Lost Maps of the Caliphs Lost Maps of the Caliphs Drawing the World in Eleventh-C entury Cairo Yossef Rapoport and Emilie Savage- Smith The University of Chicago Press Chicago and London The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637 The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London © 2018 by The University of Chicago All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews. For more information, contact the University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637. Published 2018 Printed in the United States of America 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 1 2 3 4 5 ISBN- 13: 978- 0- 226- 54088- 7 (cloth) ISBN- 13: 978- 0- 226- 55340- 5 (e- book) DOI: https:// doi .org /10 .7208 /chicago /9780226553405 .001 .0001 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Rapoport, Yossef, 1968– author. | Savage-Smith, Emilie, author. Title: Lost maps of the caliphs : drawing the world in eleventh- century Cairo / Yossef Rapoport and Emilie Savage-Smith. Description: Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: lccn 2018004554 | isbn 9780226540887 (cloth : alk. paper) | isbn 9780226553405 (e-book) Subjects: lcsh: Gharā’ib al-funūn wa-mulaḥ al-‘uyūn. | Geography, Medieval—Egypt—Maps. | Astronomy, Medieval—Egypt—Maps. | Islamic astrology—Early works to 1800. | Cosmography—Early works to 1800. Classification: lcc g93 .r37 2018 | ddc 526.0962/1609021—dc23 lc record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018004554 ♾ This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48- 1992 (Permanence of Paper). Contents Introduction 1 Chapter 1 . A Discovery 7 Chapter 2 . Macrocosm to Microcosm: Reading the Skies and Stars in Fatimid Egypt 29 Chapter 3 . The Rectangular World Map 75 Chapter 4 . The Nile, the Mountain of the Moon, and the White Sand Dunes 101 Chapter 5 . The View from the Sea: Navigation and Representation of Maritime Space 125 Chapter 6 . Ports, Gates, Palaces: Drawing Fatimid Power on the Island- City Maps 155 Chapter 7 . The Fatimid Mediterranean 181 Chapter 8 . A Musk Road to China 197 Chapter 9 . Down the African Coast, from Aden to the Island of the Crocodile 215 Chapter 10 . The Book of Curiosities and the Islamic Geographical Tradition 229 Conclusion . Maps, Seas, and the Ismaʿili Mission 249 Appendix: A Technical Discourse on Star Lore and Astrology 255 Acknowledgments 271 Notes 275 References 307 Index 337 Introduction About a millennium ago, sometime between 1020 and 1050, in Cairo, a large illustrated book was completed. Its subject was nothing less than the entire universe, or what was then known of it. In the course of ten chapters, the author moved the reader from the outermost sphere of the stars through the spheres of the five planets visible to the naked eye down to the sublu- nary world of winds and comets. This was followed by twenty- five chapters on the Earth, beginning with calculation of the Earth’s circumference, mov- ing to overall views of the inhabited world, then to coastal lands and islands of the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean, lakes of the world, the five major rivers, and ending with strange plants, animals, and birds inhabiting the Earth. In his treatise, the author assembled materials, including many large maps and diagrams, “encompassing the principles of the Raised- Up Roof [the Heavens] and the Laid- Down Bed [the Earth]”— a book, he tells his patron, “that will reveal to you their intricate and difficult aspects.”1 The rhyming title that he (and it was surely a “he”) gave the book, Kitāb Gharāʾib al- funūn wa- mulaḥ al-ʿ uyūn, loosely translates as “The book of cu- riosities of the sciences and marvels for the eye.” For convenience, it will be referred to simply as the Book of Curiosities. We do not know the name of the author nor that of the patron, and the treatise itself was unknown to modern scholars until a remarkable manu- script copy of it surfaced in the year 2000. This highly illustrated copy was probably made in Egypt around 1200, some hundred and fifty years after the original was completed, and some eight hundred years later, in June of 2002, it was acquired by the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford. The story of the “discovery” of this highly illustrated manuscript of the Book of Curiosities, and the evidence for dating the copy as well as the com- position of the treatise itself, will be discussed in the next chapter. The manuscript evoked immense interest, particularly from historians of cartography, for it contains a remarkable series of early maps and astronom- 2 Introduction ical diagrams, most of which are unparalleled in any Greek, Latin, or Arabic material. It was followed by the identification of later copies of the treatise (lacking most of the illustrations) that had lain unnoticed in various librar- ies among the thousands of unstudied Arabic manuscripts awaiting schol- arly attention. In 2014 we published a critical edition along with a facsimile and annotated translation of the maps and text (using all available copies).2 This had been preceded in 2007 by an electronic high- quality reproduction of the Bodleian manuscript and its illustrations, linked by mouse- overs to a modern Arabic edition (without full use of other copies) and a prelimi- nary