Charlemagne, Muhammad, and the Arab roots of capitalism / Gene W. Heck.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Heck, Gene W.

Series:

Studien zur Geschichte und Kultur des islamischen Orients (2004) ; n.F., Bd. 18.

Studien zur Geschichte und Kultur des islamischen Orients, 0585-6221 ; n.F., Bd. 18

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Commerce--History--Medieval, 500-1500.

Commerce.

Capitalism--Religious aspects--Islam.

Capitalism.

Islamic countries--Commerce.

Islamic countries.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (396 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Berlin ; New York : De Gruyter, 2006.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Presented in six principal analytic chapters with supporting appendices, this book explores the role of Islam in precipitating Europe's twelfth century commercial renaissance. Employing the classic analytic techniques of economics, Gene Heck determines that medieval Europe's feudal interregnum was largely caused by indigenous governmental business regulation and not by shifts in international trade patterns. He then proceeds by demonstrating how Islamic economic precepts provided the ideological rationales that empowered medieval Europe to escape its three-centuries-long experiment in "Dark Age economics" - in the process, providing the West with its archetypic tools of capitalism. While treatises such as Maxime Rodinson's excellent book, Islam and Capitalism, document the capitalistic nature of the Islamic economic system, in applying modern economic method to medieval orientalist historiography, this work is unique in capturing both the evolution and the impact of the system's role in forging medieval history.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I: The Christian Decline

Chapter 1 Medieval Christian Europe in Stasis

Part II: The Islamic Ascendency

Chapter 2 The Muslims' Medieval "Trade Explosion"

Chapter 3 Islamic "Free Market" Doctrine Pragmatically Applied

Chapter 4 The Fruition of "Commercial Capitalism" in Fātimid Egypt

Part III: Islam and the Christian Revival

Chapter 5 Imperatives of Trade and the Transformation of Europe

Chapter 6 Medieval Europe´s Transformation: "The Triumph Of Ideas"

Backmatter

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

ISBN:

9786612195792

9781282195790

1282195794

9783110202830

3110202832

OCLC:

435912099