Orientalisches Seminar  -  معهد الاستشراق

The Checklist of Arabic Documents

(Last Update 16. November 2011)

by Petra M. Sijpesteijn (p.m.sijpesteijn at hum.leidenuniv.nl), John F. Oates (✝), Andreas Kaplony (andreas.kaplony at lmu.de), and Eva M. Youssef-Grob (egrob at access.uzh.ch)

We would like to thank Lesley Wilkins and Amalia Zomeńo for making their bibliographies available to us to include in this checklist.

Introduction

The Checklist of Arabic Documents aims to facilitate and advance the use of Arabic documents. By providing this inclusive bibliography of editions of Arabic documentary texts - on papyrus, paper, parchment, leather, ostraca, wood, stone and bone - in monographs and articles, and setting out a standardized system of abbreviations for monographs of Arabic document editions, we hope it will serve to enhance the transparency of citations and improve the accessibility of editions, functioning as a useful point of reference for Arabists and non-Arabists, specialists and non-specials alike.

Arabic Papyrology

Scholars have long acknowledged the importance of papyri and other documents for our understanding of early and medieval Islamic culture and society. Tens of thousands of papyrus documents survive, in Greek, Coptic and Arabic, and among the vastly diverse and significant information they contain are the only contemporary records of the Muslim conquest of Egypt in the mid-seventh century, a cornerstone event not only in the history of Mediterranean civilization but in the development of one of the most populous religions of the world. Never intended to be read by later generations, the documents not only offer a useful check on the data preserved in narrative and literary sources, but also record aspects of life and strata of society to which we would otherwise have no access, and with a richness, immediacy and variety unmatched by any other source. Together, these documents have the potential to shine a fresh and detailed new light on early Islamic Mediterranean culture and society. The field can no longer afford to be without them.

Despite their importance, however, papyri from the Islamic period continue to be underused. The philological complexity of Arabic papyri combined with the poorly developed infrastructure of the field (with few catalogues and handlists) seriously impedes the edition of new documents. Of the tens of thousands of Arabic documents preserved in museum and library collections around the world, only some two thousand have been published so far. The relative neglect is especially striking when Arabic papyrology is compared to older disciplines such as Greek, Latin and Coptic papyrology, all of which have benefited from such essential tools as electronic and printed databases, lexicographic, geographical, onomastic and linguistic reference works and compilations of corrigenda - all of which Arabic papyrology lacks.

The Development of Arabic Papyrology

Change, however, is in the air. In March 2002 the International Society for Arabic Papyrology (ISAP) was founded in Cairo (http://www.ori.uzh.ch/isap.html) as part of an ongoing campaign to promote the study of this important resource and to ensure it is accessible to the larger scholarly community. The need to offer a professional forum for scholarly exchange has begun to be met by an electronic mailing list, the ISAP newsletter, and a web-site dedicated to the study of Arabic papyrology (http://www.ori.uzh.ch/isap.html). ISAP has also organized three conferences, in Cairo in 2002, in Granada, Spain in 2004, and in Alexandria in 2006, at which more than fifty scholars from around the world joined in a discussion of Arabic documentary sources, the challenges they pose and the rewards they offer. An important aspect of these conferences has been to integrate research conducted in the other languages of the medieval Middle East: Greek, Coptic, Judaeo-Arabic, and Persian. The high attendance among non-Arabists shows the extent to which Arabic papyrology is of interest to scholars beyond its own linguistic borders and heightens the need to make this field accessible to non-Arabic users.

On another front, in 2002 the Institute of Oriental Studies at the University of Zurich launched the internet-based Zurich Arabic Papyrology School offering initial training in the reading of Arabic papyri (http://www.ori.uzh.ch/aps). The university is also building up a fully searchable Arabic Papyrology Database (http://www.ori.uzh.ch/apd), which contains editions of Arabic documents with translations and corrections.

Another development has been the offering of training courses in Arabic papyrology. A first Arabic Papyrology Workshop was organised in January 2006 at the Oriental Institute of the University of Oxford by Petra Sijpesteijn, Teresa Bernheimer and Chase Robinson, sponsored by the Hulme University Fund and the Oriental Faculty. An Arabic Papyrology Summerschool is planned to take place in Vienna at the Papyrussammlung in the Nationalbibliothek in 2007.

