Christian Robin
Dr Christian Robin, French Center of Research in Sanaa (Yemen) founder, is a highly acclaimed and widely published researcher on ancient Arabia and Ethiopia. He has been a member of the national research center “Centre national de la Recherche scientifique” (CNRS) since 1970. Robin is currently working with The al-Sabah Collection on a book and exhibition of pre-Islamic objects from South Arabia. He is also the editor of Alessandro de Maigret, Saba’, Ma’în et Qatabân. Contributions à l’archéologie et à l’histoire de l’Arabie ancienne (2012).
The Last Glimmers of Polytheism in Arabia
Archaeological research conducted over the past 50 years throughout the Arabian Peninsula, has revealed thousands of epigraphic texts in ancient monuments or on rocks in the countryside and the desert. In this lecture Robin will highlight several resulting developments, including the decline in references to polytheistic deities during the 3rd and 4th centuries. Names of persons mentioning a polytheistic deity, such as Taym al-Lãt, Aws Manãt or ‘Abd al-‘Uzzà, become rare and from 380 onward, all prayers are addressed to a single God, who at first bears various names, then is named al-Rahmãn and al-Ilãh. The rejection of the polytheism is complete in the ruling classes of the Himyar kingdom late in the 4th century, but the transition was slower in urban and desert populations.