Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam

Abstract

The main argument of this book is that the conventional opinion of the rise of Islam is based on classical accounts of the trade between south Arabia and the Mediterranean some 600 years earlier than the time of Muhammed. The author draws on literary, epigraphical and archaeological evidence from Classical and Islamic sources to argue that the Meccans were never the commercial tycoons that current theory suggests, nor was Mecca ever an important trade centre. Moreover, she rejects the claims that Mecca was a religious sanctuary and a centre of Arabian pilgrimage. Following this, she seeks to clarify the nature of the sources on which an explanation of the birth of the new religion in Arabia in her view should be based.

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