There still remain, however, large obstacles for scholars wishing to use Arabic documents. Most importantly, a comprehensive bibliography of edited Arabic documents, which are often published in journals and unique publications unknown except to the informed scholar, is completely lacking.

The Checklist for Arabic Documents

The Checklist for Arabic Documents seeks to fill this void by collecting the editions of Arabic documents published in monographs and those editions even harder to find published in Festschriften, obscure journals and other scattered publications. The system of standardized abbreviations of monograph editions makes referencing easier for Arabic papyrologists editing documents and facilitates the use of these editions by other scholars unfamiliar with the literature. Arabists and non-Arabists, papyrologists and other scholars interested in using documents in their research will find in the Checklist all published editions of Arabic documents grouped conveniently together and, using the uniform system of abbreviations, they should be able to reconstruct all cited bibliographical information with some ease.

The format of the abbreviations used in the Checklist for Arabic Documents, including some of the actual abbreviations, follow those of the Checklist of Greek, Latin, Demotic and Coptic, Papyri, Ostraca and Tablets, ed. J. F. Oates et al. (http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/papyrus/texts/clist.html). The initial 'P.' refers to the papyrus, paper or parchment on which the documents are written. The next item in the abbreviation refers to (in order of precedence): (1) the name of the place or other geographical reference, or the individual or group of individuals with which the documents were associated in antiquity; (2) the modern-day collection to which the documents belong; (3) the title, when the documents are thematically related; or (4) the names of the editor(s). Those abbreviations in the Checklist for Arabic Documents which already exist in the Checklist of Greek, Latin, Demotic and Coptic, Papyri, Ostraca and Tablets are followed by 'Arab.' to distinguish them from similar editions in Greek, Coptic and Demotic.

Boundaries and Expected Expansion

The geographical boundaries for editions included in the Checklist for Arabic Documents are determined by the use of Arabic in the medieval Muslim world and include, for example, Egypt, Andalusia, Sicily, Palestine and Khurasan. The chronological limit is set by the Ottoman conquest of the Levant and Egypt in the sixteenth century. The Checklist for Arabic Documents includes, firstly, monographic editions of Arabic documents on papyrus, paper, parchment, and leather from the entire medieval Arabic world, consisting in most cases of an introduction, edition and translation of each text and with a comprehensive word index to all texts (I). Secondly, editions of texts on papyrus, paper, parchment, leather, wood, stone, ostraca and bone from Egypt or related to Egypt found in articles in scholarly journals, or editions of separate papers (e.g. Festschriften and symposium volumes) (II). Some instrumenta, including dictionaries, grammars, paleographical studies and the like are listed in section III. Finally, a list of abbreviated journals used in the Checklist appears at the end.

Excluded are for the moment waqf-documents which become especially numerous in Egypt from the Mamluk period onwards and often fall between the documentary and literary genre. Also left out for the moment is the Andalusian material that appeared in articles. Amalia Zomeńo provided the information for the Andalusian Arabic document editions in monographs included in the present Checklist for Arabic Documents and will add the editions in articles to future versions of the Checklist. Only a sample of Judeo-Arabic editions are included among the monograph editions and the articles. These documents were written in Arabic in Hebrew characters often interspersed with Hebrew and Aramaic phrases. Although this material is closely related in content and format to contemporary Arabic documents, we have decided not to include the vast bibliography of Judeo-Arabic editions in articles as good bibliographies of the Genizah material exist and more are being composed at the moment. See for example S. Reif, Published Material from the Cambridge Genizah Colletions: a Bibliography 1896-1980, Cambridge 1988, Hunter, E. C. D. and R. J. W. Jefferson, Published Material from the Cambridge Genizah Collections: a Bibliography 1980-1997, Cambridge 2004 and S. Shaked, A Tentative Bibliography of Geniza Documents. Prepared under the direction of D. H. Baneth and S. D. Goitein, Paris 1964. A large-scale project to gather bibliographical information on all Genizah fragments and which will include transcribed texts is currently being undertaken as part of the Friedberg Genizah Project.

