John Wansbrough
Biographic Data
| ID | 558909 |
|---|---|
| NAME | John Wansbrough |
| GIVEN NAMES | John |
| FAMILY NAME | Wansbrough |
| SIGNATURE | WANSBROUGH J |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 44 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 22 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1961 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2004 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Quranic Studies
"Wansbrough was the first to analyze carefully the documents from the first four centuries of Islam that describe the rise of the Quran to the position of absolute authority in the Muslim community. Although these works were known to exist, no modern scholar had actually read them and tried to make coherent sense of the material. Wansbrough carved out new areas of inquiry and debate for scholars and lay enthusiasts alike." "Although Quranic Studi…
Sic enim est traditum
Use of the term 'exegesis' is now so general that scholars in the field of scriptural studies must have sensed an impingement upon their conventional prerogative. If, perhaps, they are justified in so doing, they might none the less be prepared to acknowledge the value of ancillary functions accumulated in its extension into areas beyond its standard application to literature. While it may be that these can be encompassed in the general shift fro…
Gentilics and appellatives
The role of metaphor in the generation of descriptive terms is a commonplace of lexicography. Agency is usually identified as analogy, and the transfer itself analysed in terms of real or imagined similarity, e.g. ‘goth’ = barbaric, ‘gypsy’ = migrant, ‘vandal’ = destructive. Strictly defined, these exemplify metonymy, a species of metaphor found particularly in toponyms and gentilics. Development of such epithets as'‘arab’, ‘deutsch’ and ‘sūdān’ …
Diplomatica Siciliana
The study of Muslim rule and its vestiges in medieval Sicily has a long and distinguished pedigree. In the nineteenth century the impetus was both scholarly and political, to which the monumental works of Amari and De Mas Latrie bear eloquent witness. In more recent times the motive has been simple and straightforward curiosity about a remarkable instance of cultural symbiosis. The parameters are now either linguistic or historical or both, and t…
Metra Ugaritica
Amongst the contributions to a recent volume commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Ugaritic studies is a paper devoted to analysis of the problems involved in description of Semitic prosody. While the data adduced there are explicitly limited to Ugaritic and Hebrew verse, the author's method entails consideration of such general matters as the definition of metre and parallelism. Since these are, as is well known, the traditional parameters i…
Rhetorica Semitica
Although any lingering doubts about the lexical value of the Semitic particlebalought by now to have been dispelled by the observations of Labuschagne and Aartun, a few further remarks on the problems involved in contextual analysis might not be altogether superfluous. While this particular instance of etymological overkill is not included there, the several pitfalls encountered in the practice respectively of comparative philology and textual em…
Hebrew Verse
In the recently published volume of his collected papers Professor S. E. Loewenstamm includes two studies (here amplified) dealing with a feature of Semitic prosody described by him as ‘expanded colon’.His thesis is disarmingly straightforward: non-contiguous and, in some cases, contiguous repetition exhibits under certain conditions the deliberate expansion of a primary poetic structure, called ‘basic formula’ (p. 287), ‘simple basic formula’ (p…
Hebrew verse
Though beset with dispute, wavering conviction and a fair amount of inconsistency, most theories of Biblical prosody exhibit a dominant concern with phonology. Since one at least of the phenomena under scrutiny is metre, this shared propensity is hardly surprising, conditioned as a matter of course by Classical literature and the European tradition, but also by considerable evidence from the proximate sphere of other Semitic literatures. Comment …
Quranic Studies
Paul Wittek
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button
"Wansbrough's "Quranic Studies
The safe-conduct in Muslim chancery practice
One of the several branches of Islamic law in which practice diverged most sharply from theory was the law of commerce. The divergence is especially striking in two respects: regular imposition of taxes regarded by the shariī'a as illegal, and reliance upon written documents as legal proof of transactions for which juridical theory demanded only oral evidence of witnesses. A third problematical aspect of commercial law was the juridical status of…
