This book offers an analysis of the Syro-Egyptian Mamluk Sultanate's political culture, focusing on the period between 1341 and 1382 CE, when twelve descendants of the regime's most successful sultan al-N-ir Mu-ammad b. Qal-w-n reigned and the military were more deeply involved in the political process than ever. The book consists of three chapters, each of which discusses one major component of this period's political culture: political institutions, political relationships engendering households and networks, and the dynamics of the period's many socio-political conflicts. This book marks an important breakthrough in Mamluk studies, offering both insights into the history of a long-neglected period and new models of analysis that call for wider application in the field of Mamluk socio-political history.
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• List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Chapter One: A Medieval "Global Moment" Chapter Two: Mamluk Administration of Jordan Chapter Three: Structure and Character of Jordanian Society Chapter Four: Jordan's Economy at the Turn of the Fifteenth Century Chapter Five: Ottoman Jordan and the Mamluk Legacy Bibliography Index.
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The decline of the Mamluk Sultanate from the late fourteenth century is an important component of the larger transformation of the late medieval Levant. In this centralized state, the Mamluks political culture has traditionally been defined by that of the imperial capital of Cairo. The political decline of the sultanate in Cairo has, then, come to define the many-faceted transformations of the entire region with the waning of the medieval era. The dynamics of change far from Cairo, in remote settlements on the imperial frontier, are, by contrast, relatively unknown. This book explores the transformation of the Mamluk state from the perspective of the Jordanian frontier, considering the actions of local people in molding both the state and their own societies in the post-plague era. Through a critical analysis of a wide range of economic and legal documents of the late Mamluk and early Ottoman periods, as well as data on rural society generated by recent archaeological research, the work documents the complex, dialectical relationships that always existed between the Mamluk state and the tribal societies of Jordan, as well as the flexible strategies pursued by both to adapt to changing circumstances during the late medieval period. It is ultimately a provincial perspective on imperial decline, reform, and rebirth that sheds new light on the mechanisms of socio-political and economic change through the experiences of ordinary people living on the margins of empire. The book is illustrated with more than two dozen photographs and 6 maps.
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• A Note on Transliteration List of Pictures and Illustrations Acknowledgments Professor Amalia Levanoni's Contribution to the Field of Mamluk Studies Michael Winter Introduction
• Yuval Ben-Bassat A. Social and Cultural Issues
• 1. Carl Petry
• "Already Rich? Yet `Greed Deranged Him': Elite Status and Criminal Complicity in the
• Mamluk Sultanate"
• 2. Koby Yosef "Usages of Kinship Terminology during the Mamluk Sultanate and the Notion of the `Mamluk Family'"
• 3. Limor Yungman
• "Medieval Middle Eastern Court Taste: The Mamluk Case"
• 4. Bernadette Martel-Thoumian "DU SANG ET DES LARMES: LE DESTIN TRAGIQUE D'ASALBAY AL-JARKASIYYA (m. en 1509)"
• 5. Daisuke Igarashi "The Office of the Ustadar al-Ê¿Aliya in the Circassian Mamluk Era" B. Women in Mamluk Society
• 6. Yaakov Lev
• "Women in the Urban Space of Medieval Muslim Cities"
• 7. Yehoshua Frenkel
• "Slave Girls and Learned Teachers: Women in Mamluk Sources"
• 8. Boaz Shoshan "On Marriage in Damascus, 1480-1500" C. Literary and Poetical Genres
• 9. Li Guo
• "Songs, Poetry, and Storytelling: Ibn Taghribirdi on the Yalbugha Affair"
• 10. Frederic Bauden "Maqriziana XIII: An Exchange of Correspondence Between al-Maqrizi and al-Qalqashandi"
• 11. Michael Winter
• "Sultan Selim's Obsession with Mamluk Egypt according to Evliya Ò elebi's Seyahatname" D. The Politics of Material Culture
• 12. Warren Schultz
• "Mamluk Coins, Mamluk Politics and the Limits of the Numismatic Evidence"
• 13. Hana Taragan
• "Mamluk Patronage, Crusader Spolia: Turbat al-Kubakiyya in the Mamilla Cemetery,
• Jerusalem (688/1289)"
• 14. Bethany J. Walker "The Struggle over Water: Evaluating the `Water Culture' of Syrian Peasants under Mamluk Rule"
• 15. Elise Franssen "What was there in a Mamluk Amir's Library? Evidence from a Fifteenth-Century Manuscript"
• E. Regional and Local Politics
• 16. Reuven Amitai
• "Post-Crusader Acre in Light of a Mamluk Inscription and a Fatwa Document from
• Damascus"
• 17. Joseph Drory "Favored by the Sultan, Disfavored by his Son: Some Glimpses into the Career of Tashtamur Hummus Akhdar" Bibliography Index.
