This study explores the concept of sainthood in the medieval Islamic tradition. A close reading of the unexplored writings of two 14th C. mystical thinkers, Muh[dotbelow]ammad and `Ali Wafa', shows the presence of at least three distinct currents of thought regarding sainthood. …
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Medieval Middle Eastern scholars Ibn al-Muqaffa', al-Farabi, Kay Ka'us, Niz[dotbelow]am al-Mulk, and Ibn Khaldun had something in common. Though their voices emerged from vastly different circumstances, they were all able to express their perspectives on political subjects (such…
This dissertation studies Eurasian cultural interactions along the so-called Silk Road by examining the role in the culture of the Islamic Near East of a product from Central Eurasia. Musk, produced by the musk deer of the highlands of Central Eurasia, was the most important aro…
In the past thirty-five years the study of medieval Islamic historiography has shifted away from believing that Muslim chroniclers wanted to convey the facts to the belief that chroniclers had a story to tell. Nevertheless, while genuine authorship has been widely accepted for a…
This comparative dissertation analyzes Muslim perceptions of religious and social crisis precipitated by the sudden absence of a significant Islamic political institution, the caliphate, in the thirteenth and twentieth centuries. Despite the obvious disparities of chronological,…
The figure of the medieval go-between found in several Iberian texts in both Romance and Semitic languages works to undermine certain beliefs held by the dominant culture within which she finds herself. The exact nature of her profession is ambiguous, but at its most basic const…
This dissertation is the first comprehensive study of the phenomenon of the urban confraternity in 13th and 14 th -century Anatolia. Urban confraternities in late medieval Anatolia played a range of roles in cities like Ankara, Erzincan, Konya and Sivas. The important political …
The twelfth and thirteenth centuries constituted a period of transition for Iberian Jewry and a vibrant period for Hebrew writing. Growing intolerance toward Jews in Islamic Andalusia and the southward expansion of the Christian Reconquista led to the migration of Jews from the …
This dissertation examines space and gender in three medieval and early modern Mediterranean texts: the illustrated, anonymous, thirteenth-century Arabic manuscript from Seville, Bayad wa Riyad , the anonymous thirteenth-century Old French Romance Aucassin et Nicolette , and Fer…
Literary texts function as social and symbolic acts that pose questions of identity and identification, reflecting sometimes the socio-cultural attitude of the dominant majority in a historical era. Thus, medieval Castilian works often contain a biased portrayal of Muslim and Je…
This is the first comprehensive study of late medieval Yemeni mysticism (Sufism) in Western scholarship. It examines the life and works of perhaps the greatest religious and mystical thinker of pre-modern Yemen, Ah[dotbelow]mad b. 'Alwân (Ibn 'Alwân). Although he died seven and …
This dissertation is a history of representations of Syria and Syrian cities in historical and geographical writing by Muslims from the second half of the 6th /12th century through the first half of the 8th /14th century. These representations made up a discourse of place in whi…