Samuel Miklos Stern
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button
Majāz al-qur'ān
As a normative discipline Qur'anic exegesis shares both principles and terminology with the other Islamic sciences, and as such is not likely to have been articulated before the third/ninth century. Prominent in the fully elaborated system, as for example exhibited in the work of al-Zamakhshari (d. 538/1143), are the complementary principles ofqiyāsandtaqdīr.While the former is commonly understood to represent the hermeneutical instrument called …
On Recomposing the Islamic History of North Africa
The decolonization of history in the Islamic world has for a number of years proved a fascinating and profitable pursuit. For that portion of North Africa occupied by the French this process has consisted for the most part of two more or less separate activities: studies in depth and detail for the period after 1830, and for the preceding centuries (700-1830) a number of very general and frequently superficial recommendations, reflecting a sincer…
Theme, convention, and prosody in the vernacular poetry Of North Africa
Though not invariably susceptible of demonstration, the influence of Classical Arabic upon the popular literature of Arabic-speaking Muslims in North Africa may safely be assumed. 'Popular', indeed, the early Islamic verse forms (ši'r mawzūn) and the later stanzaic compositions (klam or ālat al-andalus) have remained, and in these, even when modified by local tradition, the source of inspiration is easily recognized. Less clear is the transfer pa…
The Decolonization of North African History
Since independence the countries of North Africa have been occupied almost exclusively with the establishment of a new society. An important part of this activity has been directed towards a solution to the problem of symbols and values: the construction of an image of themselves for their own contemplation and for export to the world outside. One aspect of this general problem of acculturation is concerned with interpretations of history and the…
A Judaeo-Arabic document form Sicily
Among the Arabic documents preserved in the archives of Sicily is one relating to the affairs of the Jewish community in Siracusa at the end of thetwelfth century. Belonging by origin to the episcopal church of Cefalù, it isnow in the Archivio di Stato at Palermo (Tabulario della Chiesa Vescovile di Cefalù, Perg. no. 25), and was included in the collection published by S. Cusain 1868-82
Venice and Florence in the Mamluk commercial privileges
Venetian preponderance in Mediterranean commerce during the late Middle Ages is attested in many ways. Muslim and European chronicles, travellers' reports from the Levant, and business records of the Republic illustrate the concern of Venice with the affairs, commercial and political, of the Muslim states in the Mediterranean. One striking aspect of this preponderance is found in the contemporary commercial treaties concluded between Muslim ruler…
A Mamluk ambassador to Venice in 913/1507
Of twenty commercial treaties concluded between the Mamluk Sultans and the Kepublic of Venice one of 913/1507 is unique in that it was negotiated not, as was traditional, by a Venetian representative in Egypt but by a Mamluk ambassador in Venice
A Moroccan Amīr's Commercial Treaty with Venice of the year 913/1508
IN 1508 the Mediterranean port of Bādis, located on the coast of the Rīf on approximately the same meridian as Malaga, shared with Salé and Azemmour on the Atlantic the distinction of being the only Moroccan ports not occupied by either the Spanish or Portuguese. Subject to the Wattasids at Fās, at about the beginning of the sixteenth century Bādis had been granted by the reigning Wattāsidto a cousin, who for some years ruled almost independently…
A Mamluk letter of 877/1473
Among the numerous Islamic documents preserved in the Venetian State Archives are a few which come from the chancery of Mamluk Egypt. One of the most interesting of these is a letter from Sultan Qaitbay to the Doge Nicolo Trono, dated 10 Sha'bān 877/10 January 1473, which is to be presented here in its original Arabic together with a contemporary Italian translation found in the enormous diplomatic register known as the Libri Commemoriali
The Decolonization of North African History
