Mekka

Kaaba in Mekka

Ich hatte hier im Blog schon zweimal Informationen zu Mekka und zu der Kaaba veröffentlicht:

Abraham und die Kaaba in Mekka

Artikelserie: Die Zerstörung von Mekka - Wahhabiten

Heute möchte ich passend dazu ein frei verfügbares Beispiel eines Artikels der renommierten Encyclopaedia of Islam vorstellen. Wer seriöse und fundierte Information zu allen möglichen Themen des Nahen Ostens, aber auch zu ehemals beherrschten Gebieten oder heutigen Regionen mit muslimischer Bevölkerung erfahren möchte, ist bei dieser Enzyklopädie an der richtigen Stelle. Es gibt auch einen Ableger in türkischer Sprache: İslâm Ansiklopedisi. Besonders bei Orientalisten ist dieses Nachschlagewerk ein unersetzliches Werkzeug, sollte aber auch bei hobbymäßig Interessierten in den Blick genommen werden. Zum Kaufen wird sie für die meisten sowohl in der CD-Version, als auch in Buchform zu teuer sein. Es gibt jedoch die Möglichkeit zumindest als Student in der Uni einen Zugang zur Online- oder zur CD-Version zu bekommen. Daneben bietet googlebooks Einblicke in viele Bände der veralteten Erstauflage.

Man sollte jedoch beachten, dass manchmal die Artikel der 2. Auflage etwas oder sogar sehr veraltet sein können. Daher ist momentan auch eine Neuauflage in Arbeit, in die sukzessive nachgeschlagen werden kann.

Ich hatte ja bereits einen anderen frei lesbaren Artikel aus dieser Enzyklopädie hier vorgestellt:

Sultan Süleyman der Prächtige

Makka

Sections

1. The pre-Islamic and early Islamic periods
2. From the ʿAbbāsid to the modern period
3. The Modern City
4. As the centre of the world

(in English normally “Mecca”, in French “La Mecque”), the most sacred city of Islam , where the Prophet Muḥammad was born and lived for about 50 years, and where the Kaʿba [q.v.] is situated.

1. The pre-Islamic and early Islamic periods

Geographical description.

— Mecca is located in the Ḥid̲j̲āz about 72 km. inland from the Red Sea port of Jedda ( Ḏj̲udda [q.v.]), in lat. 21° 27' N. and long. 39° 49' E. It is now the capital of the province (manātiḳ idāriyya) of Makka in Suʿūdī Arabia, and has a normal population of between 200,000 and 300,000, which may be increased by one-and-a-half or two millions at the time of the Ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ or annual pilgrimage.

Mecca lies in a kind of corridor between two ranges of bare steep hills, with an area in the centre rather lower than the rest. The whole corridor is the wādī or the baṭn Makka , “the hollow of Mecca”, and the lower part is al-Baṭḥāʾ, which was doubtless the original settlement and where the Kaʿba stands. Originally some of the houses were close to the Kaʿba, but apparently there was always a free space round it, and in the course of centuries this has been enlarged to constitute the present mosque. Into the Baṭḥāʾ converged a number of side-valleys, each known as a s̲h̲iʿb , and often occupied by a single clan. The outer and higher area of settlement was known as the ẓawāhir. The situation of Mecca was advantageous for trade. Important routes led northwards to Syria (Gaza and Damascus); north-eastwards through a gap in the mountain chain of the Sarāt to ʿIrāḳ; southwards to the Yemen; and westwards to the Red Sea, where there were sailings from S̲h̲uʿayba (and later from Ḏj̲udda) to Abyssinia and other places. Rainfall is scant and irregular. There may be none for four years. When it does come, it may be violent and a sayl or torrent may pour down each s̲h̲iʿb towards the Ḥaram or sacred area round the Kaʿba. There are accounts of the flooding of the Ḥaram from time to time. The supply of water depended on wells, of which that at Zamzam beside the Kaʿba was the most famous. One of the leading men of Mecca was always charged with the siḳāya, that is, with the duty of seeing there was sufficient water for the pilgrims taking part in the Ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ . Needles to say, there was no agriculture in the neighbourhood of Mecca. The climate of Mecca was described by the geographer al-Muḳaddisī as “suffocating heat, deadly winds, clouds of flies”. The summer was noted for ramḍāʾ Makka , “the burning of Mecca”, and the wealthier families sent their children to be brought up in the desert for a time.
Pre-Islamic Mecca. —Mecca had been a sacred site from very ancient times. It was apparently known to Ptolemy as Macoraba. The Ḳurʾān has the name Makka in XLVIII, 24, and the alternative name Bakka in III, 96/90. It also (II, 125-7/119-21) speaks of the building of the Kaʿba by Abraham and Ishmael, but this is generally not accepted by occidental scholars, since it cannot be connected with what is otherwise known of Abraham. According to Arabian legend, it was for long controlled by the tribe of Ḏj̲urhum [q.v.], and then passed to Ḵh̲uzāʿa [q.v.], though certain privileges remained in the hands of older families. After a time, presumably in the 5th century A.D., Ḵh̲uzāʿa were replaced by Ḳurays̲h̲ [q.v.]. This came about through the activity of Ḳuṣayy [q.v.], a descendant of Ḳurays̲h̲ (or Fihr), who became powerful through bringing together hitherto disunited groups of the tribe of Ḳurays̲h̲ and gaining the help of allies from Kināna and Ḳuḍāʿa. It is probale that Ḳuṣayy was the first to make a permanent settlement here as distinct from temporary encampments. In later times a distinction was made between Ḳurays̲h̲ al-Biṭāḥ (those of the Baṭḥāʾ or centre) and Ḳurays̲h̲ al-Ẓawāhir (those of the outer area); and it is significant that all the descendants, not only of Ḳuṣayy but of his great-grandfather Kaʿb, are included in the former. These are the clans of ʿAbd al-Dār, ʿAbd S̲h̲ams, Nawfal, Hās̲h̲im, al-Muṭṭalib, Asad (all descended from Ḳuṣayy), and Zuhra, Mak̲h̲zūm, Taym, Sahm, Ḏj̲umaḥ and ʿAdī. The most important clans of Ḳurays̲h̲ al-Ẓawāhir were Muḥārib, ʿĀmir b. Luʾayy and Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Fihr. There are no grounds, however, for thinking this distinction was equivalent to one between patricians and plebeians....

weiter hier.


(Bildquelle: Wikimedia Commons)