Mission to the Volga

by Ahmad Ibn Fadlan

  REPRODUCTION OF THE MASHHAD MANUSCRIPT

  Majmūʿ fī l-jughrāfiyā: mimmā allafahu Ibn al-Faqīh wa-Ibn Faḍlān wa-Abū Dulaf al-Khazrajī. Edited by Fuat Sezgin, with M. Amawi, C. Ehrig-Eggert, and E. Neubauer. Frankfurt am Main: Institute for the History of Arabic-Islamic Science at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, 1994 [additional photographic reproductions are to be found in Kovalevskiĭ, Kniga, and Czeglédy, Zur Meschheder Handschrift].

  EDITIONS OF THE KITĀB

  Togan, A. Zeki Velidi. Ibn Faḍlān’s Reisebericht. Abhandlungen für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 24, no. 3. Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1939 (a classic of twentieth-century scholarship, containing an edition and extensive and detailed commentary).

  Risālat Ibn Faḍlān. Edited by Sāmī al-Dahhān. Damascus: al-Majmaʿ al-ʿIlmī al-ʿArabī, 1959.

  Riḥlat Ibn Faḍlān. Edited by Ḥaydar Muḥammad Ghaybah. Beirut: al-Sharikah al-ʿĀlamiyyah li-l-Kitāb, 1994.

  Risālat Ibn Faḍlān. Edited by Shakīr Luʿaybī. Abu Dhabi and Beirut: Dār al-Suwaydī li-l-Nashr wa-l-Tawzīʿ and al-Muʾassasah al-ʿArabīyah li-l-Dirāsāt wa-l-Nashr, 2003.

  SELECTED TRANSLATIONS OF THE KITĀB

  Danish

  Simonsen, J. B. Vikingerne ved Volga: Ibn Faḍlāns rejsebeskrivelse. Højberg: Wormianum, 1997 [a partial translation].

  English

  McKeithen, J. E. The Risālah of Ibn Faḍlān: An Annotated Translation with Introduction. PhD diss., Indiana University, 1979.

  *Frye, Richard N. Ibn Fadlan’s Journey to Russia: A Tenth-Century Traveler from Baghdad to the Volga River. Princeton: Markus Wiener, 2005.

  *Lunde, Paul, and Caroline Stone. Ibn Fadlān and the Land of Darkness: Arab Travellers in the Far North. London: Penguin, 2012.

  French

  Canard, Marius. Ibn Fadlân: Voyage chez les Bulgares de la Volga. Paris: Sindbad, 1988. First published as “La Relation du Voyage d’Ibn Fadlân chez les Bulgares,” Annales de l’Institut d’Études Orientales 5 (1958): 41–145.

  *Charles-Dominique, Paul. Voyageurs arabes: Ibn Faḍlân, Ibn Jubayr, Ibn Baṭṭûṭa et un auteur anonyme. Paris: Gallimard, 1995.

  German

  Fraehn, C. M. Ibn Fozlan’s und andere Araber Berichte über die Russen älterer Zeit. St. Petersburg: Kaiserl. Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1823.

  Togan, A. Zeki Velidi. Ibn Faḍlān’s Reisebericht. Abhandlungen für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 24, no. 3. Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1939.

  Norwegian

  Birkeland, Harris. Nordens Historie i Middelalderen etter Arabiske Kilder. Oslo: Jacob Dybwad, 1954 [a partial translation].

  Persian

  Ṭabāṭabāʾī, Abū l-Fażl. Safarnāmah az Aḥmad ibn Fażlān ibn al-ʿAbbās ibn Rāshid ibn Ḥammād. Manābiʿ-i tārīkh va-jughrāfiyā-yi Īrān 2. Tehran: Intishārāt-i Bunyād-i Farhang-i Īrān, 1966.

  Polish

  Kmietowicz, A., F. Kmietowicz, and T. Lewicki. Źródła arabskie do dziejów słowiańszczyzny. Wroclaw: Zakład im. Ossolińskich, 1985 [edition, translation, and commentary].

  Russian

  Kratchkovskiĭ, I. Puteshestvie Ibn-Fadlana na Volgu. Moscow and Leningrad: Izdatelstvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1939 [translation, with notes and commentary, under the general editorship of Kratchkovskiĭ].

