JAMSHEED K. CHOKSY, Conflict and Cooperation, Zoroastrian Subalterns and Muslim Elites in Medieval Iranian Society (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997). Pp. 207. $46.00.

Abstract

In the past two decades, several important studies have dealt with the impact of the Arab Muslim conquest on the Near East, but they have mostly dealt with the lands that were conquered from the Mediterranean region to Iraq. Although the book under review is not a detailed history of Arab Muslims' conquest of Iran, it attempts to fill the gap in our knowledge of the eastern area that came under their control. The work is primarily concerned with the interaction between the Zoroastrian and the Muslim community in Iran and Central Asia from the 7th to the 13th century. The book attempts to study the processes in which the Zoroastrian community, which was the dominant religious community during the Sasanian empire (224–641), gradually lost its status and hold on power, while the new Muslim community became dominant as a social and political group.