Acknowledgements
There are a number of persons and institutions without whose support this book could not have been written. First and foremost, I should like to thank Petra Sijpesteijn for giving me the opportunity to participate in the Leiden-based research project âThe Formation of Islam: The View from Belowâ, funded by the European Research Council, and for encouraging me to develop myself as a scholar in the exiting fields of early-Islamic history and papyrology. By and large, this book is a slightly altered version of the Ph.D. thesis I wrote between 2009 and 2014 for this project. I also wish to express gratitude to Maaike van Berkel, co-supervisor of my thesis, for discussing the many aspects of this book in great detail without ever losing sight of the scholarly field(s) at large.
Many others helped and advised me during my years of research, only a few of whom I can mention here. I am greatly indebted to Jacques van der Vliet and Alain Delattre, who always found time to discuss the Greek and Coptic source material and helped me gain a much better understanding of those parts of Egyptâs early-Islamic society which these sources represent. My thanks also go to Renate Dekker, Janneke de Jong, Marie Legendre, and Khaled Younes. The discussions of our research greatly helped me formulate and correct my thoughts. I also must acknowledge the generous help of Jairus Banaji, Lajos Berkes, Sobhi Bouderbala, Joost Hagen, Alexandra Konstantinidou, Nikolaos Gonis, Yaacov Lev, Federico Morelli, and Klaas Worp.