Looting and Learning: War and the Qur'an in European Oriental Studies

This essay examines the relationship between war and European Qur’anic studies from the mediaeval period to the nineteenth century. It surveys manuscript sources that bear traces of wartime looting and the work of Muslim captives and converts. It argues that war played a recurring role in European oriental studies, helping to shape its practices, aims, and geography. In their early stages, war contributed to a broader shift in academic oriental studies toward the study of the Qur’an in its multilingual Islamic intellectual contexts. Later, as colonial expansion facilitated access to new sources, illicitly acquired manuscripts, especially early Qur’an fragments, were instrumental for historical scholarship on the Qur’an.