Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy, vol.1, issues 1-3.

• Author: Shahid, Irfan

The launching of the new journal, Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy (AAE), is very welcome, and its successful appearance in this attractive format is a tribute to the energy and vision of its editor, the young American scholar, Daniel Potts, who has already established his reputation as the author of the two-volume work, The Arabian Gulf in Antiquity. The editor makes in the editorial of the first issue an excellent case for the appearance of a journal dedicated to the archaeology and epigraphy of the Arabian Peninsula. In support of, and in addition to, the various cogent arguments for the appearance of this journal I should like to make the following observations:

First, Arabia, the largest peninsula in the world, is the homeland of the Semites, at least in S. Moscati's sense. Hence it is the homeland of an important family of peoples, the history of whom will greatly benefit from this sustained and intensive interest in its archaeology and epigraphy, and that includes Biblical studies. With the call of Muhammad to prophethood, the Peninsula became also the cradle of Islam, and the homeland of the ethnic group that sponsored Islam, the religion as well as the political and military movement that initiated a new era in world history. Arabia's Islamic character adds a new dimension to its importance, and makes it a most significant unit of historical study in both ancient and medieval times. This journal devoted to its ancient and medieval period is thus academically defensible and reflects the importance of the peninsula in these two periods of world history.

Second, that AAE is a journal devoted to archaeology and epigraphy is especially important. The literary sources, classical and Semitic, on ancient Arabia are not many and they have been almost exhaustively studied. And it is unlikely that new literary discoveries will be made. In the entire twentieth century only two literary documents were discovered on the history of south Arabia in the sixth century, namely, the Book of the Himyarites and the second Letter of Simeon of Beth-Arsham. Hence the history of ancient Arabia is almost entirely in the hands of the archaeologist and the epigrapher. This is roughly true of the medieval Islamic period also, when after the translatio imperii from Medina to Damascus, then to Baghdad, Arabia ceased to be the center of the Islamic empire, and literary activity, with the exception of south Arabia, flourished elsewhere. Thus the archaeology and...