In August 1924, Anabibi Safaeva set off from her home city of Khiva, which was then the capital of the Xorezm People's Republic, to study in Tashkent, which was the administrative center of the Turkistan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. Safaeva traveled with some 160 students in a convoy of three boats down the Amu River toward the Aral Sea. However, misfortune befell Safaeva: her boat was attacked by basmachis, a bandit or rebel gang.1 The basmachis killed all twenty-two of the men in Safaeva's group and carried off the women as captives. By the time that Safaeva was rescued, more than two months later, there was no longer a Xorezm People's Republic or a Turkistan Republic; instead, Safaeva's Khivan home was now in Uzbekistan, and Tashkent, the goal of her academic pilgrimage, had become the capital of Uzbekistan.

This book is a comprehensive survey of the history of the Crusades—comprehensive, that is, from the standpoint of the sources left by the Crusaders' enemies. The author sets out to reconstruct for a Western audience what the available Muslim sources (for the most part, in Arabic) tell us about the Crusading phenomenon: how the Muslims viewed and responded to the challenge presented to them by the European Christian holy warriors who suddenly appeared on the Near Eastern scene at the end of the 11th century. In this respect it is not unlike Amin Maalouf's The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, although compared to the earlier volume the present book is simultaneously less narrative and more exhaustive, even encyclopedic.

To appreciate the significance of the reform movement represented by the books selected for this survey, one needs the sharply contrasting background of Islamic thought in Iran from the mid-1960s to the end of 1980s, the period perceptively surveyed by Mehrzad Boroujerdi in Iranian Intellectuals and the West. Boroujerdi shows that the moral indignation against Westernization in Iran pre-dated the outburst of revolution in 1979 by a few decades, beginning as a series of nativistic protests that gradually cohered in the shape of an Islamic ideology. The mythical construction of the West was not exclusively or primarily a religious affair. It was, rather, a fairly general indigenous or nativistic response to Western cultural domination in which Islam played a varying and fluctuating role before the revolutionary crescendo of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The essence of this nativistic cultural response was what Boroujerdi analyzes as Occidentalism, or, borrowing a phrase from Edward Said's Syrian critic Sadiq al-עAzm, as “Orientalism in reverse.”

The study of women in the Middle East was almost dormant for the quarter-century after 1945. Since then, it has flowered, especially in the United States but also elsewhere, and it seems useful to take stock via a review of some of the main English-language scholarly books of the past decade that are of special interest to historians, including brief mention of some relevant works in the social sciences. To keep this to a reasonable length, this review concentrates on books relevant to women's history since 1800 on Iran, Egypt, greater Syria, Turkey, and North Africa, and omits journalistic and biographical books, and the important work done in literature and the arts, and also in the books primarily about other subjects. It also omits articles that were not published in books not primarily about Middle Eastern women, gender, or the family. It does not claim to include or analyze every significant book, as significance is partly a question of individual judgment and scholarly interests. The article is limited to books published since 1990.

As Lawrence I. Conrad explains in the general editor's Preface, the intention of the series, The Formation of the Classical Islamic World, is to present a critical selection of previously published articles on an aspect of the formative period of Islam, defined as A.D. 600–950. Each of the volumes is edited by an expert in a field of Islamic studies and is meant to serve as an introduction to the state of knowledge of a given topic and significant debates within the scholarship, conveying a variety of approaches. The two volumes under review here have a geographical rather than a thematic focus and together present forty articles on a range of topics having to do with the first three centuries of Islam on the Iberian peninsula. The two volumes on The Formation of al-Andalus are meant to be read together. “Part 1: History and Society” and “Part 2: Language, Religion, Culture and the Sciences” share overlapping themes, and their references and bibliographies are complementary.

