The Reading Warehouse

Moving beyond the well-studied transition between the death of Justinian in 565 and the Arab-Muslim conquests in the seventh century, the volume focuses on the period between 700 and 950 during which the Islamic world asserted its identity and authority. Whilst the extraordinary prosperity of Near
Eastern cities and economies during this time was not unprecedented when one considers the early Imperial Roman world, the aftermath of the Arab-Muslim conquests saw a deep transformation of urban retail and craft which marked a distinct break from the past. It explores the mechanisms effecting
these changes, from the increasing involvement of caliphs and their governors in the patronage of urban economies, to the empowerment of enriched entrepreneurial tā%gir from the ninth century.

Combining detailed analysis of a large corpus of literary sources in Arabic with presentation of new physical and epigraphic evidence, and utilizing an innovative approach which is both comparative and global, the discussion lucidly locates the Middle East within the contemporary Eurasian context
and draws instructive parallels between the Islamic world and Western Christendom, Byzantium, South-East Asia, and China.