  Kovalevskiĭ, A. P. Kniga Akhmeda Ibn Faḍlāna o ego puteshestvii na Volgu 921–2. Kharkiv: Izdatelstvo Gos. Universiteta, 1956 [also contains a commentary and a facs. reprod. of the Mashhad manuscript].

  Kuleshova, V. S. “Kniga Akhmada ibn Fadlana Perevod s arabskogo i primechaniya.” In Ibn Faḍlān’s Journey: Volga Route from Baghdad to Bulghar. Moscow: Mardjani Publishing House, 2016.

  COLLECTIONS OF ARTICLES

  The following books contain many articles that will be of interest to those wanting to know more about Ibn Faḍlān, or the Turkic world of the period, or the tradition of Arabic geographical writing.

  Bosworth, C. E., ed. The Turks in the Early Islamic World. Aldershot UK and Burlington VT: Ashgate, 2007.

  Golden, Peter B. Nomads and their Neighbours in the Russian Steppe: Turks, Khazars and Qipchaqs. Aldershot: Variorum, 2003.

  ———. Turks and Khazars: Origins, Institutions, and Interactions in Pre-Mongol Eurasia. Aldershot: Variorum, 2010.

  Golden, Peter B., H. Ben-Shammai, and A. Róna-Tas, eds. The World of the Khazars: New Perspectives. Selected Papers from the Jerusalem 1999 International Conference. Leiden: Brill, 2007.

  Khazanov, Anatoly M., and Andre Wink, eds. Nomads in the Sedentary World. Richmond: Curzon, 2000.

  Netton, I. R., ed. Islamic and Middle Eastern Travellers and Geographers. London: Routledge, 2007.

  Noonan, T. S. The Islamic World, Russia and the Vikings, 750–900: The Numismatic Evidence. Aldershot: Variorum, 1998.

  Sezgin, F., with M. Amawi, C. Ehrig-Eggert, and E. Neubauer, eds. Texts and Studies on the Historical Geography and Topography of Northern and Eastern Europe, vol. 3. Frankfurt am Main: Institute for the History of Arabic-Islamic Science at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, 1994.

  ON IBN FAḌLĀN AND HIS KITĀB

  Bosworth, C. E. “Aḥmad. b. Fażlān.” In Encyclopaedia Iranica. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1985, 1:640.

  Canard, M. “Ibn Faḍlān.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 1986, 3:759.

  Czeglédy, K. “Zur Meschheder Handschrift von Ibn Faḍlān’s Reisebericht.” Acta Orientalia 1 (1950–51): 217–43.

  Dunlop, D. M. “Zeki Validi’s Ibn Faḍlān.” Die Welt des Orients 1 (1947–52): 307–12.

  Frye, R. N., and R. P. Blake. “Notes on the Risala of Ibn-Fadlan.” Byzantina Metabyzantina 1, no. 2 (1949): 7–37 [repr. in The Turks in the Early Islamic World, edited by C. E. Bosworth, 229–59, Aldershot UK and Burlington VT, Ashgate, 2007].

  *Gabriel, J. “Among the Norse Tribes: The Remarkable Account of Ibn Fadlan.” Aramco World 50, no. 6 (1999): 36–42.

  Graf, H.-J. “Die Bedeutung des Ibn Faḍlān für die germanische Altertumskunde.” In Zeki Velidi Togan’a Armağan. Symbolae in honorem Z.V. Togan, 397–404. Istanbul: Maarif Basımevi, 1950–55.

  Kowalska, M. “Ibn Faḍlān’s Account of His Journey to the State of the Bulġārs.” Folia Orientalia 14 (1972–73): 219–30.

  Manylov, Y. P. “O puti Ibn Faḍlāna iz Khorezma cherez Plato Ustyurt [On Ibn Faḍlān’s route from Khorezm through Plato (sic) Ust Yurt].” Sovetskaya Arkheologiya 2 (1979): 92–100.

  Miquel, André. La géographie humaine du monde musulman jusqu’au milieu du XIe siècle: Géographie et géographie humaine dans la littérature arabe des origines à 1050, Paris and The Hague: Mouton, 1967 [especially relevant is the discussion of Ibn Faḍlān on pp. 132–39].

