The city of Qayrawan in the works of Salih Suwaysi

Writing midway during the complex social and political circumstances of the French Protectorate, Tunisian Salih Suwaysi al-Qayrawani wrote about his birth city of Qayrawan as a means to resist and critique colonial rule. Examination of two of his writings here demonstrates intellectual continuity from early Muslim writers, highlights his participation in cross-regional trends in the Arab world, and reflects the borrowing of European styles. Suwaysi's words convey his view about French actions in Qayrawan: they diminished the historical and religious significance of the city and the values and traditions of the people of the city. This article analyses Suwaysi's urban identification in his Dalil Qayrawan, a description of monuments, biographical sketches of historical figures, their tombs, etc., and Khasumah bayna madina wa-idara, a short story. The former reminds the reader of the khitat, a long-standing Arab-Islamic genre used by Suwaysi's nineteenth- and twentieth-century Arab world contemporaries to convey urban space and urban history; the latter reveals both a European inspiration and aspects of the millennium-old Arabic genre of maqama. Analysis of these two particular writings of Suwaysi highlights the ways in which he grappled with contemporary ideological trends, namely nationalism and anti-colonialism, while focusing on the principles of Islamic reformers. Keywords: Salih SuwaysiQayrawanTunisiaFrench Protectorateanti-colonialismnationalism nahda Islamic reformliterature Acknowledgement The author acknowledges the assistance of the following people: Laurie Brand, Rita Costa-Gomes, Kenneth W. Perkins, and the members of the Towson University History Department Faculty Seminar. Many thanks are also due to the American Institute for Maghrib Studies, the Centre d'études maghrébines à Tunis, and the Fulbright Scholar Program for assistance in making the research for this article possible. Notes Other than newspaper articles, no publications have emerged after the 1910s. A collection of Suwaysi's writings, of mostly previously unpublished material, was published posthumously, including one of the writings analysed in this study (Suwaysi 1978 Suwaysi, S. 1978. al-Hayfac wa-siraj al-layl mac maqamat wa-qisas ukhra, Tunis: al-Dar al-Tunisiyya li'l-nashr. [Google Scholar]). That collection includes maqamat, poetry, short stories, and a novel that address a broad range of topics from orphans in society to Islamic reform to urban life. Salih Suwaysi died in 1941. Dalil Qayrawan bears an original publication date of 1911. The one used here is a republished version from 2006. Khasumah bayna madina wa-idara appears in (Suwaysi 1978 Suwaysi, S. 1978. al-Hayfac wa-siraj al-layl mac maqamat wa-qisas ukhra, Tunis: al-Dar al-Tunisiyya li'l-nashr. [Google Scholar]). No reference has been found to a prior publication of this short story but his death in 1941 places its composition in the pre-World War II period. Country names are anachronistic, but will be used to identify similar territory that would later comprise the states by these names. By 1911 political societies had been forming on both sides of the Mediterranean, including the Young Turks, the Young Tunisians, and others, as a means to confront problems in their own societies and ultimately change them. Often the problems stemmed from colonial rule, as in the case of Tunisia, and in Italy's invasion of Libya in 1911, which Arabs, Turks, and Muslims could not justify. This occurred approximately in June 1881. Here Bakkush refers to a document issued by the French Ministry of War. For these numbers, Bakkush relies on Brunschvig 1940–47 Brunschvig, R. 1940–1947. La Berbérie orientale, sous les Ḥafṣides des origines a` la fin du 15ème sie`cle, Paris: Adrien-Maisonneuve. [Google Scholar], but does not list the page numbers in Brunschvig. Bakkush refers to volumes seven and eight of Abi Diyaf. Ahmad Ibn Abi Diyaf, a sometime government bureaucrat from a family of government bureaucrats, wrote a monumental history of government focusing on Tunisia in the nineteenth century (Abi Diyaf 1972, 2005). Jewish law would not prevail for land issues but they would in all other matters of personal status for Jews, including but not limited to birth registration, circumcision, marriage, divorce, and