This thesis investigates the emergence of Medina in the Ḥijāz as a widely-venerated holy city over the first three Islamic centuries (seventh to ninth centuries CE) within the appropriate historical context, with special attention paid to the town’s ḥaram. It focuses in particular upon the roles played by the Prophet Muḥammad, Umayyad and Abbasid caliphs, and early Islamic legal scholars in this development. It shows that Medina’s emergence as a widely-venerated holy city alongside Mecca was a gradual and contested process, and one that was intimately linked with several important developments concerning legitimate political, religious, and legal authority in the Islamic world. The most important sources for this study have been Medina’s local histories, and Chapter One investigates the development of a tradition of local history-writing there. The Prophet Muḥammad first created a form of sacred space, a ḥaram, at Medina, and Chapter Two seeks to provide the context for this by investigating some forms of sacred and protected space found in the pre-Islamic Arabian Peninsula. Chapter Three then examines a rare early document preserved in the later Islamic sources, which deals in part with Muḥammad’s creation of Medina’s ḥaram, the so-called “Constitution of Medina”, and investigates why and how Muḥammad created that particular form of sacred space at Medina. The remaining two chapters deal with the history of Muḥammad’s ḥaram at Medina after his death as its original raison d’être disappeared. Chapter Four analyses some aspects of Muslim legal scholars’ discussions concerning Medina’s ḥaram, and demonstrates that certain groups disputed its existence. Chapter Five then seeks to understand why caliphs and other scholars invested so heavily in actively promoting its widespread veneration and Medina’s status as a holy city. It concludes that caliphs from the late first/early eighth century patronised Medina to associate themselves with legitimate political authority inherited from Muḥammad, and that from the late second/eighth century certain legal scholars argued for the continued existence of Medina’s ḥaram because of its association with the Prophet and his Companions who had come to be for them the ultimate source of legal authority.

This dissertation is a study of the Futūḥ Miṣr (Conquest of Egypt) of Ibn 'Abd al-Ḥakam (d. 257/871), the earliest extant Arabic history of Egypt. Its primary aim is not to assess whether its information is 'authentic' - i.e. corresponding to an objective historical reality - though my findings are of relevance for those engaged in debates over authenticity. My goal instead is to explore the ideas about the past which are conveyed by this particular conglomeration of historical information and to propose methods through which we can expose and analyse different layers and types of authorial activity within a multi-vocal text like Futūḥ Miṣr. Ultimately, I use this analysis as the basis of a case study suggesting how we might more effectively historicise the generation and transmission of historical ideas in the early Islamic period. Part I of the thesis consists of three chapters which explore Futūḥ Miṣr as a whole, literary text which can be understood as an instantiation of the historical worldview of its composer. Part II of the thesis contains three chapters which each illuminate features of Ibn 'Abd al-Ḥakam's historical practice which are important prerequisites for the stratigraphic reading of Futūḥ Miṣr performed in Part III. Part III of the thesis uses the understanding of Ibn 'Abd al-Ḥakam's authorial techniques developed in Part II to expose the earlier packages of historical information which underpin Futūḥ Miṣr. These final three chapters demonstrate how Ibn 'Abd al-Ḥakam reinvested these pre-existing narratives with meaning at a micro-level - by interjecting commentary and accounts from other sources - and at a macro-level - by integrating them into the larger narrative structure of Futūḥ Miṣr. In sum, this thesis is the first systematic study of the sources, structure, and authorship of an early Arabic history, which both tests and expands our current understanding of the dynamics of early Islamic historical writing, and sheds light on numerous aspects of the changing uses of the past among the Muslim scholars of Umayyad and 'Abbāsid Egypt.

