In the present state of our knowledge it is not difficult to describe the
physical setting for pre-Islamic Arabian history, and new archaeological
discoveries in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Jordan and the Gulf are producing
much valuable evidence. Over the past century a vast body of epigraphical
material – some 50,000 north and south Arabian inscriptions and the
inscribed sticks now emerging by the hundreds in northern Yemen – has
provided a wealth of information on the societies of the peninsula, especially
the bedouins.1 But all this seldom provides a coherent picture of the
course of events, as opposed to vignettes and bare details, and thus does not
replace a literary historical tradition. There are external epigraphic records
of the Arabs and Arabia, and historical sources – especially in Greek and
Syriac – are often helpful.2 But this information too is profoundly discontinuous,
and in any case represents the perspective of outsiders who
regarded the Arabs as barbarian marauders and most of Arabia as a menacing
wasteland.3
There is voluminous material on the subject in the Arabic sources, but
herein lies the problem.4 The relevant accounts include a vast bulk of poetry
and are frequently attributed to the pre-Islamic period, or are presented as
describing events and conditions of that time; but – apart from the Koran –
the sources containing these accounts date from at least two centuries later.
In times past it seemed reasonable simply to compare the various accounts
to determine which seemed most likely to be true.More recently, however,
it has become clear that the Arabic sources on the Arabs in pre-Islamic
Arabia – and indeed, on the first century of Islamic history as a whole –
represent a fluid corpus that adopted a range of argumentative views on
issues important at the time when the accounts were being transmitted and
the sources compiled; the result was the colouring and reshaping of much
early and possibly genuine material and the creation of many newaccounts.5
Most importantly, pre-Islamic Arabia played an important role in early
Islamic preaching of the Word. In explaining the success of Islam and the
Arab conquerors, scholars and commentators interpreted Islam’s emergence
from Arabia as part of God’s divine plan.6 This involved presenting the
pre-Islamic Arabs as naive barbarians – ragged ignorant nomads and eaters
of snakes and lizards – and Arabia as a quintessential wasteland. This was
in sharp contrast with the powerful, sophisticated peoples of the empires
to the north and the richness and fertility of their lands: clearly, Arab
victories against such formidable foes could only have been won withGod’s
permission and as part of his plan for mankind.7 This paradigm manifestly
proclaims a religious truth, and while it may at various points correspond
to historical reality, it does not spring from that reality. In each case, then,
we must judge – often on insecure grounds – the extent to which the motifs
and stereotypes of this story of the spreading of theWord have affected our
sources.