Reviving the Islamic Caliphate in Early Modern Morocco - Stephen Cory
eTextbook alternate format product

Instant online reading.
Don't wait for delivery!

Reviving the Islamic Caliphate in Early Modern Morocco

By: Stephen Cory

Paperback | 14 October 2024

At a Glance

Paperback


RRP $82.99

$66.25

20%OFF

or 4 interest-free payments of $16.56 with

 or 

Available for Backorder. We will order this from our supplier however there isn't a current ETA.

Historians have long grappled with the question of how Islamic civilization - so clearly dominant during the medieval period - could fall completely under Western hegemony in the modern age? Many Western writers answer this question by referencing European ingenuity, initiative, and transformative energy in contrast with Islamic parochialism, passivity, and resistance to change. This book challenges such assumptions by studying the career of an aggressive sultan in early-modern Morocco, Mulay Ahmad al-Mansur (r. 1578-1603), who dared to take on the international super-powers of his day and sought to redraw the map of Islamic Africa. Al-Mansur is best known for launching a bold invasion across the Sahara desert to conquer the West African Songhay Empire. Most historians ascribe strictly economic motives for this assault, stating that the sultan wished to capture the prosperous gold trade that had traveled for centuries from West Africa to the Mediterranean. Dr Cory argues instead that Mulay Ahmad was pursuing more expansive goals than simply stuffing his coffers with West African gold, as evidenced by audacious claims made on his behalf in numerous panegyric texts produced by the sultan''s court. Through a detailed analysis of official histories, documents and correspondence, writings by European observers, and architectural evidence, he contends that the sultan sought to establish a Western caliphate that would eclipse the Ottoman Empire. Mulay Ahmad advanced this agenda through panegyric literature, elaborate court ceremonies, grand constructions, stunning military conquests, and astute diplomacy with European powers, Ottoman officials, and sub-Saharan rulers. Such assertions of universal caliphal authority had not been seriously promoted in Islam for over three hundred years before al-Mansur''s reign. Thus al-Mansur sought to move his country forward into the modern age by returning to an institution that had governed Muslim lands during the fabled golden age of the Abbasid and Andalusian Umayyad caliphates. Through an investigation of the sultan''s ambitions and achievements Dr Cory provides new insight into the history of relations between Muslim states and the West.

More in General & World History

Looking At Women, Looking At War - Victoria Amelina

RRP $34.99

$31.75

Normal Women : 900 Years Of Making History - Philippa Gregory
The Golden Road : How Ancient India Transformed the World - William Dalrymple
The Times Complete History of the World - Richard Overy

RRP $225.00

$134.75

40%
OFF
The Art of War & Other Classics of Eastern Philosophy : Leather-bound Classics - Confucius
Homo Deus : A Brief History of Tomorrow - Yuval Noah Harari

RRP $24.99

$23.75

Humankind : A Hopeful History - Rutger Bregman

RRP $24.99

$23.75

The End of Everything : How Wars Descend into Annihilation - Victor D Hanson
The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World - Bettany Hughes

RRP $34.99

$26.75

24%
OFF
The Happiest Man on Earth - Eddie Jaku

RRP $32.99

$18.95

43%
OFF
The Journals of Captain Cook : Penguin Classics - James Cook
The Fatal Shore - Robert Hughes

RRP $24.99

$23.75

War - Bob Woodward

Paperback

RRP $37.99

$33.90

11%
OFF
Kokoda : Updated Edition - Peter FitzSimons

RRP $39.99

$32.75

18%
OFF
The Voynich Manuscript - Raymond Clemens

RRP $82.95

$55.00

34%
OFF