On <I>topoi</I> in Arab Islamic historiography

Abstract

In the article the presence of topoi in early Arab Islamic historiography is substantiated for the ϐirst time. They are considered in the sense given to this term in literary criticism, i.e. as repetitive motives of folklore origin that were recorded in written form. For an example the author took the plot of surrender of a city (fortress) according to an agreement, in which the names of those who received mercy were enumerated, but the commander who concluded it forgot to inscribe there his name. At ϐirst the use of that topos is examined with regard to the capture of the city of Susa in Khuzestan by the Muslims (on the basis of the reports by al-Dīnawarī, al-Balādhurī and Ibn A‘tham al-Kūϐī and of their interpretations by Aliy I. Kolesnikov and Oleg G. Bolshakov). Then the same motive is analyzed in the tale about surrender of the fortress of al-Nudjayr which put the end to the “War of Apostasy” in Ḥaḍramawt. The assumption is made that Arab Islamic historians turned to topoi in order to make the narrative more entertaining and to ϐill up the lack of real information.