  Montgomery, J. E. “Pyrrhic Scepticism and the Conquest of Disorder: Prolegomenon to the Study of Ibn Faḍlān.” In Problems in Arabic Literature, edited by M. Maroth, 43–89. Piliscsaba: The Avicenna Institute of Middle Eastern Studies, 2004.

  ———. “Travelling Autopsies: Ibn Faḍlān and the Bulghār.” Middle Eastern Literatures 7, no. 1 (2004): 3–32.

  ———. “Spectral Armies, Snakes, and a Giant from Gog and Magog: Ibn Faḍlān as Eyewitness Among the Volga Bulghars.” The Medieval History Journal 9 (2006): 63–87.

  Ritter, H. “Zum Text von Ibn Faḍlān’s Reisebericht.” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 96 (1942): 98–126.

  Safwat, N. F. “The First Arab Diplomatic Envoy to Russia from Baghdad.” Ur 2 (1981): 10–18.

  Sobolevskii, A. I. “Zápiska Ibn-Faḍlāna [Le mémoire d’Ibn-Faḍlān].” Comptes rendus de l’Académie des sciences de Russie, B (1929): 223–27.

  Zakhoder, B. N. “Ibn Faḍlān i al-Masʿūdī.” Kratkie Soobshcheniya Instituta Vostokovedeniya 38 (1960): 15–18.

  AL-MUQTADIR’S REIGN AND EARLY FOURTH/TENTH-CENTURY ADMINISTRATION

  van Berkel, M. Accountants and Men of Letters. Status and Position of Civil Servants in Early Tenth Century Baghdad. PhD diss., Amsterdam University, 2003.

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p; van Berkel, Maaike, Nadia El Cheikh, Hugh Kennedy, and Letizia Osti, eds. Crisis and Continuity at the Abbasid Court: Formal and Informal Politics in the Caliphate of al-Muqtadir (295–320/908–32). Leiden: Brill, 2013.

  Zetterstéen, K. V. [C. E. Bosworth]. “Al-Muḳtadir.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 1993, 7:541–42.

  GEOGRAPHY AND ROUTES

  To acquire a sense of the geography and itineraries mentioned in Ibn Faḍlān’s account, the following studies, arranged according to the route of the mission, are useful:

  Le Strange, Guy. The Lands of the Eastern Caliphate. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1930 [an indispensable gazetteer for the topography of the route from Baghdad to the Ustyurt].

  Minorsky, V. [C. E. Bosworth]. “Al-Rayy.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 1995, 8:471–73.

  Bosworth, C. E. “Khurāsān.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam. 2nd ed., Leiden: Brill, 1986, 5:55–59.

  Barthold, W. [R. N. Frye]. “Bukhārā.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 1986, 2:1293–96.

  Bosworth, C. E. “Khwārazm.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam. 2nd ed, Leiden: Brill, 1997, 4:1060–65.

  Spuler, B. “Gurgandj.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam. 2nd ed, Leiden: Brill, 1991, 2:1141–42.

  Planhol, X. de. “Caspian Sea.” In Encyclopaedia of Iran. Costa Mesa: Maza, 1992, 5:48–61.

  Róna-Tas, A. Hungarians and Europe in the Early Middle Ages. Budapest: Central European University Press, 1999 [on p. 223, there is a detailed map of Ibn Faḍlān’s reconstructed riverine route from Ghuzziyyah territory to Bulghār].

  Spuler, B. “Itil.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam. 2nd ed, Leiden: Brill, 1997, 4:280–81.

  ON TRADE AND TRADE ROUTES

  Ducène, J.-Ch. “Le commerce des fourrures entre l’Europe orientale et le Moyen-Orient à l’époque médiévale (IXe-XIIIe siècle): pour une perspective historique.” Acta Orientalia 58, no. 2 (2005): 215–28.

  Kovalev, R. “The Infrastructure of the Northern Part of the ‘Fur Road’ between the Middle Volga and the East during the Middle Ages.” Archivum Eurasiae Medii Aevi 11 (2000–1): 25–64 [deals specifically with the part of the trade route traversed by Ibn Faḍlān, from Khwārazm to Bulghār on the Volga].

  *Martin, Janet. Treasure of the Land of Darkness: The Fur Trade and its Significance for Medieval Russia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.

