Fa???il-I Balkh (the Merits of Balkh).

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Azad, Arezou.

Contributor:

Herzig, Edmund.

Mir-Ansari, Ali.

Series:

Gibb Memorial Trust Series

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource (321 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Other Title:

Fada'il-i Balkh or the merits of Balkh

FadaE Il-I Balkh, or The Merits of Balkh

Place of Publication:

Havertown : Gibb Memorial Trust, The, 2021.

Summary:

This is a critical edition and translation of the medieval local history of Balkh, known as Fail-i Balkh ("The Merits of Balkh"), which was completed in 610 Hijr (1214 CE) in Arabic by Shaykh al-Islm Ab Bakr Abd Allh al-Wi and translated into Persian by Abd Allh al-usayn in 676 Hijri (1278 CE). It is the Persian version which survives today and forms the source text for this book. Balkh is one of the most illustrious cities of the Islamicate East, and yet we know very little about life in the city during the first five centuries of Islam (8th-13th centuries CE). The Fail-i Balkh, the oldest surviving local history of Balkh, changes that. The work is the sum of its parts, the first being a collection of accounts about the history of Balkh attributed largely to Muslim religious and legal scholars and their chains of transmission.The second part consists of original descriptions of Balkh's economic, urban and cultural life. The researcher who wants to know about Balkh's topography will need to look elsewhere, since in part three, which forms the bulk of the book, we learn about Balkh's learned Islamic scholars. What makes the account fascinating is the up-close and personal account of each scholar, with intimate details not only of their intellectual ideas and milieu, but also of their personal circumstances, .e.g. their wives, children and servants, how they related to the landscape around them, the city and the region to which they belonged, as well as to the wider Islamicate world of caliphs and sultans.The detailed commentary and introduction to this new publication gives remarkable and fascinating insights into the self-perception of one erudite man of Balkh. He has left us a social history of the medieval Islamicate East, and this new book brings it to life in ways an English-speaking audience has not yet seen.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

ABBREVIATIONS

I. EDITORS’ INTRODUCTION

I.1. Faḍāʾil-i Balkh and its importance

I.2. The surviving manuscripts of Faḍāʾil-i Balkh

I.3. Previous editions of Faḍāʾil-i Balkh

I.4. The sources of Faḍāʾil-i Balkh

I.5. Authorship: Who wrote Faḍāʾil-i Balkh?

I.6. Audience: For whom was Faḍāʾil-i Balkh written?

I.7. Faḍāʾil-i Balkh and later sources on Balkh

I.8. Faḍāʾil-i Balkh’s relationship to history

I.9. Technical matters and acknowledgements

II. TRANSLATION OF FAḌĀʾIL-I BALKH

[Persian Translator’s Preface]

Beginning of the Book

PART ONE. ON THE MERITS [OF BALKH] ATTESTED IN TEXTS

PART TWO. ON THE SPECIAL QUALITIES (SHAMĀʾIL-HĀ) [OF BALKH] THAT ARE PERCEPTIBLE TO THE SENSES

PART THREE. ON THE ULAMA

Conclusion of the Book

III. ANNEX

1. GLOSSARY

2. PERSONS, TRIBES, AND GROUPS MENTIONED IN FAḌĀʾIL-I BALKH

3. PLACES

4. SOURCES MENTIONED IN FAḌĀʾIL-I BALKH

5. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Notes:

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

9781913604035

1913604039

9781913604011

1913604012

OCLC:

1372397211