Since independence the countries of North Africa have been occupied almost exclusively with the establishment of a new society. An important part of this activity has been directed towards a solution to the problem of symbols and values: the construction of an image of themselves for their own contemplation and for export to the world outside. One aspect of this general problem of acculturation is concerned with interpretations of history and the…
The safe-conduct in Muslim chancery practice
One of the several branches of Islamic law in which practice diverged most sharply from theory was the law of commerce. The divergence is especially striking in two respects: regular imposition of taxes regarded by the shariī'a as illegal, and reliance upon written documents as legal proof of transactions for which juridical theory demanded only oral evidence of witnesses. A third problematical aspect of commercial law was the juridical status of…
A Mamluk letter of 877/1473
Among the numerous Islamic documents preserved in the Venetian State Archives are a few which come from the chancery of Mamluk Egypt. One of the most interesting of these is a letter from Sultan Qaitbay to the Doge Nicolo Trono, dated 10 Sha'bān 877/10 January 1473, which is to be presented here in its original Arabic together with a contemporary Italian translation found in the enormous diplomatic register known as the Libri Commemoriali
Quranic Studies
A Mamluk ambassador to Venice in 913/1507
Of twenty commercial treaties concluded between the Mamluk Sultans and the Kepublic of Venice one of 913/1507 is unique in that it was negotiated not, as was traditional, by a Venetian representative in Egypt but by a Mamluk ambassador in Venice
Diplomatica Siciliana
The study of Muslim rule and its vestiges in medieval Sicily has a long and distinguished pedigree. In the nineteenth century the impetus was both scholarly and political, to which the monumental works of Amari and De Mas Latrie bear eloquent witness. In more recent times the motive has been simple and straightforward curiosity about a remarkable instance of cultural symbiosis. The parameters are now either linguistic or historical or both, and t…
Rhetorica Semitica
Although any lingering doubts about the lexical value of the Semitic particlebalought by now to have been dispelled by the observations of Labuschagne and Aartun, a few further remarks on the problems involved in contextual analysis might not be altogether superfluous. While this particular instance of etymological overkill is not included there, the several pitfalls encountered in the practice respectively of comparative philology and textual em…
Hebrew verse
Though beset with dispute, wavering conviction and a fair amount of inconsistency, most theories of Biblical prosody exhibit a dominant concern with phonology. Since one at least of the phenomena under scrutiny is metre, this shared propensity is hardly surprising, conditioned as a matter of course by Classical literature and the European tradition, but also by considerable evidence from the proximate sphere of other Semitic literatures. Comment …
Paul Wittek
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button
Majāz al-qur'ān
As a normative discipline Qur'anic exegesis shares both principles and terminology with the other Islamic sciences, and as such is not likely to have been articulated before the third/ninth century. Prominent in the fully elaborated system, as for example exhibited in the work of al-Zamakhshari (d. 538/1143), are the complementary principles ofqiyāsandtaqdīr.While the former is commonly understood to represent the hermeneutical instrument called …
Theme, convention, and prosody in the vernacular poetry Of North Africa
Though not invariably susceptible of demonstration, the influence of Classical Arabic upon the popular literature of Arabic-speaking Muslims in North Africa may safely be assumed. 'Popular', indeed, the early Islamic verse forms (ši'r mawzūn) and the later stanzaic compositions (klam or ālat al-andalus) have remained, and in these, even when modified by local tradition, the source of inspiration is easily recognized. Less clear is the transfer pa…
A Judaeo-Arabic document form Sicily
Among the Arabic documents preserved in the archives of Sicily is one relating to the affairs of the Jewish community in Siracusa at the end of thetwelfth century. Belonging by origin to the episcopal church of Cefalù, it isnow in the Archivio di Stato at Palermo (Tabulario della Chiesa Vescovile di Cefalù, Perg. no. 25), and was included in the collection published by S. Cusain 1868-82
Venice and Florence in the Mamluk commercial privileges
