Old Documents Shed New Light on History in Book Connected to Ancient Islamic World

The painstaking work to recover history—one page at a time—is on brilliant display in this collection of essays focusing on early Arabic, Coptic, Greek, Hebrew, Latin and Sogdian manuscripts. Editors Andreas Kaplony, a professor of Arabic and Islamic studies, and Matt Malczycki, a professor of Islamic history, assemble articles by nine scholars in this volume. The compendium of essays reveals a network of relationships—both social and political. The book opens by reviewing a cache of accounting documents from Kom Ishgau, in Middle Egypt, to create a portrait of tax collectors during Umayyad rule (661 CE-750 CE). Another chapter examines legal correspondence, shedding light on the Arab conquest of Sogdiana, a civilization along the Silk Road in present-day Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. As Muslim armies swept through Central Asia beginning in the mid-seventh century CE, they introduced an imperial Arabic writing style. The documents reveal Sogdian rulers selectively adhered to this new style in epistolary diplomacy as the two cultures adapted to each other. Likewise, another chapter delves into legal documents written after the conquest of Arab Toledo in 1085 CE. The documents, bear witness to the mixed population of Muslims, Jews and Christians navigating the shift in the balance of power. Taken together, the study of these seemingly unremarkable pages mends gaps in the tapestry of history.