death. I have not seen this translated into English, nor have I see it mentioned other than in Suwaysi's own recounting of the events. A literal translation does not seem to sufficiently represent the court. How the changes that took place within the legal system from 1896 to 1897 affected Suwaysi is not clear from his statements. That the changes occurred at this time allows, however, provides the historical circumstances at the time of Suwaysi's legal difficulties. Ling refers to Consular Letters, XII, dispatch 39. Later on, in the early 1920s Suwaysi participated in the publication of a newspaper titled, al-Qayrawan. He wrote articles for it, and mostly likely submitted unattributed pieces. One example of that may be a piece on the front page both excoriating the population for losing their great city along with their religion, while also critiquing the situation in the city after the onset of French colonial rule. The article, 'Halat al-Qayrawan' ('The State of Qayrawan'), carried the byline 'Ibn Qayrawan' (1924 Ibn Qayrawan. 1924. Halat al-Qayrawan (The State of Qayrawan), al-Qayrawan 8 Sept, p. 1a [Google Scholar], 'A Son of Qayrawan') but the topics it covers are both ones that Suwaysi wrote about in his two writings analysed below. The discrepancy in the outcome of the two trials, of 1895 and 1897, may be the result of these changes in the tribunal system but research has not turned up information on the trial beyond what Suwaysi himself reports. Indeed, Girard named Suwaysi as one of the most important leaders of the Dustur Party in Qayrawan. Note: My article on this topic titled, 'Urban Identity in French Protectorate Tunisia: The Maqāmāt of Salih Suwaysi al-Qayrawani' was submitted for publication consideration as of 15 March 2011. The Dalil originally appeared in two versions, only slightly different from each other. It is not clear if a difference exists in the publication dates of these two versions. There is a complex definition of dalil in Arabic-Islamic philosophy dealing with signs and proofs. It is also widely used for instructors' guides of various kinds and other meanings. Here it is meant as a guide or guide book; Dalil is the commonly used Arabic term today for a tourist guidebook. While the British were by then installed in Egypt, the Khedive Isma'il was responsible for much of Cairo's development, which sank the country into great debt. One might look to a similar example of writing for two audiences to Khayr al-Din, Tunisia's Prime Minister in the late 1870s, when Suwaysi was a young boy in Tunis. At that time, Khayr al-Din wrote his treatise on the subject of good governance that reflected, in the manner of nineteenth-century Ottoman, but also Islamic, reformers, on the greatness of earlier period in Islamic history and on borrowing from Europe what is religiously permissible. Khayr al-Din's treatise was published first in Arabic (1867) but within a year appeared in a French translation and only within 11 years was translated into Turkish. Tunisia at that time was an autonomous province of the Ottoman Empire (al-Tunisi 1967 al-Tunisi, K.D., and Brown, L.C. (trans.), 1967. The Surest path: the political treatise of a nneteenth-century Muslim statesman. A translation of the introduction to the surest path to knowledge concerning the condition of countries. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967 [Google Scholar]). See note 16. Other Tunisians challenged French colonial rule in Tunisia in speeches on various occasions. Bahri, 1979 Bahri, M. H. 1979. Salih Suwaysi al-Qayrawani. al-Fikr., 25(3): 72–85. [Google Scholar]; Bin Abdullah, 2000 Bin Abdullah, A. 2000. Salih Suwaysi al-Qayrawani: Hayatuhu wa-Mukhtarat min Kitabatihi. Dhakira wa-Ibda Series, Tunis: Tunisian Ministry of Culture, Youth and Upbringing. [Google Scholar]; al-Hulayli, 1969 al-Hulayli, M. 1969. Fi-l-Adab al-Tunisi, Tunis: al-Dar al-Tunisiyya li'l-Nashr. [Google Scholar]; Ibn cAshur, 1961 Ibn cAshur, M. F. 1961. Arkan al-Nahda al-Adabiyya bi-Tunis, Tunis: Maktabat al-Najah. [Google Scholar]; al-Kafi, 1977 al-Kafi, N. 1977. Diwan Salih Suwaysi al-Qayrawani, Tunis: al-Dar al-Tunisiyya li'l-Nashr. [Google Scholar]. Translation: 'For whoever has a desire/affection for his country, he would not wish to die anywhere but in that country

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