Medieval Baghdad
Mapping the textual evidence
This project aims at analysing literary and photographic evidence in order to produce a new series of maps of medieval Baghdad illustrating the evolution of the city. It is financed by a grant from the British Academy and directed by Professor Hugh Kennedy, with the collaboration of Dr. Judith Ahola, Dr. Letizia Osti and Mr. Michael Kimber.
Modern knowledge of the early topography of Baghdad relies on descriptions of the city by writers of the ninth to thirteenth centuries. All describe the city as it was first built in 762 CE, providing only occasional contemporary information. They offer no diachronic picture of the city and its evolution. Modern attempts to map the city following these descriptive sources provide only a schematic representation. The combination of different historical periods within a single illustration presents a static picture of a city which over time underwent dramatic and sometimes devastating changes.
Apart from a few landmark structures, the medieval city of Baghdad has disappeared. The network of canals which crossed the city and its suburbs is no longer visible, and the course of the Tigris by which the city was built has changed. Only limited archaeological investigations have been undertaken, and the prospects for further excavations are poor, as the modern city of Baghdad now occupies much of the same land as the medieval foundation.
We do have other data. Literary sources abound in incidental and often datable references to the topography of Baghdad over a considerable period. The first obvious area for research is therefore the wealth of other literary sources for the period - biographical dictionaries, chronicles, belles-lettres. We are collecting such references in a database which allows us to cross-check them and identify their position on a map.
Furthermore, although archeological evidence is lacking, maps of the city from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries show the west bank of the Tigris at Baghdad as agricultural land. This area, where the original fortified citadel and some of the most populous quarters of the medieval period were located, was the subject of extensive aerial reconnaissance photography during World War I. Also extant are several maps of Baghdad from the nineteenth century, and a number of published works from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries cataloguing archaeological remains in the area of Baghdad. Aerial photographs will be used to provide evidence of the major canals that linked the Euphrates to the Tigris at Baghdad and of the secondary canals which crossed the city. Definition of the canal system is the key to constructing an accurate topographical outline of the city.
This pilot stage of the project, starting in September 2005, focusses on one period of 25 years, the caliphate of al-Muqtadir (908-932 CE). Anecdotal evidence suggests that the city suffered much physical damage from floods and fire during his caliphate and that its population declined dramatically at the end. The map produced during this stage of the project will test such evidence against literary and photographic records. Ultimately we intend to produce a series of maps of medieval Baghdad showing the evolution of the city from its foundation (ca.762 CE) to the time of the Seljuk conquest in 1055 CE.
Contacts
Judith Ahola - email jaa2@st-and.ac.uk
Letizia Osti - email lo3@st-and.ac.uk