As is clear from these last remarks, the Checklist for Arabic Documents remains a work in progress. The Checklist will be kept up-to-date on line and any corrections, suggestions and additions are very welcome and should be sent to Petra M. Sijpesteijn (p.m.sijpesteijn{at}hum.leidenuniv.nl) or Andreas Kaplony (andreas.kaplony{at}lmu.de).

I. Papyri Published in Edited Volumes

CPR = Corpus Papyrorum Raineri

27 = Chrest.Khoury I 2
59 = Chrest.Khoury I 3
65 = Chrest.Khoury I 4
111 = Chrest.Khoury I 5
186 = Chrest.Khoury I 6

P.Alqab

P.Aragon

154 = Barceló Torres, M. (1982), Saitabi 32

P.ArchivoGranada

P.Ardabil

P.Berl.Arab.

5 = CPR XXI 39
6 = CPR XXI 56
10 = Chrest.Khoury I 55
11 = Chrest.Khoury I 56
12 = Chrest.Khoury I 47 = P.Vente Appendix 1
15 = David-Weill/Adda/Cahen (1973) no. 2
18 = Chrest.Khoury I 32

P.Blockprints

P.Bodl.Arab.

P.Cair.Arab. = Arabic Papyri in the Egyptian Library, ed. A. Grohmann. Cairo.

11 = Chrest.Khoury I 2
14 = Chrest.Khoury I 3
31 = Chrest.Khoury I 5
37 = Chrest.Khoury I 21
45 = Chrest.Khoury I 11
48 = Chrest.Khoury I 14
49 = Chrest.Khoury I 13
52 = Chrest.Khoury I 23
62 = Chrest.Khoury I 1
77 = CPR XXI 3
81 = CPR XXI 15
82 = CPR XXI 16
83 = Chrest.Khoury I 70
85 = Chrest.Khoury I 71
86 = CPR XXI 31
87 = CPR XXI 32
88 = CPR XXI 17
96 = Chrest.Khoury I 61
98 = Chrest.Khoury I 31
101 = Chrest.Khoury I 28
106 = Chrest.Khoury I 35
111 = Chrest.Khoury I 36
114 = Chrest.Khoury I 38
121 = Chrest.Khoury I 58
137 = Chrest.Khoury I 86
138 = Chrest.Khoury I 76
139 = Chrest.Khoury I 8
141 = Chrest.Khoury I 9

P.Cair.Archives

P.CertificatsPčlerinage

P.DarAlKutub

P.DocumentosGranadinos

PERF

P.Fatimid

P.Fay.Monast.

3 = Chrest.Khour. I 74

P.Flor.Arab.

23 = Stern, S. M., "Petitions from the Ayyubid Period," BSOAS 27 (1964) 1-32. No. 1

P.GenizahCambr.

P.GenizahJewishFound.

P.GenizahKingdom

P.GenizahPalestine

P.Giss.Arab.

P.Granada

P.Granada 1 = P.GranadaNazari 1

P.GranadaNazeri

P.Hamb.Arab.

4 = Chrest.Khoury I 44

P.Haram = Watha'iq maqdisiyya ta'rikhiyya. (Jerusalem Historical Documents), ed. K. J. ʿAsali.

P.HaramCat.

P.Harrauer

P.Haun.Arab.

P.Heid.Arab.

1 = Chrest.Khoury I 90
3 = Chrest.Khoury I 91
5 = Chrest.Khoury I 93
6 = Chrest.Khoury I 94

P.Heid.Rechtsgutachten

P.Horak

P.Huesca Arab.

P.KaraiteGenizah

P.Khalili

P.KölnKauf.

P.Khurasan

P.Marchands = Marchands d'étoffes du Fayyoum au IIIe/IXe sičcle d'aprčs leurs archives (actes et lettres), ed. Y. Ragib.

1 = Chrest.Khoury I 60
8 = Chrest.Khoury I 30
12 = P.Berl.Arab. II 47
32 = P.Berl.Arab. II 48
12 = P.Berl.Arab. II 46
13 = P.Berl.Arab. II 44
21 = P.Berl.Arab. II 45

P.Mil.Vogl.

