Medieval Muslim graves in France reveal a previously unseen history

Enlarge / Three Muslim burials from the seventh or eighth century CE, in the French town of Nimes. The people were buried with great care, using Islamic funeral traditions that persist to this day. (credit: Gleize et al.)

Today, the southern French city of Nimes is known for its beautiful waterways and well-preserved Roman architecture. But back in the seventh century, it was the prize in a battle between Roman soldiers, Gothic tribes, and the well-organized forces of a new political superpower known as Islam. Now, archaeologists have discovered the first evidence that Muslims lived in Nimes during this early phase in Islamic expansion across North Africa and Europe. Three newly discovered graves—the oldest Muslim graves in France—hint at what life was like in a medieval city whose residents were a mix of Christians from Rome, local indigenous tribes, and Muslims from Africa.

A team of French archaeologists describe the three graves in an article in PLoS One, explaining that they were found in an area that was once enclosed by a Roman-style wall from the days when Nimes was a key outpost in Septimania, on the western fringes of the Roman Empire. Taken by the Visigoths in the fifth century, the city remained under that tribe's control in a region called Narbonne until the early seventh century. But then things began to change, as the Umayyad Caliphate army worked its way north.

Map of the Arab empire during the period when the people in these graves were likely alive. (credit: G. Devilder)

Though there were great battles during this time, far more common were migrations of people swept up by the cultural changes caused by shifting empires. As the Medieval POC project has been documenting for years, there were many people from Africa and the Middle East in Europe during this time.

Read 6 remaining paragraphs | Comments