposed mentalities. The full meaning of these battered and deteriorated bits of parchment emerges only from minute reconstruction of the Arabic and Latinate texts and especially from ever-widening circles of changing contexts in each world, an historical kaleidoscope. Many surprises here await students of medieval Europe, the Islamic West, Spain, the Crusades, diplomacy, Mudejars/Moriscos, and cultural conflict and interchange.
This ebook is a selective guide designed to help scholars and students of Islamic studies find reliable sources of information by directing them to the best available scholarly materials in whatever form or format they appear from books, chapters, and journal articles to online archives, electronic data sets, and blogs. Written by a leading international authority on the subject, the ebook provides bibliographic information supported by direct recommendations about which sources to consult and editorial commentary to make it clear how the cited sources are interrelated related. A reader will discover, for instance, the most reliable introductions and overviews to the topic, and the most important publications on various areas of scholarly interest within this topic. In Islamic studies, as in other disciplines, researchers at all levels are drowning in potentially useful scholarly information, and this guide has been created as a tool for cutting through that material to find the exact source you need. This ebook is a static version of an article from Oxford Bibliographies Online: Islamic Studies, a dynamic, continuously updated, online resource designed to provide authoritative guidance through scholarship and other materials relevant to the study of the Islamic religion and Muslim cultures. Oxford Bibliographies Online covers most subject disciplines within the social science and humanities, for more information visit www.aboutobo.com.
The retreat of the Byzantine army from Syria in around 650 CE, in advance of the approaching Arab armies, is one that has resounded emphatically in the works of both Islamic and Christian writers, and created an enduring motif: that of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier. For centuries, Byzantine and Islamic scholars have evocatively sketched a contested border: the annual raids between the two, the line of fortified fortresses defending Islamic lands, the no-man's land in between and the birth of jihad. In their early representations of a Muslim-Christian encounter, accounts of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier are charged with significance for a future 'clash of civilizations' that often envisions a polarised world. A. Asa Eger examines the two aspects of this frontier: its physical and ideological ones. By highlighting the archaeological study of the real and material frontier, as well as acknowledging its ideological military and religious implications, he offers a more complex vision of this dividing line than has been traditionally disseminated.With analysis grounded in archaeological evidence as well the relevant historical texts, Eger brings together a nuanced exploration of this vital element of medieval history. In this way, Eger's volume contributes to a more complex vision of the frontier than traditional historical views by bringing to the fore the layers of a real ecological frontier of settlement and interaction. For Eger, exposing the settlements and communities of the frontier constitutes a crucial gesture for understanding the interaction of two civilizations in a contested yet connected world. This work is thus vital for students of not only the medieval period and Byzantine and Islamic studies, but also for readers attempting to understand the ways in which frontiers and borders shape the construction of identity while functioning outside the traditionally understood state.
This updated edition traces Spain's history from prehistoric times to the present, focusing particularly on culture, society, politics, and personalities.