New Book: 'The Mozarabic Chronicle/Chronicle of 754' in Arabic Translation!

Amid the rapidly developing battlefield changes in Syria with the fall of Aleppo city to the insurgency and insurgent advances through south Idlib and north Hama countrysides, it is a rather surreal coincidence that I also announce the forthcoming publication of my first book to be published in Syria (cover below). It is my Arabic translation and study of the anonymous, Latin-language ‘Mozarabic Chronicle’, with the designation of ‘Mozarabic’ deriving from the likelihood that the author was a Christian living under Muslim rule in Iberia (al-Andalus). The chronicle is also called the ‘Chronicle of 754’ in reference to the fact that it concludes in the year 754 CE, with a reckoning of the number of years that have passed since the beginning of the world.

The chronicle’s primary importance lies in the fact that it is the only detailed surviving contemporary source to attest to the Muslim conquest of Iberia and the aftermath of its series of governors, formally under the authority of the Umayyad Caliphate (although by the late 740s CE, the realm became virtually independent as the caliphate’s based in the Levant was in disarray). We do not get our first surviving Arabic/Muslim sources on these events until the ninth century CE with the works of Ibn Abd al-Hakam and Abd al-Malik bin Habib, with information stemming primarily from Egyptian traditions about the conquest. As such, the Mozarabic Chronicle is an indispensable comparative source. It is also the first text to speak of ‘Europeans’ (Europenses), and one of the first Western texts to discuss the Prophet Muhammad and the history of the Umayyad Caliphate. Finally, it was an important source for Toledan archbishop Rodrigo Ximénez de Rada (d. 1247 CE) when he wrote his ‘Historia Arabum’ that can be considered the first surviving Western work focused specifically on Arab/Muslim history.

The publisher of the book is Dar Dalmun al-Jadida in Damascus. If you are interested in acquiring a copy of the book please let me know, or get in touch with the publisher on the following number: +963 930 700 443.