Founding Gods, Inventing Nations: Conquest and Culture Myths from Antiquity to Islam

192 Pages·2011·1.66 MB·English

by  William F. McCants

Founding Gods, Inventing Nations
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Founding Gods, Inventing Nations
conquest and culture myths
from antiquity to islam
William F. McCants
princeton university press
princeton and oxford
Copyright © 2012 by Princeton University Press
Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street,
Princeton, New Jersey 08540
In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, 6 Oxford Street,
Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1TW
press.princeton.edu
All Rights Reserved
ISBN 978-0-691-15148-9
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McCants, William Faizi, 1975-
Founding gods, inventing nations : conquest and culture myths from antiquity to Islam /
William F. McCants.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-691-15148-9 (hardcover)
1. Middle East—Civilization—Historiography. 2. Middle East—Civilization—
Philosophy. 3. Civilization—Philosophy. 4. Mythology, Middle Eastern. 5. Middle East—
Intellectual life. 6. Middle East—Colonization. 7. Greeks—Middle East—
History. 8. Romans—Middle East—History. 9. Arabs—Middle East—
History. 10. Acculturation—Middle East—History. I. Title.
DS57.M434 2012
939'.40072—dc22 2011009295
British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available
This book has been composed in Palatino
Printed on acid-free paper. ∞
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FOR My FATHER,
who loves to tell the story of the founding of his nation, Texas
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
One
Gifts of the Gods: The Origins of Civilization in Ancient
Near Eastern and Greek Mythology 10
Two
The Beneficent Sky God: Cultural History in the Qur’an 29
Three
Who Was First? Protography and Discovery Catalogs 57
Four
Inventing Nations: Postconquest Native Histories of
Civilization’s Origins 85
Five
“The Sciences of the Ancients”: Speculation on the Origins of
Philosophy, Medicine, and the Exact Sciences 120
Conclusion 145
Bibliography 149
Index 167
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Acknowledgments
Thanks to Michael Cook, who advised the dissertation that became this book
and encouraged me to publish it; to Peter Brown, who helped me develop its
Hermetic kernel; and to Patricia Crone, who gave generously of her time and
insight and introduced me to classicists with similar interests at a seminar on
postcolonial ethnic chauvinism in antiquity. The seminar came too late to in-
corporate their thoughts into my dissertation, but I have now referenced their
published work throughout.
Thanks also to my editor at Princeton University Press, Rob Tempio, for
sticking with the project; to Ben Holmes and Dalia Geffen for ironing out the
wrinkles; and to Princeton’s anonymous reviewers, whose criticisms made the
book much better. Any errors that remain are, of course, mine.
I am grateful to my family (Mom, Dad, David, Halleh, Martha, and Sina) and
scholarly friends who kept the wind at my back. Of the latter, I want to thank
Vahid Brown, Michael Doran, Najam Haider, Thomas Hegghammer, Stephanie
Kaplan, Stephen Lambden, Todd Lawson, Afshon Ostovar, Sam Parker, and
Farzin Vejdani. A special thanks to Michael Horowitz, who provided very help-
ful feedback at the last minute.
This book could not have been written without the support of my wife, Casey,
and my colleague and friend Sholeh Quinn. With two little daughters, Ariana
and Eva Daisy, and a full-time nonacademic job, I had no spare moments to
work on the manuscript. Casey, determined that I should publish it, gave me
every Sunday as “Book Day.” Sholeh, equally determined, showed me how to
make the revisions without making a mess. Thank you both from the bottom of
my heart.