Ancient Civilizations of North Africa and the Middle East

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Ancient Civilizations of North Africa and the
Middle East

• Sumer cuneiform writing and the first
  civilization
• Babylonia Hammurabis Codethe first written
  laws for citizens to abide by
• Assyria war-like with an expansive empire
• Phoenicians one letter/one sound alphabetsea
  trading empire
• Egyptians science, astronomy, medicine
• Romans technology, vast empire, concrete, road
  system and aqueducts
• Greeks Alexander the Greatspread Greek culture
  throughout the Middle East
• Persians In what is now Iran, descendants of the
  Aryan migration

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The Beginnings of IslamMedina, 622-632

• The prophet Muhammad was Allahs last prophet, or
  messenger. He received the message from Allah
  through Gabriel and began preaching the word
  throughout Medina after being expelled from Mecca.

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Muhammad expands control

• Muhammad took political and spiritual control.
• He led his followers into battle 80 times in 10
  years and eventually took control of Mecca two
  years before his death.
• Mecca was established as the center of worship of
  Allah.

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What do these terms mean?

• Caliph Means successor, the title given to
  those who took over leadership of the Umma (the
  Muslim community) after the death of Muhammad.
  The practice of the caliphs is called the
  Caliphate.
• Sunni Islam The followers of Sunni Islam make up
  the vast majority of Moslems, some 80 to 85
  percent. Sunnis believe that Mohammed did not
  appoint a successor, and therefore one had to be
  appointed by the Moslems themselves. This led to
  the establishment of the Caliphate, a series of
  men who took over Mohammed's worldly and temporal
  power, but who made no claim to be Mohammed's
  spiritual successor.
• Shiite Islam The Shiites believed that Mohammed
  had designed Ali as his successor and spiritual
  heir. There are two important aspects here.
  First, the idea that Mohammed's heir should be
  from Mohammed's family. Second, that unlike the
  caliphate, the successor should be a religious
  and spiritual leader.

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In Medina and Kufa, 632-661

• Ali moved the Arab capital from Medina to Kufa in
  southern Iraq.
• Islam splits into Sunnis and Shiites
• Muslim troops conquered all of Arabia north into
  Palestine, Syria, Iraq, and Iran and westward
  into Egypt and North Africa
• By 643, Muslims had conquered Egypt and the
  Persian Empire

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Empire in Damascus (Syria) The Umayyad
Caliphate, 661-750

• After Alis death, the Umayyad dynasty
  established itself in Damascus.
• They were a political and military power who
  expanded the Islamic empire.
• After the Umayyad dynasty fell in Damascus in
  750, a different line of the Umayyad dynasty
  continued in Spain until 1492.

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Umayyad Dynasty in Damascus
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Umayyad Empire in Cordoba, Spain 755-1492

• In 755 when the Umayyad Dynasty was ousted by the
  Abbasid dynasty (who made Baghdad the capital),
  the last Umayyad prince fled to Spain to take
  control there.
• He wanted to show the world the greatness of his
  caliphate.
• He recruited scholars by offering overwhelming
  gifts. Scholars, poets, philosophers,
  historians, and musicians soon made the trek to
  Cordoba.
• An infrastructure of libraries, hospitals,
  research institutions, and centers of Islamic
  study became commonplace. The Islamic
  intellectual tradition and educational system
  made Spain a world leader in this regard for the
  next 400 years.
• What is this called???

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Cultural
Diffusion!!!
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The Abbasid Caliphate in Baghdad, 750-1258

• During this time, Islamic art flourished, and the
  Sharia (Islamic law was developed)
• Also, Arab control over Islam was broken. All
  Muslims were seen as equalArabs and non-Arabs.

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Islamic Art

• As it is not only a religion but a way of life,
  Islam fostered the development of a distinctive
  culture with its own unique artistic language
  that is reflected in art and architecture
  throughout the Muslim world.
• Although the often cited opposition in Islam to
  the depiction of human and animal forms holds
  true for religious art and architecture, in the
  secular sphere, such representations have
  flourished in nearly all Islamic cultures.
• The Islamic resistance to the representation of
  living beings ultimately stems from the belief
  that the creation of living forms is unique to
  God, and it is for this reason that the role of
  images and image makers has been controversial.

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Islamic art and architecture
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The Crusades

• From the 11th century on, armies of Christian
  soldiers (spurred on by the Pope) led Crusades to
  liberate the holy land from the Muslims.
• Indiscriminate massive killings and death
  resulted, mostly by the Christians, with nothing
  really changing. As of 1250, Muslims still
  controlled Palestine.
• The impression left on the Muslims was that of
  ruthless barbarism, a view that still influences
  Muslim understanding of the West today.

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The Ottoman Caliphate, 1290-1924

• After the destruction of Baghdad and the Abbasid
  Empire by the Mongols in 1290, the Ottoman Empire
  came into power. It was dominated by the Turks
  and centered in what is modern-day Turkey.
• The Ottoman state was born on the frontier
  between Islam and the Byzantine Empire. Turkish
  tribes, driven from their homeland in the steppes
  of Central Asia by the Mongols, had embraced
  Islam and settled in Anatolia.
• The Ottoman state began as one of many small
  Turkish states that emerged in Asia Minor during
  the breakdown of the empire of the Seljuk Turks.
  The Ottoman Turks began to absorb the other
  states, and during the reign (145181) of
  Muhammad II they ended all other local Turkish
  dynasties.
• In the late 14th century, the Ottomans started to
  use Janissaries (which means new troops in
  Turkish). They were conscripted youths from
  Christian families in the Balkans. After
  conscription, they were defined as the property
  of the Sultan, and practically all of them
  converted to Islam. They became know for their
  military skills.
• In 1453, they conquered Constantinople (which had
  been founded as the capital of all Christendom by
  Constantine himself), renamed it Istanbul, and
  made it the capital of their Empire.
• Within a century the Ottomans had changed from a
  nomadic horde to the heirs of the most ancient
  surviving empire of Europe.
• Here the leaders are called Sultans ("emperors").
  

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The Ottoman Empire

• The Ottoman Empire expanded into southeastern
  Europe (the Balkans and Hungary) and then east
  and south into Iraq, Arabia, and Egypt.

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Suleiman the Magnificent

• Suleiman I (nicknamed 'the Magnificent' in Europe
  and 'the Lawgiver' in the Islamic World) was the
  sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1520 to 1566.
• At the age of seven he was sent to study science,
  history, literature, theology, and military
  techniques in the schools of the Istanbul palace.
  
• While he may have been seen as dangerous to the
  outside world, he was known as a fair ruler
  within the empire, fought corruption, and was a
  great supporter of artists and philosophers. He
  was also noted as one of the greatest Islamic
  poets. He earned his nickname the Lawmaker from
  his complete reconstruction of the Ottoman law
  system. The laws that he gathered covered almost
  every aspect of life at the time.

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Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent

• Suleiman died in 1566, the night before victory
  at the Battle of Szigetvar, in Hungary. He is
  buried in a mausoleum with his wife Roxelana at
  the Suleymaniye Mosque.
• After rising to its peak under Sultan Suleiman
  the Magnificent, the Empire gradually began to
  deteriorate before the increasing technological
  and industrial might of the European nations.

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The End of the Ottoman Empire

• In the progressive decay that followed Suleiman's
  death, the clergy and the Janissaries gained
  power and exercised a profound, corrupting
  influence.
• The breakup of the state gained speed with the
  Russo-Turkish Wars in the 18th century. Egypt
  was only temporarily lost to Napoleon's army, but
  the Greek War of Independence and its sequels,
  the Russo-Turkish War of 182829, and the war
  with Muhammad Ali of Egypt resulted in the loss
  of Greece and Egypt.
• The rebellion (1875) of Bosnia and Herzegovina
  precipitated the Russo-Turkish War of 187778, in
  which Turkey was defeated. Romania, Serbia, and
  Montenegro were declared fully independent, and
  Bosnia and Herzegovina passed under Austrian
  administration. Bulgaria was made a virtually
  independent principality.
• It did not come to a final end until World War 1,
  however, when the Allies managed to encourage
  many of the dissident factions within the Empire
  to bring about such internal strife that it fell
  as much from internal troubles as from the
  Allies external attacks.

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Ataturk, the Father of the Turks

• The Turkish defeat in the First World War (in
  which the Ottoman Empire sided with Germany and
  the Central Powers) finally discredited the Young
  Turks, however, and paved the way for the success
  of a new nationalist movement under the
  leadership of an army officer named Mustafa
  Kemal, later known as Ataturk or "Father of the
  Turks."
• The nationalist government under Ataturk,
  dedicated to leading Turkey in the direction of
  secularism and Westernization, abolished the
  sultanate, declared a republic, and eventually
  (in 1924) abolished the caliphate as well.

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Information and Images from the following sources
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ies.com/alislamiworld/Birht_place_of_Prophet_Muham
mad_PBUH.JPG http//www.ifanca.org/images/graphic
s/madina.jpg http//alfatihoun.edaama.org/Fichier
s/Islamic20art/Art/web/images/Casket20containing
20the20soil20from20the20tomb20of20the20Pro
phet20Muhammad.jpg http//www.good-hotels-guide.
com/middle-east/middle-east.gif http//biblia.com
/islam/history.htm3-20Empire20in20Damascus ht
tp//www.islamicity.com/mosque/ihame/Sec13.htm
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http//www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/image
islam/centralAsia661Large.gif http//www.muslimhe
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/www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/abba/hd_abba.htm http
//utah.indymedia.org/uploads/crusades.jpg www.his
torylink101.net/ turkey/castles-turkey.htm
http//www.ottoman-traders.com/pix/ottomanmap.jp
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d/targets/images/pho/0005c/0005c05d.jpg http//ww
w.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0860176.html http/
/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suleiman_the_Magnificent