A good history of 20th century Yemen is something for which those of us researching that fascinating country have long been asking, and Paul Dresch's work in many ways fills the void. Within a clear chronological framework and in limited space he authoritatively outlines the political history of Yemen. He starts his account around 1900, just before Imam Yahya (1905–48) acceded to the imamate in the north. Meanwhile, the British extended their rule over the south from their base in Aden (occupied in 1830). The book ends with a discussion of the recent unification (1990) and the troubled decade that followed it. In an impressive tour de force, Dresch has written a history that is clearly informed by the large body of new scholarship in a variety of disciplines, as well as by his background in anthropology. Thus, he uses myriad illuminating details and quotations from original sources to paint a picture that is far more interesting and deeper than is commonly expected of historical textbooks. This is particularly evident in the first three chapters, which deal with background and with the 1950s. This part of the book seems particularly rich. It is therefore regrettable that Dresch accords the first half of the century only slightly more than a quarter of the book (the discussion of the 1950s starts on p. 58 of 214).

The period 1955–62 was a particularly productive one for the eminent Italian Orientalist Alessandro Bausani (1921–88), professor of Islamic studies at Rome University. His Italian translation of the Qurءan, which appeared in 1955, was soon followed by a trilogy of works, each of which testifies to the depth and scope of his encyclopedic knowledge of and love for all things Iranian: Persia Religiosa (Milan, 1959), Storia della Letteratura Persiana (Milan, 1960), and I Persiani (Florence, 1962). The last, a concise history of Iran that many consider complementary to Persia Religiosa, was translated into German as Die Perser (Stuttgart, 1965) and into English as The Persians (London, 1971) within a decade of its release. It seems strange, then, that Persia Religiosa, which forty years after it was first published is still the only work in a Western language that treats the history of religions in Iran in a comprehensive manner (p. vii), should not have been translated earlier. Perhaps some of Bausani's innovative, avant-garde insights meant that scholars of Iran downplayed the book's significance at the time.

The term “post-colonial” is a relative newcomer to the jargon of Western social science. Although discussions about the effects of colonial and imperialist domination are by no means new, the various meanings attached to the prefix “post-” and different understandings of what characterizes the post-colonial continue to make this term a controversial one. Among the criticisms leveled against it, reviewed comprehensively by Hall (1996), are the dangers of careless homogenizing of experiences as disparate as those of white settler colonies, such as Australia and Canada; of the Latin American continent, whose independence battles were fought in the 19th century; and countries such as India, Nigeria, or Algeria that emerged from very different colonial encounters in the post-World War II era. He suggests, nevertheless, that “What the concept may help us to do is to describe or characterise the shift in global relations which marks the (necessarily uneven) transition from the age of Empires to the post-independence and post-decolonisation moment” (Hall 1996, 246). Rattansi (1997) proposes a distinction between “post-coloniality” to designate a set of historical epochs and “post-colonialism” or “post-colonialist studies” to refer to a particular form of intellectual inquiry that has as its central defining theme the mutually constitutive role played by colonizer and colonized in shaping the identities of both the dominant power and those at the receiving end of imperial and colonial projects. Within the field of post-colonial studies itself, Moore-Gilbert (1997) points to the divide between “post-colonial criticism,” which has much earlier antecedents in the writings of those involved in anti-colonial struggles, and “post-colonial theory,” which distinguishes itself from the former by the incoporation of methodological paradigms derived from contemporary European cultural theories into discussions of colonial systems of representation and cultural production. Whatever the various interpretations of the term or the various temporalities associated with it might be, Hall claims that the post-colonial “marks a critical interruption into that grand whole historiographical narrative which, in liberal historiography and Weberian historical sociology, as much as in the dominant traditions of Western Marxism, gave this global dimension a subordinate presence in a story that could essentially be told from its European parameters” (Hall 1996, 250). In what follows, I will attempt a brief discussion of some of the circumstances leading to the emergence of this concept and interrogate the extent to which it lends itself to a meaningful comparison of the modern trajectories of societies in the Middle East and Central Asia.

