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Christian-Islamic Encounters on Thirteenth-Century Ayyubid Metalwork: Local Culture, Authenticity, and Memory Author(s): Eva R. Hoffman Source: Gesta, Vol. 43, No. 2 (2004), pp. 129-142 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the International Center of Medieval Art Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25067100 Accessed: 13-03-2019 12:39 UTC

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Christian-Islamic Encounters on Thirteenth-Century Ayyubid Metalwork: Local Culture, Authenticity, and Memory*

Biographies of things can make salient what might otherwise remain obscure. . .. what is significant about the adoption of alien objects?as of alien ideas?is not the fact that they are adopted, but the way they are culturally redefined and put to use.

Igor Kopytoff1

EVA R. HOFFMAN

Tufts University

Abstract

This paper explores a multilayered Christian-Islamic en counter that is inscribed on a group of celebrated and well studied Ayyubid silver-inlaid metalwork objects with Christian themes, made in Syria and Egypt between the late 1230s and the 1250s. Studies have demonstrated the possibility of an extraordinary range of patronage and functions for these works. Indeed, the success of these works depended on their connection to a variety of Christian and Muslim audiences and on readings from various Christian and Muslim perspec tives. This article explores, further, these multiple readings, highlighting the centrality of local culture in the production and reception of objects. A fully shared local visual culture explains the interchangeability of Christian and non-Christian motifs on these pieces of metalwork, with indigenous Chris tians and Muslims as participants and inhabitants of the same visual culture. The consideration of local identity for these objects also informs their Crusader patronage and reception. For the Crusaders, these works carried the imprimatur of authenticity and helped to shape the memory of their experi ence in the Holy Land.

Portable objects played a central role in defining and mapping visual culture in the Mediterranean world between the tenth and thirteenth centuries. The implications of porta bility and the relationships forged by portable works were vast and varied. Portability allowed an object to extend well beyond itself, traveling far and wide through space and time, forging and extending cultural relationships and connections and, in the process, expanding identities and meanings.2 At the same time, however, the range and frequency of movement distance us from these encounters and experiences, making it difficult to access the multiple layers of identity and meaning in these works.

This paper explores a multilayered Christian-Islamic encounter involving a group of celebrated and well-studied Ayyubid silver-inlaid metalwork objects made in Syria and Egypt between the late 1230s and the 1250s.3 These eighteen works, comprising candlesticks, ewers, cylindrical boxes, incense burners, trays, a basin, and a canteen, are typical of

Ayyubid metalwork, representing a full range of styles and

functions. They have been singled out as a distinctive group because of their inclusion of Christological themes. Full nar rative scenes, such as the Virgin and Child Enthroned, the Na tivity, Presentation in the Temple, and Entry into Jerusalem,

may be found, for example, on the spherical side of a canteen, now in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (Figs. 1-4). Christian scenes also appear in abbreviated forms: the An nunciation, Adoration, Raising of Lazarus, Entry into Jerusa lem, and the Last Supper or Marriage at Cana can be found in the small medallions on the exterior walls of a basin, also in the Freer Gallery of Art (Fig. 5). Representations of saints framed within arcades appear on both the interior walls of the basin and on the back of the canteen (Figs. 2 and 6). A number of closely related Ayyubid works of enameled glass with Chris tian themes should be included in the consideration of this

group as well.4 At least ten of these glass objects survive, in cluding bottles, canteens, beakers, a horn, and fragments, that contain related motifs.5

The visual vocabulary used in these metal and glass ob jects is clearly rooted in the local Ayyubid milieu. The style and motifs of vegetal designs, hunting, and astrology fit neatly into the body of Islamic Ayyubid metalwork made in Syria and Egypt during the first half of the thirteenth century.6 Although certain iconographie mistakes and divergences have been noted in some of the Christian images, for the most part the models for these scenes can be located solidly in the indig enous Eastern Christian sphere. The Nativity, Entry into Jeru salem, and Presentation in the Temple scenes on the Freer Canteen, for example, are closely related to scenes in Syrian Christian manuscripts, in particular to the British Library Add. MS 7170, dated 1219-1220, and to the Vatican Library, MS Syr. 559, dating to about 1220.7 Furthermore, the format as well as a number of expanded narrative scenes on the Freer Canteen find striking comparisons in the rectangular head pieces for each of the four Gospels in Paris, Institut Catholique, MS Copte-Arabe l.8

Studying these works as a group, scholars have outlined a variety of possible combinations for Muslim-Christian inter section in the making and viewing of these objects. Never theless, the identities of the makers, patrons, functions, and

GESTA XLIII/2 ? The International Center of Medieval Art 2004 129

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FIGURE 1. Canteen, brass inlaid with silver, Syria, ca. 1250, front, spherical side, Washington, DC, Freer Gallery of Art, 41.10 (photo: Freer Gallery of Art, by permission).

FIGURE 2. Canteen, brass inlaid with silver, Syria, ca. 1250, back, flat side B, Washington, DC, Freer Gallery of Art, 41.10 (photo: Freer Gallery of Art, by permission).

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FIGURE 3. Canteen, detail of Nativity and Baptism (photo: Freer Gallery of Art, by permission).

meanings of many of these works remain speculative. Com plicating the matter further is the possibility that in addition to local Christians and Muslims, some of these works were

made for the Crusaders, who established a presence in Pales tine and Syria between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries. Significantly, scholars have reached the conclusion that there is probably no single answer to these questions and that these works speak to a multiplicity of engagements among all these populations.9

Local Culture and Identity

If the material under discussion here has been resistant

to cultural untangling, it is because the visual vocabulary was never intended to be segregated into Christian and non Christian categories in the first place. The polarization between Christian and Islamic themes is the result of conditioning by later historians rather than by thirteenth-century Ayyubid art ists, patrons, and viewers.10 It is futile to attempt to deconstruct these works into their Christian and Muslim constituent parts or to search for any single Christian-Muslim encounter. The sharing of visual culture between the indigenous Syrian and Egyptian Christians and the Muslims went far beyond the exchange of particular motifs or elements of style; rather, it penetrated deeply into the fabric of a fully integrated Ayyu bid visual culture. The local Christian populations of Syria and Egypt were substantial, comprising diverse sects, includ ing branches of Orthodox Christianity (Melkites, Greeks, and Syrian Jacobites), Armenians, Copts, and Abyssinian Chris tians.11 Along with the Jewish minority, the Christians were subject to various social and religious restrictions under the Ayyubids. Nevertheless, they participated significantly in the culture, serving as administrators, merchants, physicians, and

FIGURE 4. Canteen, detail of Presentation in the Temple (photo: Freer Gal lery of Art, by permission).

craftsmen.12 The contribution of Christians to the formation

of the local Ayyubid visual arts has been well documented, particularly in the realm of Christian Syrian and related Cop tic manuscripts and paintings, where specialists have argued for a less polarized view of the culture.13

A striking example of the synthesis between Christian and non-Christian elements from the broader culture is the

illustrated Gospels MS Copte-Arabe 1. This bilingual Copto Arabic work stands as a powerful expression of both linguis tic and visual assimilation of the Eastern Christians into the

Ayyubid culture at large. It has been suggested that some of these Christian manuscripts, MS Copte-Arabe 1 in particular,

may have been produced in the same workshops as the con temporary celebrated "secular" Arabic manuscripts, notably the Maqamat MS B.N. arabe 6094, and the Kalila was Dimna

MS B.N. arabe 3465, both in the Biblioth?que Nationale in Paris.14 Convincing as they are, however, these observations of the naturalization of Christian and non-Christian elements

into an integrated Ayyubid visual system have occurred pri marily in the context of the study of Christian manuscripts within the sphere of Christian use and ritual.

