First Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies — Venise (Italie), 23-25/06/2014

The conference will be divided into two parts and will be followed by a two-and-a-half day intensive course on Mamluk poetry (June 26–28). The theme of the first part of the conference will be al-Suyuti (d. 911/1505). The following two days of the conference will be structured in panels, which may focus on any aspect of the intellectual, political, social, and economic life of the Mamluk period.

Programme

June 23 THEMED DAY: AL-SUYUTI

• Bahl, Christopher (SOAS, London), The Raf’sha’n al-hubshan by Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti or Preservation through Elaboration in the “Historicisation” of the Abyssinians
• Banister, Mustafa (University of Toronto), Casting the Caliph in a Cosmic Role: The Transmission of al-Suyuti’s Historical Vision
• Blecher, Joel (Washington and Lee University), Al-Suyuti and the Art of Hadith Commentary: The Case of Ta’zir
• Burge, Stephen R. (Institute of Ismaili studies, London), Al-Suyuti’s Qur’anic Hermeneutics Revised: A Comparison of his Tahbir and Itqan
• Firanescu, Rodica (Dalhousie University), Revisiting Love and Coquetry in Medieval Arabic Islam: al-Suyuti’s Perspective
• Geoffroy, Eric (Université de Strasbourg), Al-Suyuti as a Sufi
• Grande, Francesco (Università Ca’ Foscari di Venezia), L’Histoire tend au système. The Protohistory of Arabic in the Muzhir of al-Suyuti
• Hämeen Anttila, Jaakko (University of Helsinki), Al-Suyuti and Erotic Literature
• Humphreys, Stephen (University of Santa Barbara), Defending the Orthodox Caliphate: al-Suyuti’s Ta’rikh al-khulafa’
• Ibrahim, Mahmood (California State Polytechnic University at Pomona), Social Origin of Qur’anic Abrogation: al-Suyuti on the issue of Naskh
• Ito, Takao (Kobe University), Al-Suyuti and the Problems of the Waqf
• Kindinger, Judith (Leiden University), Reconceiving the Taylasan in al-Suyuti’s work
• Mauder, Christian (University of Göttingen), Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti’s stance toward worldly power: A reexamination based on unpublished sources
• Mostafa, Heba (University of Berkeley), Al-Rawdah: Narratives of an Earthly Island Paradise in al-Suyuti’s Kawkab al-rawdah fi tarikh Jazirat Misr al-musammah bi-al-Rawdah
• Patel, Youshaa (Lafayette College), Al-Suyuti on the Relative Value of Skin Color
• Petrone, Michele (Università degli Studi di Firenze), Al-Suyuti in the Catalogues of West African Collections of Manuscripts

June 24-25: PANELS

The ‘Archival Turn’ or How Mamluk Diplomatics Serves Mamluk History
Chair: Dekkiche, Malika (Ghent University, Belgium)

• Bauden, Frédéric (Université de Liège), Bandar al-Tur: A Harbor on the Red Sea and Its Significance for the Mamluks
• El-Leythi, Tamer (New York University), The Biography of a Coptic Alley in Cairo: Reproducing Home and Family, Rethinking (Dhimmi) Community and (Muslim) Courts
• Rustow, Marina (Johns Hopkins University), An Unpublished Mamluk Legal Document from the Cairo Geniza

Boundaries of Epistemological Models in the Mamluk Period: Knowing from Tradition and Knowing from Signs
Chair: Günther, Sebastian (University of Göttingen)

• Bori, Caterina (Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna), Firasa as a Source of Legal Judgment, or a “Semeiotic” Paradigm in the Service of Justice
• Cecere, Giuseppe (The Hebrew University of Jerusalm – IFAO Caire), Sanctity and Knowledge in Ibn ‘Ata’ Allah al-Iskandari: A Sunni Sufi epistemology in Early Mamluk Egypt
• Griffel, Frank (Yale University), The Epistemological Foundation of Ibn Taymiyya’s Critique Against Mainstream Ash’arism
• Holtzman, Livnat (Bar Ilan University), The Dream-Interpreter and the Later Hanbalis: Regulating Oneiromancy in Mamluk Damascus

Conceiving Space in 14th Century Syrian Hanbali Religious Thought
Chair: Holtzman, Livnat (Bar Ilan University)

• Bosanquet, Antonia (Berlin Graduate School Muslim Societies and Cultures), Spacing Paradise: Ibn al-Qayyim’s Discussion of non-Muslims and the Afterlife
• Hoover, Jon (University of Nottingham), Ibn Taymiyya on God’s Relation to Space

