The Late Antique World of Early Islam: Muslims Among Christians and Jews in the East Mediterranean [Hardcover]

This book offers a number of innovative studies on the three main communities of the East Mediterranean lands--Muslims, Jews and Christians--in the aftermath of the seventh-century Arab conquests. It focuses principally on how the Christian majority were affected by and adapted to their loss of political power in such arenas as language use, identity construction, church building, pilgrimage, and the role of women. Attention is also paid to how the Muslim community defined itself, administered justice, and regulated relations with non-Muslims. This book will be important for anyone interested in the ways in which the cultures and traditions of the late antique Mediterranean world were transformed in the course of the seventh to tenth centuries by the establishment of the new Muslim political elite and the gradual emergence of an Islamic Empire.This book offers a number of innovative studies on the three main communities of the East Mediterranean lands-Muslims, Jews and Christians-in the aftermath of the seventh-century Arab conquests. It focuses principally on how the Christian majority were affected by and adapted to their loss of political power.List of FiguresList of ContributorsForewordPreface1 Baghdad: Political Metropolis and Intellectual CenterJens Scheiner & Damien Janos 2 Talking about Arab Origins: The Transmission of the ayyam al-'arabin al-Kufa, al-Basra and BaghdadIsabel Toral-Niehof 3 The Language of the Arabs in Early Ninth Century Philology: An Investigation of the Term mathalin Abu 'Ubayda's Majaz al-Qur-anNora Schmidt 4 'Earnest and Jest (al-jidd wa-l-hazl)' as an Educational Concept? Some Considerations on Selected Works of al-Jahiz (d. 255/869)Hans-Peter Pokel 5 Abu l-'Atahiya and the Versification of DisenchantmentNora K. Schmid 6 Teachers and HadithTrlód