Islamic Art (review)

120 Reviews speech in the Canterbury Tales' is less focussed as an essay, perhaps because stories about saints do not have such a primary function for Chaucer as they do for Christine de Pisan. The essay of Jo Ann McNamara, 'The need to give: suffering and female sanctity in the Middle Ages' matches that of Vauchez in breadth of scholarship and vision. She looks at the way in which communities of religious women were gradually transformed from being centres of active care-giving to being relatively impoverished communities in which women pursed a vocation of spiritual purification on behalf of the wider community. In a restrictive society, ambitious women turned to setf-imposed deprivation to continue to be the caregivers of society. The essays of John Coakley, 'Friars as confidants of holy women in medieval Dominican hagiography', Elizabeth Robertson, 'The corporeality of female sanctity in The life of Saint Margaret' and indirectly that of Richard Kieckheffer 'Holiness and the culture of devotion: remarks on some late medieval male saints' all draw attention to the differences between male and female saints. Here is a subject worthy of a volume on its own. As with so many volumes that emanate from conferences, this coUection is a mixed bag. It contains sufficient treasure, however, for it not to be missed. Constant J. M e w s Department of History Monash University Brend, Barbara, Islamic Art, London, British Museum Press, 1991; paper; pp. 240; 105 colour and 60 black and white illustrations; R.R.P. AUSS49.95 [distributed in Australia by Thames and Hudson]. Early eighth-century Islamic traditions were evolved by the architects and artists of the conquered Byzantine principalities surrounding the Mediterranean and those of the Persian Sassanid empire extending from Iraq to Central Asia. Later on, the symphony of blue and white ornamentation on tiles bonowed from the Chinese and the stone carvings of the Indians bestowed on the Islamic monuments brilliance and glamour of indescribable beauty and delicacy. The arrangements of arch forms, domes and minarets in conjunction with geometrical patterns, vegetal ornamentations and different calligraphic styles in their mosques, khanqahs (stiff monasteries) and madrasas (seminaries) were, however, dictated by their own religious needs to demonstrate the Oneness and omnipotence of the Divine Almighty. Only a few specimens of Islamic metal work, pottery, jade, jewels, ivory, arts of the book, paintings,textiles,carpet and wood carvings have survived in museums and private collections. Nevertheless they go a long way towards showing cross-cultural influences from the artistic traditions of both east and west Reviews 121 Barbara Brend in her book traces historically the period styles and individual media of Islamic art and architecture over 1200 years. Starting with the legacy of the Umayyads, who ruled from 661 to 750, and their successors the 'Abbasids, who were overthrown by the Mongol conquerors in 1258, she goes on to describe the distinctive features of Islamic art in the lands of the West (Egypt North Africa and Spain), and in the regions ruled by Turks extending from Transoxiana to Western Iran and Anatolia. Before describing the majestic tile work on the monuments of the Mongols in Tabriz, Samarqand and Shahr-i Sabz and the fourteenth and fifteenth century Persian paintings of the Mongols, who had converted to Islam, she picks up some of the architectural monuments in Aleppo and Cairo which were built by the rulers of the dynasties who ruled over Northern Mesopotamia, Syria and Egypt in the wake of the expulsion of the Crusaders from the region. She then discusses the artistic achievements of the Safavids and Qajars of Iran and those of the Ottomans both in the east and also west of the Bosphoras. Her last chapter deals with the development of Islamic art in the Indian environment under the Sultans of Delhi and the Mughal emperors. In her conclusion she points out the Western interest in Islamic patterns in passing. Barbara Brend, who is a lecturer for the British Museum and British Library, has developed a knack to explain complex artistic concepts to lay visitors. Whtie summarizing from the standard works on the subject she brings to bear upon her book her sktil of simplifying controversial issues for general...