In Urban Autonomy in Medieval Islam Fukuzo Amabe offers the first in-depth study on autonomous cities in medieval Islam stretching from Aleppo and Damascus to Cordoba, Toledo and Valencia through Tunis during the late tenth to early twelfth centuries. Each city is treated separately to cull facts to prove its autonomy at least for a certain period. The Middle East was the first region to develop cities and then empires in ancient times. Furthermore, the Islamic world was the first to transform ancient political or farmer cities to economic and industrial ones consisting of notables and plebeians, followed by China, then parts of Western Europe.

Connected by their veneration of the One God proclaimed by Abraham, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam share much beyond their origins in the ancient Israel of the Old Testament. This Very Short Introduction explores the intertwined histories of these monotheistic religions, from the emergence of Christianity and Islam to the violence of the Crusades and the cultural exchanges of al-Andalus.

Analyzes Muslim countries' contemporary problems, particularly violence, authoritarianism, and underdevelopment, comparing their historical levels of development with Western Europe.

"One of the best comprehensive histories of a culture in this century."—Amos Funkenstein, Stanford University

"One of the best comprehensive histories of a culture in this century."--Amos Funkenstein, Stanford University

The term 'Islamic cities' has been used to refer to cities of the Islamic world, centring on the Middle East. Academic scholarship has tended to link the cities of the Islamic world with Islam as a religion and culture, in an attempt to understand them as a whole in a unified and homogenous way. Examining studies (books, articles, maps, bibliographies) of cities which existed in the Middle East and Central Asia in the period from the rise of Islam to the beginning of the 20th century, this book seeks to examine and compare Islamic cities in their diversity of climate, landscape, population and historical background. Coordinating research undertaken since the nineteenth century, and comparing the historiography of the Maghrib, Mashriq, Turkey, Iran and Central Asia, Islamic Urbanism provides a fresh perspective on issues that have exercised academic concern in urban studies and highlights avenues for future research.

S.D. Goitein's five-volume work on Jewish communities in the medieval Mediterranean world has been abridged and reworked into this volume that captures the essential narratives and contexts.