The Places Where Men Pray Together: Cities in Islamic Lands, Seventh through the Tenth Centuries
by Paul Wheatley
University of Chicago Press, 2001 Cloth: 978-0-226-89428-7 Library of Congress Classification HT384.I67W48 2001 Dewey Decimal Classification 307.760917671
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ABOUT THIS BOOK
What makes a city an economic, political, and cultural center? In The Places Where Men Pray Together, Paul Wheatley draws on two decades of astonishingly wide-ranging research to demonstrate that Islamic cities are defined by function rather than form—by what they do rather than what they are. Focusing on the roles of cities during the first four centuries of Islamic expansion, Wheatley explores interconnected cultural, historical, economic, political, and religious factors to provide the clearest and most extensively documented portrait of early Islamic urban centers available to date.
Building on the tenth-century geographer al-Maqdisi's writings on urban centers of the Islamic world, buttressed by extensive comparative material from roadbooks, topographies, histories, adab literatures, and gazetteers of the time, Wheatley identifies the main functions of different Islamic urban centers. Chapters on each of the thirteen centers that al-Maqdisi identified, ranging from the Atlantic to the Indus and from the Caspian to the Sudan, form the heart of this book. In each case Wheatley shows how specific agglomeration and accessibility factors combined to make every city functionally distinct as a creator of effective space. He also demonstrates that, far from revolutionizing every aspect of life in these cities, the adoption of Islam often affected the development of these cities less than previously existing local traditions.
The Places Where Men Pray Together is a monumental work that will speak to scholars and readers across a broad variety of disciplines, from historians, anthropologists, and sociologists to religious historians, archaeologists, and geographers.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Paul Wheatley (1921-99) was the Irving B. Harris Professor Emeritus of Comparative Urban Studies at the University of Chicago. He was the author of, among others, The Pivot of the Four Quarters: A Preliminary Inquiry into the Origins and Character of the Ancient Chinese City and Nagara & Commandery: Origins of the Southeast Asian Urban Tradition.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Illustrations
List of Tables
Preface
Explanatory Notes
Matters of Definition
Orthographical and Related Matters
The Islamic Date
Bibliographical Matters PART I: Introduction
1. The Roots of Islamic Society
Arabia of the Jahiliyah Al-Hijaz A'rab and Hadari
Tribal Organization
The Role of Reciprocity
The Ghazu
External Trade
"The Mother of Settlements"
Religion of the Badu
The Quraysh Makkan Commerce
Fairs
Muhammad's Message
Consolidation of Quraysh Authority
The Hums
Muhammad's Opposition
Characterisitics of Makkah Yathrib (al-Madinah)
The Constitution of Madinah
The Madinan Confederacy
Extending the Hizb Allah Al-Ta'if
Urbanism in the Jahili Hijaz
2. The Shaping of Urban Systems in the Islamic World
The Expansion of Islam
Campaigns of Conquest
Continuing Expansion
Evolution of Islamic Institutions
Extension of the Empire under the Umayyads
The Great Tamsir Amsar Al-Basrah Al-Kufah Al-Fustat
The Process of Sedentarization Ribats
Princely and Dynastic Foundations Baghdad
North Africa
Other New Foundations
Spontaneously Generated Cities
Cities Modified by Muslim Occupation
3. Preliminaries
The Concept of the Urban System
The Spatial Expression of the Settlement System
The Vertical Organization of the Settlement Hierarchy
Primary Sources for the Study of Tenth-Century Middle Eastern Urban Systems Al-Maqdisi Al-Maqdisi's Sources Al-Istakhri and Ibn Hawqal Hudud al-'Alam Al-Hamdani Al-Mas'udi and His Contemporaries
Other Sources
The Urban Systems Al-Maqdisi's Criteria for Urban Status Al-Maqdisi's Urban Hierarchies
Relative Sizes of Cities PART II: Urban Systems in the Islamic World, Seventh through the Tenth Centuries
4. The Urban System in al-'Iraq
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
The Sacral Hierarchy Makkah as the Epitome
Urban Centers on the Diyala Plains
Commentary
Arab Settlements
Agricultural Development
5. The Urban System in Aqur (al-Jazirah)
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
The Urban System
Christian Communities Hamdanid Rule
6. The Urban System in al-Sham
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
Northern Strongholds
The Emerging Urban System
Eastern Cities
Transformation of the Urban System
7. The Urban System in the Jazirah of the Arabs
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
Commentary
The Hijaz
The Haraman
The Yaman 'Uman
8. The Urban System in al-Jibal
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
Commentary
Fortified Settlements 'Abbasid Settlement
9. The Urban System in Khuzistan
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
Commentary
10. The Urban System in Fars
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
11. The Urban System in Kirman
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
12. The Urban System in al-Rihab
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
13. The Urban System in al-Daylam
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
14. The Urban System in al-Mashriq Khurasan
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Transoxania
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary Khurasan
Transoxania
15. The Urban System in Misr
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
16. The Urban System in al-Maghrib
North Africa
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Indu
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who has a disability that prevents you
from using this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the disability coordinator at your school fill out this form.
