Ninth Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, June 8-10, 2023
See the schedule of papers and panels, along with other information about this conference, here.
Eighth Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, University of Marburg, July 4-9, 2022
See the schedule of papers and panels, along with other information about this conference, here.
Seventh Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, July 1-2, 2021
Themed Day only (online)
The Seventh SMS conference was scheduled for the summer of 2020 in Nicosia, Cyprus, but was postponed to 2021 due to the global pandemic. When it became clear that it would again not be feasible to convene in person, the conference was converted to an online-only event that included just the papers for the themed day split into two sessions (July 1-2, 2021).
See the online conference schedule, including all papers presented, here.
Sixth Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, June 2019, Tokyo
A PDF of the conference program, with abstracts of the papers presented, is at SMS2019-Tokyo-Program-Abstracts.pdf.
Fifth Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, July 2018, Ghent
A listing of papers presented at the 2018 SMS conference in Ghent can be seen at sms-2018-ghent.html. The Ghent conference website is http://www.sms2018.ugent.be/.
Fourth Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, May 2017, Beirut
Click here for a full list of panels and papers, including videos of most papers, at the 2017 conference in Beirut.
See the program HERE (PDF).
Third Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, June 2016, Chicago
JUNE 20-22: Intensive Course on Mamluk Numismatics
JUNE 23: Themed Day: Exchange in the Mamluk Sultanate: Economic & Cultural
Group 1 (Chair: Warren Schultz)
- Housni Alkhateeb Shehada (Levinsky College of Education; Ben-Gurion University of the Negev), “Mamluk Acquisition of Horses and Slaves: A Comparative Approach”
- Rania Elsayed (Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilisations, Aga Khan University), “The Pureblood Horse as a Currency of Exchange in the Mamluk Sultanate”
- Hannah Barker (Rhodes College), “Boys Like Gold Coins: The Trade in Mamluks for the Mamluk Sultanate”
Group 2 (Chair: Miriam Frenkel)
- Ellen Kenney (American University in Cairo), “Makers OntheMove: Mobility and Artistic Exchange in Mamluk Material Culture”
- Rebecca Sauer (Heidelberg University), “The Penbox (Dawāt): an Object between Everyday Practices and Mamlūk Courtly Gift Culture”
- Mustafa I. Kaya (University of Chicago), “Difficult Deal: Mystics, Rulers and the Terms of Patronage in the Early 14th Century”
Group 3 (Chair: Carl Petry)
- Stuart Borsch (Assumption College), “Exchange Systems, Human Capital, and Technological Regression”
- Nathan Hofer (University of Missouri), “Baraka and Commodity Fetishism: A Study in Mamluk Political Economy”
Group 4 (Chair: Li Guo)
- Milana Iliushina (National Research University Higher School of Economics [HSE]), “Concubines, Daughters and Wives: Family Ties inside the ‘Dynasty’ of Circassian Sultans”
- Amina Elbendary (American University in Cairo), “Food and Social Exchange in Ibn Tawq’s Diaries”
Group 5 (Chair: Frédéric Bauden)
- Adeline Laclau (AixMarseille University), “Economic and Cultural Exchanges between Mamluks and Ilkhanids: The Example of Manuscript Productions”
- Fadi Ragheb (University of Toronto), “MamlūkTimurid Embassy Exchanges and the Gifting of a Mātūrīdī Tafsīr: a Historical and Biobibliographical Inquiry”
- Malika Dekkiche (University of Antwerp), “The Right of Embassy: Pattern of Exchanges and Recognition in the Mamluk Sultanate”
PANELS:
Literature in Mamluk Times Revisited: Poetry, Prosimetrum and Poetics
Chair: Hakan Özkan (University of Münster)
- Syrinx von Hees (University of Münster), “Sorry, but This is Not White Hair Excuse-Poems—a Special Rhetorical Device as Presented by aṣ-Ṣafadī”
