The Historical Chronicle of Abū ʿAbdallāh Maḥammad Ibn Ibrāhīm al-Dukkālī

Book excerpt: Ibn Ibrāhīm al-Dukkālī’s Historical Chronicle, edited and translated by Norman Cigar, is a valuable contemporary manuscript source from Morocco’s poorly documented and seldom-studied mid-eighteenth century, a period marked by weak rulers and conflicts, but also a golden age for local political actors and the autonomous power centers in the cities. As a well-placed observer and active participant in events in his native city of Fes, al-Dukkālī provides unique data that helps us address key questions about cities in the Muslim world raised in multiple disciplines, such as whether cities could be considered communities or were simply an agglomeration of disparate elements, and to what extent cities enjoyed autonomy in their relations with the central government, and in what sense they were “Islamic.”