8 - Prophetic Etymologies and Sacred Spaces

Summary

Chapter Eight examines how authors incorporate etymologies of their cities and regions as one way of claiming a privileged connection with the Prophet and sacred space. Some etymologies incorporate Muhammad and a paradigmatic event, such as Muhammad’s heavenly ascent (miʿrāj). This section argues that analysis of etymologies in local histories and micro-historical accounts based on them is a fresh angle from which to approach local histories. Sacred etymologies compress and flatten time to connect a pivotal Qurʾanic and prophetic moment to the city. Tārīkh-i Qum illustrates how its authors employed rhetorical strategies for legitimation to assert that the city was a bona fide Muslim community and was an integral part of the larger umma. Qum’s sacred etymologies demonstrate the dynamic of how Persian local histories attempted to make the notional universal Muslim umma local by simultaneously asserting a strongly local identity while tying the city to critical moments and characters in Islamic sacred history. The etymology of Qum, including hadith and akhbar reports, is one avenue through which Qummī builds the sacred credentials for his city. A similar process occurs in Tārīkh-i Bukhārā by Narshakhī and Tārīkh-i Ṭabaristān by Ibn Isfandiyār.