- Stephan Toelke (University of Münster), “Ibn Nubāta’s Anthological Composition of Prose and Poetry in his Fürstenspiegel Sulūk Duwal al-Mulūk”
- Hakan Özkan (University of Münster), “Why Stress Does Matter—New Material on Zajal-Metrics”
Mamluk Receptions
Chair: Adam Talib (American University in Cairo)
- Elias Muhanna (Brown University), “The European Reception of Mamluk Encyclopedias in the 17th-18th Centuries”
- Adam Talib (American University in Cairo), “Mamluk Literature for Modern Tastes: Ibn al-Wardī’s Poem Rhyming in Lām as a Tracer”
- Ahmed El Shamsy (University of Chicago), “The Rediscovery of Mamluk Encyclopedias in Modern Egypt”
- Joel Blecher (Washington & Lee University), “Trustees across the Ocean: The Afterlife of Mamluk Hadith Commentary in India”
Aesthetics and Performance of Knowledge: The Social and Courtly Roles of Scholarship in Mamluk Cairo
Chair: Elias G. Saba (University of Pennsylvania)
- Yehoshua Frenkel (University of Haifa), “The Social Role of Knowledge and Scholarship”
- Christian Mauder (University of Göttingen), “From Quizzing to Religious Policy: Kalām Debates in Sultan al-Ghawrī’s Majālis”
- Matthew L. Keegan (New York University), “Legal Riddles, Levity, and the Law: From Alghāz to Furūʿ”
- Elias G. Saba (University of Pennsylvania), “Forms of Law: Ritual Purity in the Works of Jamāl al-Dīn al-Asnawī”
Endowments as Source for Mamluk Social History
Chair: Ahmed El Shamsy (University of Chicago)
- Munther al-Sabbagh (University of California, Santa Barbara), “Women’s Waqf Credit as Social Currency in Mamluk Damascus”
- Amenah F. Abdulkarim (Queen Mary University of London), “Mamluk Endowment Deeds and the Regulations of Building Craft”
- Sarra Hilali (University of Chicago), “Towards a Reexamination of the Role of Mamluk Women in Madrasas and Ribats”
- Yaacov Lev (Bar Ilan University), "Charitable Giving and the Quest for Spiritual Rewards: A Systematic Approach to the Waqf Institution in the Mamluk Period"
Mamluk Patronage: An Expansion of a Traditional Concept
Chair: Iman R. Abdulfattah (University of Bonn)
- Iman R. Abdulfattah (University of Bonn), “From Behind the Scenes: Amir Sanjar al-Shujāʿī ’s Involvement in Building the Complex of Qalawūn”
- Noha Abou-Khatwa (University of Toronto), “Continuity and Change: Quran Manuscripts of Sultan Faraj ibn Barqūq”
- Hani Hamza (Independent Scholar), “Small is Beautiful: Zawiyya of al-Nāṣir Faraj (811/1408)”
- Dina Ishak Bakhoum (Université Paris 1, Panthéon-Sorbonne), “The Comité de Conservation des Monuments de l’Art Arabe and its Members: Patrons of the Study of Mamluk Architecture in Egypt”
Beyond Cairo and Damascus: Archaeological Contributions to the Study of Mamluk Frontiers
Chair: Bethany J. Walker (University of Bonn)
- Bethany J. Walker (University of Bonn), “What is a ‘Village’?: A Comparative Study of Village Society and Land Use in Mamluk-Era Bilād al-Shām”
- Reem Samed Al Shqour (University of Bonn), “The Economics of the Rural and Urban Khān Markets of Mamluk Jordan”
- A. Asa Eger (University of North Carolina at Greensboro), “Patronage and Commerce on the Northern Frontier at the Twilight of Mamluk Rule”
Makings of the Military and Political Elite in the Mamluk Sultanate
Chair: Nobutaka Nakamachi (Konan University)
- Takao Ito (Kobe University), “Slave Traders and Mamluks”
- Wakako Kumakura (University of Tokyo), “Reconsideration of the Mamluk Iqṭāʿ System on the Basis of an Ottoman Register”
- Nobutaka Nakamachi (Konan University), “The Life of a Quasi-Mamluk, Ibn al-ʿAynī: Was He a Military Man or a Civilian?”
Between Narrative Representation of Individuals and Discursive Production of Identities
Chair: Kristof D’hulster (University of Ghent)
- Kristof D’hulster (University of Ghent), “Looking at Mamluk Biographical Dictionaries through the Lens of Physiognomy”
- Stephan Conermann (University of Bonn), “Baybars and his Amirs as Depicted by Izz al-Din Ibn Shaddad (d. 1285) in his al-Rawd al-Zahir fi Sirat al-Malik al-Zahir—Fact or Fiction?”
