Notes on the translation of the texts of treaties concluded between the Mamluk Sultans and the Italian Cities

Volume Volume VI|Issue 11| Jan 2020 |Primary Source

Abstract

Many copies of treaties concluded between European sovereigns and the Mamluk sultans are preserved in European archival centers, particularly in Venice, Genoa, Florence, Barcelona and Ragusa. They facilitate studying the relations that existed between the Mamluk authorities and the Europeans settled in Egypt and Syria from the thirteenth century until the end of the fifteenth century. Arabic was the language of the original texts issued by the chancellery of the sultans, which were then translated to provide a copy for the European envoys. The texts of the treaties concluded between the Mamluk sultans and the Italian rulers were not quoted in the chronicles and the books of the Mamluk period chancellery. The authors of these manuscripts did not refer to the translation of the texts written in Arabic into Latin and Italian or state who the translators of these texts were. They gave no information about translator practices of the time or the criteria and norms adopted in translating treaties and correspondence between the sultans and the Italian rulers. Hence the importance of the translated texts preserved in the Italian archives, which are sources providing very plentiful material and important information about writing style, the translation method adopted, vocabulary and orthographic variants, the chancellery language adopted in diplomacy with Europe and its progress from the thirteenth century till the fifteenth century.

The article aims to study and analyze the influence of Arabic on Italian diplomacy in an attempt to answer the following questions: Why were Arabic words used in Italian and Latin translations? To what extent was the translation accurate? And was the linguistic influence monodirectional or mutual


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