Aimed at the historians of Islam and Byzantium, the essays in this volume deal with the history of the Middle East from c 550 to 1000 AD. It emphasises social and economic trends and the integration of written and archaeological evidence to elucidate the complex developments in this pivotal part of the world.

Contents: Preface; From Polis to Madina: urban change in late Antique and early Islamic Syria; The last century of Byzantine Syria: a reinterpretation; Gerasa and Scythopolis: power and patronage in the Byzantine cities of Bilad al-Sham; The impact of Muslim rule on the pattern of rural settlement in Syria; From Antiquity to Islam in the cities of al-Andalus and al-Mashriq; The Melkite church from the Islamic conquest to the Crusades: continuity and adaptation in the Byzantine legacy; Antioch: from Byzantium to Islam and back again; The Arab-Byzantine frontier in the 8th and 9th centuries: military organisation and society in the borderlands; Byzantine-Arab diplomacy in the Near East from the Islamic conquests to the mid 11th century; Central government and provincial élites in the early 'Abbasid caliphate; Military pay and the economy of the early Islamic state; Caliphs and their chroniclers in the middle Abbasid period (3rd/9th century); The Uqaylids of Mosul: the origins and structure of a nomad dynasty; The decline and fall of the first Muslim empire; Index.

’... so wie man abschliessend sagen kann, dass ausnahmslos alle Artikel dieses Bandes lesenswert und sehr lehrreich sind. Durch diese Zusammenstellung der Aufsätze in einem Band ist dem Leser viel Recherchetätigkeit erspart geblieben. Den Herausgebern sei dafür herzlich gedankt!’ Sehepunkte