Ayyubid metalwork with Christian themes provides a neutral territory where Christian and non-Christian users alike could partake of a fluid and interchangeable vocabulary. The treatment of the scene of the Virgin and Child on the Freer Canteen, for example, may be compared not only to the rep resentation in the Christian manuscripts but also to scenes of enthroned rulers in other non-Christian Syrian and Mesopo tamian metalwork objects and Arabic manuscripts.15 In another example, on the lid of a circular inlaid brass container in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Virgin wears a headdress and pants, which were likely modeled on a turban and gar ments for an enthroned (male) ruler in a non-Christian scene.16

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Stylistically, the group of inlaid metalwork with Christian scenes, as a whole, fits into the larger Ayyubid metalwork production, as mentioned above. The metalwork artist, Ahmad al-Dhak? al-Mawsili, as well as other artists who used the nisba al-Mawsill (denoting origin from or association with the city Mosul), created metalwork both with and without Christian themes, while the name of the Ayyubid sultan, al Malik al-S?lih, appears on two works with, and two works without, Christian themes.17 For the most part, the inscrip tions on these works share repeated formulas of good wishes to anonymous owners. Even some of the luxury works, such as the Freer Canteen and a tray at the State Hermitage Mu seum in St. Petersburg, are inscribed with lengthy and elab orate blessings and wishes of triumph and glory but do not name the owners, leaving the question of patronage entirely open.18 The high-quality box in the Metropolitan Museum of Art is not inscribed at all.

The naturalization of Christian motifs on objects used by Muslims may be the most surprising notion for us in the twenty-first century to reconcile. This is largely due to our assumption of an inherent Christian-Muslim incompatibility and also to lingering misconceptions about prohibitions of representational imagery in Islamic art. To be sure, Christian

Muslim polarization found expression in the context of the Crusader reception of the metalwork, discussed below, but it did not define the visual discourse between the local Chris

tians and Muslims. The use of metalwork objects with Chris tian themes would not have been at all shocking to thirteenth century Muslim viewers. After all, Jesus was also revered by the Muslims as a prophet.19 The Christian scenes represented on these works were carefully chosen to include only those episodes acceptable to Muslims, specifically from the infancy and life of Jesus, omitting episodes dealing with his death and divinity. The inclusion of Christian subjects within a wider repertoire of Islamic figurai representations on these metal work pieces elucidates an expanded overriding iconographie system of a shared visual culture, with indigenous Christians and Muslims as participants and inhabitants of the same visual universe. The coexistence of these Christian and non-Christian

themes on the metalwork represents the fullest expression of cultural interchange in this thirteenth-century pluralistic society.

Does this seamless visual integration imply a homoge neous undifferentiated society? On the contrary, the metal work pieces with Christian themes varied in quality and served a range of audiences and functions, from everyday works with primarily Christian scenes made for local Christian use, such as the utilitarian incense burner used in liturgical practice, now in the Cleveland Museum of Art (37.26), to luxury works

with Christian and Islamic themes made for either or for both

the Crusader and Muslim aristocracy (Figs. 1-6).20 Inscrip tions may sometimes clarify context and patronage. Two luxury

works, the basin at the Freer Gallery and a tray in the Louvre, are inscribed with name of the Ayyubid sultan al-S?lih Najm

ad-Din, who ruled in Diyarbakr (1232-1239), in Egypt (1240 1249), and in Damascus (1245-1249). The references in the inscriptions to al-S?lih as a holy warrior (murahit) and the defender of the frontiers (muth?gir) are particularly poignant for al-S?lih, because he died fighting the Crusade of St. Louis in 1249. The appearance of al-S?lih's investiture title, "friend of the Commander of the Faithful" (khal?l amir al-mu 'minin), on the interior of the Freer Basin may further specify the pe riod of his rule over Syria and Egypt, following his formal caliphal investiture in 1247.21 Distinctions between Christians and Muslims certainly existed, but they cannot be deciphered by separating and parsing out the "Christian" and "Islamic" visual themes. These differences were folded into the broader

distinctions of patronage, function, and reception. From such a range in patronage and function it follows

that while these works may have shared a similar vocabulary, they did not convey any single shared meaning, because

meaning was tied to reception and circumstances of use. The imagery on the same works was perceived and interpreted differently by the different users and viewers. As suggested by Ranee Katzenstein and Glenn Lowry, a Muslim viewer and owner would read these Christian themes in direct rela

tionship and as a visual complement to the typical Islamic non-Christian themes. Hence, Jesus may be a reference to the ruler as the "just and divine king."22 Perhaps, in the con text of Ayyubid court work, as Eva Baer has suggested in her analysis of the Freer Basin, an Islamic reading would view the Christian themes within the overarching context of royalty and power. The Christian figures would function like the other royal and astral figures surrounding the prince. They, like all the other figures in his universe, pay homage to the prince be cause he is positioned as the cosmic center corresponding to the epithets inscribed on the basin, "the king who rules over nations," "the sultan of the Arab and non-Arab people," and the "slayer of the infidels."23 Alternatively, Nuha Khoury has suggested that the Muslim reader might view this in terms of a counterclaim to the Crusaders' possession of the holy cities, subsuming the prophet Jesus into the Muslim tradition. In contemporary Islamic literature, the tables were turned on the Christians as Jesus condemns the Christian desecrators of the

holy sites.24 The flexibility and range of function and patronage

observed here for the silver-inlaid metalwork with Christian

themes is also perfectly consistent with the overall trends of production and demand for Ayyubid silver-inlaid metalwork. Inlaid metalwork enjoyed enormous popularity and value throughout every strata of Ayyubid culture. It has been noted, for example, that the quality and decoration of works for the middle class and aristocracy are often so similar that it is dif ficult to tell these works apart without the specific informa tion given in inscriptions.

Thus far, the Christian-Muslim encounter explored for these works defines a local exchange between the indigenous Christian and Muslim populations, suggesting a multicultural

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FIGURE 5. Basin, brass inlaid with silver, Syria, ca. 1247-1249, Washington, DC, Freer Gallery of Art, 55.10 (photo: Freer Gallery of Art, by permission).

engagement with a flexible vocabulary within an integrated iconographie system and with the potential for multiple read ings. It also suggests a definition of "the local" in which

Muslim-Christian distinctions existed but were expressed within the broader spectrum of distinctions in patronage, function, and reception in reference to class as well as re ligious affiliations. The specific circumstances and networks of connections and meanings can best be explored one rela tionship at a time. This local Christian-Muslim intersection represents only the first of multiple exchanges afforded by the implications of portability. A second context of Christian

Muslim engagement involved the Crusaders. For them the possibilities offered in the expanded iconographie system and the recognizable local production just described made these works not only highly desirable but crucial to promoting their ideological agenda.

Crusader Encounter and Identity

The metalwork pieces of this indigenous production that were available to the Crusaders were purchased on the open market or made as commissions, either to be kept by the Cru saders as souvenirs or exchanged as gifts with their counter parts among the Muslim aristocracy. But what did these works mean to the Crusaders? What role did visual imagery and rhet oric play in shaping ideology, memory, and identity for them?

