The Mamluk City in the Middle East: History, Culture, and Urban Landscape

Year 2020, Issue: 43, 198 - 203, 01.01.2020

Beyza Topuz Demir

https://doi.org/10.26570/isad.650332

Abstract

The Mamluk City in the Middle East is an
interdisciplinary study of urban history in Syria, Bilād al-Shām, during
the Mamluk Sultanate (1260-1517). This comparative study focuses on three
Mamluk cities, Jerusalem, Safad, and Tripoli. The author, Nimrod Luz, explains
his selection of these cities by highlighting their political significance and
to some extent their analogous urban development during the Mamluk period.
However, Luz actually emphasizes Mamluk Jerusalem while Safad and Tripoli become
of secondary importance throughout the book. The distinguishing feature of the
book is its attempts to understand the nature of these Mamluk cities and their
sense of urbanism. In doing so, Luz calls into question the overgeneralizing
and religion-centered notion of the “Islamic city” and tries to demonstrate
that the three Mamluk cities he investigates were actually “full-fledged
cities.” The author successively uses physical, social, and conceptual
frameworks for his analysis of the Mamluk cities and organizes the book
accordingly.

Keywords

Syria, Bilād al-Shām, Mamluk Sultanate

The Mamluk City in the Middle East: History, Culture, and Urban Landscape

Abstract

The Mamluk City in the Middle East is an interdisciplinary study of urban history in Syria, Bilād al-Shām, during the Mamluk Sultanate (1260- 1517). This comparative study focuses on three Mamluk cities, Jerusalem, Safad, and Tripoli. The author, Nimrod Luz, explains his selection of these cities by highlighting their political significance and to some extent their analogous urban development during the Mamluk period. However, Luz actually emphasizes Mamluk Jerusalem while Safad and Tripoli become of secondary importance throughout the book. The distinguishing feature of the book is its attempts to understand the nature of these Mamluk cities and their sense of urbanism. In doing so, Luz calls into question the overgeneralizing and religion-centered notion of the “Islamic city” and tries to demonstrate that the three Mamluk cities he investigates were actually “full-fledged cities.” The author successively uses physical, social, and conceptual frameworks for his analysis of the Mamluk cities and organizes the book accordingly.

Keywords

Mamluk, Middle East, History

References

• Nimrod Luz, The Mamluk City in the Middle East: History, Culture, and Urban Landscape, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014, XV + 265 pages