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Papers by Yusuf Umrethwala
Cambridge University Library Geniza Fragment of the Month, 2024
Not a lot is known about the diplomatic connections between the Buyids and the Fatimids. Historic... more Not a lot is known about the diplomatic connections between the Buyids and the Fatimids. Historical sources are typically silent on this subject. This paper examines a Fatimid state document, most probably an internal correspondence that mentions the Buyid amīr Abū Kālijār (d. 440/1048), and reports on the arrival of his wazīr. It contextualizes this document and seeks to derive evidence for potential diplomacy between the two regimes,
Science, Nature and Beauty: Harmony and Cosmological Perspectives in Islamic Science, 2022
This is a brochure to accompany the exhibit: “Science, Nature and Beauty: Harmony and Cosmologica... more This is a brochure to accompany the exhibit: “Science, Nature and Beauty: Harmony and Cosmological Perspectives in Islamic Science” (October 19th, 2022- March 3rd, 2023). This exhibit showcases over 90 manuscripts, instruments and objects from the Muslim World Manuscript collection which are housed in the Rare Book and Manuscript Library (RBML), at the Columbia University Libraries (CUL). This exhibit is a collective curatorial effort that has involved many students, faculty members, librarians, and library staff working hand-in-hand to exchange ideas and to select, research, engage with and mount the items.
Conference Presentations by Yusuf Umrethwala
MESA Annual Meeting, 2023
This paper investigates the relationship between medieval Islamic empires and the large classes o... more This paper investigates the relationship between medieval Islamic empires and the large classes of merchants that provided them with tax revenue and other essential services. Looking particularly from the angle of taxation on transit trade and individual merchant-amīr relationships, the main question it asks is: were merchants using the state as an apparatus to further their interests and needs or were state officials getting involved in trade in order to keep the merchants in check and impose state interventions? In more general terms, what did it mean for the state to be involved in commercial activities and how did that inform state governance and policies directly and indirectly?
Scholars of medieval Europe have shown how states were often instruments for mercantile interests and that state power was partly wielded through commercial activities. In the Islamic context, scholars have long believed that there was not enough surviving evidence to evaluate whether a similar connection existed between Islamic polities and merchant classes. Surviving narrative sources, such as chronicles, are generally silent on this topic. The documentary evidence preserved in the Cairo Geniza includes scores of merchant letters from the eleventh and twelfth centuries CE in Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic, as well as state and legal documents that shed light on this issue and inform our understanding of how commercial activities took place in Medieval Islamic Empires. Merchant letters frequently mention requisitions by Fatimid amīrs (state officials) as well as the role of state-owned ships in delivering commodities arriving on state-owned ships and the activities of merchants selling goods on behalf of amīrs.
This paper uses Geniza documents to overcome the silence of the narrative sources and to debunk the idea that insufficient sources for this economic history have survived. My findings demonstrate how the merchants used the state to further their economic interests and how the state simultaneously sought to control merchant activities for their own strategic needs and by imposing taxes on every step of trade and production.
ISAP IX Conference 2023 Program Institut fur den Nahen und Mittleren Osten LMU Munchen, 2023
Egyptian chroniclers like al-Maqrīzī and Ibn Muyassar among others report several famines that pl... more Egyptian chroniclers like al-Maqrīzī and Ibn Muyassar among others report several famines that plagued the lands of Egypt from the beginning of the tenth century, blaming them primarily on low Niles and ongoing political strife. Their accounts are like the horror stories of modern-day fiction in which pillages and cannibalism were just a starting point. The works of these chroniclers focus primarily on the consequences of famines in the metropolises and the state of people living in the urban fabric. On the contrary, The letters of Geniza merchants dating to these years suggest that trade continued as usual, with occasional hiccups. Several letters between the traders and peasants in the countryside also shed light on the prevailing conditions in the countryside during famines and times of food shortage. In this paper, through a study of the Geniza corpus supplemented with documents of Arabic papyrology dating to that period, I try to examine the social history of Egyptian famines in the 10th and 11th centuries from the perspective of the people in the countryside. How did they perceive the famine? Were they aware of the ongoing crises in the metropolises and did they affect them? Were they instrumental in countering the food shortages or did they aggravate the situation by hoarding grain or favoring the cultivation of commercial crops over food crops? Were the periods of famine as severe as historians narrate? Did the famines occur because of environmental catastrophes coupled with political crises or were they urban shortages for which the state had inadequate means to tackle?