The Crusader experience in the Holy Land was not mono lithic. Their relations with the Muslims ranged from open hostility to negotiated truces that supported a delicate modus

FIGURE 6. Basin, detail of interior, side view (photo: Freer Gallery of Art, by permission).

vivendi.25 Yet, throughout their various campaigns and con quests in the Levant between the eleventh and thirteenth cen turies, the mission of the Crusaders remained constant and centered on reclaiming the Holy Land for Christianity. The goals of this mission were to rid the Holy Land of Muslim idols and of the Muslim idolaters who had, from the Christian

point of view, desecrated the holy sites and to restore these sites to Christian use.26 The opposition of this potent imagery of idols and idolaters, on the one hand, and holy images and monuments, on the other, remained the centerpiece of the

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rhetoric of destruction and restoration that stirred the Crusad

ers into action and made the Holy Land real for them. Between 1099 and 1187, during their absolute control of

Jerusalem, the Crusaders made good on their promise, un leashing maximum effort, enacted visually and perpetrated physically. In 1099 the Crusaders destroyed the infidel enemy and established the Kingdom of Jerusalem. During the mid twelfth century they restored their key churches, including the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, with full cycles of holy imagery in paintings, mosaics, and sculpture.27 The cleansing of the temple and the expulsion of the idolaters were played out as central themes in the sculptural program of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.28 The equation of the enemy with the idola ters and anti-image completed the meaning here. As expressed by Michael Camille, "images were not only what were being fought over but also constituted the holy war's most potent weapons."29

The rhetoric of destruction and restoration, the idol and

the holy image, was similarly activated in the Crusader con quest and rededication of the Islamic monuments: the Dome of the Rock as the Templum Domini and the al-Aqs? Mosque as the Templum Salomonis. In the Gesta Tancredi by Raoul of Caen we first read about the calm before the coming storm. On the day before the conquest of Jerusalem, the hero, Tan cred, admires Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives. He "is amazed by the temples; by the copper cupola of the Temple of the Lord, by the unusual length of the temple of Solomon and by the ring of spacious porticoes, as it were another city within a city."30 Then, in the very place he admired the day before, Tancred participated in the massacre at the Haram, as described in Raymond of Aguilers' well-known account, when "in the Temple of Solomon and the portico, Crusaders rode in blood to the knees and bridles of their horses."31 In the de

struction, according to the Gesta Tancredi, the Crusaders cleared away a large silver gilt statue adorned with jewels and a purple cloth from one of the Haram monuments, either from the Dome of the Rock (Fig. 7) or from the al-Aqs?

Mosque. The chronicler speculates on the identity of the statue:

Maybe this effigy is of Mars or Apollo. Perhaps even Christ's? Yet Christ's insignia, The cross, the crown of thorns, the nails, the transfixed

flank are not there.

Thus it is not Christ: why should it not be the pristine Antichrist, Depraved Muhammad, pernicious Muhammad.

Oh should his associate, the one to come, appear presently!

May my feet instantly destroy the Antichrist.32

Of course, there was no statue of Muhammad, but since the Crusaders came to the Holy Land to destroy the idols and

idolaters, they simply had to find them. It has been suggested that an actual Roman statue was found and that, in part, the story represents an exaggeration.33 Misidentification and ex aggeration may be part of the explanation. More than exag geration, the association of the idol with Muhammad and the accusation that Muslims were idol worshipers fueled the de monization of the Muslim enemy as "the other" and the equa tion of this enemy with the Antichrist and the anti-image.34 Idols and idolaters were conflated here. In the continuation of

the passage, the chronicler of the Gesta makes this clear:

For shame! God's house is possessed by the inhabitant of the abyss.

Pluto's slave parades as God in Solomon's house! Let him fall down quickly, forthwith let him come down! Insolent effigy, by now has he almost defied us. Scarcely had the order been issued as you shall see it

executed, The warriors executing this order more willingly than

any other. The statue is snatched, dragged, torn to pieces,

beheaded.35

The destruction of the idol was linked to the destruction

of the idolater, and Muslims embodied both.36 The discourse of idolatry provided cover for the real violence, a human mas sacre of appalling scale. Furthermore, after the destruction and removal of the idols, the Templum Domini could be purified and "rededicated." The discourse of idols, therefore, also represented a strategy to divert malice and destruction from the monuments, the objects of admiration described in the chronicles. In short, the Crusades removed and destroyed the idols/idolaters (i.e., the Muslims), not the monuments and their decoration, which were left completely unscathed. In deed, consistent with this conflation between the idols and idolaters, after the Crusader conquest Muslims and Jews were banned from the city of Jerusalem. The Haram monuments were consecrated and rededicated in 1141. A golden cross was placed on the top of the Dome of the Rock/Templum Domini, Latin inscriptions were placed on the exterior and interior, and Christian images were installed inside.37

The Crusaders had fulfilled their mission. By installing Christian images and inscriptions in the Templum Domini, the Crusaders had purified the monument, replacing the anti image with a holy one. It has been suggested that the in clusion of a baptismal hymn in the Latin inscriptions may represent a symbolic baptism of this Islamic monument.38 It is, of course, no coincidence that the Crusaders projected their visual political and religious counterclaim on the very monu ment that four centuries earlier had visually established the po litical and religious presence of Islam. Here was the Christian response to Muslim doctrine voiced in the late-seventh-century Arabic inscriptions in the Dome of the Rock denouncing the Incarnation and Trinitarianism.39 The reclamation of the Dome

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of the Rock constituted the pinnacle of accomplishment for the Crusaders, the glorious final chapter of the historical and sacred epoch, from the Jewish Temple of Solomon to the Islamic Dome of the Rock, to the Crusader Templum Domini.

I would like to suggest that Crusader reception of the silver-inlaid metalwork with Christian scenes similarly was part of the discourse of restoration. By the time these pieces were made in the thirteenth century, the fire of Crusader rhet oric had died down and the Crusaders were reconciled to a permanent Muslim presence in Jerusalem. The Muslims had recaptured Jerusalem in 1187 under Saladin, and, while the Crusaders regained Jerusalem briefly between 1229 and 1244 (from 1229 to 1239 and again in 1243) through diplomatic

means under Frederick II, the Muslim holy sites were left under Muslim control, except for a time in 1243.40 The Chris tian images in the Dome of the Rock had long been removed and the Crusaders could no longer install Christian images in

Muslim places. The portable arts, however, could still serve as visual sites for the display of claims of the truth and success of the Crusader mission, as well as wishful claims over the monuments. It is possible that the program represented on the Freer Canteen (Figs. 1-4), for example, referred to a particu

FIGURE 7. Jerusalem, Dome of the Rock, interior view, 691.

lar narrative program in one of the churches restored by the Crusaders. The themes on the canteen, for example, were all represented in the twelfth-century mosaic cycle at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem: the Virgin and Child flanked by the biblical prophets David and Abraham appeared in the center of the choir apse, the Presentation in the Temple appeared on the south side of the sanctuary; and the Nativity and Entry into Jerusalem were represented in the south transept.41 The Christian imagery installed in the Dome of the Rock may have included a painting of the Virgin and Child; the Nativity (the child with ox and ass) and saints.42 The layout of the scenes on the Freer Canteen mirrors the format for compara ble decoration on the drum and dome here or in another re

stored church (Fig. 7). For the Crusaders, the representation of Christian imagery on the metalwork would signify and cel ebrate the restoration of the Holy Landr just as the installation of the Christian paintings and inscription in the restored Tem plum Domini did. The possession of such an object as the Freer Canteen may have served as a substitute for and a commem oration of a monumental program. But whereas the Christian programs had been pulled down from the Islamic monuments when the Muslims reclaimed the holy sites, the portable objects could continue to carry the message of the Crusader mission, expressing the rhetoric of restoration, long after the return to Islamic rule.