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The present volume contains seventeen essays on the Mamluk Sultanate, an Islamic Empire of slaves whose capital was in Cairo between the 13th and the 16th centuries, written by leading historians of this period. It discusses topics as varied as social and cultural issues, women in Mamluk society, literary and poetical genres, the politics of material culture, and regional and local politics. The volume presents state of the art scholarship in the field of Mamluk studies as well as an in-depth review of recent developments. Mamluk studies have expanded considerably in recent years and today interests hundreds of active researchers worldwide who write in numerous languages and constitute a vivid and strong community of researchers, some of whose best research is presented in this volume. With contributions by Reuven Amitai; Frederic Bauden; Yuval Ben-Bassat; Joseph Drory; Elise Franssen; Yehoshua Frenkel; Li Guo; Daisuke Igarashi; Yaacov Lev; Bernadette Martel-Thoumian; Carl Petry; Warren Schultz; Boaz Shoshan; Hana Taragan; Bethany J. Walker; Michael Winter; Koby Yosef; Limor Yungman.
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• Introduction-- Iqta and the end of the Crusader States-- The supply of money and the direction of trade in 13th-century Syria-- The Mamluk conquest of the County of Tripoli-- Egypt, Syria and their trading partners, 1450-1550-- Factions in medieval Egypt-- The image of the Byzantine and the Frank in Arab popular literature of the late Middle Ages-- How many miles to Babylon? The Devise des Chemins de Babiloine redated.-- Toynbee and Ibn Khaldun-- Eating horses and drinking mare's milk-- Usamah ibn Munqidh, an Arab Syrian gentleman at the time of the crusades, reconsidered-- The impact of the early crusades on the Muslim world-- What the Partridge Told the Eagle: a neglected Arabic source on Chinggis Khan and the early history of the Mongols-- Under Western eyes: a history of Mamluk studies-- Ali al-Baghdadi and the joy of Mamluk sex-- The privatisation of justice under the Circassian Mamluks-- Mamluk literature-- Orientalism and the early development of Crusading studies-- Tribal feuding and Mamluk factions in medieval Syria-- Al-Maqrizi and Ibn Khaldun, historians of the unseen-- Gunpowder and firearms in the Mamluk kingdom reconsidered-- Futuwwa: chivalry and gangsterism in medieval Cairo-- Ibn Zunbul and the romance of history-- The political thinking of the 'virtuous ruler' Qansuh al-Ghawri-- Index.
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"Mamluks and Crusaders: Men of the Sword and Men of the Pen" brings together a series of studies, based mainly on medieval Arabic sources, of Middle Eastern history and society in the late Middle Ages. Several of these studies deal with the confrontation between the Mamluks and the Crusaders. Others deal with aspects of Mamluk society and culture in Egypt and Syria from the 13th to the early 16th centuries. There are articles on such matters as Crusader feudalism and Mamluk iqta, Crusader and Mamluk currency, the last years of the Crusader states, Mamluk faction fighting, the size of the Mamluk army, the image of the Crusaders and other Europeans in Arabic popular literature, a neglected source on the sex life of the Mamluks, the ritual consumption of horse meat by Mamluks and Mongols, the table talk of the Mamluk Sultan Qansuh al-Ghawri, the deployment of gunpowder and firearms in the Middle East, gangsterism in Cairo and the shared interest of Ibn Khaldun and al-Maqrizi in the occult. Finally, several studies deal with questions of historiography, in both Crusader and Mamluk studies.
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In c.1142 work started on the construction of a major castle in the southern Jordanian town of Karak. The largest of a network of fortifications, Karak castle became the administrative centre of an important Crusader lordship. After 1188 Karak and its territories were incorporated into the Ayyubid, Mamluk and Ottoman sultanates. This book traces the history of Karak and the surrounding lands during the Middle Islamic period (c.1100-1650 CE). The book offers an innovative methodology, combining primary textual sources (in Latin and Arabic) with archaeological data (principally the ceramic record) as a means to reconstruct the fluctuating economic relations between Karak and other regions of the Middle East and eastern Mediterranean.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

The historiography of the Early Mamluk Circassian period is prolific but has not yet received proper scholarly attention. For the first time, this study examines in a comprehensive manner the key sources for the reign of al-Z-hir Barq-q (784-91, 792-801/1382-9, 1390-9) in terms of their originality and importance. By means of a systematic analysis of the annals of three different years, it provides a critical evaluation of published and manuscript primary sources, identifies the nature of the interdependence amongst authors, and sheds new light on the craft of historical writing. This book fills a critical gap in the scholarship on Mamluk historiography. The author not only assesses the production of well-known historians (Ibn Khald'n, Ibn al-Fur't, al-Maqr'z', Ibn Taghr'bird', etc.), but also studies pivotal authors (Ibn Duqm Ibn Hijj', etc.) whose works has been up until now either ignored or unknown.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)