Cities and Caliphs: On the Genesis of Arab Muslim Urbanism.

• Author: Celik, Zeynep

The starting point of Nezar Alsayyad's Cities and Caliphs addresses an important problematic in Middle Eastern historiography, namely, the "Muslim city" as a construct of orientalist scholarship. Alsayyad promises to deconstruct this concept with the help of new data from the chronicles of al-Baladhuri, al-Yaqubi, al-Tabari, Ibn Asakir, and al-Maqrizi, arguing that political matters were more instrumental than religious ones and that the caliphs' political visions and programs played crucial roles in the formation of the early Muslim cities. But the author's stated goal is even more ambitious. He claims "this work is more a thesis about history from the point of view of method...." Furthermore, he attempts "to marry ... the practice of urban history and the analytical techniques of urban forms and design." After a discussion on the historiography of the Muslim city, Alsayyad examines the garrison towns of Basra and Kufa, urban transformations in Damascus, Aleppo, and Cordova, and the planned capital cities of Baghdad and Fatimid Cairo.

Perhaps because it tries to be too many things at the same time, the book ends up by dissappointing the reader on all fronts. This is especially unfortunate given the framework of recent post-colonial criticism that re-evaluates different aspects of orientalist and colonialist scholarship with growing authority and eloquence, cutting through various disciplines. Although a revisionist approach to the "Islamic city" has already been undertaken rigorously by Janet Abu-Lughod in a memorable article (IJMES, May 1987), a further investigation with detailed case studies would have been most welcome.

One of the disturbing aspects of this book is its derivative nature. Alsayyad himself states that his main theses are derived from other scholars: chapter II "primarily build|s~ on Abu-Lughod's work"; chapter III "explore|s~ ... further" Oleg Grabar's argument about the classical moment of Islamic art and "primarily refer|s~ to the work of Fred Donner"; chapter IV asks questions, which "in a variety of works, Oleg Grabar has answered...." One might have accepted this approach had Alsayyad expanded it significantly through his case studies. But, he frustrates the reader by referring to the same texts and urban examples already dissected by other scholars. For example, in tracing the origins of the stereotype for the Muslim city, Alsayyad quotes the same passages from Gustave von Grunebaum and Georges Marcais that...