Petitions From the Mamlūk Period (Notes on The Mamlūk Documents From Sinai)

Abstract

The monastery of St. Catherine in Sinai possesses a large collection of odocuments concerning its own affairs and dating from the Fāṭimid, Ayyūbid, Mamlūk, and Ottoman periods. They were used for historical purposes as early as the seventeenth century by certain writers belonging to the monastery, but, if exception be made for the pioneer (but limited) work done by B. Moritz in the early years of this century, they remained unexploited by modern scholars. The American expedition of 1950, which has microfilmed about one-half of the library's manuscripts in various languages, brought back microfilms of the entire collection of Arabic and Turkish documents, thus making a thorough study of them possible for the first time. There is no need to specify the earlier bibliography of the Sinai documents, since readers of this Bulletin can obtain the necessary information from an article of mine published in an earlier volume.

Popular politics in the Medieval Middle East

“…In addition to violent outburst and riots, popular politics was sometimes also expressed in the form of petitions to higher ruling authorities—including the sultans—to intervene and redress wrongs. Literary sources give some scant references from this process but suggest that it was a common, indeed age‐old, tactic by subject populations (Elbendary, ; Stern, , , ). More references to petitions are available for the Ottoman period due to the survival of state archives (Faroqhi, ; Ginio, ; Lafi, ; Singer, ).…”

Une requête (petition) au calife fatimide al-Ḥākim bi-amr Allāh (Rémondon 1, musée du Louvre)

“…Graphie conservant des traces nettes d'angulosité ; pied des alifs en attaque ou à l'intérieur 12 Stern indique que l'on a « wa-abnā'ihi al-akramīn » lorsque le calife a des fils et « wa-abnā'ihi al-muntaz ̣irīn » lorsqu'il n'en a pas (Stern 1962: 182-3, et, à sa suite, Khan 1990a1993 : 307). 13 Sur la « standardisation du formulaire d'obéissance », voir Khan (1990a : 24-5 ; 310-2), qui cite à l'appui Gil (1983 : 345-6, 347-53, 353-5) ; Ibn Nāz ̣ir al-Ǧ ayš (1987 : 206-8) ; Khan (1990a) ; al-Maqrīzī (1270/1853 : II, 399-400) ; al-Qalqašandī (1903-18 : VI, 339, VII, 90, VIII, 171-85) ; Richards (1973 : 141-2) ; Stern (1956 : 532 ;1962 ;1964a ;1966 ;et 1969 : 214-6, 220-1), ainsi que de nombreux documents de la Geniza TS, dont certains ont été publiés par Khan (1993 : chap. XIIa).…”

“… 13 Sur la « standardisation du formulaire d'obéissance », voir Khan (1990a : 24–5 ; 1993 : 310–2), qui cite à l'appui Gil (1983 : 345–6, 347–53, 353–5) ; Ibn Nāẓir al-Ǧayš (1987 : 206–8) ; Khan (1990a) ; al-Maqrīzī (1270/1853 : II, 399–400) ; al-Qalqašandī (1903–18 : VI, 339, VII, 90, VIII, 171–85) ; Richards (1973 : 141–2) ; Stern (1956 : 532 ; 1962 ; 1964a ; 1966 ; et 1969 : 214–6, 220–1), ainsi que de nombreux documents de la Geniza TS, dont certains ont été publiés par Khan (1993 : chap. XIIa).…”