Bibliotheca Maqriziana – serie

The present book investigates three short late Mamluk treatises about land properties (waqf) in the Palestinian city of Hebron, which the prophet Muhammad granted to Tamīm al-Darī. The treatise entitled Ḍawʾ al-sārī li-maʿrifat ḫabar Tamīm al-Dārī by al-Maqrīzī (d. 845/1442) is the core of the book. It is edited here for the first time on the sole basis of the copy corrected by the author. A facsimile of the manuscript is also provided at the end of the book. In order to illuminate the discourse on property rights and donation that prevailed in the Mamluk period and al-Maqrīzī’s position, two additional treatises dealing with the same issue are included. The first is al-Ǧawāb al-ǧalīl ʿan ḥukm balad al-Ḫalīl by Ibn Ḥaǧar al-ʿAsqalānī (d. 852/1448). The second is al-Faḍl al-ʿamīm fī iqṭāʿ Tamīm by al-Suyūṭī (911/1505). The three texts are fully translated and annotated and preceded by a thorough introduction.

Der kurze Traktat al-Maqāṣid al-saniyyah li-maʿrifat al-aǧsām al-maʿdiniyyah des berühmten ägyptischen Geschichtsschreibers al-Maqrīzī (gest. 845/1442) befasst sich mit der Klassifikation der Mineralien, ihren medizinischen Anwendungen sowie Theorien über ihre Entstehung. Käs legt hier erstmals eine kritische Textedition mit deutscher Übersetzung und ausführlichem Kommentar vor. Grundlage der Edition des arabischen Texts war in der Hauptsache ein Leidener Codex, der von al-Maqrīzī eigenhändig korrigiert und mit Glossen erweitert wurde. Ein Faksimile der Handschrift wird in diesem Band ebenfalls abgedruckt. Käs konnte nachweisen, dass der Traktat fast vollständig von den Enzyklopädien Ibn Faḍlallāh al-ʿUmarīs und al-Qazwīnīs abhängig ist. Die Inhalte der Mineralienkapitel dieser Werke lassen sich ihrerseits bis zu den frühen arabischen Naturphilosophen und ihren griechischen Vorläufern zurückverfolgen.The short treatise entitled al-Maqāṣid al-saniyyah li-maʿrifat al-aǧsām al-maʿdiniyyah by the famous Egyptian historiographer al-Maqrīzī (d. 845/1442) deals with the classification of minerals, their medicinal uses and theories of their coming into being. Käs presents for the first time a critical edition of this text along with a German translation and a detailed commentary. The edition of the Arabic text is mainly based on the Leiden codex corrected and enlarged by al-Maqrīzī himself. A facsimile of this manuscript is also provided in this volume. Käs was able to prove that the treatise depends almost exclusively on the encyclopedias by Ibn Faḍlallāh al-ʿUmarī and al-Qazwīnī. The contents of their chapters on minerals can in turn be traced back to the early Arabic natural philosophers and their Greek precursors.

In Caliphate and Kingship in a Fifteenth-Century Literary History of Muslim Leadership and Pilgrimage Jo Van Steenbergen presents a new study, edition and translation of al-Ḏahab al-Masbūk fī Ḏikr man Ḥağğa min al-Ḫulafāʾ wa-l-Mulūk, a summary history of the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca by al-Maqrīzī (766-845 AH/ca. 1365-1442 CE). Traditionally considered as a useful source for the history of the ḥağğ, al-Ḏahab al-Masbūk is re-interpreted here as a complex literary construction that was endowed with different meanings. Through detailed contextualist, narratological, semiotic and codicological analyses Van Steenbergen demonstrates how these meanings were deeply embedded in early-fifteenth century Egyptian transformations, how they changed substantially over time, and how they included particular claims about authorship and about legitimate and good Muslim rule.

