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Series Editor
Françoise Gaill
Mankind and Deserts 3
Wind in Deserts and Civilizations
Edited by
Fernand Joly
Guilhem Bourrié
First published 2021 in Great Britain and the United States by ISTE Ltd and John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms and licenses issued by the CLA. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms should be sent to the publishers at the undermentioned address:
ISTE Ltd
27-37 St George’s Road
London SW19 4EU
UK
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
111 River Street
Hoboken, NJ 07030
USA
© ISTE Ltd 2021
The rights of Fernand Joly and Guilhem Bourrié to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2021930490
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978-1-78630-632-6
Foreword
Mankind and deserts
Fernand Joly1 departed from this world before he was able to complete this book, through which he had hoped to share his experiences of and passion for deserts.
“Yet another book on deserts!” some might think; another book to add to the numerous publications dedicated to these alien and fascinating worlds.
This book, however, is different from earlier books, as can be seen from its title “Mankind and Deserts”. It is based on the singular relationships that are formed between humans and the world of the desert – relationships that are unique because they can be traced back to the very origins of humanity. Indeed, it is from the arid Horn of Africa (East Africa) that large migrations began and it is along the deserts, if not within the deserts themselves, that we find the major cradles of burgeoning historical civilizations. This inhospitable world is also associated with great spiritual leaders such as Moses, Jesus, Mohammed and the Buddha, while serving as the backdrop for adventurers and empire builders from Alexander the Great to Genghis Khan, or from the Incans to the Conquistadors in the Andes and Mexico.
What is this universe that is so barren and yet so mesmerizing?
“All about a word” was how Fernand Joly introduced his book: “What is a desert?” The ambiguity in this word results from the fact that it has been used in different senses across literature and throughout history. For a geographer-writer such as Fernand Joly, the one fact that stood out was that there was no one desert; instead there were multiple deserts,