Historical Memory and Authenticity

For the Crusaders, above all, objects like the Freer Can teen preserved a tangible link to the sacred topography of the Holy Land. As has been duly pointed out, the themes of the Nativity (Fig. 3), the Presentation in the Temple (Fig. 4), and the Entry into Jerusalem that are recorded on the Freer Can teen are all associated with loca sancta, holy sites, in Beth lehem and Jerusalem.43 The scene of the Presentation in the

Temple is represented as taking place in a structure that is prob ably meant to be the Dome of the Rock/Templum Domini. The Dome of the Rock, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and the Anastasis Rotunda have been specifically identified in loca sancta representations on related Ayyubid enameled glass.44 The specificity of architectural representations on these works may indicate that they were commissioned expressly for Crusader patrons in the context of pilgrimage. The Freer Canteen, in both its form and decoration, is a magnificent ver sion of the traditional pilgrim ampullae, containers for holy earth, water, or sanctified oil that were souvenirs or "bless ings" carried back by pilgrims from the Holy Land from Early Christian times on (Figs. 8 and 9). Often decorated with representations of loca sancta, the ampullae served as com memorative objects for the spiritual journey of the pilgrim age. The ampullae preserved contact with the sacred sites and with the events represented on them and were brought home for personal memory of the experience as well as to provide direct contact with holiness for those who could not personally

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FIGURE 8. Pewter pilgrim ampulla from Palestine, ca. 600, Adoration of the Magi, Monza Cathedral Treasury (photo: after Grabar, Ampoules).

make the pilgrimage.45 As receptacles for secondary relics of earth, water, or oil of the loca sancta, holiness was transferred

to the ampullae, which were then considered apotropaic.46 While the shape and function of the Freer Canteen have been noted as unusual, other thirteenth-century enameled glass can teens and flasks that have survived are similarly stylistically related to Ayyubid metalwork and glass production and may also be associated with Crusader use. One of these is a can

teen with Ayyubid vegetal designs and representations of Crusader riders juxtaposed with merrymakers and musicians, now in the British Museum in London (Fig. 10).47 Another enameled and gilded flask, now in the Cathedral and Dio cesan Museum in Vienna, is decorated with representations of riders and merrymakers in medallions on the body of the flask, while standing figures (saints) circle the neck (Fig. 11). This work was probably brought to Europe by the Crusaders in the second half of the thirteenth century. It later became part of the collection of the Hapsburg Duke Rudolf IV (1339 1365), where it was recorded to contain earth mixed with the blood of the Holy Innocents who were massacred by Herod.48

FIGURE 9. Lead pilgrim ampulla from Acre, ca. 1200, Israel Antiquities Authority, 99-53 (photo: Rozenberg, Knights of the Holy Land, 110, by permission).

These commemorative vessels gain meaning within the context of the Crusader worldview and the creation of Cru

sader historical memory. This was a medieval worldview in which the Bible lay the foundation and master plan for the un folding of all future events, linking past, present, and future in a continuum.49 With their conquest of the Holy Land, the Crusaders found their place in this scheme as the successors to the biblical conquerors who purified the Holy Land and as the direct and legitimate heirs to the biblical heritage. For the Crusaders, their conquest signaled the fulfillment of the bib lical promise. It should come as no surprise that the famous description by Raymond of Aguilers of the Crusaders' bloody conquest of Jerusalem was modeled closely on the descrip tions of the destruction of Jerusalem in Revelation (14:20) and in Josephus' The Jewish War, documenting the Roman destruction of the Jewish Temple during the first century.50 Following closely in the footsteps of history as well as the promise of prophecy, the Crusaders identified with archetypal biblical heroes, like Joshua and the Maccabees, who are pic tured carrying out their heroic efforts in Crusader chronicles

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FIGURE 10. Canteen, glass painted with enamel and gilded, Egypt or Syria, ca. 1275, London, British Museum, OA 69.1-20.3 (photo: Trustees of the British Museum, by permission).

and illustrated manuscripts, sometimes in Crusader garb.51 Such blurring of boundaries and links between past and present are clearly expressed by the Crusaders' naming their kingdom the "Kingdom of Jerusalem." In a series of twelfth century Crusader maps, the Crusader worldview is offered in

microcosm.52 The center of this familiar typological universe is located in Jerusalem, where it was possible to move with fluidity between the biblical past and present. Here St. George is dressed in the armor of a Templar Knight and defeats the infidel Muslim; Crusader monuments of the Templum Domini, Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and the citadel of David's Tower appear along with sites identified by their biblical names, such as "Bethlehem of Judah" and "Sodom and Gomorrah."

In this seamless universe, the descriptions by pilgrims of holy sites often blend scriptural accounts with the extant monu ments built from early Christian times through the Crusader restorations. Some pilgrims relied on Scripture while others gave greater weight to what they saw. This did not matter since one validated the authenticity of the other. What pilgrims saw could not be separated from Scripture, and their descrip tions conveyed an immediacy of experience, as if they were witnessing the holy events themselves. In an 1185 account of his visit to the grotto of the Church of the Nativity in Beth lehem, the Cretan pilgrim John Phocas provides an affective eyewitness account: "I am in the Holy Cave and I see all the circumstances of the Lord's birth."53 He describes the repre

FIGURE 11. Flask, glass painted with enamel and gold, probably Syria, ca. 1275, Vienna, Cathedral and Diocesan Museum, L-6 (photo: Cathedral and Diocesan Museum, by permission).

sentation of the Nativity on the walls of the grotto as if he were seeing a reenactment of the event.54 The biblical narra tive of the Scripture merged with the extant holy sites of sacred topography and with the pilgrims' experiences of these sites. Biblical history was perceived as continuous living history.

It is within this realm of Crusader historical memory that we understand the reception of silver-inlaid metalwork by the Crusaders and their engagement with Islamic art more gen erally. Naturally, the Crusaders appreciated the splendid aesthetic and material value of inlaid metalwork, glass, and other precious Islamic media. But instead of classifying these works as "Ayyubid" or "Islamic" as we do today, the Crusad ers valued these works, above all, for their distinct local Holy Land origin and identity. This does not mean that the Cru saders were ignorant of the reality of the contemporary pro duction of these works. These objects, furthermore, may have been commissioned and exchanged as gifts between the Crusaders and Muslims during the 1230s and 1240s, a time of good relations between the two groups and precisely the

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period to which the production of inlaid metalwork with Chris tian themes was limited. Exchange of fancy metalwork pro vided a way for aristocrats from both cultures to pursue diplomacy and impress each other with wonderful posses sions. The practical modus vivendi reached by the Muslims and Crusaders allowed for the unavoidable intersection and

accommodation of cultures.55 This reality of the present could coexist with the Crusader devotion to the past. These works, however, did not speak primarily to the Crusader-Muslim present and certainly not to an Islamic identity. The Islamic presence in the Holy Land, according to the Crusader view, was just a temporary interruption in the master plan of re demption. For the Crusaders, the deepest value of these works lay in their ahistorical, truer association with the sacred topog raphy. This broader view also closes the historical distance between the substantial production of ampullae during the sixth and seventh centuries, an early wave of Christian pilgrimage, and its renewed production during Crusader times in the twelfth century (Fig. 9).56 Though separated by many historical cen turies, objects and monuments were linked within the contin uum of living biblical history and could move fluidly between time periods and transcend historical boundaries and realities.

