Farm to fork: Cairo’s food supply and distribution during the Mamluk sultanate (1250-1517)

The wealth of Cairo’s markets throughout the Mamlūk period is well attested in the sources. From roving peddlers to stationary markets, the city’s food supply was a testament to Egypt’s agricultural bounty. This study attempts to understand the food economy that provisioned these food markets. In doing so, Egypt’s agricultural production, its transportation network, distribution system, and Cairo’s markets are discussed with a focus towards understanding both the nature of the many aspects of the Mamūk food economy as well as the changes occurring within it. In providing an overall description of the mechanisms by which the Mamlūk food economy functioned, this thesis argues that the structure of the system was an ongoing dialectic between the labor and efforts of the peasants, the activities of the food merchants and sellers, and the contrivances of those with power, especially the Mamlūk regime itself. The complexities of this system were not only influenced by the activities of these three groups but were also driven by environmental and geographic factors as well. When all of these factors worked in concert, an intricate, multi-layered system produced the abundance and wealth of Cairo’s markets that were evident for all to see. However, the effects of the plague, starting in the fourteenth century CE, combined with the labor-intensive nature of the Egyptian agricultural and transportation systems disrupted this multiplex system. The agricultural sector being key to the overall Mamlūk economy, this breakdown created the conditions from which the agricultural system and, correspondingly, the economy failed to recover

Tales of an Eccentric Character of Old Dover Township, York County, Pennsylvania

A typed submission to Alfred L. Shoemaker entitled, Tales of an Eccentric Character of Old Dover Township, York County, Pa. , by David M. Quickel, dating from circa 1950. Within, Quickel recounts humorous sayings and tales surrounding the eccentric character he calls Mr. Bull .https://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/shoemaker_documents/1173/thumbnail.jp

Evaluation of a dialectical behavior therapy-informed partial hospital program: outcome data and exploratory analyses

The use of dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) among a variety of programs and patients has recently exploded. Of particular interest is the use of DBT in partial hospital (PH) programs due to the high number of severely ill and suicidal patients who participate in these programs. Recently, Lothes, Mochrie and St. John (2014) examined data from a local DBT-informed PH program and found significant reductions in depression, anxiety, hopelessness, and degree of suffering from intake to discharge. The present study examined these same four symptom constructs by assessing intake and discharge data for additional individuals enrolled in this DBT-informed PH program. In addition, lengths of stay and acuity ratings were analyzed to explore the relationship between these variables and symptom constructs. Significant symptom reduction in depression, anxiety, hopelessness, and degree of suffering from intake to discharge was found among high and medium acuity patients, replicating the results of Lothes et al. (2014). Further, individuals with the highest acuity saw the largest reduction in hopelessness symptoms the longer they participated in the program (i.e., a significant interaction effect between acuity and length of stay). This is meaningful given the connection between hopelessness and suicidal ideation/action, which is of particular concern for those charged with treating clinical populations. DBT-informed PH programs may be a cost-effective and useful way to treat high-risk patients who come from inpatient facilities. Future studies may wish to create follow-up periods (i.e., 3 months, 6 months) post-discharge to assess if symptom reduction remains

Voltage-induced coercivity reduction in nanoporous alloy films : a boost towards energy-efficient magnetic actuation

Magnetic data storage and magnetically actuated devices are conventionally controlled by magnetic fields generated using electric currents. This involves significant power dissipation by Joule heating effect. To optimize energy efficiency, manipulation of magnetic information with lower magnetic fields (i.e., lower electric currents) is desirable. This can be accomplished by reducing the coercivity of the actuated material. Here, a drastic reduction of coercivity is observed at room temperature in thick (≈600 nm), nanoporous, electrodeposited Cu-Ni films by simply subjecting them to the action of an electric field. The effect is due to voltage-induced changes in the magnetic anisotropy. The large surface-area-to-volume ratio and the ultranarrow pore walls of the system allow the whole film, and not only the topmost surface, to effectively contribute to the observed magnetoelectric effect. This waives the stringent "ultrathin-film requirement" from previous studies, where small voltage-driven coercivity variations were reported. This observation expands the already wide range of applications of nanoporous materials (hitherto in areas like energy storage or catalysis) and it opens new paradigms in the fields of spintronics, computation, and magnetic actuation in general

Introduction

While the field of Mamluk studies continues to mature and deepen, the period’s environmental history remains undeveloped. The EGYLandscape Project (https://www.egylandscape.org/), started in 2019 with financing from the German Research Foundation, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, and the French National Research Agency, Agence nationale de la recherche, anf cohosted by the University of Marburg in Germany and the University of Aix-Marseille in France, has brought together scholars of Egypt’s environmental history studying the period between the thirteenth and eighteenth centuries. The present issue of Mamlūk Studies Review is a cross-section of some of the work of the project team and highlights the different avenues of inquiry that we have begun to undertake