When considering the available sources for Islamic history between the seventh and eighth centuries CE, there are few which have greater importance than al-Balādhurī's (d. ca. 892 CE/279 AH) Kitāb Futūḥ al-Buldān (The Book of the Conquest of Lands). While the text and its author are recognized for their importance as a historical source for the early Islamic period, there has previously been no in-depth study of either. This dissertation works to correct these gaps in knowledge of the author and his text by investigating the construction, form, content, and early reception history of al-Balādhurī's book. This research begins by providing a manuscript tradition of Futūḥ al-Buldān, including a discussion of a previously unpublished manuscript. It thereafter illuminates the background of al-Balādhurī, bringing together much of the previous scholarship on the author while augmenting that information with an analysis of biographical sources and the text itself. It situates the author and his text in its ninth/third century milieu, a period of history where the early Arabic historical tradition was still in its infancy and only just being committed to writing. It suggests the text was likely completed at the end of the "anarchy at Sāmarrā'" in the late 860s CE, and highlights the author's role at the court of several 'Abbāsid Caliphs. After this, it discusses a number of al-Balādhurī's most important (and, in some cases, previously understudied) sources of information, and argues that the author chose to differentiate when he was learning information directly from a teacher and when he had access to written sources. It then analyzes the content and themes of the text, placing special attention on the unique form of Futūḥ al-Buldān and its importance in providing modern scholars with information on the conquest, settlement, and building projects of the early Islamic world. In considering these key themes, this research then argues that Futūḥ al-Buldān defies traditional modern genre classification by borrowing form and content from several different Arabic genres including conquest literature (futūḥ), legal texts, and administrative geographies. It contends that both the text's content and form suggest that it was written to be read by courtly administrators in the service of the state as both a site of memory (lieu de mémoire) and as an "administrator's handbook" during a time of upheaval in the 'Abbāsid realm. Finally, it considers the legacy of Futūḥ al-Buldān and the popularity of al-Balādhurī's book throughout the medieval period through an analysis of textual reuse.

Em nossa dissertação, estudamos o excerto da crônica Kitāb al-Kāmil fi l-ta\'rīkh, de Ibn al-Athīr, que relata os anos de governo de Nūr ad-Dīn. Nossa pesquisa é dividida em três partes. Na primeira, apresentamos o autor e sua obra, a origem e a composição da crônica, além do debate historiográfico sobre a obra. Na segunda, abordamos os gêneros retóricos da Retórica de Aristóteles e a aplicação de dois destes gêneros, epidítico e deliberativo, na composição do discurso de Ibn al-Athīr. Na terceira, realizamos uma síntese das definições de jihād tanto no Alcorão quanto nos tratados jurídicos muçulmanos e mostramos como o nosso autor se apropria deles para legitimar as ações de Nūr ad-Dīn e construir, por meio de seu discurso, a figura do biografado como um exemplo de governante. / In our dissertation, we study the extract of Ibn al-Athīr\'s chronicle, Kitāb al-Kāmil fi l-ta\'rīkh, reporting the years of Nūr ad-Dīn\'s governmet. Our research is divided into three parts. The first presents the author and his work, the chronicles origin and the composition, besides presenting the historiographical debate on the work. The second approachs the rhetoric genres of Aristotles Rhetoric and the use of two of these genres, epideictic and deliberative, at the construction of Ibn al-Athīr\'s discourse. The third discusses the definitions of jihād both at Coran and at muslims juridical treatises, indicating how our author uses them to legitimate Nūr ad-Dīn\'s action in order to elaborate him, through his discourse, as an example of ruler.

Em nossa dissertação, estudamos o excerto da crônica Kitāb al-Kāmil fi l-ta\'rīkh, de Ibn al-Athīr, que relata os anos de governo de Nūr ad-Dīn. Nossa pesquisa é dividida em três partes. Na primeira, apresentamos o autor e sua obra, a origem e a composição da crônica, além do debate historiográfico sobre a obra. Na segunda, abordamos os gêneros retóricos da Retórica de Aristóteles e a aplicação de dois destes gêneros, epidítico e deliberativo, na composição do discurso de Ibn al-Athīr. Na terceira, realizamos uma síntese das definições de jihād tanto no Alcorão quanto nos tratados jurídicos muçulmanos e mostramos como o nosso autor se apropria deles para legitimar as ações de Nūr ad-Dīn e construir, por meio de seu discurso, a figura do biografado como um exemplo de governante. / In our dissertation, we study the extract of Ibn al-Athīr\'s chronicle, Kitāb al-Kāmil fi l-ta\'rīkh, reporting the years of Nūr ad-Dīn\'s governmet. Our research is divided into three parts. The first presents the author and his work, the chronicles origin and the composition, besides presenting the historiographical debate on the work. The second approachs the rhetoric genres of Aristotles Rhetoric and the use of two of these genres, epideictic and deliberative, at the construction of Ibn al-Athīr\'s discourse. The third discusses the definitions of jihād both at Coran and at muslims juridical treatises, indicating how our author uses them to legitimate Nūr ad-Dīn\'s action in order to elaborate him, through his discourse, as an example of ruler.