| Description |
This thesis was started by a study and literal translation of al-ldrisi's description of the island of Sicily where he had lived for a considerable period of his life. This constitutes the Second Section of the Fourth Clime of his monumental geographical work entitled Nuzhat al-Mushtaq fi Ikhtiraq al-Afag, written at the court of the Norman King Roger II and dedicated to him as al-Kitab al-Rujari. The Arcbic text used for this translation was taken from the complete edition by Michele Amari and Celestino Schiaparelli which appeared in 1883 under the title L'Italia Descritta nel Libro del Re Ruggero Comilato da Edrisi. This old text, reproduced together with the translation in Chapter IV, has been carefully compared with a newer edition in progress by a learned consortium of scholars at the University of Naples. The original notes on the text have been incrorporated in our essay, but our own annotation on many facets of the work appears with the translation. However, it will be noted that this work is more than just a reproduction and a translation of the text. We have introduced for that crucial part by three important background chapters in which we tried to summarize the annals of Muslim as well as Norman Sicily and concluded with an attempt to relate rather succinctly al-Idrisi's life and work. Subsequent to the translation and the text, in a conclusion chapter, an account of al-Idrisi's contribution to the story of both Muslim and Norman Sicily has been made. Without minimizing the lofty place of al-Idrisi's work in geographical lore, we could not resist the temptation to offer some critique on certain segments of Nuzhat al-Mushtaq based on our exploration in other geographers voyages and records. At the end of the thesis, we have compiled four Appendices in which we present an inventory of place names as dices in which we present an inventory of place names as they appear in the text together with our identification thereof in modern nomenclature. For convenience, we have grouped thesis place names under specific titles including cities, topographical landmarks, rivers, islands, forest and mountains. This has proved to be an arduous, but rewarding task. Though we have succeeded in identifying most of these places, rewarding task. Though we have succeeded in identifying most of these places, a few still remain for further research. Three maps of ancient and medieval Sicily have been juxtaposed to our study, including al-Irisi's own chart of the island. In the third map, we have attempted a presentation of modern Sicily depicting both the cities, towns and villages mentioned by al-Idrisi and still in existence as well as those cited by him but no longer to be found. |
