Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam

Meccan Trade And The Rise Of Islam is a 1987 book written by

scholar and historiographer of early Islam Patricia Crone. The book Meccan Trade and the Rise
argues that Islam did not originate in Mecca, located in western of Islam
Saudi Arabia, but in northern Arabia. Her views are hugely
different from those of historians and orientalist scholars like W.
Montgomery Watt and Fred Donner, who have publications
detailing trade activities and the struggles between competing
Meccan tribes for control over trade routes.[1][2][3][4][5]

Content
Crone found no evidence of Mecca being an important trading
center in late antiquity of 6th and 7th century CE:

Mecca was not on the overland trade route from

Southern Arabia to Syria[6]
Even if it had been, the overland trade route from
Southern Arabia to Syria was not very important
compared to the maritime trade route[6]
by the end of the second century AD at latest, the route Cover
was no longer in use.[7]
Author Patricia Crone
A close examination of the Muslim sources themselves
show that, except for Yemeni perfume, the Meccans Language English
traded mainly in cheap leather goods and clothing, and Subject Islam
occasionally, in basic foodstuffs (clarified butter and
cheese)[8] Published 1987 (Gorgias Press)

These goods were not exported to Syria, which already Media type Print
had plenty of them, but were supplied almost exclusively ISBN 1-59333-102-9
to inhabitants of the Peninsula.[9]
OCLC 57718221 (https://ww
w.worldcat.org/oclc/57
If it is obvious that if the Meccans had been 718221)
middlemen in a long-distance trade of the kind
described in traditional Islamic literature, there ought
to have been some mention of it in the writings of their
customers who wrote extensively about the south
Arabians who supplied them with aromatics. Despite
the considerable attention paid to Arabian affairs there
is no mention at all of Quraysh (the tribe of
Mohammed) and their trading center Mecca, be it in
the Greek, Latin, Syriac, Aramaic, Coptic, or other
literature composed outside Arabia.[10]
She concludes that "Meccans did not trade outside of Mecca on the eve of Islam".[11] That there was no
continuous transmission of historical fact through the three generations or so that separated the early
first/seventh century from the mid-second/eight century" and that the lines of transmission of the accounts
were "pure fabrications".[12]

Crone also found Islamic "traditions" to be unreliable, conflicting "with each other so often and so regularly
`that one could were one so inclined, rewrite most of Montgomery Watt's biography of Muhammad in the
reverse.'"[13]

An examination of all available evidence and sources leads Crone to conclude that Mohammed's career
took place not in Mecca and Medina or in southwest Arabia at all, but in northwest Arabia.

Reception
Robert Bertram Serjeant described the book as a "confused, irrational and illogical polemic, further
complicated by her misunderstanding of Arabic texts, her lack of comprehension of the social structure of
Arabia, and twisting of the clear sense of other writings, ancient and modern, to suit her contentions."[14]

Abdullah al-Andalusi of the Muslim Debate Initiative contended Crone's placing Islamic events not in
Mecca, but closer to the Mediterranean Sea, stating: "If there was a proto-Islamic sect pre-dating Meccan
Islam existing at Abdat or elsewhere in Nabatean borderland between Arabia and the Roman Empire, an
advanced and literate society with extensive trade links with the rest of the Roman world, it is surely utterly
implausible that no sect, nor text of a sect, nor witness to the sect would have survived."[15]

Fred Donner, on the other hand, stated that "[the] assumption that Mecca was the linchpin of international
luxury trade [has] been decisively challenged in recent years – notably in Patricia Crone, Meccan Trade and
the Rise of Islam.",[16] although Patricia Crone's theory has been challenged by Robert Bertram Serjeant
who favored the Meccan trade theory.[17]

