Al-ʿUṣūr al-Wusṭā 25 (2017): 210-212

Book Review

Longing for the Lost Caliphate: A Transregional History by Mona Hassan explores the idea of the cali-
phate—a means through which people 
could assume leadership after the death 
of the Prophet Muḥammad in 11/632—
particularly its manifestations and valences 
under the Abbasids and the Ottomans 
through wide-ranging evidence, including 
poetry and juridical texts (5). Chronolog-
ically, the work spans two specified time 
periods, namely the first/seventh into the 
tenth/sixteenth centuries and the nine-
teenth and twentieth centuries. The study 
demonstrates strong grounding in theoret-
ical approaches to collective memory and 
memory studies. It stands out overall as a 
work that contributes to and encourages 
important conversations among scholars 
of Islam and also between them and those 
working in other fields. 

The work consists of six main chapters, 
along with an Introduction and Epilogue. 
Chapter 1, “Visions of a Lost Caliphal 
Capital: Baghdad, 1258 CE,” is centered 

on the Mongol conquest of Baghdad in 
656/1258 and how the loss of this city was 
felt and conceptualized by Muslims in a 
multitude of sources, including written, 
visual, and aural texts. For example, 
Hassan explores how the scholar Tāj al-Dīn 
al-Subkī (d. 771/1370) wrote about this 
loss in his history, Ṭabaqāt al-Shāfiʿiyyah 
al-Ku brā ,  foc u s ing  on how t he w ork 
evokes and interprets the loss of Baghdad 
for Muslims collectively. Aside from 
such discussions of specific scholars and 
their works, the chapter also emphasizes 
a broader “cultural discourse” that they 
created and participated in, the contours 
of which begin to emerge if we assess such 
figures and their writings in light of one 
another (22).

T h e  f i r s t  c h a p t e r  s i t u a t e s  t h e 
d e s t r u c t i o n  a n d  l o s s  o f  B a g h d a d  a s 
a  c e n t r a l ,  d e f i n i n g  e v e n t  i n  M u s l i m 
collective memory, particularly in terms 
of subsequent conceptualizations of the 
caliphate, which is the topic of Chapter 2, 
“Recapturing Lost Glory and Legitimacy.” 

Mona Hassan, Longing for the Lost Caliphate: A Transregional 
History. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 
2016. Pp. xv, 390, with index. $45.00 (hardback). ISBN: 

9780691166780. ISBN: 9781400883714 (eBook).

Sabahat F. Adil 
University of Colorado, Boulder

(sabahat.adil@colorado.edu)

mailto:sabahat.adil%40colorado.edu?subject=


Al-ʿUṣūr al-Wusṭā 25 (2017)

211  •  Sabahat F. adil

This chapter also examines various texts 
like Chapter 1, but it delves into the 
years following the seventh/thirteenth 
century Mongol conquest of Baghdad. In 
this vein, it explores how the conquest 
was conceived of, particularly in terms 
of reclaiming the past prestige, power, 
and authority of the caliphate. Hassan 
accentuates these ideas with historical 
examples of rulers, dynasties, and others 
in the political domain who sought to 
assume the power and position once held 
by the Abbasid Caliphate.

C h a p t e r  3 ,  “ C o n c e p t u a l i z i n g  t h e 
Caliphate, 632–1517 CE,” expands the 
intellectual frame established by the 
first two chapters to demonstrate how 
an interest in the caliphate extended 
chronologically long before and well 
after the Mongol conquest of Baghdad. 
As such, the idea of the caliphate must be 
explored in light of the years surrounding 
the foundation of Islam itself, including 
early Abbasid articulations. On this note, 
Chapter 3 looks at how caliphates were 
conceptualized in juridical texts from the 
first/seventh into the tenth/sixteenth 
centuries, paying particular attention to 
the work of Mamluk-era intellectuals 
such as Ibn Khaldūn (d. 784/1406) and 
al-Qalqashandī (d. 821/1418). 

While Chapters 1, 2, and 3 focus on the 
premodern, Chapters 4, 5, and 6 are situated 
in the modern period. Chapter 4, “Manifold 
Meanings of Loss: Ottoman Defeat, Early 
1920s,” relies on various types of texts 
to show how the notion of a caliphate 
at that time can be understood through 
a consideration of these texts, but in a 
contextually distinct moment—post-WWI 
and on the eve of the shattering of the 
Ottoman Caliphate and the launching of 
the Turkish Republic—than that of the first 

three chapters. In terms of sources, this 
chapter centers on historical documents to 
examine attitudes towards the caliphate, 
which ought to be contrasted with the 
emphasis on texts such as juridical in 
earlier chapters. This is notable because it 
suggests that discourse about the caliphate 
was not limited to a particular discursive 
domain, but rather pervaded multiple 
ones. Chapter 5, “In International Pursuit 
of a Caliphate,” reviews conceptions of the 
caliphate on a global scale, particularly 
o r c h e s t r a t e d  e f f o r t s  t o  i m a g i n e  t h e 
caliphate beyond nation-state borders. As 
the title suggests, this chapter truly sheds 
light on the international character of 
such efforts, spanning discussions raging 
in Istanbul and Cairo to Indonesian and 
Chinese viewpoints on the composition 
of a caliphal council. Finally, Chapter 6, 
“Debating a Modern Caliphate,” looks at 
specific figures in the Ottoman context 
with ideas, often differing ones, regarding 
the caliphate, including Mustafa Sabri  
(d. 1954) and Said Nursi (d. 1960). 

Overall Lost Caliphate makes numerous 
noteworthy contributions to scholarship. 
First, it considers a variety of sources 
rather than remain confined to a single 
body of texts. In addition to written 
materials, the work features visuals, 
including reproductions of paintings, 
m a p s ,  a n d  m o r e ,  d e m o n s t r a t i n g  t h e 
multidimensional pull of the idea of the 
caliphate. Because the work delves into 
numerous texts and forms of evidence, 
more studies on the topic in the future 
will be beneficial to move along this area 
of academic interest in memory studies 
and Islamicate pasts by exploring in 
greater detail some subset of what has 
been discussed here. Additionally, the 
work builds upon foundational studies on 



Al-ʿUṣūr al-Wusṭā 25 (2017)

Mona Hassan’s Longing for the Lost Caliphate: A Transregional History  •  212

memory and history, including those by 
Émile Durkheim, Maurice Halbwachs, and 
others, and it aptly considers their ideas 
in light of particular Islamicate contexts. 
Furthermore, it is highly useful in terms 
of advancing the study of Islamicate 
intellectual history, and ought to be put 
into conversation with other works that 
are also exploring the history of ideas in 
global and Islamicate contexts, including 
recent ones such as Cemil Aydin’s The Idea 
of the Muslim World: A Global Intellectual 
History (Harvard UP, 2017).

Scholars and students alike, particularly 
those with an interest in the history 

of ideas and memory studies, will find 
this work intellectually engaging and 
highly informative. It can be assigned in 
classroom settings, especially at advanced 
undergraduate and graduate levels, across 
a range of departments, including history, 
religious studies, and literature. At its 
core, Longing for the Lost Caliphate is 
a timely and noteworthy book about the 
development and pull of the notion of the 
caliphate on Muslim communities and 
Islamicate contexts over time, and is as 
relevant to the twenty-first century world 
stage as ever.