It is also probable that the Crusaders knew that the Dome of the Rock was an Islamic structure, but they nevertheless chose to identify it as the restored biblical Temple, an iden tity that would be assimilated into the popular imagination of Europe for many centuries to come.57 If Jerusalem was at the center of this view of living biblical history, the Templum Domini emerged as one of the major Crusader landmarks at the heart of this city, as is prominently showcased on the twelfth-century Crusader maps.58 The popularity and authen ticity of the Templum Domini as a Christian site are dem onstrated by the practice of pilgrims' carving away pieces of the rock as souvenirs, quite literally taking the holy site back home with them.59

Crusader engagement with local/Islamic visual culture and its integration into the Crusader worldview is fully artic ulated in the Crusader manuscript of the Histoire Universelle, a vernacular history of the world from the biblical creation to the reign of Julius Caesar, produced in Acre, dating about 1285, now in the British Library (MS Add. 15768, fol. lv).60

The frontispiece chosen as the foundation image for this view of history comprises a central motif of Christological scenes of the Creation painted in the distinct style of the Acre work shop surrounded by a distinctly local/Islamic motif of revelers, banqueters, and animals (Figs. 12 and 13). These two separate modes on the page represent a fully unified message within the Crusader worldview. For the Crusaders, the use of the local/ Islamic vocabulary not only introduced an exotic visual ele

ment but also defined an association and identity connected to biblical history, framing the central biblical theme, as it were, in an authentic aura of the Holy Land.61 Moreover, the contemporary Islamic style would have also labeled the work as one connected to the Latin East, thus demonstrating that it was through the Crusaders that the biblical continuum would

FIGURE 12. Histoire Universelle, frontispiece, London, The British Library, MS Add. 15768, fol. lv (photo: British Library, by permission).

occur. Similarly, on the Freer Canteen, it is the local/Islamic mode and milieu that help to identify the riders wearing West ern armor as Crusaders and to locate these figures in the Holy Land (Fig. 2). By picturing themselves on the canteen, the Crusaders thus implicate themselves within the full biblical narrative, conflating past and present. Represented on the inner circle and visually parallel to the row of saints that surround them, the Crusader riders assert their claim as successors to these saints, as holy warriors who carry on the mission of the saints, by fighting for the reclamation and restoration of the holy sites represented on the other side.62

The majority of objects acquired by the Crusaders in the Holy Land and taken back to Europe did not carry the narra tives or representations of the holy Christian persons and sites. They were made in the local/Islamic style and were collected precisely because of their obvious and authentic localization in the Holy Land and association with the memory of the pil grimage and Crusades. It is no coincidence that some of these works are associated with Crusader rulers. Two celebrated

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^*r ' i;s*

FIGURE 13. Histoire Universelle, detail of frontispiece.

basins come to mind. One was commissioned for Hugh IV of Lusignan, king of Cyprus and titular king of Jerusalem (1324 1359).63 The basin, bearing French and Arabic inscriptions referring specifically to this ruler, depicts shields with the arms of Jerusalem and a Maltese cross. The second basin, the so called Baptist?re de St. Louis, probably dates later (ca. 1260 1279 or ca. 1325-1360) than the Crusader St. Louis after whom it was named.64 The name later given to this work has con structed an identity and value within Crusader memory by connecting it both to the Holy Land and to the pious Crusader King Louis. By the eighteenth century, the use of this basin as a royal baptismal font connects it to the practice of using objects procured in the Holy Land for holy Christian rituals once they were taken to Europe.

Many precious objects of rock crystal, glass, and ivory from the Holy Land were deposited into European church treas uries, where they enriched the church coffers and were put to use as holy liturgical vessels and reliquaries (e.g., Fig. II).65 These works enjoyed a special status in part because of their high value. Moreover, they served as vessels for historical memory, connecting the living holy ritual in the churches of Europe to the sacred topography of the Holy Land. They also stirred the memory of the Crusader adventure and discourse of restoration. In many cases the objects were refit with elab orate mounts, enamels, and jewels, changing their original appearance.66 These additions, however, did not compromise the holiness or authenticity of the objects; rather, they natu ralized the works into the treasuries, where they would now look like the other treasury objects, following in the long tra dition and continuum of Christian holy objects.67 As the embodiment of the restoration of the Holy Land, the vessels themselves were now similarly rescued, purified, and fully restored. During the conquest of Jerusalem in 1092, after the idol was destroyed on the Haram, the chronicler tells us: "The

metal when its shape is lost is changed back from vile to pre cious."68 In other words, materials and objects were mere re ceptacles that had to be activated through their usage, either as holy vessels or as unholy vessels, that is to say, as idols. And as in the restoration of the Haram monuments, the holy functions of these objects also justified any violence and plunder that were involved in acquiring them. Like the inlaid metalwork with Christian scenes, these objects in church treasuries represented the mediation between the sacred to pography and the believer and expressed the mission of the Crusades?to rid the Holy Land of idols and to restore it for Christianity.

Conclusion

The complex Christian-Muslim relationship inscribed on the Syrian-Egyptian inlaid metalwork with Christian themes defies any singular definition. Indeed, the celebrity and suc cess of these works depended on their flexible and integrated visual vocabulary, which served an extraordinary range of patrons, functions, and readings from various Christian and Muslim perspectives. Here, I have focused on the interactions of three major local cultural groups?Eastern Christians, Mus lims, and Crusaders?and on two key relationships. While both of these relationships have highlighted "the local," they have been defined very differently in each context.

The first relationship between the indigenous Christians and Muslims involved the creation of a genuine shared local Syrian-Egyptian visual culture. This culture was marked by an assimilation and interchangeability of visual vocabulary that included Christian and non-Christian themes and styles, where the circulation of portable objects promoted connec tions and linked these indigenous populations. The second re lationship centered on Crusader culture in Syria and Palestine during the thirteenth century. While the definition of local iden tity for these works was equally significant for the Crusaders, their engagement with these works did not primarily point to a shared culture with their Muslim counterparts. For the Cru saders, above all, these works represented more than anything else a direct link to their biblical legacy and claims to the Holy Land. A discourse of portability, where the movement of objects over considerable distances offered opportunities for cultural exchange, was tied here to the controlled journey of pilgrimage and crusade that forged the temporal and geo graphic connection between the sacred topography and the ultimate destination of the work, whether it was in the Latin

Kingdom or in Europe. In both cases, the definition of the local has highlighted

the limitations of classification. Given our underlying assump tions of the separation between Christian and Muslim cul tures, the label "Ayyubid" has inhibited our understanding of the truly integrated local culture in Syria and Egypt during the first half of the thirteenth century. At the same time, it has

obscured the local meaning defined by the Crusaders. Ulti mately, the relationships uncovered in these encounters, both past and present, force us to adjust and reevaluate the categories in which we classify these works. In the end, the categories

must be as mobile as the works themselves, and the relation ships established between the works will be our best guides.

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NOTES

* I would like to express my gratitude to the conference organizers, D. Fairchild-Ruggles and Robert Ousterhout. Earlier versions of this paper were delivered at the College Art Association in Boston in February 1996, at the Fifth International Conference of the Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East, in Jerusalem and Acre, July 1999, and at Harvard University, March 2004, where I completed this project as a Fellow at the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Art and Architecture. I would like to thank Dr. Massumeh Farhad, Chief Curator and Curator of

Islamic Art at the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, for generously providing me with photographs of the Canteen and Basin (Figs 1-6).

1. I. Kopytoff, "The Cultural Biography of Things: Commoditization as Process," in The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Per spective, ed. A. Appadurai (Cambridge, 1986), 67.

2. Discussed more fully in E. R. Hoffman, "Pathways of Portability: Islamic and Christian Interchange from the Tenth through the Twelfth Century," AH, XXIV/1 (2001), 17-50.

3. See these excellent studies: N. N. Khoury, "Narratives of the Holy Land: Memory, Identity and Inverted Imagery in the Freer Basin and Can teen," Orientations, XXIX/5 (1998), 63-68; E. Baer, Ayyubid Metal work with Christian Images (Leiden, 1989); R. Katzenstein and G. D. Lowry, "Christian Themes in Thirteenth-Century Islamic Metalwork," Muqarnas, I (1983), 53-68; E. Atil, Art of the Arab World (Washing ton, DC, 1975), 64-73; and L. T. Schneider, "The Freer Canteen," Ars orientalis, IX (1973), 138-156. References to important earlier studies may be found in these works.