  PEOPLES AND TRIBES IN THE KITĀB

  The territories north of the caliphate, from the realm of the Samanids east of the Caspian to Bulghār on the middle Volga, are not well documented for the period in question. They were inhabited predominantly by nomadic or semi-nomadic Turkic tribes, and large-scale migrations were frequent. In the early fourth/tenth century an important trade route emerged between the Samanids and the Bulghārs of the middle Volga, along which caravans transported great quantities of goods in exchange for Arabic silver dirhams, some of which were produced specifically for export via this trading relationship.

  *Christian, David. A History of Russia, Central Asia and Mongolia. Vol. 1, Inner Eurasia from Prehistory to the Mongol Empire. Oxford: Blackwell, 1998 [a useful historical overview with a section on the Samanids].

  Dolukhanov, Pavel. The Early Slavs: Eastern Europe from the Initial Settlement to the Kievan Rus. London and New York: Longman, 1996 [valuable archaeological study].

  *Frye, Richard N. The Golden Age of Persia, London: Orion, 2000.

  Göckenjan, Hansgerd, and Istvan Zimonyi. Orientalische Berichte über die Völker Osteuropas und Zentralasiens im Mittelalter: Die Ğayhānī-Tradition. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2001 [analyzes and discusses texts by other Arabic writers on some of the peoples encountered by Ibn Faḍlān].

  *Golden, Peter B. An Introduction to the History of the Turkic Peoples: Ethnogenesis and State-Formation in Medieval and Early Modern Eurasia and the Middle East. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1992 [essential reading].

  *———. Central Asia in World History. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011 [the best place to start for an overview of the region, from ancient to modern].

  Khazanov, A. Nomads and the Outside World. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1994.

  Minorsky, V. Ḥudūd al-ʿālam. Edited by C. E. Bosworth. Cambridge: Gibb, 1982 [a translation of this important early anonymous Persian geography, with excellent commentary].

  Pritsak, O. “The Turcophone Peoples in the Area of the Caucasus from the Sixth to the Eleventh Century.” In Il Caucaso: Cerniera fra culture dal Mediterraneo alla Persia (secoli IV–XI) 20–26 aprile 1995, vol. 1, 223–45. Spoleto: Sede dello Centro, 1996.

  Sinor, Denis. Introduction à l’étude de l’Eurasie Centrale. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1963 [a useful if outdated bibliographic resource].

  *———, ed. The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990 [excellent survey articles on the Turkic peoples of the steppes].

  *Soucek, S. A History of Inner Asia, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

  Roux, J.-P. La mort chez les peuples altaïques anciens et médiévaux. Paris: Librairie d’Amérique et d’Orient, 1963.

  ———. Faune et flore sacrées dans les societés altaïques. Paris: Librairie d’Amérique et d’Orient, 1966.

  ———. “Tengri.” In The Encyclopedia of Religion. New York: MacMillan, 1987, 14:401–3.

  ———. “Turkic Religions.” In The Encyclopedia of Religion. New York: MacMillan, 1987, 15: 87–94.

  Shboul, A. M. H. Al-Masʿūdī and His World: A Muslim Humanist and His Interest in Non-Muslims. London: Ithaca Press, 1979 [al-Masʿūdī’s work of human geography, dating from several decades after Ibn Faḍlān’s mission, provides notices on many of the peoples and places Ibn Faḍlān visited].

  *Whittow, Mark. The Making of Byzantium, 600–1025. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1996 [excellent account of Byzantium’s dealings with many of the peoples encountered by Ibn Faḍlān].

  The Ghuzziyyah

  The Ghuzziyyah (Ghuzz/Oghuz) were an important Turkic tribe, whose earliest recorded abode was northeast of the Caspian Sea. In the fourth/tenth century they began moving west into the Khazar realm and ultimately played a role in its downfall.

  Adamović, M. “Die alten Oghusen.” Materialia Turcica 7–8 (1981–82): 26–50.

  Agajanov, S. G. “The States of the Oghuz, the Kimek and the Kïpchak.” In History of Civilizations of Central Asia. Vol. 4, The Age of Achievement: AD 750 to the End of the Fifteenth Century. Part One, The Historical, Social and Economic Setting., edited by M. S. Asimov and C. E. Bosworth, 61–76. Paris: Unesco, 1998.

