J.E. Montgomery, ‘Vikings and Rus in Arabic Sources’, in Y. Suleiman (ed.) Living
Islamic History: Studies in Honour of Carole Hillenbrand, Edinburgh: Edinburgh Uni-
versity Press (forthcoming). A convenient overview of the principal features of
geographical writings in Arabic and their study is P. Heck, The Construction of
Knowledge in Islamic Civilization, Leiden: Brill, 2002 : 94 – 145.[?] The earliest reference to the Rus in an Arabic text is the phrase ‘the mountain of
the Rus from which the river Drws flows’, which Novosel’tsev (according to Golden,
‘Rus’, 620 ) finds in the Treatise on the Shape of the Earth, a revision by the geodesist
al-Khwarazmi (fl. 800 – 47 ) of the coordinates given in Ptolemy’s Geography, designed to
accompany the map which the Caliph al-Mamun (r. 813 – 33 ) commissioned. In the
section of this work on ‘the Islands in the Exterior Sea of the West’, the coordinates for
the islands of Bwbarnya (Ireland), Thwly (Thule), Sqydya (Scandia) and the all-male and
all-female islands of Amratws (Amazones) are listed, among others. In the corresponding
account of ‘the Rivers and Water-sources beyond the Seventh Clime’, Bwbarnya and
Thwly are again mentioned. The enigmatic Suhrab, writing his Treatise on the Marvels of
the Seven Climes about one century later, revised al-Khwarazmi’s text and his coordinates,
though he retains these mysterious islands and their rivers in his sections on ‘the Islands
in the Exterior Western and Northern Sea’ and ‘Knowledge of the Rivers and Water-
sources beyond the Seventh Clime’. Neither author reveals any indication that these
islands may be the home of the Majus or the Rus.
Bibliography: Al-Khwarazmi, Kitab Surat al-Ard, H. von Mzˇik (ed.), Leipzig:
Harrassowitz, 1927 ; Suhrab, Kitab Ajaib al-Aqalim al-Saba, H. von Mzˇik (ed.),
Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1930 ; J. Vernet, Al-Khwarazmi, EI 2 , vol. 4 : 1070 – 1.[a] and [b] The earliest reference to the Rus in an Arabic text which is as good as fully
extant is that contained in Ibn Khurradadhbih’s Treatise on the Highways and the
Kingdoms. Ibn Khurradadhbih, of Persian descent, was the head of intelligence and
postal communications in an eastern province of the Islamic Empire (the Jibal) and was a
prominent member of the Baghdad court famous for his expertise in music. His work
(which is an account of the territories of the Caliphate dedicated to the ruler presented
according to the Iranian tradition as the Just King) was written before ad 850 and then
rewritten some thirty years later. It is available in two different recensions. The passage
on the Rus is found in the recension which ante-dates ad 850 , and provides two
itineraries through which these ‘Slav’ traders with their furs and swords came to Muslim
lands: via Spain or Francia and North Africa (their terrestrial route); and from the
north (their maritime and riverine route). The former itinerary has been incorrectly
assimilated by some scholars with the fabled and oft-disputed Jewish trading federation,
the Radhanites (Ar. Radhaniyya). In the first case, the Rus are said to travel as far as
al-Sin (Turko-China), while the destination of the second group is Baghdad. The author
notes that this group claims to be Christians.
[b] In ad 903 a quarter of a century or so after the second recension of this work, Ibn
al-Faqih of Hamadhan completed his Treatise of the Regions, a work which is extant today
in two different abridgements of varying degrees of completeness. In a municipal
eulogy, the author rings the praises of al-Rayy as the ‘bride of the earth’, the destination
–– chapter 40 : Arabic sources on the Vikings––