Muslim Sicily: Encounters and Legacy

by Nuha Alshaar (Editor)

Overview

The period of Arabo-Islamic domination of parts of Sicily, and the consequent large Muslim presence on the island from 800 to the mid-13th century constitutes a crucial epoch whose influence remains an integral part of the island’s architectural and cultural landscape. This volume builds on existing scholarship and goes beyond the ‘Arabo-Norman’ construct to afford greater recognition to the island’s Arabic and Islamic history. Using a multidisciplinary approach, the chapters examine Sicily’s mercantile, artistic and architectural links to the Muslim world, including the subjects of the Fāṭimids of Ifrīqiya and their Kalbid allies in Sicily. It also reflects upon the Arabo-Islamic philosophical legacy at the court of Frederick II, Muslim accounts of medieval Sicily, Fāṭimid influence on the arts, women’s textile production, discussions of linguistics and literature, and various other aspects of Sicily’s diverse cultural and religious life during this period.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781399536813
Publisher:	Edinburgh University Press
Publication date:	09/30/2024
Series:	Advances in the Study of Islam
Pages:	376
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.00(d)

About the Author

Nuha Alshaar is Associate Professor at the American University of Sharjah and Institute of Ismaili Studies, London. Her publications include On God and the World: An Arabic Critical Edition and English Translation of Epistles 49-51(with Madelung, W., Baffioni, C., & Uy, Oxford UniversityPress, 2019) and Ethics in Islam: Friendship in the Political Thought of al-Tawḥīdī and his Contemporaries (Routledge, 2015). She is also the volume editor of The Qur’an and Adab: The Shaping of Literary Traditions in Classical Islam (Oxford UniversityPress, 2017) and Sources and Approaches across Disciplines in Near Eastern Studies: Proceedings of the 24th Congress of the L Union Européenne des Arabisants et Islamisants (with Verena Klemm, Peeters, 2013). She has also contributed several book chapters and articles to prestigious publications.

Table of Contents

1. Sicily’s Islamic Heritage: A Pervasive Culture - Nuha Alshaar

Part One: Sicily and North Africa: Sociocultural and Political links

2. Sociocultural links between Sicily and Ifrīqiya in the Middle Ages - Mohamed Hassan

3. The Kalbids of Sicily: Stalwarts of Fāṭimid Ifrīqiya - Shainool Jiwa

Part Two: Arabo-Islamic Philosophical and Intellectual Traditions of Sicily

4. From Averroes to Dante: A Mediterranean Encounter Between Philosophy and Religion - Massimo Campanini

5. Two Examples of Arabic Texts in Sicily: Between Linguistics and Philosophy -Patrizia Spallino

6. Psychological and Epistemological Concepts in Ibn Sabʿīn’s al-Masāʾil al-Ṣiqilliyya (The Sicilian Questions) - Beate Ulrike La Sala

Part 3: Sicily and its Textile and Artistic Traditions

7. Common Threads: Women and the Making of Fāṭimid and Norman Textiles - Delia Cortese

8. Architectural and Numismatic Traces of Arabic Cultural Exchange between Sicily and Greater Syria - Ammar Abdulrahman and Alaa Aldin, al Chomari

9. On the Artistic Culture of Medieval Sicily - William Tronzo

Part 4: Sicily, Literature, Language, and Identity

10. Intellectual and Poetic Traditions of Sicily during the Fāṭimid and Kalbid Rules - Nuha Alshaar

11. Arabic-Muslim Accounts of Medieval Sicily and the Qur’an: An Intertextual Reading - Nesma Mohamed Taher Mostafa Elsakaan

12. Consequences of the Reconquista in Greater Sicily for the Core Vocabulary of Maltese - Geoffrey Hull

13. Three Worlds in one Island (Muslims, Jews, and Christians) - Giovanna Summerfield

Appendix of Arabic PoetryNotes