Evidence and the History of Early Islamic Egypt, 03/02

*First Announcement*

DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE AND THE HISTORY OF EARLY ISLAMIC EGYPT A Workshop Conference to be held in Cairo 23-25 March 2002
Hosted by the Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo (NVIC)

Scholars of the medieval Near East are sometimes heard to complain of the paucity of documentary and archival evidence available to them. Yet, for early Islamic Egypt (7th-10th centuries) this can hardly be said to be the case. Beginning with Silvestre de Sacy's publication of Arabic papyri in the first half of the 19th century, thousands of documents from this period have come to light. Found throughout Upper and Middle Egypt by farmers, archaeological excavators, and treasure hunters, these texts include Arabic, Coptic, and Greek documents written on papyrus, parchment, cloth, paper, bone, leather, and ostraca, not to mention the Cairo Geniza documents, the considerable epigraphic evidence from architectural contexts and funerary stelae, as well as coins, seals, and inscribed weights.

While a considerable number of these texts have been edited and published, including several important contributions in recent years, there have been few efforts on the part of historians to fully exploit this evidence in their reconstructions of the social, economic, and administrative history of early Islamic Egypt. Furthermore, as of yet there have been no opportunities for scholars from all the relevant disciplines to meet and collaborate. It is hoped that this conference will bring together those involved in the editing and conservation of texts in all three languages (Arabic, Coptic, and Greek), as well as historians using the documentary evidence in their own research on Egypt in the first four centuries after the Arab Conquest.

The conference will be centered around 90-minute "workshop" sessions in which researchers will present for discussion a text (or texts) which will have been circulated in advance along with a tentative translation. There will also be opportunities for the presentation of short (15 min.) papers treating methodologies of editing and interpretation, communications about any of the numerous collections of these documents, or projects of common interest and concern, such as the production of linguistic and lexical aids, collection catalogs, digitization and conservation projects, etc. It is hoped that some of these papers will also present historical research based on documentary evidence. In addition, the conference will organize visits to the several collections of papyri and other documentary texts in the Cairo area, as well as other sites of related interest.

For more information, please contact:
Petra Sijpesteijn (petras@princeton.edu)
Lennart Sundelin (sundelin@princeton.edu)