Maged S. A. Mikhail, From Byzantine to Islamic Egypt: Religion, Identity and Politics After the Arab Conquest, London/New York 2014
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The conquest of Egypt by Islamic armies under the
command of Amr ibn al-As in the seventh century transformed medieval Egyptian
society. Seeking to uncover the broader cultural changes of the period by
drawing on a wide array of literary and documentary sources, Maged Mikhail
stresses the cultural and institutional developments that punctuated the
histories of Christians and Muslims in the province under early Islamic rule.
From Byzantine to Islamic Egypt traces how the largely agrarian Egyptian
society responded to the influx of Arabic and Islam, the means by which the
Coptic Church constructed its sectarian identity, the Islamisation of the
administrative classes and how these factors converged to create a new medieval
society. The result is a fascinating and essential study for scholars of
Byzantine and early Islamic Egypt.
