Maps and Trade in Byzantine Trade
Maps and Trade in Byzantine Trade
Maps and Trade in Byzantine Trade
1
It has been given the shelfmark MS Arab. c. 90. The acquisition was made possible
through donations from the National Art Collections Fund, the Heritage Lotery Fund,
the Friends of the Bodleian Library, ARAMCO (Saudi Arabia), several colleges of Oxford
University, and a number of individual donors. The project to edit, translate and publish it,
partially funded by the AHRC, was a joint undertaking by the present author and Dr Yossef
Rapoport, with the collaboration of and Prof. Jeremy Johns and Prof. Paul Kunitzsch.
2
Christie’s, Islamic Art and Manuscripts, lot 41. Portions of the treatise are preserved
in three other copies, all of them lacking the maps. Recently, a fourth manuscript, copied
in 1565 (972 H), has come to light (Damascus, Maktabat al-Asad al-Wataniyah, MS. 16501,
formerly Aleppo, al-Maktaba al-Waqiya, MS. 957) that has crude, mostly unlabelled, sketches
representing the maps of al-Mahdiyah, Cyprus, the Euphrates, and the Oxus.
For the internal evidence for dating its composition, see the website.
From Byzantine Trade, 4th-12th Centuries. Copyright © 2009 by the Society for the Promotion
of Byzantine Studies. Published by Ashgate Publishing Ltd, Wey Court East, Union Road,
Farnham, Surrey, GU9 7PT, Great Britain.
15
16 MAPS AnD TRADE
4
B. Salway, ‘Travel, Itineraria and Tabellaria’, in C. Adams and R. Laurence, eds., Travel
and Geography in the Roman Empire (London, 2001), 22–109; K. Brodersen, ‘Geographical
knowledge in the Roman World’, in Adams and Laurence, eds., Travel and Geography, 7–21;
and O.A.W. Dilke, ‘Itineraries and geographical maps in the early and late Roman Empires’,
in J.B. Harley and D. Woodward, eds., The History of Cartography, vol. I: Cartography in
prehistoric, ancient, and medieval Europe and the Mediterranean (Chicago, 1987), 24–57.
5
See R. Talbert, ‘Cartography and taste in Peutinger’s Roman map’, in R. Talbert and
K. Brodersen, eds., Space in the Roman World, its Perception and Presentation (Münster, 2004),
11–41, and E. Albu, ‘Imperial cartography and the medieval Peutinger Map’, Imago Mundi
57 (2005), 16–48. Richard Talbert is currently undertaking a new edition and reinterpretation
of the ‘Peutinger Table’.
EMILIE SAvAGE-SMITH 17
6
A. Delate, ed., Les portulans grecs (Liège, 1947); O.A.W. Dilke, ‘Cartography in the
Byzantine Empire’, in Harley and Woodward, eds., History of Cartography, vol. I, 258–75. For
the term and genre of periploi, see D. Marcote, ed., Les géographes grecs. Tome I: Introduction
générale, Pseudo-Scymnos ‘Circuit de la Terre’ (Paris 2002), LXIv–LXXII.
7
J. Blomquist, The Date and Origin of the Greek Version of Hanno’s Periplus (Lund, 1979);
Marcote, Géographes grecs, XXIv–XXv.
8
GGM I, 70–401; Arrian, Periplus Ponti Euxini, ed. and trans. A. Liddle (London,
200).
9
GGM I, 427–514. The unique manuscript, now in Madrid, belonged to Constantine
Laskaris, a fugitive from Constantinople ater it was taken by the Turks.
18 MAPS AnD TRADE
10
Known as the ‘Madaba mosaic’, discovered in a town near Amman in Jordan; P.
Barber, The Map Book (London, 2005), 6–7.
11
G.R. Tibbets, ‘The Balkhi school of geographers’, in J.B. Harley and D. Woodward,
eds., History of Cartography, vol. II, Book 1: Cartography in the traditional Islamic and South Asian
societies (Chicago, 1992), 108–6.
EMILIE SAvAGE-SMITH 19
Figure 2.1 A map of Syria, from Al-Istakhri, Kitab al-Masalik wa-al-mamalik; copy
dated Dhu al-Qa‘da 696 (July–August 1297).
20 MAPS AnD TRADE
are more useful for memory and organization of routes than actual models
or representation of physical reality.12
The Book of Curiosities of the early 11th century represents a second
approach to regional cartography. The map of the Indian Ocean (ig. 2.3)
and that of the Mediterranean (ig. 2.4) are both unique to this manuscript.
Both are drawn as ovals, with no atempt made to delineate the contours
of the shoreline. Around the peripheries of these ovals, however, new
information is supplied regarding trade and travel. The map of the Indian
Ocean, as well as the unique maps of the Indus River, Oxus River and
Lake Issıq Kul, which also form part of the Book of Curiosities, together
provide information regarding the Silk Road across Central Asia, the
overland route along the Indus and the Ganges, and the maritime route
to China along the coasts of the Indian Ocean.1 For his knowledge of
eastern lands, however, our author was dependent upon earlier writen
sources and various informants. The information, therefore, is second
hand and derivative, and cannot be taken as a direct measure of the role
or importance of these trade routes in the early 11th century. nonetheless,
the depiction of the land-routes to China provides a new perspective on
their role in trade with China prior to the time of our author.
