Marriage, Kinship, and Islamic Law in Al-Andalus: Reflections on Pierre Guichard's Al-Andalus

ISSN： 0950-3110

Source： Al Masaq: Islam and the Medieval Mediterranean, Vol.20, Iss.2, 2008-09, pp. : 161-177

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Abstract

In his important book on society in Islamic Spain, Al-Andalus, Pierre Guichard theorises that until the late fourth/tenth century Arabs and Berbers followed what he calls an Eastern family pattern, meaning that they married within the extended family, disinherited women, and calculated kinship through the male line. The subject population, whether they converted to Islam or not, maintained a Western pattern of marrying out, allowing women to inherit, and recognising kinship through the male and female lines. Recently published collections of rulings from Islamic courts, however, complicate the picture Guichard presents. They suggest that Islamic law, which neither favours nor discourages close kin marriage, allows women to inherit property, and recognizes bilateral kinship, was influential well before the late tenth century. Its influence challenged the Eastern kinship model Guichard documents, particularly in the area of women's property rights.