4. S. Carboni, "Painted Glass," in New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Glass of the Sultans (New Haven, 2001), ed. S. Carboni and D. Whitehouse, with contributions by R. H. Brill and W. Gudenrath, Nos. 121, 123, and 124, 198-207 and 240-260; M. Georgopoulou, "Orientalism and Crusader Art: Constructing a New Canon," Medieval Encounters, V/3 (1999), 289-321; and J. Carswell, "The Baltimore Beakers," in Gilded and Enamelled Glass from the Middle East, ed. R. Ward (London, 1998), 61-63. These works of enameled glass are not firmly dated. For the most part, scholars have dated the painted glass to the second half of the thirteenth century, slightly later than the metal work. For the relationship between metalwork and glass, though for a slightly later period, see R. Ward, "Glass and Brass: Parallels and Puz zles," in Gilded and Enamelled Glass, 30-34.

5. A bottle at the Furussiya Arts Foundation, Vaduz, Liechtenstein, a can teen at the British Museum, London, and a flask at the Cathedral and Diocesan Museum, Vienna, all in Glass of the Sultans, Nos. 121, 123, and 124; two beakers at the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, in E. Atil,

Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks (Washington, DC, 1981), Nos. 44-45, with excellent photographs; a colorless glass "perfume bottle" in the Madina collection, ibid., No. 61; two pilgrim's flasks in Toledo and Dijon, in C. J. Lamm, Mittelalterliche Gl?ser und Stein schnittarbeiten aus dem Nahen Osten (Berlin, 1929-30), II, 2, PL 183, and Colorpl. G; a horn at the State Hermitage Museum in St. Peters burg, in Gilded and Enamelled Glass, PL 17.1; a fragment at the Vic toria and Albert Museum, London, in the catalogue London, Victoria and Albert Museum, Glass: A Handbook for the Study of Glass Vessels of All Periods and Countries and a Guide to the Museum Collection, by W. B. Honey (London, 1946), PL 19d; and a fragment at the Mus?e du Louvre, Paris, in Rouen, Mus?es et Monuments d?partementaux de la Seine-Maritime, A travers le verre: Du moyen ?ge ? la renaissance (Rouen, 1989), ed. D. Foy and G. Sennequier, No. 129, and also repro duced in Georgopoulou, "Orientalism and Crusader Art," 316, Fig. 9.

6. Schneider, "Freer Canteen," 148-149. For a full study of the style of Syrian metalwork, see D. S. Rice, "Inlaid Brasses from the Workshop of Ahmed al-Dhak? al-Mawsili," Ars orientalis, II (1957), 322.

7. J. Leroy, Les manuscrits syriaques ? peintures conserv?s dans les bi blioth?ques d'Europe et d'Orient: Contribution ? l'?tude de l'icono graphie des ?glises de langue syriaque (Biblioth?que arch?ologique et historique, LXXVII) (Paris, 1964), 280-313, Pis. 70-99; Schneider, "Freer Canteen," 141-142; Baer, Ayyubid Metalwork, 24-39; and Katz enstein and Lowry, "Christian Themes in Thirteenth-Century Islamic Metalwork," 54-62, have pointed out peculiarities in iconography to prove that the vocabulary belonged within "the broader context of Syr ian and Egyptian culture" (62). While variations naturally exist, the similarities between the metalwork and Eastern Christian works far

outweigh the differences, and the role that Eastern Christian works played in the formation of Syrian-Egyptian culture should not be mini mized. In a number of cases the "mistakes" or omissions can be found

also in other Eastern Christian manuscripts, and in other cases the mis takes do not seriously compromise the integrity or meaning of the scenes. The variations speak to the variety that characterizes Syrian-Egyptian metalwork as a whole.

8. These headpieces are discussed in L.-A. Hunt, "Christian-Muslim Re lations in Painting in Egypt of the Twelfth to Mid-Thirteenth Centuries: Sources of Wallpainting at Deir es-Suriani and the Illustration of the New Testament MS Paris, Copte-Arabe 1/Cairo, Bibl. 94," CA, XXXIII (1985), 131-136.

9. Khoury, "Narratives of the Holy Land," 63-68; Baer, Ayyubid Metal work, 48; Katzenstein and Lowry, "Christian Themes in Thirteenth Century Islamic Metalwork," 65-68.

10. Khoury, "Narratives of the Holy Land," 69, argues for an open meaning, one "receptive to different memories and imaginations as the liminal space to which they refer." Georgopoulou, "Orientalism and Crusader Art," 291, has also argued for "a shared common culture which more often than not transcended ethnic or religious boundaries." For the danger of employing "Christian" and "Muslim" labels, see R. Nelson, "An Icon at Mount Sinai and Christian Painting in Muslim Egypt during the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries," AB, LXV (1983), 201-218.

11. S. Brock, in Blackwell Dictionary of Eastern Christianity (Oxford, 1999), 467; Hunt, "Christian-Muslim Relations in Painting in Egypt," 112-115; T. Thomas, "Christians in the Islamic East," in New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Glory of Byzantium: Art and Cul ture of the Middle Byzantine era, A.D. 843-1261 (New York, 1997), ed. H. C. Evans and W. D. Wixom, 365-371; R. M. Haddad, Syrian Christians in Muslim Society: An Interpretation (Princeton, 1970; rpt. Westport, CT, 1981); and A. S. Atiya, History of Eastern Christianity (Notre Dame, IN, 1968).

12. For the participation of minority cultures, see S. D. Goitein, A Medi terranean Society: The Jewish Communities of the Arab World as Por trayed in the Documents of the Cairo Geniza (Berkeley, 1967-93), II, 240; C. Cahen, "Dhimma," Encyclopedia of Islam, 2nd ed. (Leiden, 1960-2000), 227; J. Prawer, "Social Classes in the Crusader States: The Minorities," in The Impact of the Crusades on the Near East, ed. N. P. Zacour and H. W. Hazard (A History of the Crusades, ed. K. M. Setton, V) (Madison, 1985).

13. For indigenous Syrian and Egyptian Christian art, see Hunt, "Christian Muslim Relations in Painting in Egypt," 111-155; and eadem, "Art and Colonialism: The Mosaics of the Church of the Nativity in Beth lehem (1169) and the Problem of 'Crusader' Art," DOP, XLV (1991), 69-85. These and other helpful articles by Hunt are also available in her anthology, Byzantium, Eastern Christendom and Islam: Art at the Crossroads of the Medieval Mediterranean (London, 2000), II. Also see the classic studies by H. Buchthal, "The Painting of the Syrian Ja cobites in Its Relation to Byzantine and Islamic Art," Syria, XX (1939), 136-150; idem, " 'Hellenistic' Miniatures in Early Islamic Manuscripts,"

Ars isl?mica, VII (1940), 125-133.

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14. Hunt, "Christian-Muslim Relations in Painting in Egypt," 136-137; Buchthal, "Painting of the Syrian Jacobites," 136-150; idem, " 'Helle nistic' Miniatures," 125-133; and Glory of Byzantium, No. 287, 428 429, for connection of the Maqamat, MS arabe 6094, to the Eastern Christian realm. For the extension of these connections to large-scale painting, see now E. S. Bolman, ed., Monastic Visions: Wall Paintings in the Monastery of St. Antony at the Red Sea (New Haven, 2002), and E. C. Dodd with Leonard C. Chiarelli et al., The Frescoes of Mar Musa al-Habashi: A Study in Medieval Painting in Syria (Toronto, 2001).

15. Baer, Ayyubid Metalwork, 32.

16. Accession number MMA 1971.39, in Baer, Ayyubid Metalwork, 31 and PL 44; and Glory of Byzantium, No. 285, 426-427.

17. For Ahmad al-Dhaki, see Rice, "Inlaid Brasses," 311-316. For the works of al-S?lih, see Katzenstein and Lowry, "Christian Themes in Thirteenth-Century Islamic Metalwork," 66.