3 = Chrest.Khoury I 27

P.Mird

28 = Kister, M. J., "On an Early Fragment of the Qur'an," in S. R. Brunswick, ed., Studies in Judaica, Karaitica and Islamica Presented to Leon Nemoy on His Eightieth Birthday. Ramat-Gan 1982. 163-166.
47 = Kister, M. J., "On a Fragment of a Private Letter of the First Century A.H.," JSAI 3 (1981) 237-239.

P.Moriscos

58 = P.PaisValenciano 267

P.Mozarab. = Los Mozarabes de Toledo en los siglos XII y XIII, ed. A. Gonzalez Palencia. Madrid. All texts are parchment.

P.Ness. = Excavations at Nessana.

P.PaisValenciano

P.Panop.Bisch.

P.Philad.Arab.

P.Prag.Arab.

4 = Chrest.Khoury I 69

P.Quds

P.Qurra

P.QuseirArab.

P.Ross.Georg. = Papyri russischer und georgischer Sammlungen. Tiflis. [Rp. AMH]

P.Ryl.Arab.

P.Ryl.Copt.

P.Saarisalo

P.Sinai.Arab.

P.St.Catherine

P.Steuerquittungen

P.Terminkauf

P.Vente

P.Vind.Arab.

P.World

115 = SB XX 14443 (Greek text; note also that on pages 113 and 131 there are 2 bilingual, Greek and Arabic, texts.)
119 = Grohmann, "Aperçu," Études de papyrologie 1 (1932) 27
121 = P.Cair.Arab. 172
122 = Levi della Vida, G., "A papyrus Reference to the Damietta Raid of 853 A.D.," Byzantion 17 (1944-1945) 212-221
123 = P.Ryl.Arab. I 6
124-125 = P.Heid.Arab. I 1
126-128 = P.Cair.Arab. 148
129 = P.Cair.Arab. 154
138 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 25
140 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 7
141 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 8
142 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 9
147-148 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 10
148 = Karabacek, MPER II/III (1887) 162
152b = Chrest.Khoury II 15
153 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 11
154-155 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 17
158 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 26
166-167 = Grohmann, "Einige bemerkenswerte Urkunden," ArchOrient 18 (1950). No. 19
168-170 = Grohmann, "Texte zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte," ArchOrient 7 (1935). No. 2
171-172 = P.Ryl.Arab. I 5
175-176 = P.Ryl.Arab. VI 15
177 = P.Ryl.Arab. VI 1
178-179 = P.Ryl.Arab. VI 6
179-180 = P.Ryl.Arab. VI 14
180-181 = P.Ryl.Arab. VI 18
184-185 = Jahn, "Vom frühislamischen Briefwesen," ArchOrient 9 (1937). No. 6
185-186 = Jahn, "Vom frühislamischen Briefwesen," ArchOrient 9 (1937). No. 7
189-190 = P.Cair.Arab. 37
191-193 = P.Cair.Arab. 48
196-197 = P.Cair.Arab. 45
200-201 = P.Cair.Arab. 52
202-203 = P.Cair.Arab. 53
203-205 = P.Cair.Arab. 54
207-208 = P.Cair.Arab. 81
208-209 = P.Cair.Arab. 96
209-210 = P.Cair.Arab. 98
210-211 = P.Cair.Arab. 105
212-213 = P.Cair.Arab. 111