The dependence of our author upon mercantile informants when
compiling his work is evident from the following statement in the chapter
immediately proceeding those with the maps of the Indian Ocean and the
Mediterranean.
We have only mentioned here what we have heard from trustworthy [?]
sailors, from which I selected and made my own judgments; and from what
had reached my ears from the wise merchants who traverse the seas, and from
any ship captain who leads his men at sea, I mentioned what I have knowledge
of.14
12
See E. Savage-Smith, ‘Memory and maps’, in F. Datary and J. Meri, eds., Culture and
Memory in Early and Medieval Islam: a Festschrit in honour of Wilferd Madelung (London, 200),
109–27 and igs 1–4.
1
For details, see Y. Rapoport, ‘The Book of Curiosities: a medieval Islamic view of
the East’, in A. Kaplony and P. Forêt, eds., The Journey of Maps and Images on the Silk Road
(London, 2008).
14
Bodleian Library, MS Arab. c. 90, fol. 29a.
EMILIE SAvAGE-SMITH 21
Figure 2.2 The bays of Byzantium, from the anonymous Kitab Ghara’ib al-funun
wa-mulah al-‘uyun (undated; early 1th century).
Figure 2. The Indian Ocean, from the anonymous Kitab Ghara’ib al-funun wa-mulah al-‘uyun (undated; early 1th century).
Figure 2.4 The Mediterranean, from the anonymous Kitab Ghara’ib al-funun wa-mulah al-un (undated; early 1th century)
24 MAPS AnD TRADE
Figure 2.5 The city of al-Mahdiyah, from the anonymous Kitab Ghara’ib al-
funun wa-mulah al-‘uyun (undated; early 1th century).
15
I. Hrbek, ‘Bulghār’, in C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, Th. Bianquis et al., eds., The
Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd edn, 11 vols (Leiden 1960–2002), vol. 1, 104–8.
16
For an illustration of the Tinnis map, see J. Johns and E. Savage-Smith, ‘The Book of
Curiosities: a newly-discovered series of Islamic maps’, Imago Mundi 55 (200), 7–24, esp. 19,
ig. 4.
26 MAPS AnD TRADE
Figure 2.6 The island of Cyprus, from the anonymous Kitab Ghara’ib al-funun
wa-mulah al-‘uyun (undated; early 1th century).
17
For a reproduction, see Johns and Savage-Smith, ‘Book of Curiosities’, pl. 6; and Y.
Rapoport, ‘Medieval Islamic view of the Cosmos: the newly discovered Book of Curiosities’,
The Cartographic Journal 41 (2004), 253–9, esp. 256, ig. 3.
18
Bass et al., Serçe Limanı.
28 MAPS AnD TRADE
19
Remains of cooked pigs-legs were found, indicating that at least some of the people
on board were neither Muslim nor Jewish.
20
For evidence of some mercantile contacts between Fatimid Egypt and Byzantium,
see D. Jacoby’s paper below and D. Jacoby, ‘What do we learn about Byzantine Asia Minor
from the documents of the Cairo Genizah?’, in S. Lampakes, ed., Byzantine Asia Minor (6th–
12th Century) (Athens, 1998), 8–95.
21
See S.M. Ahmad, ‘Cartography of al-Sharif al-Idrisi’, in Harley and Woodward, eds.,
History of Cartography, vol. II, book 1, 156–74.
EMILIE SAvAGE-SMITH 29
Can any of these medieval maps have been employed and used by
traders? When considering the function of maps in earlier societies, it
is imperative to resist imposing our values and perspectives. Today we
expect instrumentation to be employed in navigation, and maps to serve
as nautical guides. Both are anachronistic and incorrect assumptions prior
to the use of the magnet compass and the consequent changes in naval
cartography. Early medieval seafarers did not use mathematical astronomy,
but only folk astronomy employing major stars; nor did they use astrolabes
on board ship for guidance, even though miniature paintings sometimes
show astrolabes on ship. Byzantine and Islamic travellers did not employ
maps, other than as possible mnemonic guides to sequences of stops or
ports. Travel on the seas most oten involved the assistance of human
guides (nautical pilots) who learned the course through apprenticeship,
or, on land, local guides who could direct a person to the next stop.
Much, if not most, of the preserved geographical literature was
composed for those who could not or would not travel. In the Western
tradition, maps were designed for contemplation and not for aids to
travel. In the Islamic world, there was no tradition of a sacred geography
aimed at contemplation,22 but it is evident that some maps (such of those
of the Balkhi school) were intended as aids to memory, and – inasmuch as
memory is useful for traders – they could have been employed by traders.
Most maps, however, were designed for entertainment and for those who
could not travel, as exempliied by the title of al-Idrisi’s famous illustrated
geography, ‘Entertainment for He Who Longs to Travel the World’, or the
title of our anonymous ‘Book of Curiosities of the Sciences and Marvels
for the Eyes’.
22
Sacred geography in Islam took the practical form of Qibla diagrams by which
Muslims could orient themselves towards Mecca.