Description
Book SynopsisIn the vast expanse of lands in the Mediterranean and Near East that came under Muslim sway in and after the seventh century, the spread of Islam at the expense of Christianity was a more gradual process than is often acknowledged. While the status of Christians was indeed reduced to that of a tolerated community, the production of religious art within such congregations was not brought to a halt (as the silence about it in traditional art history might suggest). Rather, it simply continued, and often very productively, under different precepts. While some examples, such as the art of Mozarabs and Copts, are better known, Christian artistic production in other Muslim contexts and in the period after the Mongol invasion is less explored. Moreover, there have been few attempts to integrate this body of art into mainstream art history. The workshop from which most of these papers were collected sought to explore to what extent this art produced under non-Christian rule, when collected together, irrespective of period and region, can serve as a useful frame for analysis. It aimed to do so by bringing together scholars working on different territories in the Islamic world between the seventh and nineteenth centuries to present and discuss case studies with a view to identifying common threads.