II. Papyrus Editions Published in Articles

1 = Chrest. Khoury I 10
2 = Chrest. Khoury I 15
7 = Becker (1911) 4 = P.Cair.Arab. 147
12 = P.Cair.Arab. 150
14 = Becker (1911) = P.Cair.Arab. 151
1 = P.Cair.Arab. 146
2 = P.Cair.Arab. 148
3 = P.Cair.Arab. 149
4 = P.Cair.Arab. 147
5 = P.Cair.Arab. 151
6 = P.Cair.Arab. 153
8 = P.Cair.Arab. 154
9 = P.Cair.Arab. 155
10 = P.Cair.Arab. 152
11 = P.Cair.Arab. 156
13 = P.Cair.Arab. 160
14 = P.Cair.Arab. 161
15 = P.Cair.Arab. 162
16 = P.Cair.Arab. 163
14 = Chrest.Khoury I 7.
Colin, G. S., "Sur une charte hispano-arabe de 1312," Islamica 3 (1927) 363-390.
10 = P.Vente 8
Dagorn, R., "Le document almohade de Poblet,"
Islamochristiana 7 (1981) 146-166.
7 = Chrest.Khoury I 22
13 = Chrest.Khoury I 12
15 = Chrest.Khoury I 16
1 = Chrest.Khoury II 29
1 = P.QuseirArab. 42
2 = P.QuseirArab. 53
3 = P.QuseirArab. 39
4 = P.QuseirArab. 56
5 = P.QuseirArab. 46
6 = P.QuseirArab. 59
7 = P.QuseirArab. 6
8 = P.QuseirArab. 64
1 = P.QuseirArab. 7
2 = P.QuseirArab. 20
3 = P.QuseirArab. 9
4 = P.QuseirArab. 74
1 = Chrest.Khoury I 96 = P.Heid.Arab. II 1 (with edition of verso)
8 = Chrest.Khoury I 97
12 = Chrest.Khoury I 98
1 = Chrest.Khoury I 72 = CPR XXI 1
2 = Chrest.Khoury I 72 = P.Berl.Arab. II 75
Barceló Torres, María del Carmen, "Documentos árabes de al-Azrāq (1245-1250)", Saitabi 32 (1982), 27-41.
Burns, Robert I./Chevedden, Paul E., "El tractat de rendició d'al-Azraq amb Jaume I i l'Infant Alfons en 1245, el text ŕrab i el context valenciŕ", Espill 17-18 (1983), 242-257.
Burns, Robert I./Chevedden, Paul E., "Al-Azraq's Surrender Treaty with Jaume I and Prince Alfonso in 1245, Arabic Text and Valencian Context", Der Islam 66 (1989), 1-37.
Guichard, Pierre, Les musulmans de Valence et la reconquęte (XIe-XIIIe sičcles), Damaskus 1990-91.
Burns, Robert I./Chevedden, Paul E./de Epalza, Míkel, Negotiating Cultures. Bilingual Surrender Treaties in Muslim-Crusader Spain under James the Conqueror, Leiden 1999 (The Medieval Mediterranean - Peoples, Economies and Cultures, 400-1453, vol. 22). Chapter 3.
1 = P.Granada 16
4 = P.Granada 93
1 = Raghib, Y., "Sauf-conduits d'Egypte omeyyade et abbaside," Annales Islamologiques 31 (1997) 143-168, No. 7
1 = Raghib, Y., "Sauf-conduits d'Egypte omeyyade et abbaside," Annales Islamologiques 31 (1997) 143-168, No. 8

III. Corpora

Chrest.Khoury

47 = P.Vente appendix 1
49 = Chrest.Khoury II 12
53 = P.Vente 9
54 = P.Vente 25
67 = CPR XXI 7
69 = CPR XXI 12
72 = CPR XXI 1
16 = P.Vente 10
17 = P.Vente 14
18 = P.Vente 17
27 = CPR XXI 9
28 = CPR XXI 10
31 = P.Vind.Arab. III 77
32 = P.Vind.Arab. III 76
33 = P.Vind.Arab. III 75

IV. Instrumenta

Handbooks

Grohmann, World. See P.World in section I.

Grohmann, Chronologie

Grohmann, Geographie

Grohmann, Einführung

Grundriss

Onomastica

Gratzl, Frauennamen

Hess, Beduinennamen

Ibn al-Kalbi

Wuestenfeld, Register

NB

Geographical Dictionaries

Halm

Salmon, Repertoire

Timm

Palaeography

Abbott, North Arabic Script

Gruendler, Scripts

Moritz, Palaeography

Schopen, Tinten

Grammars

Blau, Grammar of Christian Arabic

Blau, Handbook

Diem, Untersuchungen

Hopkins, Studies

Dictionaries

Diem Radenberg, Dictionary

Blau, Dictionary

Dozy, Supplement

Kazimirski, Dictionnaire

Lane, Lexicon

Ullmann, Wörterbuch

V. Series

Codices Arabici Antiqui. Wiesbaden. [OH]

Documenta Arabica Antiqua. Wiesbaden. [OH]

VI. Abbreviations Used For Periodicals and Serials

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