- Mohammad Gharaibeh (University of Bonn), “Biographical Dictionaries in the Service of the Intellectual Agenda of Religious Scholars”
Second Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, June 2015, Liège
Download the program here.
Intensive course: A Holistic Approach to Manuscript Studies
A three-day intensive course intended for advanced graduate students, given by Prof. Dr. Frédéric Bauden (University of Liège), will be held immediately before the conference (June 22 to June 24). The course will be focused on manuscript studies. The course, intended to help students who need to work on manuscripts for their research, will provide them with the most important tools and methods to achieve their goal. Codicology is essential to describe a manuscript and to analyze its support, but it needs to be used with other disciplines in order to apprehend a manuscript (i.e., also its text) in all its complexity. It is important to note that this course is not just about codicology: theoretical issues will be addressed in the morning sessions while afternoon sessions will be devoted to practice. To this end, they will be held at the manuscript room, where the students will have the opportunity to work on a selection of manuscripts. A very good level of Arabic is required (minimum four years of Arabic at the university level). Since the number of the participants will be limited (a maximum of 15), those who desire to take part in the course are requested to send a CV, a statement of purpose, and a letter of recommendation by January 31, 2015. Course fees will amount to 300€, including attendance at the conference and the social dinner. The fees must be paid by April 30, 2015 (information on the method of payment to be used will be provided by the end of February together with the announcement of the selection of participants). Participants must make their own travel arrangements. The local organizer will provide suggestions for lodging at an affordable price. A certificate of attendance will be awarded. Those who are selected for the course will be notified by the end of February 2015.
First Conference of the School of Mamluk Studies, June 2014, Venice
Università Ca’ Foscari, Venezia, Italy, 23-25 June 2014
CONFERENCE SCHEDULE
JUNE 23: THEMED DAY ON AL-SUYUTI
Chair: Thomas Bauer
- ÉRIC GEOFFROY, Al-Suyuti as a Sufi
- JAAKKO HÄMEEN ANTTILA, Al-Suyuti and Erotic Literature
- RODICA FIRANESCU, Revisiting Love and Coquetry in Medieval Arabic Islam: al-Suyuti's Perspective
- HEBA MOSTAFA, Al-Rawdah: Narratives of an Earthly Island Paradise in al-Suyuti’s Kawkab al-Rawdah fi Tarikh Jazirat Misr al-Musammah bi-al-Rawdah
Chair: Jaakko Hämeen Anttila
- STEPHEN R. BURGE, Al-Suyuti’s Qur'anic Hermeneutics Revised: A Comparison of his Tahbir and Itqan
- MAHMOOD IBRAHIM, Social Origin of Qur'anic Abrogation: Al-Suyuti on the Issue of Naskh
- JOEL BLECHER, Al-Suyuti and the Art of Hadith Commentary: The Case of Ta'zir
- FRANCESCO GRANDE, L’histoire tend au système: The Protohistory of Arabic in the Muzhir of al-Suyuti
Chair: Frédéric Bauden
- MUSTAFA BANISTER, Casting the Caliph in a Cosmic Role: The Transmission of al-Suyuti’s Historical Vision
- CHRISTIAN MAUDER, Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti’s Stance Toward Worldly Power: a Reexamination Based on Unpublished Sources
- TAKAO ITO, Al-Suyuti and Problems of the Waqf
- JUDITH KINDINGER, Reconceiving the Taylasan in al-Suyuti’s Works
Chair: Marlis Saleh
- MICHELE PETRONE, Al-Suyuti in the Catalogues of West African Collections of Manuscripts
- CHRISTOPHER BAHL, The Raf' Sha'n al-Hubshan by Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti or "Preservation Through Elaboration in the 'Historicisation' of the Abyssinians"