  Cahen, Cl. “Ghuzz.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 1991, 2:1106–10.

  Golden, P. B. “The Migrations of the Oğuz.” Archivum Ottomanicum 4 (1972): 45–84 [reprinted as Article IV in his Nomads and Their Neighbours].

  Gömeç, S. “The Identity of Oguz Kagan. The Oguz in the History and the Epics of Oguz Kagan.” Oriente Moderno 89, no. 1 (2009): 57–66.

  Gündüz, T. “Oguz-Turkomans.” In The Turks. Vol. 1, Early Ages, edited by Hasan Celâl Güzel, C. Cem Oğuz, and Osman Karatay, 463–75. Ankara: Yeni Türkiye, 2002.

  Husseinov, R. “Les sources syriaques sur les croyances et les moeurs des Oghuz du VIIe au XIII siècle.” Turcica 8, no. 1 (1976): 21–27.

  Koca, S. “The Oghuz (Turkoman) Tribe Moving from Syr Darya (Jayhun) Region to Anatolia.” In The Turks. Vol. 2, Middle Ages, edited by Hasan Celâl Güzel, C. Cem Oğuz, and Osman Karatay, 129–43. Ankara: Yeni Türkiye, 2002.

  Klyashtornyj, S. G. “The Oguz of Central Asia and the Guzs of the Aral region.” International Journal of Central Asian Studies 2 (1997): 1–4.

  Salgado, F. M. “El Arabismo Algoz (al-guzz): contenido y uso.” Historia, Instituciones, Documentos 26 (1999): 319–28.

  Nagrodzka-Majchrzyk, T. “Les Oghouz dans la relation d’Aḥmad Ibn Faḍlān.” Rocznik Orientalistyczny 49, no. 2 (1994): 165–69. Zachariadou, E.
A. “The Oğuz Tribes: The Silence of the Byzantine Sources.” In Itinéraires d’Orient: Hommages à Claude Cahen, edited by R. Curiel and R. Gyselen, 285–89. Bures-sur-Yvette: Groupe pour l’Étude de la Civilisation du Moyen-Orient, 1994.

  The Bajanāk

  The Bajanāk (Pechenegs) were a nomadic or semi-nomadic Turkic people first reported east of the Caspian Sea. In the third/ninth century they migrated west, under pressure from the Ghuzziyyah (Ghuzz/Oghuz). As allies of the Byzantines, the Pechenegs were an important force on the Pontic steppes and further west, near Kievan Rus’, and, by the end of the century, they had driven the Magyars to the Pannonian lowlands, where the state of Hungary was established.

  Romashov, S. A. “The Pechenegs in Europe in the Ninth-Tenth Centuries.” Rocznik Orientalistyczny 52, no. 1 (1999): 21–35.

  Takács, B. Z. “Khazars, Pechenegs and Hungarians in the Ninth Century.” In The Turks. Vol. 1, Early Ages, edited by Hasan Celâl Güzel, C. Cem Oğuz, and Osman Karatay, 524–32. Ankara: Yeni Türkiye, 2002.

  Wozniak, F. E. “Byzantium, the Pechenegs, and the Rus’: The Limitations of a Great Power’s Influence on its Clients in the Tenth Century Eurasian Steppe.” Archivum Eurasiae Medii Aevi 4 (1984): 299–316.

  The Bāshghird

  Not much is known about the Bāshghird (Bashkirs) in the fourth/tenth century, although they are mentioned by several Arab geographers. They were apparently an independent people occupying territories on both sides of the Ural mountain range in the region of the Volga, Kama, and Tobol Rivers.

  Togan, Z. V. “Bashdjirt.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 1986, 1:1075–77.

  The Bulghār

  The Turkic Volga Bulghārs established their state on the confluence of the Volga and Kama rivers in the third/ninth century. Early in the fourth/tenth century they entered into a dynamic trading relationship with the Samanids in Central Asia, as a result of which the territory of the Volga Bulghārs became one of the principal emporia of the period, rivaling and ultimately outlasting those of the Khazars. The Bulghārs adopted Islam in the early fourth/tenth century, and it remained their religion until the demise of their state in the wake of the attacks of the Mongols and their subsequent integration into the Golden Horde.