Medieval Nubia: A Source Book

Welcome to A Source Book for Medieval Nubia. This site is a resource for all students of African civilization, and in particular a place to read about medieval Nubia. The emphasis here is on the documentary evidence from Nubia itself: the letters, land sales, inscriptions and other texts written by Nubians, for Nubians. In particular, the emphasis is on paper and leather manuscript documents written in Old Nubian, the indigenous language of the Nubian people in the medieval period. Nonetheless, many documents written in Greek, Coptic and Arabic will also appear on this site in its final form.

Contents

Nubian letters.

Nubian inscriptions.

Nubian accounts.

Nubian sales.

Nubian legal texts.

Forthcoming

Nubian graffiti.

Related Reading

Many of the sources appearing in this reader receive a more detailed discussion in Giovanni Ruffini's Medieval Nubia: A Social and Economic History.

Acknowledgments

Translations of texts found at Qasr Ibrim are published here with the kind permission of the Egypt Exploration Society. All translations from P.QI 2 and P.QI 3 are those of Gerald M. Browne, unless otherwise indicated. All translations from P.QI 4 are those of Giovanni Ruffini, unless otherwise indicated. All translations from I.QI are those of Adam Lajtar and Jacques van der Vliet, and are published with their permission and that of the Raphael Taubenschlag Foundation. Many thanks to Jonathan Mitri (Fairfield '12) for assistance with the upgrades and extensions that make this site possible.

Developed with funding from the Fairfield University Faculty Research Committee and the generous support of Fairfield University's Robert E. Wall Award.