The Places Where Men Pray Together: Cities in Islamic Lands, Seventh through the Tenth Centuries
by Paul Wheatley
University of Chicago Press, 2001 Cloth: 978-0-226-89428-7
What makes a city an economic, political, and cultural center? In The Places Where Men Pray Together, Paul Wheatley draws on two decades of astonishingly wide-ranging research to demonstrate that Islamic cities are defined by function rather than form—by what they do rather than what they are. Focusing on the roles of cities during the first four centuries of Islamic expansion, Wheatley explores interconnected cultural, historical, economic, political, and religious factors to provide the clearest and most extensively documented portrait of early Islamic urban centers available to date.
Building on the tenth-century geographer al-Maqdisi's writings on urban centers of the Islamic world, buttressed by extensive comparative material from roadbooks, topographies, histories, adab literatures, and gazetteers of the time, Wheatley identifies the main functions of different Islamic urban centers. Chapters on each of the thirteen centers that al-Maqdisi identified, ranging from the Atlantic to the Indus and from the Caspian to the Sudan, form the heart of this book. In each case Wheatley shows how specific agglomeration and accessibility factors combined to make every city functionally distinct as a creator of effective space. He also demonstrates that, far from revolutionizing every aspect of life in these cities, the adoption of Islam often affected the development of these cities less than previously existing local traditions.
The Places Where Men Pray Together is a monumental work that will speak to scholars and readers across a broad variety of disciplines, from historians, anthropologists, and sociologists to religious historians, archaeologists, and geographers.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Paul Wheatley (1921-99) was the Irving B. Harris Professor Emeritus of Comparative Urban Studies at the University of Chicago. He was the author of, among others, The Pivot of the Four Quarters: A Preliminary Inquiry into the Origins and Character of the Ancient Chinese City and Nagara & Commandery: Origins of the Southeast Asian Urban Tradition.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Illustrations
List of Tables
Preface
Explanatory Notes
Matters of Definition
Orthographical and Related Matters
The Islamic Date
Bibliographical Matters PART I: Introduction
1. The Roots of Islamic Society
Arabia of the Jahiliyah Al-Hijaz A'rab and Hadari
Tribal Organization
The Role of Reciprocity
The Ghazu
External Trade
"The Mother of Settlements"
Religion of the Badu
The Quraysh Makkan Commerce
Fairs
Muhammad's Message
Consolidation of Quraysh Authority
The Hums
Muhammad's Opposition
Characterisitics of Makkah Yathrib (al-Madinah)
The Constitution of Madinah
The Madinan Confederacy
Extending the Hizb Allah Al-Ta'if
Urbanism in the Jahili Hijaz
2. The Shaping of Urban Systems in the Islamic World
The Expansion of Islam
Campaigns of Conquest
Continuing Expansion
Evolution of Islamic Institutions
Extension of the Empire under the Umayyads
The Great Tamsir Amsar Al-Basrah Al-Kufah Al-Fustat
The Process of Sedentarization Ribats
Princely and Dynastic Foundations Baghdad
North Africa
Other New Foundations
Spontaneously Generated Cities
Cities Modified by Muslim Occupation
3. Preliminaries
The Concept of the Urban System
The Spatial Expression of the Settlement System
The Vertical Organization of the Settlement Hierarchy
Primary Sources for the Study of Tenth-Century Middle Eastern Urban Systems Al-Maqdisi Al-Maqdisi's Sources Al-Istakhri and Ibn Hawqal Hudud al-'Alam Al-Hamdani Al-Mas'udi and His Contemporaries
Other Sources
The Urban Systems Al-Maqdisi's Criteria for Urban Status Al-Maqdisi's Urban Hierarchies
Relative Sizes of Cities PART II: Urban Systems in the Islamic World, Seventh through the Tenth Centuries
4. The Urban System in al-'Iraq
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
The Sacral Hierarchy Makkah as the Epitome
Urban Centers on the Diyala Plains
Commentary
Arab Settlements
Agricultural Development
5. The Urban System in Aqur (al-Jazirah)
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
The Urban System
Christian Communities Hamdanid Rule
6. The Urban System in al-Sham
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
Northern Strongholds
The Emerging Urban System
Eastern Cities
Transformation of the Urban System
7. The Urban System in the Jazirah of the Arabs
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
Commentary
The Hijaz
The Haraman
The Yaman 'Uman
8. The Urban System in al-Jibal
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
Commentary
Fortified Settlements 'Abbasid Settlement
9. The Urban System in Khuzistan
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Religious Centers
Commentary
10. The Urban System in Fars
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
11. The Urban System in Kirman
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
12. The Urban System in al-Rihab
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
13. The Urban System in al-Daylam
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
14. The Urban System in al-Mashriq Khurasan
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Transoxania
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary Khurasan
Transoxania
15. The Urban System in Misr
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Industrial and Craft Centers
Fortified Settlements
Religious Centers
Commentary
16. The Urban System in al-Maghrib
North Africa
Marketing and Service Centers
Transportation Foci
Indu
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who has a disability that prevents you
from using this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the disability coordinator at your school fill out this form.
It can take 2-3 weeks for requests to be filled.
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE