632 AD : The
Islamic prophet Mohammed dies in
Medina,
and Abu Bakr is selected af the First Khalifa, or
Caliph (deputy).
The desert
Bedouin tribes and urban dwellers of
Arabia come into conflict after
the Prophet's death, and rival sects are founded. Abu Bakr dispatches
his most fearsome commander
Khalid (ibn al'Walid), known as the Blade of
Allah, who summarily slaughters the
infidels and
heretics wherever he finds
them, for as the
Qu'ran reads, "...in the shade of scimitars is Paradise
prefigured."
633 AD : Al-Muthanna (ibn Haritha), chief of the Banishaiban
clan, steals into Persian Mesopotamia and begins siege of Hira (which he
takes on camelback) and then drives his army west to Damascus. 700,000
Christian troops are dispatched from Constantinople by Emperor Heraclius in response; most
of them are slaughtered in the desert outside the city. "Infidels they
came, infidels they departed."
635 AD : Damascus falls after Khalid and his army
arrives. He then leads his troops into Jordan and defeats the Byzantine
army massed against him at Battle of Yarmuk.
638 AD : The Islamic armies swarm Jerusalem after
a 600 day siege of the city and soon control most of the Holy Land.
640 AD : Arabian troops cross into Egypt, and by September
control Alexandria. Amr (ibn Al'as), the general now in command,
writes back to the Caliph in Mecca, "We entered the city, every man having
to veil their eyes from the sunlight glaring off the marble and gold."
649 AD : Arabs take Cyprus and begin a naval war with
the Byzantine Empire.
653 AD : The lessons of the Prophet are for the first
time officially compiled into the Koran (Qu'ran) while all other unauthorized
literature is immediately suppressed. The First Jihad erupts.
656 AD : The Third Caliph Uthman (ibn Affan) is assassinated
in Medina by religious sectarians, and two opposed armies of the faithful
mass at Siffin, in Syria, copies of the Qu'ran spiked to the tips of their
lances. The Syrian side carries the day as Islam schisms effectively
into the Sunni (who believe the Caliph line to be legitimate) and the Shi'a
(who believe Ali ibn Abu Talib, Mohammed's cousin, to be the true spiritual
successor. This schism, however, and Talib, have nothing to do with Taliban (ta-fathah), which is Arabic for "student", as most of them are graduates from various orthodox Islamic institutions).
Syrians were Sunnis, the Persians Shi'a. (The Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s
was fought along exactly the same religious grounds, with Iraq as Sunnis,
Iran as Shi'as). Many thanks, yaqub0r, for the etymology.
661-667 AD : Islamic armies besiege Constantinople
for the first time. The city becomes a battleground between Islam
and Christendom for the next 900 years.
670 AD : Under Caliph Mu'awiya, the Moslem armies
march 10,000 cavalry across Egypt, through Libya and into Tunisia.
685 AD : Civil war erupts in Persia, with two opposed
Caliphates, one in Damascus, the other in Medina.
711 AD : The Arab general Tarik moves his troops into
the Gothic kingdom of 'occupied' Spain, completely surprising the northern
Goths at Guadalete, who retreat into Gaul (France).*
714 AD : Seville and Medina surrender to another Arab
general, Musa.
722 AD : Tarik, under the order of Emir Yazid, brings
his forces across the Pyrnees mountains, marching on Toulouse, which manages
to barely hold its territory with the help of the Duke of Aquitaine.
733 AD : Arab armies now reach as far as Poitiers,
in Gaul, where a loose confederacy of troops are brought together by the
Franks, Belgians and Germans.
762 AD : The re-construction of Baghdad, the Alexandria
of Arabia, as scholars flock there from around the known world seeking
access to the amassed literature there. The Caliph al-Ma'mun (scholar, astronomer, theologian) establishes the
library/translation center/school. the Bait al-Hikmah ('House of Wisdom'), where all the Greek, Roman and Alexandrian classics of poetry, science and philosophy are transcribed and preserved through the Middle Ages. It also is the beginning of The Arabian contribution to Cryptology.
778 AD : Charlemange crosses into Spain, 'liberating' Saragossa and Barcelona.
788 AD : Jihad is declared against the Frankish Charlemange.
844 AD : Viking ships begin attacking the Moslems in Seville, Moorish armies retreat to the stronghold city of
Cordoba, where they remain until their expulsion by the Portugeuse in 1492.
Notes:
Ironically, the only other instance of such cultural foresight in the history of the world is taking place at the
same time, on remote wind torn islands of the coast of Northern
Ireland, where bands of
Celt hermits, recently converted to
Christianity, are undertaking the translation of hundreds of
Persian,
Byzantine and
Spanish texts, brought to them by religious
refugees displaced by plagues and wars throughout the 7th and 8th centuries. The
Book of Kells and the
Lindisfarne Gospels are
two examples of the literature produced by the meeting of
Middle Eastern and
Irish culture. For further reading, see
Thomas
Cahill's
How the Irish Saved Civilization (NY: 1995), a knotted history of 'extreme'
monasticism and the fragile
transmission of ideas in a dark time (despite the book's clich?characterizations of the Irish as unchanging, nature-loving
heathens and Cahill's
neo-conservative social views).
* The temptation to make a
Goth joke here (with
Killing an Arab) at
the Cure's expense, is almost overwhelming...
Years later, a young friar named Gerbert (who will become
Pope Silvester II) visits the libraries of
Cordoba when the city is ruled by
Abd-Al Rahman. The Pope will remark these were some of the finest libraries the world had
known, and to which Europe had little access. Not long after this statement, once Silvester' s successor is chosen,
the
Crusades begin, a concerted effort by European leaders, in particular the
Church, to recover science and learning.
Sources:
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