The
first time I read Francesco Gabrieli’s Arab
Historians of the Crusades, it was for a graduate-level History of Islam
course at CSU Pomona. Like most books
read for courses, I dissected the book so that it could be studied quickly and
rigorously; but not to the extent that I tried to genuinely take in Gabrieli’s
overall purpose. At the onset, such an
endeavor seems almost impossible:
Gabrieli wrote very little for the text—it is more-or-less a collection
of historical documents presented in a particular fashion by Gabrieli to convey
an “other side” perspective on the Crusades for the average Western
reader. First published in 1957, the
book is riddled with Eurocentrism and a consistent portrayal of Islam as “outside”
Western civilization (despite, by the 1950s, its heavy entrenchment in various
parts of Western and Eastern Europe, as well as the growing population of
Muslims in the United States). Despite
this shortcoming, however, the book effectively depicts the key sources
necessary to link an over-arching historiography of the crusades that includes
Arab authors.
Part of
Gabrieli’s depiction of Islam is the style and prose of Arab authors with
regard to history, and how these divergences from the typical European
historical narrative highlight cultural differences between two sets of sources
covering the same material. The most
iconic difference is that while histories of the Crusades are far-reaching and popular, Arab historians’ account
of the conflict do not fit so neatly into their own private histories. Instead, depictions of Frankish invasions into
the Muslim lands were “always incorporated into the customary literary forms,
given their place in annals recording general
history.”[i] As such, Gabrieli’s choice in displaying Arab
historians’ take on the Crusades as an amalgam of various depictions of general
Islamic history is both necessary and enlightening for the Western reader—who likely
considers the Crusades an isolated event within the over-arching history of
Western Civilization. In his own words,
a history of the Crusades from the works of Arab historians functions “by
juxtaposing and interweaving material from the various types of historical
writing of the period.”[ii]
Another
major feature of Gabrieli’s work is his focus on the Third Crusade and the rule
of Saladin up through 1192. This stems
from two points desired by the author.
The first is that there is more of a comparative analysis possible
between Western and Arab historians on the Third Crusade than there are of the
earlier events. The second is that,
according to Gabrieli, the peace negotiations in the final months of the
crusade offer polemics not mentioned in earlier accounts; specifically the “military
reprisals” emphasized by quoting the Qur’an.
By examining sources covering the peace negotiations, Gabrieli hopes to
draw attention to the fact that peace between Christian and Muslim armies were
detested by the vast majority of Muslim citizens living under the rule of
Saladin.
Overall,
Gabrieli’s collection of writings is a must-read for Western writers and
enthusiasts of the Crusades, particularly to get an outsider view of what is
more-than-likely already-known details.
But it also offers a more general conceptualization of history as a
duality between conquerors and the conquered.
We often hear the phrase “history is written by the winners,” but the
Crusades stand out as an exception to this archaic rule: Christianity did not succeed in its
endeavors, but has nevertheless had the most profound influence in shaping the
history of the Crusades throughout Western society in written memory. Gabrieli’s collection gives testament to the
duality of narrative, and challenges the conviction that history can and is
remembered only by those who achieve the most.
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