Understanding Egypt's Christian-to-Muslim transformation
Between the 7th and 10th centuries, Egyptian society evolved from a Christian, Greek- and Coptic-speaking milieu into an Arabic-speaking Muslim polity. The 'Christian communities in early Islamic Egypt. The view from inside' (CHRISTIANSINEGYPT) project sought to account for this evolution through an exploration of the integrative power of Islamic culture. To this end, research was directed at examining the Islamic conquest on the basis of documents produced by the Egyptian Christian communities. These texts, preserved thanks to Egypt's exceptionally dry climate, offer invaluable insights, given that they were intended for daily use. As such, they lack the biases that so often characterise narrative sources written long after the event. Three topics were identified as central to understanding the processes of Egypt's Arabisation and Islamisation: taxation, evolution of monastic life, and linguistic changes. During the course of the project, a number of new texts were published in relation to these topics, as were historical studies discussing the historical significance of these texts. By pairing languages and disciplines not traditionally studied together, the multidisciplinary approach strengthened research findings, allowing an improved understanding of Christian–Muslim interaction and cross-cultural negotiation. The study successfully offers a fresh look at social, cultural and economic changes, and at different levels of interactions between the communities following the arrival of the Arabs. This more precise look at how the country's Islamic conquest impacted Christian populations offers important insights into religious–cultural confrontation and exchange. The project's research outcomes therefore have potential value if utilised in ongoing debates regarding interreligious relations, both past and present, in Egypt.