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[German version] [1] City in Arabia Felix (Σάβη/ Sábē: Ptol. 8,22,15). Unlocated city in the interior of  Arabia Felix. Toral-Niehoff, Isabel (Freiburg) [German version] [2] Capital of Mapharitis in Arabia (Σάβη βασίλειον/ Sábē basíleion: Ptol. 6,7,42; Σάυη/ Sáuē: Peripl. m. r. 22; Save: Plin. HN 6,104; …

Strohmaier, Gotthard (Berlin RWG) I. The Near East (CT) [German version] A. Origin and Development of the Arabic-Islamic Cultural Sphere (CT) In a power vacuum between Byzantium and Persia, the prophet Mohammed founded a new theocratic and militant state on the Arabian peninsula in 622. Within less than a century, it extended from the Atlantic Ocean to the I…

[German version] (Μαλαγγῖται; Malangîtai). According to Ptol. 6,7,23, a people in central Arabia who lived on the Máreitha órē (Μάρειθα Ὄρη), i.e. on the Āriḍ. Probably corresponds to the tribe of the Maḏḥiǧ which was expelled by Imru al-Qais, the king of the Lakhmids in c. AD 300. …

[German version] According to Ptol. 6,7,10 (Μαιφάθ κώμη; Maipháth kṓmē), town in the region of the Ἀδραμίται/ Adramítai (coastal dwellers of Ḥaḍramau…

[German version] (Τερηδών/ Terēdṓn, Ptol. 5,19,5; Ἰρίδωτις/ Irídōtis or Διρίδωτις/ Dirídōtis, Arr. Ind. 41,6). Arabian city in lower Mesopotamia, 420 km south-east of Baghdad on the Šaṭṭ al-Arab (combined course of the Euphrates [2] and Tigris shortly before their mouth). Although B. lies at the site of the Persian settlement of Vahištābāḏ Ardašer (preceded perhaps by ancient Diridotis/Iridotis or Teredon), it is essentially a new foundation originating during the period of the Arab conquest (AD 635), an…

[German version] [1] City in Arabia Felix to the northwest of Adan …

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(Μάκαι; Mákai). [German version] [1] People in eastern Arabia According to Ptol. 6,7,14, a people in eastern Arabia in the hinterland of the bays around modern Rāʾs Musandam on the road from Hormuz. Also mentioned in Str. 13,765f., Plin. HN 6,98.152 and Mela 3,79; according to them, the M. settled opposite the Carmanian foothills. According to Arr. Ind., Μακέτα/ Makéta (Rāʾs Musandam) was an important trading centre for the spice trade ( Spices) on the Persian Gulf. Toral-Niehoff, Isabel (Freiburg) [German version] [2] Nomadic tribe or tribal league ( Macae). A large nomadic tribe o…

[German version] (Ζεερῖται/ Zeërîtai, Ζειρῖται/ Zeirîtai or Εἰρῖται/ Eirîtai). A people in Arabia mentioned in Ptol. 6,7,24 but still not unequivocally located. [1] places their territory in Wādī al-Irḍ (modern Wādī Banī Ḥanīfa near Al-Riyāḍ), and therefore central Arabia; [2] in the area of Oman as far as the Wādī al-Dawāsr, and therefore dispersed across the whole of the Al-Rub al-Ḫālī desert.…

[German version] I. General Since the 16th cent. the Latin term missio (‘sending’) has designated the efforts by Christians to spread their religion, by divine command. The term mission, unknown in antiquity, corresponds in essence to the instruction of the risen Christ to his disciples to make all peoples disciples (Mt 28:19). It is this commission that distinguishes Christian mission from similar manifestations of expansion (diffusion) in most other religions and cults. Only Manichaeism (Mani) and Islam (divine ‘summons’, …

[German version] Region in southern Arabia mentioned in a partly extant naval report of 323 BC in Theophr. Hist. pl. 9,4,2 (Μαμάλι/ Mamáli), probably Mamal near modern Aṣīr in Saudi Arabia on the coast.…

