15 décembre 2022
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info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.3989/alqantara.2022.028
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Aurélien Montel, « The Islamic West in the Light of the Sources from the First Abbasid Era (8th-10th Centuries): An Invisible World », HAL-SHS : histoire, ID : 10.3989/alqantara.2022.028
Within the scope of the rich literature produced in the circles of the Abbasid caliphal power, the Muslim West (i.e., al-Andalusand the Maghrib, including their insular dependencies in the Western Mediterranean) plays a tiny role, although its authorshad a universalist ambition. That silence affects every literary genre, except for geography, which indeed experienced a greatdevelopment in those times. How can that situation be explained? Contextualizing those texts makes clear that two reasons canbe considered. The first one is the lack of historical data about the West available to Eastern authors, which questions directlythe formation of Western scholarly communities, as well as the circulation of knowledge at the scale of the whole Islamic world.Also, it can be seen as the result of an intentional disinterest toward the West, directly linked to political and geopolitical stakes.From an imperial point of view, to make the Islamic West —a land of political rebellion since the middle of the 2th/8th century—invisible contributed to shape an ideal world, whose limits implicitly underscored the centrality of Baghdad.