中世アラブ料理書の系統と特徴について

抄録

Many cookery books were compiled in the medieval Islamic times and thirteen of them were already indicated by Ibn al-Nadim (d. ca. 387/995) in the Fihrist. Although their importance as historical sources has been recognized, they have been a generally neglected subject of study.
My main purpose of study of the Arab cookery books is to describe food availability and dietary life in the medieval Islamic period and to explicate the changes of dietary life under the constant influence of the various factors of political, economical and cultural activities. In this paper I intended to clarify their general character and to point out the strong textual similarities among eight books.
As a result, it can be claimed, they were compiled as one of adab Literature. All those authors who compiled cookery books before the 11th century were on intimate terms with Abbasid caliphs in the courts in the capacity as physicians, musicians, bureaucrats and scholars; the authors who compiled them after the 13th century, on the other hand, they belonged to the urban society as the people of the educated class (khassah) like 'ulama's, jurists, scholars and poets. It alludes to the emergence and development of an urban high cooking after this period.
Arad cookery books were, generally speaking, compiled with the aim of defining “the healthful diet (al-sahih min al-at'imah)” in accordance with the Islamic law and medical science. As for their contents, a wide variety of subjects are taken up; proper kitchen practices, the nature of various kinds of food stuffs, table manners and preparations for breads, condiments, preserves, sweetmeats, drinks and so on.
The comparison of contents of eight cookery books reveals that these cookery books can be divided into four “extended families”.
(1) Books that drew information from al-Warraq's work which was written around the end of the 10th century
(2) Books that are strongly parallel with al-Baghdadi (d. 637/1239-1240)'s work
(3) Books of which a number of recipes of preparations closely parallels those of Ibn al-'Adim (d. 660-1262)'s work
(4) Books which were compiled in Maghrib-Andalus in 13th century Despite the similarities among those cookery books, each of them serves as a totally independent source with new information which reflected the social and economical conditions of the areas where they were compiled.
In sum, Arab cookery books are important sources for the study of medieval Islamic societies in general.