ABSTRACT
Growing research on a diversity of translation practices and knowledge transmission patterns beyond the Western canon (amongst other Gaddis Rose, 2000; Cheung, 2006, 2012) has expanded the historical grounding of the discipline and questioned mainstream narratives. In the case of the Arabic translation tradition, competing narratives range from an almost hagiographical account of the Arabo-Islamic contribution to knowledge via translation to readings which tend to oversimplify the input of that tradition into intellectual history. Drawing on a current research project aiming at producing an anthology of Arabic discourse on translation, with specific focus on two iconic translation periods, the Classical Age of Arab Science (ninth–tenth centuries) and the Nahḍah period in the nineteenth century, this chapter engages critically with the historiography of that translation tradition, through medieval chronicles and later testimonies and discuss the epistemological and methodological challenges inherent to the construction of an anthology.
