Ibn Baṭṭūṭa’s “Prayer of Damascus:” A window on to Damascus in the hell of the Black Death (Part 1)

Abstract

Ibn Baṭṭūṭa’s famous Riḥla [(Chronicle of) Travels] is probably the only work of medieval travel literature whose protagonist claims to have personally witnessed the plague pandemic known as the Black Death, which ravaged the Mediterranean world between 1348-1350 (and continued in subsequent waves). The passages describing the scourge include the story of a rogatory – and ecumenical prayer held in Damascus in July 1348. This is probably the most often mentioned passage of the Riḥla, the most quoted in the studies on the Black Death in the Middle East, as well in those on relations between religious groups in the Mamluk empire. Nevertheless, to this day it has not yet been the subject of in-depht analysis. This article is an endeavour to contribute to both the studies on Ibn Baṭṭūṭa’s Riḥla and the Black Death by analysing the story of the Damascus prayer in its historical context and literary aspects, i.e., by answering the questions: how does the story fit into the climate of the pandemic in general and into Ibn Baṭṭūṭa’s Riḥla in particular? What are its lexical and narrative characteristics? Moving from the story to the narrated event leads to the question on relations between the different religious groups that took part in the rite. Moreover, how did Islamic scholars interpret the prayer gathering? Since the Riḥla is not a chronicle but a narrative work, another question arises: to what extent is its information reliable? The answer will be found by comparing it with the main Middle Eastern Arabic sources of the 14^th and 15^th centuries, which are mostly Chronicle texts. The concluding paragraph investigates whether the story of the Damascus prayer derives from Ibn Baṭṭūṭa’s personal testimony, as he claims in the Riḥla, or whether he (or the editor of the work, Ibn Juzayy) might have taken the information from other sources.