Venetian preponderance in Mediterranean commerce during the late Middle Ages is attested in many ways. Muslim and European chronicles, travellers' reports from the Levant, and business records of the Republic illustrate the concern of Venice with the affairs, commercial and political, of the Muslim states in the Mediterranean. One striking aspect of this preponderance is found in the contemporary commercial treaties concluded between Muslim ruler…
A Mamluk letter of 877/1473
Among the numerous Islamic documents preserved in the Venetian State Archives are a few which come from the chancery of Mamluk Egypt. One of the most interesting of these is a letter from Sultan Qaitbay to the Doge Nicolo Trono, dated 10 Sha'bān 877/10 January 1473, which is to be presented here in its original Arabic together with a contemporary Italian translation found in the enormous diplomatic register known as the Libri Commemoriali
A Moroccan Amīr's Commercial Treaty with Venice of the year 913/1508
IN 1508 the Mediterranean port of Bādis, located on the coast of the Rīf on approximately the same meridian as Malaga, shared with Salé and Azemmour on the Atlantic the distinction of being the only Moroccan ports not occupied by either the Spanish or Portuguese. Subject to the Wattasids at Fās, at about the beginning of the sixteenth century Bādis had been granted by the reigning Wattāsidto a cousin, who for some years ruled almost independently…
A Mamluk ambassador to Venice in 913/1507
Of twenty commercial treaties concluded between the Mamluk Sultans and the Kepublic of Venice one of 913/1507 is unique in that it was negotiated not, as was traditional, by a Venetian representative in Egypt but by a Mamluk ambassador in Venice
Venice and Florence in the Mamluk commercial privileges
Venetian preponderance in Mediterranean commerce during the late Middle Ages is attested in many ways. Muslim and European chronicles, travellers' reports from the Levant, and business records of the Republic illustrate the concern of Venice with the affairs, commercial and political, of the Muslim states in the Mediterranean. One striking aspect of this preponderance is found in the contemporary commercial treaties concluded between Muslim ruler…
A Judaeo-Arabic document form Sicily
Among the Arabic documents preserved in the archives of Sicily is one relating to the affairs of the Jewish community in Siracusa at the end of thetwelfth century. Belonging by origin to the episcopal church of Cefalù, it isnow in the Archivio di Stato at Palermo (Tabulario della Chiesa Vescovile di Cefalù, Perg. no. 25), and was included in the collection published by S. Cusain 1868-82
The Decolonization of North African History
Since independence the countries of North Africa have been occupied almost exclusively with the establishment of a new society. An important part of this activity has been directed towards a solution to the problem of symbols and values: the construction of an image of themselves for their own contemplation and for export to the world outside. One aspect of this general problem of acculturation is concerned with interpretations of history and the…
On Recomposing the Islamic History of North Africa
The decolonization of history in the Islamic world has for a number of years proved a fascinating and profitable pursuit. For that portion of North Africa occupied by the French this process has consisted for the most part of two more or less separate activities: studies in depth and detail for the period after 1830, and for the preceding centuries (700-1830) a number of very general and frequently superficial recommendations, reflecting a sincer…
Theme, convention, and prosody in the vernacular poetry Of North Africa
Though not invariably susceptible of demonstration, the influence of Classical Arabic upon the popular literature of Arabic-speaking Muslims in North Africa may safely be assumed. 'Popular', indeed, the early Islamic verse forms (ši'r mawzūn) and the later stanzaic compositions (klam or ālat al-andalus) have remained, and in these, even when modified by local tradition, the source of inspiration is easily recognized. Less clear is the transfer pa…
Samuel Miklos Stern
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button
Majāz al-qur'ān
As a normative discipline Qur'anic exegesis shares both principles and terminology with the other Islamic sciences, and as such is not likely to have been articulated before the third/ninth century. Prominent in the fully elaborated system, as for example exhibited in the work of al-Zamakhshari (d. 538/1143), are the complementary principles ofqiyāsandtaqdīr.While the former is commonly understood to represent the hermeneutical instrument called …