(Σικελία/ Sikelía, Sicily). The largest island in the Mediterranean (Mare Nostrum; cf. Str. 2,5,19; differently Hdt. 1,170 and Timaeus FGrH 566 F 65): 25,460 km2, including the offshore islands such as the Insulae Aegates, Ustica, the Aeoli Insulae, Cossura, Lopadusa (present-day Lampedusa), Aethusa (present-day Linosa) and Melite [7] 25,953 km2. [German version] I. Name The island was originally called Trinacria (Τρινακρία/ Trinakría, Hellanicus FGrH 51 F 79b), later Sicania (Σικανίη/ Sikaníē, Hdt. 7,170; Σικανία/ Sikanía, Thuc. 6,2,2) and only then Sicelia (Σικελία). The change of name reflects the successive immigration of the Sicani and Siculi; however, Trinacria is probably an unhistorical construction from the Homeric Thrinacia (Hom. Od. 11,107; 12,127; 12,135; 19,275), taking into account the triangular shape ( tría ákra) of the island. Olshausen, Eckart (Stuttgart) …

[German version] According to Plin. HN 6,158 a people in the interior of southern Arabia, which has not been successfully identified. It may be derived from the name of the modern town of Ḏamār, to the southeast of Ṣana'a. In Plinius the two (also unlocated) cities of Sagiatta and Canthace are classed as theirs. The context suggests that the Z. lived in the territory of the Homeritae at Sapphar (Ẓafār).…

I. General [German version] A. Notions of measuring time Most cultures have some method of measuring time, frequently based on periodical changes within nature or the stars. The oldest of these is the pars-pro-toto method, in which it is not a certain period of time as a whole that is connected, but a regularly recurring phenomenon within that time [1. 9 f.] (e.g. lunar phases). Metaphors of time or the measuring thereof play no great role in antiquity, with the exception of the field of  metrics. Usually, the focus was not on the precise measurement of time, but on the utilization of conventional time units such as generations or governments' terms of office. Accounts of time periods were often rounded, …

Toral-Niehoff, Isabel (Freiburg) [German version] A. History from 1060 (CT) Sicily (S.) was under Norman rule until the end of the 12th cent., and, in adjusting to Western European conditions, especially from the time of William I (1154-1166), experienced an immense process of feudalization and an ecclesiastical and cultural reorientation to Latin Catholic Christianity. William II’s death without issue…

[German version] I. Classical antiquity Pilgrimage, defined here as a journey of considerable length to a sacred place, undertaken for religious reasons, was a common practice in all of antiquity, not solely a Christian phenomenon. Rutherford, Ian C. (Reading) [German version] A. Greek world The best-documented form is the state pilgrimage ( theōría ), in which the Greek city-states sent out envoys ( theōroí) to attend religious festivals, announce their own festivals or consult oracles. However, festivals drew not only official theōríai but also private pilgrims; in general…

[German version] I. Definition The term 'creation of the world' ('CW') (κτίσις/ ktísis, Lat. creatio) in the narrower sense should be distinguished from two similar concepts. Unlike 'cosmogony', 'CW' refers to a personal act. Secondly, unlike 'fashioning of the world' in the sense of the craft of a demiourgos [3] (cf. [1]), 'CW' does not mean the mere modelling of existing material in analogy to the creative intervention of an artist, but the absolute bringing-into-being of everything (the universe, i.e. 'the whole', τὰ πάντα/ …

[German version] (Ζάμης/ Zámēs, also Ζάμητος/ Zámētos). According to Ptol. 6,7,20 a long mountain range in central Arabia. This is presumably not the Jurassic escarpment of Ğabal Ṭuwaiq (see [1. 213 f., 279], see also [2]), which extends across the Arabian peninsula, since that corresponds to the Μάρειθα/ Máreitha mentioned in Ptol. loc.cit., but rather, as in [3. no. 315] and [4. 192], the Šammar Mountains much farther to the north [5]. Cf. also [6] (with a map of pre-Islamic Arabia). Toral-Niehoff, Isabel (Freiburg) Bibliography 1 E. Glaser, Skizze der Geschichte und Geogra…

I. Terminology and philosophy [German version] A. Modern concept The general modern meaning of the word 'tolerance' is the readiness of individuals, groups or states to permit the opinions, ways of life and philosophical and religious convictions of others to 'have validity' alongside their own. Today, the meaning of the word ranges from 'sufferance' (e.g. in the sense of constitutional law: the sufferance of immigrants, diverse confessions, rel…