Abu Muslim in Cultural Memory of the Dagestan Muslims

Abstract

The article investigates cultural memory of a very long islamization happened in the Caucasus from the 7th through the beginning of the 19th centuries as it was reflected in the cult of Muslim saints, namely in the case of sheikh Abu Muslim who is believed to have converted Caucasus highlanders into Islam in the early Islamic period. His name appears in countless chronicles and memorials. The sheikh, his relatives and companions are credited with dozens of shrines. The study is based on the texts of Arabiclanguage chronicles and commemorative notes (tawarikh), compared with the data of epigraphy and field materials of the author he collected mainly inDagestan. After the works of Russian classics in Islamic studies from Kazembek to Bartold and M.-S. Saidov nobody confuses this hero of Caucasus Islamization with the famous religious leader from Khurasan who helped the ‘Abbasids to seize power in the Caliphate in the middle of the eighth century and was never to theCaucasus. However, as the author argues, one should not deny his existence and therefore reject his cult as an odd historical mistake. A comparative analysis of the chronicles, memorials, and oral traditions devoted to his deeds suggests that different Islamic missionaries of foreign and local origin fused in the figure of Abu Muslim. A study of his cult in terms of cultural memory allows answering a number of important research questions concerning main stages and actors of Islamization in the Caucasusho operated in the region under study from the Middle Ages through the modern times, its social and cultural background as well as changing directions and networks.