The safe-conduct in Muslim chancery practice
One of the several branches of Islamic law in which practice diverged most sharply from theory was the law of commerce. The divergence is especially striking in two respects: regular imposition of taxes regarded by the shariī'a as illegal, and reliance upon written documents as legal proof of transactions for which juridical theory demanded only oral evidence of witnesses. A third problematical aspect of commercial law was the juridical status of…
"Wansbrough's "Quranic Studies
Paul Wittek
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button
Quranic Studies
Hebrew Verse
In the recently published volume of his collected papers Professor S. E. Loewenstamm includes two studies (here amplified) dealing with a feature of Semitic prosody described by him as ‘expanded colon’.His thesis is disarmingly straightforward: non-contiguous and, in some cases, contiguous repetition exhibits under certain conditions the deliberate expansion of a primary poetic structure, called ‘basic formula’ (p. 287), ‘simple basic formula’ (p…
Hebrew verse
Though beset with dispute, wavering conviction and a fair amount of inconsistency, most theories of Biblical prosody exhibit a dominant concern with phonology. Since one at least of the phenomena under scrutiny is metre, this shared propensity is hardly surprising, conditioned as a matter of course by Classical literature and the European tradition, but also by considerable evidence from the proximate sphere of other Semitic literatures. Comment …
Metra Ugaritica
Amongst the contributions to a recent volume commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Ugaritic studies is a paper devoted to analysis of the problems involved in description of Semitic prosody. While the data adduced there are explicitly limited to Ugaritic and Hebrew verse, the author's method entails consideration of such general matters as the definition of metre and parallelism. Since these are, as is well known, the traditional parameters i…
Rhetorica Semitica
Although any lingering doubts about the lexical value of the Semitic particlebalought by now to have been dispelled by the observations of Labuschagne and Aartun, a few further remarks on the problems involved in contextual analysis might not be altogether superfluous. While this particular instance of etymological overkill is not included there, the several pitfalls encountered in the practice respectively of comparative philology and textual em…
Diplomatica Siciliana
The study of Muslim rule and its vestiges in medieval Sicily has a long and distinguished pedigree. In the nineteenth century the impetus was both scholarly and political, to which the monumental works of Amari and De Mas Latrie bear eloquent witness. In more recent times the motive has been simple and straightforward curiosity about a remarkable instance of cultural symbiosis. The parameters are now either linguistic or historical or both, and t…
Gentilics and appellatives
The role of metaphor in the generation of descriptive terms is a commonplace of lexicography. Agency is usually identified as analogy, and the transfer itself analysed in terms of real or imagined similarity, e.g. ‘goth’ = barbaric, ‘gypsy’ = migrant, ‘vandal’ = destructive. Strictly defined, these exemplify metonymy, a species of metaphor found particularly in toponyms and gentilics. Development of such epithets as'‘arab’, ‘deutsch’ and ‘sūdān’ …
Sic enim est traditum
Use of the term 'exegesis' is now so general that scholars in the field of scriptural studies must have sensed an impingement upon their conventional prerogative. If, perhaps, they are justified in so doing, they might none the less be prepared to acknowledge the value of ancillary functions accumulated in its extension into areas beyond its standard application to literature. While it may be that these can be encompassed in the general shift fro…
Quranic Studies
"Wansbrough was the first to analyze carefully the documents from the first four centuries of Islam that describe the rise of the Quran to the position of absolute authority in the Muslim community. Although these works were known to exist, no modern scholar had actually read them and tried to make coherent sense of the material. Wansbrough carved out new areas of inquiry and debate for scholars and lay enthusiasts alike." "Although Quranic Studi…
Philosophy (17 works) · History (15 works) · Linguistics (15 works) · Historical and Linguistic Studies (10 works) · Law (10 works) · Art (9 works) · Political science (9 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Epistemology (8 works) · Literature (8 works)