Parution: M. Tillier et N. Vanthieghem, Mariages et séparations en Égypte au Moyen Âge. Actes inédits sur papyrus, papier, parchemin et tissu, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, octobre 2024

One day of December 875, the weaver ʿUmar b. Mūsā, married Ḥalīma bint Nafīs before illustrious witnesses from Fusṭāṭ. Some six centuries later, in the spring of 1411, Lady Fāṭima bint Fatḥ al-Dīn celebrated a second wedding with Ṭūġān, a promising Mamluk officer, and hosted him with her retinue in her Cairene palace. Present-day historians would know nothing of them had their marriage contract not withstood the ravages of time, as have the hundred or so documents that Mathieu Tillier and Naïm Vanthieghem are publishing, translating and studying for the first time in this volume. Rich or poor, free or enslaved, the men and women of Medieval Egypt adopted the habit, from at least the eighth century CE onwards, of having their unions recorded in order to lay down the terms and conditions of their marriage. Dissolution by repudiation (ṭalāq) or amicable divorce (ḫulʿ) were also entrusted to the care of notaries. The hitherto unpublished documents collected here, which span across the Abbasid, Fatimid, Ayyubid and Mamluk periods, provide a unique insight into matrimonial strategies among commoners as well as elite members, and into marital relationships and legal practices, both in the capital and in the Egyptian countryside. After a first part devoted to the editing of marriage contracts and divorces deed as well as a few related documents, the authors offer a detailed study of matrimonial practices in medieval Egypt based on Arabic documents.

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