English translation. This preliminary edition and translation (no lon- ger available at www .bodley .ox .ac .uk /bookofcuriosities) has now been su- perseded by the printed critical edition and translation of 2014. Images of all the folios of the manuscript are available through the Bodleian Library for digital images (https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/). While the recent critical edition makes the treatise and its maps available for further study, it does not explain what they mean. In the 2014 publica- tion, we limited ourselves to deciphering and translating the details of the text, and left out the analysis of the treatise as a whole, whether within the context of Fatimid Egyptian society and learning or within the traditions of astrology, astronomy, geography, and cartography as they had developed up to that time in the medieval Islamic world. In this book, we show what the Book of Curiosities can teach us about eleventh- century Egyptian views of the macrocosm and microcosm— that is, the celestial universe and the diminutive world of humankind. By doing so, we will open a window into the worldview of eleventh- century Islamic society and learning, its geo- graphic horizons, and some of its scientific endeavors. The image of the macrocosm and microcosm is essential for understand- ing the structure and composition of the Book of Curiosities. The macro- cosm is the entire celestial universe, while the microcosm is the earthly realm of humans regarded as a miniature reflection of the universe. As- tronomy, astrology, and star lore are the topics of the first half of the trea- tise, “On the Heavens.” In the second chapter of the present volume, Emilie Savage- Smith shows that the Book of Curiosities sheds considerable light on the practice of astrology and the role of star lore in medieval Islam. The second half of the Book of Curiosities, “On the Earth,” is discussed by Yossef Rapoport in chapters 3 through 10, which are devoted to the enigmatic maps, their geographical information, and the evidence for global trade and mission networks found in this remarkable treatise. The depictions of both the celestial sphere and of the terrestrial world reflect the Fatimid Egyptian intellectual milieu in which the author operated and the Ismaʿili missionary network of which he may have been a member. Introduction 3 Fatimid Cairo, where this unique treatise was composed, was an excep- tional intellectual and political center. The Fatimids had built the city of Mahdia, in modern Tunisia, as their capital in 909– 12, and indeed the Book of Curiosities has the earliest preserved depiction of the city (see fig. 2.4 and plate 9). From this North African base, the Fatimids came to occupy Sicily and to undertake naval operations against the Byzantines. In 969 the Fatimids entered Old Cairo (Fusṭāṭ) and built a new capital nearby— that of New Cairo, known as “The Victorious” (al- Qāhirah). Uniquely among Middle Eastern Islamic empires, the Fatimids made a strategic decision to rely on maritime power rather than land armies, and they were to become the most powerful Islamic empire in the Mediterranean at the time. From their capital in Cairo, the Fatimids ruled over Egypt and Syria, and faced the forces of the First Crusade in 1099. Greatly weakened in the twelfth century, they were eventually overthrown by Saladin in 1187. Unlike the majority of Sunni Islamic states, the Fatimids were an Ismaʿili- Shiʿa dynasty that used a missionary network to propagate their sect throughout the Islamic world. By virtue of claiming descent from the Prophet’s daughter Fāṭimah and his cousin ʿAlī, the Fatimid caliph imams saw themselves as the righteous leaders of the Muslims and the salvation guide for humankind. To fulfil this divine promise, the Fatimids relied on a clandestine missionary network, called daʿwah, established in the mid- ninth century. It continued to operate following the foundation of the Fatimid state in North Africa, and, after the conquest of Egypt, its head- quarters were relocated to Cairo. The training of missionaries was some- times associated with the House of Knowledge (Dār al- ʿIlm), founded by the caliph al-Ḥ ākim in 1005, which became a focal point for encyclopedic learning by missionaries as well as non- Ismaʿilis. As a result of caliphal patronage and the missionary network, Fatimid Cairo attracted some the most influential scientists, philosophers, and poets of the medieval Islamic world. The chapters that follow go beyond the analysis of the work of one indi- vidual in one extraordinary capital of the Islamic world. We aim here to offer a reconsideration of the development of astronomy, astrology, geog- raphy, and cartography in the first four centuries of Islam. Through the comprehensive and structured discussion of the skies in the Book of Curi- osities, this book outlines the medieval Islamic understanding of the basic structure of the cosmos and celestial phenomena, as they were understood outside the circles of practicing astronomers and astrologers. Moreover, the Book of Curiosities forcefully illustrates the pervasive assumptions about the effects on life on Earth of almost any visible celestial phenomenon— be it zodiacal or non- zodiacal constellations, the smaller star groups called lunar