The title of Şevket Pamuk's book is misleading. Far from restricting himself to monetary phenomena—interest rates, coinage, inflation, and availability of specie—the author has chosen to cast his study of money during the Ottoman period (1300–1918) in the widest possible terms. Viewing some of the crucial issues of Ottoman economic and political history through a monetary lens has produced new and interesting insights—in some cases, the result is a revision of old arguments—but on other matters, Pamuk has produced provocative new hypotheses. Furthermore, the book offers a timely addition to the rapidly developing field of global history. Although most of Pamuk's comparative remarks relate to early modern Europe, his study establishes a benchmark against which the analyses of monetary and economic phenomena in the other two early modern Middle Eastern states—the Mughal and the Safavid—can be measured.

The theme of “Nationalism after Colonialism” as far as Afghanistan is concerned begs many questions: with the national or patriotic idea so weak and undeveloped, it arguably makes more sense to analyze rival ideas of the nation held by the country's different ethnic groups than some hypothetical all-embracing Afghan nationalism. When did the era of colonialism (neo-colonialism would be more apt) end—or, indeed, begin? Quite as much as foreign colonialism, was not internal colonialism by Pashtun tribal elites the major feature of development of nationalism in modern Afghanistan?

This is the best biography to date of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Kemal co-founded the Turkish Republic in 1923 and was its first president until his death in 1938 at age 58. Mango writes that Kemal “believed that the struggle for genuine independence should be waged by each nation for itself in the name of an overarching secular ideal of progress common to all. . . . His aim was not imitation but participation in a universal civilization” (p. xi). Kemal's views derived from those of late Ottoman ideologues—notably Namık Kemal and Ziya Gökalp (authors of significant studies that are not in Mango's bibliography, which, in this reviewer's opinion, would have enhanced his fine work). Kemal was “[a]bove all . . . a builder, the greatest nation-builder of modern times,” writes Mango on the first page of his engagingly written, well-documented book. He concludes that “Atatürk was a competent commander, a shrewd politician, a statesman of supreme realism. But above all he was a man of the Enlightenment. And the Enlightenment was not made by saints” (p. 528).

The Taqdima of Ibn Abi Hatim was meant to serve as an introduction to his biographical dictionary of hadith transmitters, Kitab al-Jarh wa-l-taעdil. Dickinson argues that the primary purpose of this introduction was to show that hadith criticism as practiced by Ibn Abi Hatim began early and was used continuously up to his own time. In this way, he defended the practice and its techniques against its detractors. Dickinson also highlights the general principles and methods of the hadith critics of Ibn Abi Hatim's time.

The story of the collapse of the USSR and of the newly independent states that have risen on its ruins is still shrouded in mystery, because the actual cause of the rapid breakdown of the strong power is not quite comprehensible. Statements to the effect that the underlying cause was an inefficient economy do not seem convincing, as even during the so-called stagnation period, the annual gross national product (GNP) growth rate had been 2–3 percent, which looks satisfactory, especially taking into account the overall production slump experienced by all of the republics after 1991.

Itzchak Weismann's recent book on reform movements in late Ottoman Damascus illustrates how contemporary Islamic reform movements such as the Salafiyya have their origins in the efforts of Damascene religious men of learning and mysticism. These men attempted to construct reform movements that adhered to Islamic ideals while accommodating changed circumstances brought about by Western penetration into the region. Sufi ulama movements that made claims to both orthodoxy and reform in this early period provided much of the intellectual and social fodder for what Weismann calls modern Islamic movements. The combination of עilm and taṣawwuf, according to Weismann, allowed these early scholars to carve a reformist, yet orthodox, path that avoided the rigidity of the traditional ulama, who ignored mystic thought, and the popular Sufis, who neglected religious learning. Further, the story of these early reform movements illustrates how the path to modernity in the Muslim world is not simply the tale of an all-out adoption of Western rationalism by a centralized Ottoman bureaucracy; rather, it reflects a deep commitment by local Muslim intellectuals to contend with their changing world in terms that reflect the depth of their Islamic tradition. Through an investigation of the teachings and participants of three distinct reform movements in late Ottoman Damascus, Weismann illustrates the tensions within the movements and with the central Ottoman government—all of which pushed many of these reformers gradually to rely on more local avenues of expression, thereby paving the way for the rise of Arab nationalism.