The Funerary Complex of al-Ashraf Qansuh al-Ghawri in Cairo
Chair: Juvin, Carine (Musée du Louvre, Paris)

• Juvin, Carine (Musée du Louvre), Inscriptions in Context: The Programmatic Epigraphy of Qansuh al-Ghawri’s Complex
• Kuehn, Miriam (Museum of Islamic Art, Berlin), The Epigraphic Programme of the Minbar in the Madrasa of al Ashraf Qansuh al-Ghawri’s Complex
• Loiseau, Julien (Institut universitaire de France), Sacred Relics in a Mamluk Mausoleum: The Sanctification of Qansuh al-Ghawri’s Complex

Mamluk Palestine and Bilad al-Sham
Chair: Lev, Yaacov (Bar Ilan University)

• Drory, Joseph (Bar Ilan University), Arqutay: An Influential Safed Governor and Cairene Statesman
• Frenkel, Yehoshua (Haifa University), The Contribution of Environmental History to the Study of Land Tenure
• Lev, Yaacov (Bar Ilan University), The 666/1267-1268 Truce between Sultan Baybars and Hugh III of Acre: Political and Geographical Aspects
• Taragan, Hana (Tel Aviv University), Mamluk Patronage, Crusader Memories: Spolia and Appropriation in 13th-Century Bilad al-Sham

Mamluk Manuscripts: Witnesses of Their Time
Chair: Franssen, Élise (FNRS, Université de Liège)

• Behrens-Abouseif, Doris (SOAS, London), Mamluk Text on Kingship with Two Titles and Two Dedications
• Ohta, Alison (Royal Asiatic Society, London), The Look of the Book during the Reign of Sultan Barquq
• Sagaria Rossi, Valentina (Accademia dei Lincei, Rome), The ‘mise en texte’ of Some Manuscripts of al-Safadi’s al-Wafi bi-l-wafayat: Techniques and Models

Marked Bodies: Meanings and Practices
Chair: Holmes Katz, Marion (New York University)

• Holmes Katz, Marion (New York University), Fattening up in Medieval Cairo: Religion, Medicine, and the Social Meanings of Body Size
• McGregor, Richard (Vanderbilt University), Thinking about Looking: Relics and the Rhetoric of the Body in Mamluk Egypt
• Richardson, Kristina (Universität Münster/City University of New York), Blue and Green Eyes in the Islamicate Middle Ages
• van Hees, Syrinx Carola (Münster University), Descriptions of the Body in Biographies and Their Social Meanings

Scribal Culture and Practice in the Mamluk Empire
Co-Chair: Muhanna, Elias (Brown University); Co-Chair: Talib, Adam (American University of Cairo)

• Hirschler, Konrad (SOAS, London), Moving beyond the Centre: Scribes in the Officers’ Administration
• Muhanna, Elias (Brown University), Innovation and Tradition in Scribal (Best) Practices: The Concept of Istilah in Chancery Literature
• Pomerantz, Maurice (NYU – Abu Dhabi), The Administrative Imaginary: Governance, Geography, and Trade in a Maqama Collection of the 8th/14th century
• Talib, Adam (American University of Cairo), The Professional Professionals: The Illusion of Personality in the Works of Ibn Hijjah al-Hamawi and his Fellow Scribal Professionals

Venice and Mamluk Egypt
Chair: Pedani, Maria Pia (Ca’ Foscari University)

• Christ, Georg (University of Manchester), Urban Transhumance: Mamluk Imperial Power and Venetian Trade between Cairo, Alexandria and Damietta (Early 15th Century)
• Horii, Yutaka (Doshisha University), The Venetian Consul and Trade in Late Mamluk Egypt
• Pedani, Maria Pia (Ca’ Foscari University), Mamluk-Venetian Relations
• Sopracasa, Alessio (Centre histoire civilisation Byzance – CdF), The Mamluk Economic and Administrative Apparatus managing the International Trade in Alexandria between the Second Half of the 15th and the Beginning of the 16th Century (with Some Topographical Elements Related to the Subjectt

Those who wish to attend the conference are invited to register by sending a message to the organizers (smsvenice2014@unive.it) before April 30. We won’t be able to accept registration after that date.

Plus d’infos:  http://mamluk.uchicago.edu, rubrique “School of Mamluk Studies”.