- YOSHUAA PATEL, Al-Suyuti on the Relative Value of Skin Color
JUNE 24, 2014 PANELS
Panel 1: Venice and Mamluk Egypt (Maria Pia Pedani)
- MARIA PIA PEDANI, Mamluk-Venetian Relations
- GEORG CHRIST, Urban Transhumance: Mamluk Imperial Power and Venetian Trade between Cairo, Alexandria and Damietta (Early 15th Century)
- YUTAKA HORII, The Venetian Consul and Trade in Late Mamluk Egypt
- ALESSIO SOPRACASA, The Mamluk Economic and Administrative Apparatus Managing the International Trade in Alexandria between the Second Half of the 15th and the Beginning of the 16th Century (with Some Topographical Elements Related)
Panel 2: Mamluk Palestine and Bilad al-Sham (Yaacov Lev)
- YAACOV LEV, The 666/1267–1268 Truce between Sultan Baybars and Hugh III of Acre: Political and Geographical Aspects
- JOSEPH DRORY, Arqutay, an Influential Safed Governor and Cairene Statesman
- YEHOSHUA FRENKEL, Mamluk Bilad al-Sham: The Contribution of Environmental History to the Study of Land Tenure
- HANA TARAGAN, Mamluk Patronage, Crusader Memories: Spolia and Appropriation in 13th-Century Bilad al-Sham
Panel 3: The “Archival Turn,” or How Mamluk Diplomacy Serves Mamluk History (Malika Dekkiche)
- FRÉDÉRIC BAUDEN, Bandar al-Tur, a Harbor on the Red Sea and its Significance for the Mamluks
- MARINA RUSTOW, An Unpublished Mamluk Legal Document from the Cairo Geniza
- TAMER EL-LEITHY, The Biography of a Coptic Alley in Cairo: Reproducing Home and Family, Rethinking (Dhimmi) Community and (Muslim) Courts
JUNE 25, 2014 PANELS
Panel 4: Scribal Culture and Practice in the Mamluk Empire (Elias Muhanna – Adam Talib)
- ELIAS MUHANNA, Innovation and Tradition in Scribal (Best) Practices: The Concept of Istilah in Chancery Literature
- KONRAD HIRSCHLER, Moving beyond the Centre: Scribes in the Officers’ Administration
- MAURICE POMERANTZ, The Administrative Imaginary: Governance, Geography, and Trade in a Maqamah Collection of the 8th/14th Century
- ADAM TALIB, The Professional Professionals: The Illusion of Personality in the Works of Ibn Hijjah al-Hamawi and His Fellow Scribal Professionals
- VALENTINA SAGARIA ROSSI, The «Mise en texte» of Some Manuscripts of al-Safadi's al-Wafi bi-al-wafayat: Techniques and Models
Panel 5 Boundaries of Epistemological Models in the Mamluk Period (Caterina Bori – Livnat Holtzmann; chair: Giovanna Calasso)
- CATERINA BORI, Firasah as a Source of Legal Judgment, or a “Semeiotic” Paradigm in the Service of Justice
- GIUSEPPE CECERE, Sanctity and Knowledge in Ibn 'Ata' Allah al-Iskandari: A Sunni Sufi
- FRANK GRIFFEL, The Epistemological Foundation of Ibn Taymiyah’s Critique Against Mainstream Ash'arism
- LIVNAT HOLTZMANN, The Dream-Interpreter and the Later Hanbalis: Regulating Oneiromancy in Mamluk Damascus
Panel 6 Marked Bodies: Meanings and Practices (Marion Katz)
- MARION HOLMES KATZ, Fattening up in Medieval Cairo: Religion, Medicine, and the Social Meanings of Body Size
- RICHARD MCGREGOR, Thinking about Looking: Relics and the Rhetoric of the Body in Mamluk Egypt
- KRISTINA RICHARDSON, Blue and Green Eyes in the Islamicate Middle Ages
- SYRINX VAN HEES, Descriptions of the Body in Biographies and their Social Meanings
Panel 7 Conceiving Space in 14th-Century Syrian Hanbali Religious Thought (Livnat Holtzman)
- ANTONIA BOSANQUET, Spacing Paradise: Ibn al-Qayyim's Discussion of Non-Muslims and the Afterlife
- JON HOOVER, Ibn Taymiyah on God’s Relation to Space
Workshop on Mamluk Poetry, 26-28 June, 2014
Università Ca’ Foscari, Venezia
Intensive course: A two-and-a-half day intensive course intended for advanced graduate students was held immediately following the conference (June 26 to June 28). The course, given by Prof. Dr. Thomas Bauer (Muenster University), focused on Mamluk poetry. A certificate of attendance was awarded.