Zīrid Ifrīqiya and the Islamic world conference: Call for Papers

Zīrid Ifrīqiya and the Islamic world in the 10th-12th centuries 

Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and UCL are co-hosting a conference on the archaeology and history of medieval North Africa, on 28 & 29 May 2026, with support from The Barakat Trust.

Organisers: Corisande Fenwick (Professor of Late Antique and Islamic Archaeology, UCL), Annliese Nef (University Professor of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne) and Viva Sacco (British Academy International Fellow, UCL). 

The study of medieval North Africa is experiencing a renaissance. Recent scholarship on the caliphal, Aghlabid and early Fatimid periods as well as the Ibadi imamates has transformed our understanding of North Africa’s complex history in the early Islamic period.

The Zīrids (972-1148), a Berber Sanhaja dynasty, were the first of the great Berber dynasties to rule North Africa with their reach extending from the Maghrib al-Aqṣā to Cyrenaica at times. Yet unlike the Almoravids and Almohads, Zīrid Ifrīqiya has not received sustained scholarly attention since Hady Roger Idris’s (1962) landmark history which notably overlooked material culture. This neglect is explained, in part, by the enduring power of the (much contested) ‘Hilali myth’ and Ibn Khaldun’s vivid descriptions of widespread destruction of settlements, agriculture and trade networks by the Banū Hilāl tribes, and, in part, by a tendency to view North Africa as a cultural backwater whose artistic production was derivative of Fatimid Cairo or Umayyad Cordoba. However, Zīrid Ifrīqiya was no periphery. At the crossroads of the Mediterranean and the Sahara, the region – and its peoples – played a central role in transregional political, economic, craft and scholarly networks in the fragmented but increasingly connected world of the 10th-12th centuries.

Building on the success of the Aghlabids and their Neighbors conference held in London a decade ago and of the volume published in its aftermath, this conference aims to critically re-evaluate Zīrid Ifrīqiya and its role in the Islamic world and to bring together scholars in different fields (e.g. archaeology, history, art history, numismatics, epigraphy, manuscripts) who seldom have the opportunity to discuss these issues with each other.

Call for Papers

We invite paper proposals for communications (English/ French) on the following themes, including but not restricted to:

• How did the Zīrid rulers assert autonomy from Fatimid Cairo and emerge as a significant political and maritime power? How did this process reshape regional political dynamics?
• What new trends are visible in monumental architecture and urbanism (e.g. the palace-cities of Achir, Sabra al-Mansūriyya, Mahdiya). How do they reflect shifts in patronage and sovereignty?
• What were the nature and extent of Zīrid Ifrīqiya’s interactions – political, economic, socio-cultural – with the Umayyads and Taifa kingdoms of al-Andalus, the Kalbids of Sicily and other regional players? With more distant political entities?
• What does archaeology reveal of settlement patterns, urban networks, production and technology, agriculture and daily life in this period? Do recent findings challenge, or support, long-held assumptions of 11th-century abandonment and decline?
• How integrated was Ifrīqiya into Fatimid Mediterranean economy and how related was it to Sicily’s and Egypt’s economies, as is so vividly suggested in the Geniza documents?
• What role did Saharan trade networks play in shaping Zirid Ifrīqiya’s economy?
• What new technological and artistic innovations are visible in material culture and craftsmanship (e.g. ceramics, lustrewares, glass, brasses, stone-carving, woodwork)?
• What do the Kairouan manuscripts reveal about shifts in manuscript production, writing practices, scholarly networks, and the evolution of Mālikī legal thought?
• Moving beyond the contested ‘Hilali myth’, what role did pastoralism and mobile peoples play in this period?

Deadline for submissions

Paper proposals for the conference should be sent to Corisande Fenwick (c.fenwick@ucl.ac.uk) or Annliese Nef (Annliese.Nef@univ-paris1.fr ) by 30 September 2025.

• Title, author(s) and institutional affiliation(s)
• Abstract (max 250 words) in English or French
• Authors will be notified of acceptance of their contribution no later than end October 2025

Read further details about the conference