It is, to say the least, rather startling that prior to the appearance of this new book by Stefan Reif, who is professor of Medieval Hebrew Studies at Cambridge University in England, the director of the Genizah Research Unit, and head of the Oriental Division at the University Library, there simply was no detailed history of the discovery of the Cairo Genizah and its transferal abroad. Neither had there been a convenient single survey of the broad range of its contents, nor a comprehensive mise au point of the century of scholarship in so many disciplines that has resulted from this unique treasure trove. Brief introductory sketches existed in the works of Paul Kahle and S. D. Goitein, and Norman Golb surveyed the first half-century of Genizah scholarship more than forty years ago in the journal Judaism (1957). But none of these provided the wealth of detail to be found in A Jewish Archive from Old Cairo.

Studies on the social history of the ulama are generally scarce for the medieval Islamic period, which makes one welcome any new study to tackle this overlooked subject. Surveying ulama (both hadith and fiqh scholars) of different Sunni madhhabs for the 11th and 12th centuries, Ephrat analyzes considerable data in the biographical dictionaries to provide patterns that characterize the ulama who lived in Baghdad, migrated there, passed through the city in their travels, or were attached to teaching positions in madrasas there. The inquiry yields interesting insights into the relative powers of different madhhabs. One notes the preponderant role of Hanafis and Shafiעis in the formation of rival madrasas in the second half of the 11th century and how the Hanbalis, mortal enemies of kalām—which preoccupied Muעtazilis and Ashעaris over issues such as the concept of divine unity, attributes (al-ṣifāt), and justice—were latecomers to this institution in the 12th century, having chosen earlier to use mosques and private houses to disseminate hadith teaching. The Hanbalis' emphasis on educational routine on ascetic example and public exhortation gave them little need for the forum of the academy.

Variations in the formulation of the past as an official political enterprise give significant clues to the genres of nationalism. The “state past” reveals preferences for different historical periods and different subdisciplines of history, as well as for alternative regional and international alliances.

The principle thesis of Jahangir Amuzegar's book is to examine the success of the nations in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in managing their oil wealth. OPEC countries came into a great deal of money as a result of the oil-price shocks of 1973–74 and 1979–80. Their newly gained wealth became one of the most celebrated stories of the 1970s and 1980s. What happened to all the wealth? Where did it go? Whom did it benefit? And finally, how does one measure the success or failure of different countries?

The Qurءan contains numerous verses dealing with the relationship between Muslims and non-Muslims. Some exhort the Muslims to summon the non-Muslims to Islam through peaceful discussions (e.g., Q16:125), whereas others instruct them to fight the unbelievers unconditionally (e.g., Q2:216, Q9:5). In the chapters on jihad, Muslim jurists resolved these contradictions by claiming that these verses were the expression of successive stages in the policy of the early Muslim community with regard to the non-Muslims. According to this theory, the verses instructing the Muslims to summon the unbelievers to Islam by peaceful means are the oldest. Those permitting the Muslims to fight the unbelievers because they have been wronged and expelled from their homes (Q22:39–40), revealed immediately after the Hijra, mark a turning point, after which defensive warfare was allowed. The final stage, according to traditional Muslim exegesis, began at a later but unspecified date and was inaugurated by verses unconditionally ordering the believers to wage war on the non-Muslims (e.g., Q2:216, Q9:5). These last verses, often called “Sword Verses,” were regarded as having abrogated all previous revelations on the subject of the relations with the unbelievers.

Perhaps the Byzantine Empire's most significant achievement during its thousand-year history was the civilizing of its northern neighbors, the Slavs, through Christianization and political tutelage. The process was not entirely altruistic; rather, it was designed to secure the empire's northern border against the Slavs and other peoples. This border shifted over time, sometimes embracing the entire Balkan peninsula as far as the Danube to modern Croatia, sometimes comprising little more than the Thracian littoral and a few isolated areas in the south of the Greek peninsula.