Falconry at Medieval Islamicate Courts: Open-Air Practice and Backstage Knowledge

Abstract

Falconry at Islamicate courts of the pre-Ottoman period involved a complex set of practices, traditions and institutions. Evolving as part of the royal hunt from the late Umayyad period onwards, it included a body of scientific, mostly medical literature from early Abbasid times. A corpus of falconry poetry developed from around the same time. In Fatimid contexts, falconry images appear prominently in the visual arts. In Mamluk times, the connection between hunting with birds of prey and fighting becomes more pronounced. The present article discusses the significance of Islamicate courts which offered singular conditions for the multi-layered and cumulative nature of falconry as an elite and highly symbolic practice. Insofar as these details are known, it also takes the various human agents involved in courtly falconry into account.