Syria in Crusader Times
Conflict and Co-Existence
Edited by Carole Hillenbrand
- Analyses valuable little-known primary sources in Arabic, Armenian, Syriac, Latin and Old French about a key period in Middle Eastern history
- Highlights the role of Oriental Christian communities in Syria
- Sheds new light on Saladin’s career
- Contributes significantly to the ever-expanding field of Crusader studies
Presenting numerous interconnected insights into life in Greater Syria in the 12th century, this book covers a wide range of themes relating to Crusader–Muslim relations. Some chapters deal with various literary sources, including little-known Crusader chronicles, a jihad treatise, a lost Muslim history of the Franks, biographies, letters and poems. Other chapters look at material culture, from coins to urban development, internal relations between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims and between Crusader and Oriental Christians, and the role of the Turkmen.
Preface
Acknowledgments
Part 1: Sources
1. Hamdan al-Atharibi’s History of the Franks revisited, again, Paul M. Cobb
2. Legitimate authority in the Kitab al-jihad of ʿAli b. Tahir al-Sulami, Kenneth Goudie
3. Politics, religion and the occult in the works of Kamal al-Din Ibn Talha, a vizier, ‘alim and author in thirteenth-century Syria, A.C. Peacock
Part 2: Christians
4. Adapting to Muslim rule: the Syrian Orthodox community in twelfth-century north Syria and the Jazira, R. Stephen Humphreys
5. The afterlife of Edessa: remembering Frankish rule, 1144 and after, Christopher MacEvitt
Part 3: Convivencia
6. Diplomatic relations and coinage among the Turcomans, the Ayyubids and the Crusaders: Pragmatism and change of identity, Taef Elazhari
7. Symbolic conflict and cooperation in the neglected chronicle of a Syrian Prince, Luke Yarbrough
8. A critique of the scholarly outlook of the Crusades: The case for tolerance and co-existence, Suleiman A. Mourad
Part 4: War and Peace
9. The portrayal of violence in Walter the Chancellor’s Bella Antiochena, Thomas Asbridge
10. Infernalising the enemy: images of hell in Muslim descriptions of the Franks during the Crusading period*, Alex Mallett
Part 5: Cities
11. Sunnites et Chiites à Alep sous le règne d’al-Salih Isma‘il (569-577/1174-1181): entre conflits et réconciliations, Anne-Marie Eddé
12. The War of Towers: Venice and Genoa at war in Crusader Syria, 1256-58, Thomas F. Madden
13. Gaza in the Frankish and Ayyubid periods: the run-up to 1260 CE, Reuven Amitai
Part 6: Saladin’s men
14. Picture-poems for Saladin: ‘Abd al-Mun‘im al-Jilyani’s mudabbajat, Julia Bray
15. Ayyubid Realpolitik and political-military vicissitudes versus counter-crusading ideology in the memoirist-chronicler al-Katib al-Isfahani, Lutz Richter-Bernburg
16. Assessing the evidence for a turning point in Ayyubid-Frankish Relations in a letter by al-Qaḍi al-Fadil, Bogdan C. Smarandache
Part 7: Key personalities
17. Saladin, Generosity and Gift-Giving, Jonathan Phillips
18. Hülegü: the new Constantine? Angus Stewart
Bibliography
Index
The book gathers contributions dealing with topics spanning across Medieval Syria and its many constituent societies. It is a stellar line-up including leading scholars working in different specialisms...which have a great deal to offer one another and yet where there has previously been little collaboration.
Emphasising variety in contemporary experiences of living and thought that transcended faith boundaries, this refreshingly rich, eclectic collection of essays releases Syria from misleading stereotypes of binary homogeneous religious, political and cultural confrontation to present a layered and nuanced picture of a region characterised by complex diversity and exchange.