SPICED ISLAM & SPICED ISLAM & TEXTUAL CIRCULATIONS TEXTUAL CIRCULATIONS INDIA, INDONESIA & THE INDIAN OCEAN, 2022
Books by Yusuf Umrethwala
Jupiter Printers, 2020
This self-published book records the migratory history of the Dawoodi Bohras, an ethno-religious ... more This self-published book records the migratory history of the Dawoodi Bohras, an ethno-religious minority originally from India. It documents first hand migratory experience of the community members in a time frame of approximately 150 years. The history spans across 40 countries and features pictures and archives each of which complement the vivid history of migrations.
Other Publications by Yusuf Umrethwala
Science, Nature, Beauty: Harmony and Cosmological Perspectives in Islamic Science, 2022
Muslim scholars attached a great weight to the value and development of knowledge, and it is fair... more Muslim scholars attached a great weight to the value and development of knowledge, and it is fair to say with Rosenthal that ʿ ilm [knowledge], its pursuit and propagation, defined many aspects of Islamic societies across locations and eras. Over extended periods of time and across a multitude of cultural contexts, the conceptualization and classification as well as the pursuit of knowledge were fostered by some fundamental beliefs undergirding the new faith, namely the view that God's creaturessmall or big, including humans as one component of a vast, harmonious and dynamic universe-all lead to knowledge of God. This worldview nurtured a vibrant curiosity and sense of awe at the world, which permeated every possible aspect of inquiry. ʿIlm was ultimately concerned with understanding God's āyats, his signs and creations in the world, and of man's place in the cosmos. Seeking and transmitting knowledge was a vital public good and a religious duty. A vibrant, diverse and dynamic system of scholarly exchange and scientific inquiry flourished throughout the Islamic worlds: religious sciences (e.g., shariah, fiqh and kalām) as well as literary and linguistic ones (adab, rhetoric, grammar, logic), "exact" and "applied" sciences all flourished side by side and fed one another. An astounding curiosity, humility, vibrancy and connectedness animated the outlook of scholars who traveled far and wide in search of a teacher, or of knowledge, leaving their lands, families, possessions, and familiar surroundings behind.
Cambridge University Library Geniza Fragment of the Month, 2024
Not a lot is known about the diplomatic connections between the Buyids and the Fatimids. Historic... more Not a lot is known about the diplomatic connections between the Buyids and the Fatimids. Historical sources are typically silent on this subject. This paper examines a Fatimid state document, most probably an internal correspondence that mentions the Buyid amīr Abū Kālijār (d. 440/1048), and reports on the arrival of his wazīr. It contextualizes this document and seeks to derive evidence for potential diplomacy between the two regimes,
Science, Nature and Beauty: Harmony and Cosmological Perspectives in Islamic Science, 2022
This is a brochure to accompany the exhibit: “Science, Nature and Beauty: Harmony and Cosmologica... more This is a brochure to accompany the exhibit: “Science, Nature and Beauty: Harmony and Cosmological Perspectives in Islamic Science” (October 19th, 2022- March 3rd, 2023). This exhibit showcases over 90 manuscripts, instruments and objects from the Muslim World Manuscript collection which are housed in the Rare Book and Manuscript Library (RBML), at the Columbia University Libraries (CUL). This exhibit is a collective curatorial effort that has involved many students, faculty members, librarians, and library staff working hand-in-hand to exchange ideas and to select, research, engage with and mount the items.
MESA Annual Meeting, 2023
This paper investigates the relationship between medieval Islamic empires and the large classes o... more This paper investigates the relationship between medieval Islamic empires and the large classes of merchants that provided them with tax revenue and other essential services. Looking particularly from the angle of taxation on transit trade and individual merchant-amīr relationships, the main question it asks is: were merchants using the state as an apparatus to further their interests and needs or were state officials getting involved in trade in order to keep the merchants in check and impose state interventions? In more general terms, what did it mean for the state to be involved in commercial activities and how did that inform state governance and policies directly and indirectly?
