Al-Hind, Volume 2 Slave Kings and the Islamic Conquest, 11th-13th Centuries (AL-HIND, THE MAKING OF THE INDO-ISLAMIC WORLD)

Al-Hind: The Making of the Indo-Islamic World series gives the most comprehensive presentation of Islam's origins and long history in the sub-continent. Contrary to popular imagination the introduction of Islam first appeared in the south and south west of india (earliest reports suggest present day Kerala) and independently in the Island of Sri Lanka primarily by arab traders. This was a full century before skirmishes in the north west (present day pakistan and north india) between muslim troops sent to pacify pirate states to protect trade routes. Al three volumes provide the most comprehensive information about the history of half of the world muslims, one that is often ignored in todays sensationalist and monolithic view of Islam.

I will write here a review of all three volumes of Andre Wink's Al-Hind, his magnum opus.Professor Wink presents in his volumes what I would call (for lack of a better term) a pointillist view of the history of Islam in India from the earliest Arab conquests to about 1500. His method is far too often to look at a single source, either primary or secondary, and make a grand generalization. The result is a series of tiny historical points, strung together to make something like a history. Unfortunately, he lacks critical knowledge of large regions of India, particularly Rajasthan, of which his treatment is embarrassingly inadequate. His inability to stray very far from translated primary sources makes one question his knowledge of the languages involved.He asks inadequate questions, provides weak answers, and relies too much on questionable received opinion. The result is three volumes of limited use. Specialists will have to read them, but non-specialists would be better off reading Peter Jackson's or Peter Hardy's works on the early Islamic period in South Asia.

This book is the second part of a projected five-part series on the history of Asia from the rise of Islam in the 7th century of the Christian era down to the 18th century. Few scholars would have the courage and even fewer the competence to undertake such an exercise. Nor is this a history of religion or of religious conversion : it is far vaster in its scope and ranges from the study of environments, demography, and economy to kinship, statecraft and military technique. What is more, the author seeks to establish structural linkages and connections between these very diverse historical phenomena - not just in a single region but right across Eurasia from Siberia to Sumatra. He touches, en passant, on issues like the (now extinct) elephant populations of China, horsebreeding in India, and the era of Tibetan military dominance in north-central Asia. The basic paradigm that informs this work is that of the interaction between the herding and trading peoples of Central Asia and the settled farming and city-dwelling populations that lived around them in West, South and East Asia. The great integrative role of Islamic society is seen in its capacity draw and integrate these diverse lifeways and fit them into a single ecumene. It is inevitable that specialists will find some of Wink's assertions weak and some arguments speculative. Given the imperfect record of the past available to us, no grand synthesis of this type can ever be without some weak spots. I personally felt uncomfortable with the repeated citation of traditions recorded centuries after the events they purported to describe, and the heavy reliance on the stories of Marco Polo. But I would still conclude by saying that this is a book that well repays the reading - it is simply bursting with ideas and information.