Land and Landscapes in Mamluk and Ottoman Egypt (13th-18th Centuries)

该项目源于ANR-DFG项目DYNTRAN：传播的动力：现代早期中东（15 -17世纪）的家庭、权威和知识。在该项目中，一个个人小组讨论了围绕前现代埃及农村地区发生的转变继续开展合作的兴趣，这是当前最重要的问题。事实上，埃及对自然和人类空间的研究已经达到了一个门槛，如果不将各个时期（中世纪晚期，即马穆鲁克，与早期现代，即奥斯曼帝国）和学科结合起来，反思就无法取得进展。考古学家们对他们所研究的定居点的自然和人文环境变得敏感起来，但他们面临着伊斯兰时期的数据缺失，尤其是12世纪之后。历史学家，特别是中世纪历史学家，必须处理有限的可用资料，并超越传统的以开罗为中心的历史，以便向农村和环境研究开放研究领域。前现代时期埃及环境史是一个新兴的研究领域。大多数现存的工作主要集中在埃及的农业历史，特别是其与统治政权的经济关系。很少有研究在其生态背景下或在人口变化的影响方面探索埃及的农村环境。前现代的液压系统开始被更好地理解，但其几个世纪以来的演变及其对人文地理的影响仍有待澄清。此外，虽然土地利用是根据农业和粮食生产来考虑的，但我们对土地所有权的性质及其在六个世纪以来的演变所知甚少。因此，通过探索城乡之间的相互作用以及村庄内部的关系，将研究范围扩大到耕种者或村庄之外是很重要的。在这两个时期，埃及的大片地理区域几乎没有被研究过，尤其是西部沙漠和尼罗河中部山谷。最后，关于人口定居模式，以及这些模式如何受到生态因素和灾难（如瘟疫和政权方向）的驱动，历史记录中存在空白。为了解决这些问题，该项目建议将文本历史学家和考古学家聚集在一起，为长期的跨学科合作奠定基础。此外，地理信息系统调查项目的发展将使埃及境内在土地和水的使用、人口和生态方面发生的变化更加可视化；地理信息系统仍将是后世学者的宝贵资源。通过各种来源和多学科方法，拟议的项目将进一步讨论埃及农业、农村和农民及其生态在讨论期间发生的变化。

This project grows out of a collaboration within the ANR-DFG project DYNTRAN: Dynamics of Transmission: Families, Authority and Knowledge in the Early Modern Middle East (15th-17th Centuries). During that project, a subgroup of individuals discussed interest in continuing a partnership centered around transformations occurring within pre-modern rural Egypt, an issue of upmost importance at the current moment. Indeed, the state of research on natural and human spaces in Egypt has reached a threshold where reflection cannot progress without pooling together periods (late Middle Ages, i.e. Mamluk, with the early modern, i.e. Ottoman) and disciplines. Archeologists have become sensitive to the natural and human context of the settlements they study but face an absence of data for the Islamic period, especially after the twelfth century. Historians, and especially medievalists, must deal with the limited corpus of available sources and move beyond traditionally Cairo-centric history in order to open the field of research to rural and environmental studies. The environmental history of Egypt in the pre-modern period is a newly emerging field. Most extant work has primarily focused on Egypt’s agricultural history, especially its economic relevance for ruling regimes. Less research has explored the rural environment of Egypt within its ecological context or with regards to the impact of changing demography. The pre-modern hydraulic system is beginning to be better understood, but its evolution over centuries and its impact on human geography remains to be clarified. Furthermore, while land use has been considered in light of farming and food production, we know far less about the nature of land ownership and its evolution during the six centuries under scrutiny. Thus, it is important to widen the scope of study beyond the cultivator or the village, by exploring the interplay between the urban and rural as well as intra-village relationships. Large geographic stretches of Egypt remain nearly unstudied in both periods, especially the Western Desert and the Middle Nile Valley. Finally, there is a gap in the historical record regarding demographic settlement patterns, and how these patterns were driven by ecological factors and catastrophes – like the plague and regime direction. In addressing these issues, this project proposes to bring together textual historians and archeologists to build the foundations for perennial, interdisciplinary collaborations. Furthermore, the development of a GIS survey project will allow for a better visualization of the transformations happening within Egypt as regards land and water use, demography, and ecology; and the GIS will remain an invaluable resource for later scholars. With a variety of sources and a multidisciplinary approach, the proposed project will further the discussion on the changes occurring within Egyptian agriculture, its countryside and peasantry, and its ecology during the periods discussed.