18. For the inscription on the Freer Basin, see Atil, Art of the Arab World, 71; for that on the St. Petersburg tray, see Baer, Ayyubid Metalwork, 10 and note 28.

19. See Khoury, "Narratives of the Holy Land," 67-69, for a full consid eration of this issue; also, Katzenstein and Lowry, "Christian Themes in Thirteenth-Century Islamic Metalwork," 65-67, for Christian figures in court poetry; and see now T. Khalidi, The Muslim Jesus: Sayings and Stories in Islamic Literature (Cambridge, MA, 2001).

20. Baer, Ayyubid Metalwork, PL 9.

21. For inscriptions with the name of al-S?lih, see Katzenstein and Lowry, "Christian Themes in Thirteenth-Century Islamic Metalwork," 63-64.

22. Ibid., 65.

23. Baer, Ayyubid Metalwork, 42.

24. Khoury, "Narratives of the Holy Land," 68.

25. See, among others, J. Prawer, The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (London, 1972); idem, The World of the Crusades (New York, 1972); J. Folda, The Art of the Crusaders in the Holy Land, 1098-1187 (New York, 1995).

26. On the discourse of idolatry, see M. Camille, The Gothic Idol: Ideology and Image-Making in Medieval Art (New York, 1989), esp. 129-164.

27. B. Hamilton, "Rebuilding Zion: The Holy Places of Jerusalem in the Twelfth Century," Renaissance and Renewal in Christian History (Studies in Church History, XIV) (Oxford, 1977), 105-116; Folda, Art of the Crusaders, 245-251, 347-364; B. K?hnel, Crusader Art of the Twelfth Century: A Geographical, an Historical, or an Art Historical Notion (Berlin, 1994), 47-60; for the Church of the Nativity, see Hunt, Art and Colonialism, 72-81.

28. N. Kenaan-Kedar, "The Figurative Western Lintel of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem," in The Meeting of Two Worlds: Cultural Exchange between East and West during the Period of the Crusades, ed. V. P. Goss and C. V. Bornstein (Kalamazoo, MI, 1986), 123-131.

29. Camille, Gothic Idol, 128.

30. X. Muratova, "Western Chronicles of the First Crusade as Sources for the History of Art in the Holy Land," Crusader Art in the Twelfth Cen tury, ed. J. Folda (Oxford, 1982), 47.

31. Raymond of Aguilers, Historia Francorum Qui Ceperunt Iherusalem, trans. J. H. Hill and L. L. Hill (Philadelphia, 1968), 127-128. For this often quoted passage, see Folda, Art of the Crusaders, 32; Muratova, "Western Chronicles," 47; and Y. Katzir, "Conquests of Jerusalem," in Goss and Bornstein, Meeting of Two Worlds, 104, with the observation that this passage paraphrases Revelation 14:20 and Josephus.

32. Gesta Tancredi, cap. CXXIX, 695: translation here follows Muratova, "Western Chronicles," 48, with full Latin text and translation. Also see Folda, Art of the Crusaders, 43-44; Camille, Gothic Idol, 142-146.

33. Muratova, "Western Chronicles," 52-55.

34. Ibid., 49-53, and discussion in Camille, Gothic Idol, 142-146. For the perpetuation of the idea that Muslims were idolaters, see the chronicle of Fulcher of Chartres (1120-1127): "All the Saracens held the Temple of the Lord in great veneration. Here rather than elsewhere they preferred to say the prayers of their faith although such prayers were wasted be cause offered to an idol set up in the name of Mohammed," in Fulcher of Chartres, A History of the Expedition to Jerusalem, trans. F. R. Ryan, ed. H. S. Fink (Knoxville, 1969), 118.

35. As translated in Muratova, "Western Chronicles," 48.

36. For a study of the cultural mechanisms involved in the destruction of images, see D. Freedberg, The Power of Images: Studies in the History and Theory of Response (Chicago, 1989). A brilliant study of the con fusion between material things and human beings and the connection between acts of violence against images and people is A. Kibbey, The Interpretation of Material Shapes in Puritanism: A Study of Rhetoric, Prejudice, and Violence (Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture) (Cambridge, 1986); and see now the excellent case studies in M. Caviness, "Iconoclasm and Iconophobia: Four Historical Case Stud ies," Diogenes, L/3 (2003), 99-114.

37. Folda, Art of the Crusaders, 251-253, with the inscriptions and scrip tural sources.

38. Katzir, "Conquests of Jerusalem," 108.

39. The Dome of the Rock, in both its architectural form and decoration, was

a major source of inspiration for the Crusader restoration efforts in the Holy Land. For the relationship and response of the restored mosaic programs in the Church of the Nativity to the earlier Umayyad mosaic programs, see Hunt, "Art and Colonialism," 84-85; also K?hnel, Cru sader Art of the Twelfth Century, 59; and Folda, Art of the Crusaders, 347 and 247 for the rebuilding of the Church of the Ascension. It is not clear, however, whether these responses were in emulation of or in com

petition with the Islamic mosaic programs.

40. C. Hillenbrand, The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives (New York, 2000), 217-228; R. S. Humphreys, From Saladin to the Mongol: The Ayyubids of Damascus, 1193-1260 (Albany, 1977), 246-316. For an analysis of practical concessions made by the Ayyubids, see idem, "Ayyubids, Mam luks, and the Latin East in the Thirteenth Century," Mamluk Studies Review, II (1998), 1-18.

41. Hunt, "Art and Colonialism," 78; G. K?hnel, "Das Ausschm?ckungs programm der Geburtsbasilika in Bethlehem: Byzanz und Abendland im K?nigreich Jerusalem," Boreas: M?nstersche Beitrage zur Arch?o logie 10 (1987), 138-140, with diagrams of the original program.

42. Folda, Art of the Crusaders, 252-253; John of W?rzburg, in J. Wilkin son, Jerusalem Pilgrimage: 1099-1185 (London, 1988), 248.

43. Schneider, "Freer Canteen," 147.

44. For the identification of loca sancta on the glass, see Carswell, "Bal timore Beakers," 62-63; and Georgopoulou, "Orientalism and Cru sader Art," 304. Also see the mapping of biblical sites on a series of Crusader maps of Jerusalem in M. Levy-Rubin, "The Crusader Maps of Jerusalem," in Jerusalem, The Israel Museum, Knights of the Holy Land (Jerusalem, 1999), ed. S. Rozenberg, 231-237; M. Levy-Rubin and R. Rubin, "The Image of the Holy City in Maps and Mapping," in City of the Great King: Jerusalem from David to the Present, ed. N. Rosovsky (Cambridge, MA, 1996), 353-362.

45. For ampullae, see C. Hahn, "Loca Sancta Souvenirs: Sealing the Pil grim's Experience," in The Blessings of Pilgrimage, ed. R. Ousterhout (Illinois Byzantine Studies, I) (Urbana, 1990), 85-96; G. Vikan, "Byz antine Pilgrims' Art," in Heaven on Earth: Art and the Church in Byzantium, ed. L. Safran (University Park, PA, 1998); idem, Byzantine Pilgrimage Art (Washington, DC, 1982); and A. Grabar, Ampoules de Terre Sainte (Paris, 1958).

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46. For the circulation of medieval commemorative objects and the relation ship between objects and memory, see P. Geary, "Sacred Commodities: The Circulation of Medieval Relics," in Social Life of Things, 169-191; S. Coleman and J. Eisner, Pilgrimage Past and Present: Sacred Travel and Sacred Space in the World Religions (London, 1995), esp. 98-101; and A. Remensnyder, "Legendary Treasure at Conques: Reliquaries and Imaginative Memory," Speculum, LCCI (1996), 884-906.

