The Spread of Islam

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The Spread of Islam
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Key Notes

• Main religion by 10th c.
• During Uthmans reign, Muslim envoy reached
  Chinese palace
• Stretching from the Pyrenees and Siberia, to
  China and New Guinea covering 2/3s of Africa

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Expansion of Islam

• Unified contending clans
• Persians and Byzantines were exhausted by
  recurrent wars
• Arabs able to make and hold conquests
• Arabs could not govern all areas conquered
• Expanded most rapidly in period following
  Muhammads death in 632

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Islamic Conquest of Spain

• Arabs brought in by rebels to expel newly
  throwned King
• Arabs defeated King and took over Iberia
• Established a community, but lacked a central
  control
• Local policy determined by the settlers

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Conquest of Spain contd

• CORDOBA
• Muslim Spain was urbanized
• Caliphate tolerated religious communities
• Spain became staging area for raids into by
  Frankish kingdom

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Islamic Economy

• Embraced numerous economic systems
• Maritime commerce in Mediterranean provided until
  16th c.
• Commercial exchange stimulated agriculture within
  the Arabic world
• Trade prompted better craftsmanship

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Islamic Society

• Greatly improved communications through use of
  universal language, Arabic
• Islamic law favored commerce
• Vigorous urban life concentrated in Damascus,
  Baghdad, Cairo, and Cordoba
• Islam recognized no distinction between church
  and state

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Technology

• Progress by borrowing from China, India, and
  Byzantium
• Improved on fortress building
• Served as conduit to the West by introducing
  inventions from China

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Decline of Medieval Islamic Civilization

• Growing military weakness by 11th c.
• In West, Christian armies embarked on reconquest
  of Iberian Peninsula
• In East, Turkish nomads took over Abbasid
  caliphate
• In 1055 Turks seized Baghdad
• Arab economic base changing

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