‘This awful and distressing circumstance’
translating Ibn Faḍlān’s ‘Vikings’ for Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.9750/PSAS.154.1432Keywords:
Viking, Arabic, Ibn Faḍlān, translation, Orientalism, antiquarianism, Edinburgh Blackwood’s Magazine, Proc Soc Antiq Scot, funerary archaeologyAbstract
The first English-language translation of Ibn Faḍlān’s Arabic account of a Rūs funeral appeared as part of a Danish essay translated for Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine in 1818. This was not the only translation of Ibn Faḍlān published in Scotland in the 19th century; in 1871, Joseph Anderson (1832–1916) published another translation, again translated from Danish, in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, in which he expressed doubt as to the existence of the 1818 translation. Neither translation has seen significant attention, since both treatments of Ibn Faḍlān were better suited for antiquarian rather than orientalist engagement, and so do not feature prominently in the historiography of Ibn Faḍlān as an Arabic geographical source. Looking at the Scottish antiquarian reception of this source, this article traces Ibn Faḍlān’s journey from Danish into English, and identifies Alexander Nicoll (1793–1828) as the first English translator of the source. I explore the tragic personal circumstances leading Nicoll to visit Denmark and establish scholarly networks with the Danish literati and, evaluating the impact of Nicoll’s work, contextualise the publication of both the 1818 and 1871 translations against the development of Scottish antiquarian efforts to explore the Viking Age in order to present a trajectory for the increased study, interest and comparative merit of Ibn Faḍlān as an Arabic source for antiquarians, setting the source against the scholarly networks in which it circulated.
