Early Middle Ages and Crusades
Persecutions by the caliph al-Hakim
1012-1020·Le Caire, Fustat
The toll is reproduced exactly as the source states it — never rounded, never added to another. Tolls overlap from one event to the next.
distinctive sign imposed, synagogues destroyed, forced conversions
The Fatimid caliph al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah imposed on the protected communities of Cairo and Fustat a series of measures unprecedented in Muslim Egypt: distinctive signs and objects worn around the neck, prohibitions affecting daily life, the destruction of synagogues and churches, and conversions obtained under duress. Some families left the country; others converted in outward appearance.
The measures are recorded by Arab chroniclers and by documents from the Genizah. They would be repealed after the caliph's disappearance, and converts were permitted to return to their faith; the episode remained in the memory of Egyptian communities as a parenthesis whose erratic character was bound up with the sovereign's own person.
- Period :
- Early Middle Ages and Crusades
- Type :
- Persecution
- Region :
- Egypt and Maghreb
- Country :
- Égypte
al-Maqrizi, *Khitat* ; Gueniza du Caire ; S. D. Goitein, *A Mediterranean Society* ; Moshe Gil, *A History of Palestine*.