References
1. Watt, W. Montgomery (William Montgomery) (1990). Early Islam : collected articles (https://w
ww.worldcat.org/oclc/1145654394). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 978-1-
4744-7345-3. OCLC 1145654394 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1145654394).
2. Watt, W. Montgomery. (1993). Muhammad at Mecca (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/25836440
2) (2. impr ed.). Karachi: Oxford Univ. Press. ISBN 0-19-577278-4. OCLC 258364402 (https://
www.worldcat.org/oclc/258364402).
3. Watt, W. Montgomery (William Montgomery) (1965). A history of Islamic Spain (https://www.w
orldcat.org/oclc/391773). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 0-85224-332-4.
OCLC 391773 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/391773).
4. Watt, William Montgomery (1999). Islam : a short history (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/4369
7146). Oxford, England: Oneworld. ISBN 1-85168-205-8. OCLC 43697146 (https://www.worl
dcat.org/oclc/43697146).
5. Donner, Fred McGraw, 1945- (1998). Narratives of Islamic origins : the beginnings of Islamic
historical writing (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/37594489). Princeton, N.J.: Darwin Press.
ISBN 0-87850-127-4. OCLC 37594489 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/37594489).
6. Neva & Koren, "Methodological Approaches to Islamic Studies", 2000: p.431
7. Crone, Patricia (1987). "2". Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam. Princeton University Press.
8. Crone, Patricia (1987). "4". Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam. Princeton University Press.
9. Crone, Patricia (1987). "5". Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam. Princeton University Press.
10. Patricia Crone, Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam (Princeton, U.S.A: Princeton University
Press, 1987), p.134
11. Crone, Patricia (1987). Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam (https://archive.org/details/mecc
antraderisei00cron). Princeton University Press. p. 114 (https://archive.org/details/meccantra
derisei00cron/page/n121). ISBN 9780691054803.
12. Neva & Koren, "Methodological Approaches to Islamic Studies", 2000: p.432
13. Crone, Patricia (1987). Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam (https://archive.org/details/mecc
antraderisei00cron). Princeton University Press. p. 111 (https://archive.org/details/meccantra
derisei00cron/page/n118). ISBN 9780691054803.
14. Serjeant, R. B.; Crone, Patricia (1990). "Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam:
Misconceptions and Flawed Polemics" (https://www.jstor.org/stable/603188). Journal of the
American Oriental Society. 110 (3): 472. doi:10.2307/603188 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F60
3188). JSTOR 603188 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/603188).
15. Al Andalusi, Abdullah (20 October 2012). "Tom Holland's Obsession with Islam's Origins: A
Critical response" (https://thedebateinitiative.com/2012/10/20/tom-hollands-obsession-with-i
slams-origins-a-critical-response/). Muslim Debate Initiative.
16. Donner, Fred M. (2010). Muhammad and the Believers (https://archive.org/details/muhamma
dbeliever00donn). Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University
Press. p. 241 (https://archive.org/details/muhammadbeliever00donn/page/n261). ISBN 978-
0-674-05097-6.
17. D. Bukharin, Mikhail (January 2009). Mecca On The Caravan Routes In Pre-Islamic Antiquity
(https://brill.com/view/book/edcoll/9789047430322/Bej.9789004176881.i-864_005.xml).
Brill. ISBN 9789047430322. Retrieved 20 February 2020.

Bibliography
Amaal Muhammad al-Roubi (https://www.scribd.com/doc/32958465/Amaal-Muhammad-al-R
oubi-A-Response-to-Patricia-Crone-s-Book-Meccan-Trade-and-the-Rise-of-Islam), A
Response to Patricia Crone's Book (Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam)
Crone, Patricia (1987). Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam (http://www.almuslih.org/Library/
Crone,%20P%20-%20Meccan%20Trade%20and%20the%20Rise%20of%20Islam.pdf)
(PDF). Princeton University Press.
Nevo, Yehuda D.; Koren, Judith (2000). "Methodological Approaches to Islamic Studies".
The Quest for the Historical Muhammad. New York: Prometheus Books. pp. 420–443.

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