Contents

pp i-iv

List of Figures

pp v-vi

List of Contributors

pp vii-xii

Foreword

pp xiii-xvi

Preface

pp xvii-xx

1 - Baghdād: Political Metropolis and IntellectualCenter

pp 1-46

2 - Talking about Arab Origins: The Transmission of theayyām al-ʿarab in al-Kūfa, al-Baṣra andBaghdād

pp 47-76

3 - The Language of the Arabs in Early Ninth CenturyPhilology: An Investigation of the Term mathal inAbū ʿUbayda’s Majāz al-Qurʿān

pp 77-102

4 - ‘Earnest and Jest (al-jidd wa-l-hazl)’ as anEducational Concept? Some Considerations on SelectedWorks of al-Jāḥiẓ (d. 255/868–9)

pp 103-146

5 - Abū l-'Atāhiya and the Versification ofDisenchantment

pp 147-182

6 - Teachers and Ḥadīth Transmitters: The Quṣṣāṣ in IbnḤanbal’s Musnad

pp 183-236

7 - ‘We shall neither learn the Qur-ān nor teach it toour children’: The Covenant of ʿUmar onLearning

pp 237-266

8 - Christian Learning about Islam in the EarlyʿAbbāsid Caliphate: The Muslim Sources of theDisputation of the Monk Abraham of Tiberias

pp 267-342

9 - Mufiammad b. Khalaf b. al-Marzbān (d. 309/921) andHis Role in Translations from the MiddlePersian

pp 343-362

10 - Why Did Ḥunayn, the Master Translator into Arabic,Make Translations into Syriac? On the Purpose of theSyriac Translations of Ḥunayn and his Circle

pp 363-388

11 - Al-Maʾmūn’s Patronage of Astrology: SomeBiographical and InstitutionalConsiderations

pp 389-454

12 - Court Astrologers and Historical Writing in EarlyʿAbbāsid Baghdād: An Appraisal

pp 455-502

13 - From Lyrics by al-Fazārī to Lectures by al-Fārābī:Teaching Astronomy in Baghdād (750–1000C.E.)

pp 503-526

14 - ‘Until his eyes light up’: Talmud Teaching inBabylonian Geonic Yeshivot

pp 527-556

15 - Safeguarding Lord’s Word: The Work of the Masoretesin Palestine and Babylon

pp 557-574

Sketches for Further Research

pp 575-576

16 - ‘Baghdād for lovers lies not far away’:Baghdād and other Imaginary Places in a 7th/13thcent. Manuscript of the Hundred and OneNights

pp 577-586

17 - Historical Writing in Baghdād: The Case ofthe Futūḥ al-Shām ascribed to al-Wāqidī (d.207/822)

pp 587-600

18 - Teaching Qurʾānic Exegesis: Some InitialInsights

pp 601-614

Index

pp 615-655