47. Carboni and Whitehouse, Glass of the Sultans, No. 123, 247-249.

48. Ibid., No. 124, 249-252. For other canteens and flasks, see Lamm, Mittelalterliche Gl?ser, PI. 183 and Colorpl. G; Atil, Renaissance of Islam, No. 61, and two ceramic canteens with molded decoration, Nos. 96 and 97. A number of enameled glass flasks are recorded in Euro pean inventories, such as one in the personal treasury of Pope Clement VI (1342-1343) and one in the inventory of Louis d'Anjou (1384), which were probably brought back to Europe by Crusaders. See J. M. Rogers, "European Inventories as a Source for the Distribution of Mamluk Enamelled Glass," in Ward, Gilded and Enamelled Glass, 69 and 71, respectively.

49. On medieval memory, see M. Carruthers, The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture (Cambridge, 1990). There are many relevant parallels in the important work on Jewish memory by Y. S. Yerushalmi, Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory (Seattle, 1982), 5-52.

50. Katzir, "Conquests of Jerusalem," 104. For the relationship between the Crusader and Roman conquests of Jerusalem, see L. Seidel, "Images of the Crusades in Western Art: Models as Metaphors," in Goss and Bornstein, Meeting of Two Worlds, 381-385.

51. The typology is discussed in Katzir, "Conquests of Jerusalem," 103 113; J. Prawer, "The Roots of Medieval Colonialism," in Goss and

Bornstein, Meeting of Two Worlds, 24; and H. Buchthal, Miniature Painting in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (Oxford, 1957), for ex ample: 59, PI. 65a; 57, Pis. 61d and 80a; 67, Pis. 77-79.

52. Levy-Rubin and Rubin, "Image of the Holy City," 258-261.

53. Quoted in Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrimage, 333.

54. See Hunt, "Art and Colonialism," 73 note 25, for an earlier reference to the pilgrims' belief that the representation of biblical narratives repro duced historical fact.

55. For exchange of gifts, see Baer, Ayyubid Metalwork, 45. The modus vivendi has been noted as a necessary condition for the exchange of these works between Christians and Muslims in ibid., 1-5, 46-49; and

Katzenstein and Lowry, "Christian Themes in Thirteenth-Century Islamic Metalwork," 62-65. For the limitations, volatility, and unpre dictability of Muslim-Crusader relations, also see B. Z. Kedar, "The Subjected Muslims of the Frankish Levant," in Muslims under Latin Rule, 1100-1300, ed. J. Powell (Princeton, 1990), 136-173; Prawer, "Roots of Medieval Colonialism," 29-35.

56. For Crusader ampullae, see D. Syon, "Souvenirs from the Holy Land: A Crusader Workshop of Lead Ampullae from Acre," in Rozenberg, Knights of the Holy Land, 110-115. For the use of comparable older sixth-century local models by the Crusaders, see N. Kenaan, "Local Christian Art in Twelfth-Century Jerusalem," Israel Exploration Society, XXIII (1973), 223-229.

57. For a full discussion of this issue, see D. Weiss, "Hec Est Domus Do mini Firmiter Edificata: The Image of the Temple in Crusader Art, " in The Real and Ideal Jerusalem in Jewish, Christian and Islamic Art: Studies in Honor of Bezahl Narkiss on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday, ed. B. K?hnel (Jewish Art, XXIII-XXIV) (Jerusalem, 1997 98), 210-217; also the important study by S. Schein, "Between Mount

Moriah and the Holy Sepulchre: The Changing Traditions of the Temple Mount in the Central Middle Ages," Traditio, XL (1984), 175-195;

and A. Grabois, "Medieval Pilgrims, the Holy Land and Its Image in European Civilization," in Pillars of Smoke: The Holy Land in History and Thought, ed. M. Sharon (Johannesburg, 1986), 65-79.

58. Weiss, "Hec Est Domus," 213; Levy-Rubin, "Crusader Maps of Jeru salem," 231-237; and Y. Friedman, "Pilgrims in the Shadow of the Crusader Kingdom," in Rozenberg, Knights of the Holy Land, 101-109.

59. See Tmad al-D?n's description of the "sacred rock" after Saladin's con quest of Jerusalem in F. Gabrieli, Arab Historians of the Crusades (New York, 1969; rpt. 1993), 168-171. For the interpretation of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre as a relic and the significance of "the local" to lend authenticity to the sacred site, see R. Ousterhout, "Ar chitecture as Relic and the Construction of Sanctity: The Stones of the Holy Sepulchre," JSAH, LXII/1 (March 2003), 4-23.

60. E. Hoffman, "A Fatimid Book Cover: Framing and Reframing Cultural Identity in the Medieval Mediterranean World," in L'Egypte fatimide: Son art et son histoire, ed. M. Barrucand (Paris, 1999), 415-417; Buch thal, Miniature Painting, 80 and PL 83.

61. Also see the Fatimid ivory frame with comparable Islamic motifs, which was similarly used to frame an early-fourteenth-century Venetian frontis piece in the aura of the Holy Land, in Hoffman, "Fatimid Book Cover," 416-417 and Fig. 8.

62. There are many examples of Crusader illustrations in which Crusaders interpose themselves into biblical victories involving the Holy Land.

Among others, see Buchthal, Miniature Painting, Pis. 65a, 67a, 70.

63. Rachel Ward argues that both basins were made as export ware for Europe. This would not necessarily negate the Crusader memory attached to them. For the Basin of Hugh IV of Lusignan, see R. Ward, "The 'Baptist?re de Saint Louis': A Mamluk Basin Made for Export to

Europe," in Islam and the Italian Renaissance, ed. C. Burnett and A. Contadini (London, 1999), 120, with references; eadem, "Glass and Brass," 33; and D. S. Rice, "Arabic Inscriptions on a Brass Basin Made for Hugh IV Lusignan," in Studi orientalistici in onore di Giorgio Levi della Vida (Rome, 1956), II, 390-402.

64. For the two suggested dates, see Ward, "Baptist?re de Saint Louis," 113-131, and D. Behrens-Abouseif, "The Baptist?re de Saint Louis: A

Reinterpretation," Islamic Art, III (1989), 3-13; also, the classic study with drawings by D. S. Rice, Le Baptist?re de Saint Louis (Paris, 1951).

65. For the pilgrim's flask in the Diocesan Museum in Vienna, see Carboni and Whitehouse, Glass of the Sultans, No. 124. Also see the "Coupe de Charlemagne," in Ward, Gilded and Enamelled Glass, Fig. 14.9 and Colorpl. K. See the many examples and analysis in A. Shalem, Islam Christianized: Islamic Portable Objects in the Medieval Church Trea suries of the Latin West (Frankfurt am Main, 1996); and E. R. Hoff man, "The Emergence of Illustration in Arabic Manuscripts: Classical Legacy and Islamic Transformation" (Dissertation, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 1982), 221.

66. For examples of such transformations in the Treasury of San Marco, Venice, see New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Trea sury of San Marco (Milan, 1984), ed. D. Buckton, No. 29, a tur quoise glass bowl, which combines tenth-century Fatimid Islamic glass, eleventh-century Byzantine enamel, and other metalwork from the tenth-fifteenth centuries; also No. 32, a Fatimid rock crystal vase set into a thirteenth-century Venetian metal mount.

67. Medieval Christian holy objects were typically created by combining a variety of precious materials. This practice was exemplified by the mag nificent Byzantine creations. See examples in Evans and Wixom, Glory of Byzantium, Nos. 28 and 29; also the celebrated Western Chalice of Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis, No. 296.

68. Muratova, "Western Chronicles," 48, quoted in Camille, Gothic Idol, 144.

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