Now available in Open Access thanks to support of the University of Helsinki. Al-Maqrīzī's (d. 845/1442) last work, al-Ḫabar ʿan al-bašar, was completed a year before his death. This volume, edited by Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila, covers the history of pre-Islamic Iran from the Creation to the Parthians. Al-Maqrīzī's work shows how Arab historians integrated Iran into world history and how they harmonized various currents of historiography (Middle Persian historiography, Islamic sacred history, Greek and Latin historiography).Among al-Ḫabar's sources is Kitāb Hurūšiyūš, the Arabic translation of Paulus Orosius' Historiarum adversum paganos libri vii. This source has only been preserved in one defective copy, and al-Maqrīzī's text helps to fill in some of its lacunae.

In The Arab Thieves, Peter Webb critically explores the classic tales of pre-Islamic Arabian outlaws in Arabic Literature. A group of Arabian camel-rustlers became celebrated figures in Muslim memories of pre-Islam, and much poetry ascribed to them and stories about their escapades grew into an outlaw tradition cited across Arabic literature. The ninth/fifteenth-century Egyptian historian al-Maqrīzī arranged biographies of ten outlaws into a chapter on ‘Arab Thieves’ in his wide-ranging history of the world before Muhammad. This volume presents the first critical edition of al-Maqrīzī’s text with a fully annotated English translation, alongside a detailed study that interrogates the outlaw lore to uncover the ways in which Arabic writers constructed outlaw identities and how al-Maqrīzī used the tales to communicate his vision of pre-Islam. Via an exhaustive survey of early Arabic sources about the outlaws and comparative readings with outlaw traditions in other world literatures, The Arab Thieves reveals how Arabic literature crafted lurid narratives about criminality and employed them to tell ancient Arab history.

This volume contains the edition and translation of the chapter of al-Maqrīzī’s al-Ḫabar ʿan al-bašar dealing with Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Franks, and Goths. This chapter is, for the most part, an almost exact reproduction of Ibn Ḫaldūn’s Kitāb al-ʿIbar, from which al-Maqrīzī derived material from many other sources, including prominent Christian sources such as Kitāb Hurūšiyūš, Ibn al-ʿAmīd’s History, and works by Muslim historians like Ibn al-Aṯīr’s Kāmil. Therefore, this chapter of al-Ḫabar ʿan al-bašar is a continuation of the previous Arabic historiographical tradition, in which European history is integrated into world history through the combination of Christian and Islamic sources.

The chapter about idols in Maqrīzī’s universal history is made of excerpts from earlier books, some of which are no longer extant. Excerpts from the latter category naturally form the most exciting aspect of this text. Its appearance comes at a time when certain scholars doubt the import or even the very existence of pre-Islamic idol worship. Early Islamic literature often focuses on the contemporaries of the Prophet Muḥammad whose stories were a source of pride for their offspring. The crucial moment in one’s life was the conversion, and it is in the context of conversion that we learn about idol worship.

Al-Maqrīzī's (d. 845/1442) last work, al-Ḫabar ʿan al-bašar, was completed a year before his death. This volume, edited by Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila, covers the history of pre-Islamic Iran during the Sasanian period and the conquest. Al-Maqrīzī's work shows how Arab historians integrated Iran into world history and how they harmonised various currents of historiography (Middle Persian historiography, Islamic sacred history, Greek and Latin historiography).This part harmonises the versions of Miskawayh's Tağārib, al-Ṭabarī’s Taʾrīḫ, and several other sources, producing a fluent narrative of Iran from the early 3rd century until 651. It also includes the complete text of ʿAhd Ardašīr, here translated for the first time into English.

This section of al-Ḫabar ʿan al-bašar, the last work of the fifteenth-century historian al-Maqrīzī, presents an overview of the genealogies of the pre-Islamic northern Arabs, regarded as the descendants of the apical ancestor figure ʿAdnān. Al-Maqrīzī’s text is embedded in the broader context of the genealogical tradition as a major organising principle in premodern Muslim historiography. The volume highlights the segmentary nature of Bedouin society, which resulted in inherently controversial tribal genealogies and historical traditions. The existence of many conflicting versions of the same pedigrees (and of the historical narratives undergirding each version) affected the Muslim historian’s work in subtle but profound ways.