The Andalusi origins of the Berbers?
Building on the contributions of H.T. Norris, Joaquín Vallvé Bermejo, Eduardo Manzano Moreno, Maya Shatzmiller and others about the Berbers, this article uses the difference between the political situation in al‐Andalus and the Maghrib in the eighth century to argue for a possible Andalusi origin of a particular use of the category “Berber.” Since before the Arab conquests the sources did not imagine that the “Berbers” inhabited northwest Africa and that today it is common to do so, the article introduces the idea of a Berberization to account for that transformation. It argues that al‐Andalus was an important early site of production of a specific notion of what Berber meant and seeks to show categories such as Arab and Berber did not refer to an unchanging objective reality and that they did not always carry the same connotations or support the same understandings. Embracing the limits posed by the historical record, the article participates in the effort of historians to replace ideologically informed convictions with a more nuanced delineation of the boundaries of the knowable.
Conversion to Islam in the Medieval Period: An Essay in Quantitative History
THE ALEXIAD OF ANNA COMNENA THE PRAYERS AND MEDITATIONS OF Anna Comnena. Translated by E. R. A. Sewter SAINT ANSELM Byzantine historian Anna Comnena's biograTranslated and introduced by Benedicta Ward. phy of her father, Emperor Alexius I Foreword byR. W. Southem. The prayers and (1081-1118), vividly records the apprehension meditations ofAnselm of Aosta (1033-1109), felt in Constantinople on the arrival of the First the "Father of Scholasticism," are noted for Crusade, as well as dynastic rivalries, Christian their mixture of personal ardor and scrupulous heresies, and recurring threats from neighbortheology. ing countries and tribes. 0-14-044278-2 288 pp. $2.95 0-14-0442154 560 pp. $4.95 THE EXETER BOOK RIDDLES FOURTEEN BYZANTINE RULERS Translated and introduced by Kevin CrossleyMichael Psellus. Translated by E. R. A. Sewter Holland. One of the four surviving miscellanies Introduction by Joan Hussey. A new translation of Old English poetry, the Exeter Book conof the Chronographia, which forms the princistitutes a delightful and informative ntroducpal source of the history of the Eastern Empire tion to the Anglo-Saxon world. The main text of during the period (A.D. 976-1078) when Bythis volume contains seventy-five riddles and a zantium declined from a military power to an further sixteen are translated inthe notes. Availeffete bureaucracy. able March 1980. 0-14-044169-7 400 pp. $3.95 0-14-044396-7 144 pp. $3.50
Roman Homosexuality: Ideologies of Masculinity in Classical Antiquity
This comprehensive study of Roman sexuality and the ideologies of masculinity discusses a wide range of ancient texts, arguing that native Roman concepts of masculinity did not rely on the distinction between homosexuality and heterosexuality, but were instead structured around such antitheses as free versus slave, dominant versus subordinate, and masculine versus effeminate.