Scholars of medieval Europe have shown how states were often instruments for mercantile interests and that state power was partly wielded through commercial activities. In the Islamic context, scholars have long believed that there was not enough surviving evidence to evaluate whether a similar connection existed between Islamic polities and merchant classes. Surviving narrative sources, such as chronicles, are generally silent on this topic. The documentary evidence preserved in the Cairo Geniza includes scores of merchant letters from the eleventh and twelfth centuries CE in Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic, as well as state and legal documents that shed light on this issue and inform our understanding of how commercial activities took place in Medieval Islamic Empires. Merchant letters frequently mention requisitions by Fatimid amīrs (state officials) as well as the role of state-owned ships in delivering commodities arriving on state-owned ships and the activities of merchants selling goods on behalf of amīrs.
This paper uses Geniza documents to overcome the silence of the narrative sources and to debunk the idea that insufficient sources for this economic history have survived. My findings demonstrate how the merchants used the state to further their economic interests and how the state simultaneously sought to control merchant activities for their own strategic needs and by imposing taxes on every step of trade and production.
ISAP IX Conference 2023 Program Institut fur den Nahen und Mittleren Osten LMU Munchen, 2023
Egyptian chroniclers like al-Maqrīzī and Ibn Muyassar among others report several famines that pl... more Egyptian chroniclers like al-Maqrīzī and Ibn Muyassar among others report several famines that plagued the lands of Egypt from the beginning of the tenth century, blaming them primarily on low Niles and ongoing political strife. Their accounts are like the horror stories of modern-day fiction in which pillages and cannibalism were just a starting point. The works of these chroniclers focus primarily on the consequences of famines in the metropolises and the state of people living in the urban fabric. On the contrary, The letters of Geniza merchants dating to these years suggest that trade continued as usual, with occasional hiccups. Several letters between the traders and peasants in the countryside also shed light on the prevailing conditions in the countryside during famines and times of food shortage. In this paper, through a study of the Geniza corpus supplemented with documents of Arabic papyrology dating to that period, I try to examine the social history of Egyptian famines in the 10th and 11th centuries from the perspective of the people in the countryside. How did they perceive the famine? Were they aware of the ongoing crises in the metropolises and did they affect them? Were they instrumental in countering the food shortages or did they aggravate the situation by hoarding grain or favoring the cultivation of commercial crops over food crops? Were the periods of famine as severe as historians narrate? Did the famines occur because of environmental catastrophes coupled with political crises or were they urban shortages for which the state had inadequate means to tackle?
SPICED ISLAM & SPICED ISLAM & TEXTUAL CIRCULATIONS TEXTUAL CIRCULATIONS INDIA, INDONESIA & THE INDIAN OCEAN, 2022
Jupiter Printers, 2020
This self-published book records the migratory history of the Dawoodi Bohras, an ethno-religious ... more This self-published book records the migratory history of the Dawoodi Bohras, an ethno-religious minority originally from India. It documents first hand migratory experience of the community members in a time frame of approximately 150 years. The history spans across 40 countries and features pictures and archives each of which complement the vivid history of migrations.
Science, Nature, Beauty: Harmony and Cosmological Perspectives in Islamic Science, 2022
Muslim scholars attached a great weight to the value and development of knowledge, and it is fair... more Muslim scholars attached a great weight to the value and development of knowledge, and it is fair to say with Rosenthal that ʿ ilm [knowledge], its pursuit and propagation, defined many aspects of Islamic societies across locations and eras. Over extended periods of time and across a multitude of cultural contexts, the conceptualization and classification as well as the pursuit of knowledge were fostered by some fundamental beliefs undergirding the new faith, namely the view that God's creaturessmall or big, including humans as one component of a vast, harmonious and dynamic universe-all lead to knowledge of God. This worldview nurtured a vibrant curiosity and sense of awe at the world, which permeated every possible aspect of inquiry. ʿIlm was ultimately concerned with understanding God's āyats, his signs and creations in the world, and of man's place in the cosmos. Seeking and transmitting knowledge was a vital public good and a religious duty. A vibrant, diverse and dynamic system of scholarly exchange and scientific inquiry flourished throughout the Islamic worlds: religious sciences (e.g., shariah, fiqh and kalām) as well as literary and linguistic ones (adab, rhetoric, grammar, logic), "exact" and "applied" sciences all flourished side by side and fed one another. An astounding curiosity, humility, vibrancy and connectedness animated the outlook of scholars who traveled far and wide in search of a teacher, or of knowledge, leaving their lands, families, possessions, and familiar surroundings behind.