Muhammad ibn al‐Zain's basin (baptistère de Saint Louis)

Abstract

AbstractThe traditional baptismal font of the kings of France for centuries, the so‐called baptistère de Saint Louis is part of 1750s–1900s French national legend. Against all evidence, the name suggests that it is the spoils of Louis IX's crusade of 1250–1254. In fact, that large, copper vessel of exceptional quality, with gold and silver figural decoration, was probably produced in Damascus or Cairo in 1320–1340, almost a century after French downfall at the hands of the Mamluks in Northern Egypt in 1250. As part of the crown treasure of France and because of its outstanding artistry, it is one of the most thoroughly researched Islamicate objects in the Louvre. The association with Louis IX is pure fiction that illustrates the nonsensical and yet persuasive economies of French national legends. Paradoxically, the ransom that the French army paid to leave Egypt in 1250 was one of the stepping stones for the rise of the Mamluk dynasty, renowned for gold and silver incrusted metalwork objects, such as the basin. In another paradoxical turn, the Mamluks who ruled the Central Islamic area from 1250 to 1517 are the military elite recruited from enslaved non‐Muslims, including Turkic and Christian populations. The basin invites us to connect the points on the archipelago that includes France, the Eastern Mediterranean (fall of Acre, 1291), Cyprus and Armenia under the Lusignans, Sicily, Naples, and the South of Italy under the Angevins. Further still, this splendid and still enigmatic work of art brings together Ming China, Mongol Persia, Mamluk Islam, and Gothic France. This paper includes the earliest French description of the basin, from 1606, published in 1642 and reproduced later, including in 1742 (Piganiol de la Force, 1742). The paper also discusses the French tradition of medievalists opposing white supremacist fantasy of white, Christian medieval origins of the French nation. Finally, the paper notes some differences between French and U.S. mentalités in relation to race, in the context of recent events (2019), based on the French ideal of republican universalism, citing such symptomatic events as the replacing of the word “race” by “sex” in the French constitution, the reluctance to base activism on collective identitaire claims, the reluctance to think in terms of race and use race‐related or communautariste terms with which to think about complex social, historical, or artistic rights and responsibilities, and the prohibition to collect race‐based statistics, but also, often in advance of similar laws enacted in other countries, such acts as the Taubira law of 2001 that recognizes France's responsibility for slavery and slave trade beginning in the fifteenth century as a crime against humanity and provides for teaching, research, and commemoration.