Search
Search Results
Definition
Yazdegerd III
Yazdegerd III (r. 632-651) was the last monarch of the Sassanian Empire (224-651), ruling – or attempting to rule – amidst the chaos of its final decline and fall to the invading Muslim Arabs. He was the son of the prince Shahriyar (d. 628...
Definition
Islamic Caliphates
Caliphate (“Khilafat” in Arabic) was a semi-religious political system of governance in Islam, in which the territories of the Islamic empire in the Middle East and North Africa and the people within were ruled by a supreme leader called...
Definition
Abbasid Dynasty
The Abbasids were an Arabic dynasty that initially ruled over most of the Islamic empire (save some western parts) after assuming the caliphate in 750 CE, later on, their empire fragmented, however, they retained spiritual supremacy as caliphs...
Definition
Visigoth
The Visigoths were the western tribe of the Goths (a Germanic people) who settled west of the Black Sea sometime in the 3rd century CE. According to the scholar Herwig Wolfram, the Roman writer Cassiodorus (c. 485-585 CE) coined the term...
Definition
First Fitna
The First Fitna (656-661 CE) was the first civil war of the Islamic Empire fought between the fourth Rashidun Caliph, Ali ibn Abi Talib (656-661 CE), and the governor of Syria, Muawiya (later Muawiya I; r. 661-680 CE). Deep fissures divided...
Article
What happened to the Great Library at Alexandria?
Once the largest library in the ancient world, and containing works by the greatest thinkers and writers of antiquity, including Homer, Plato, Socrates and many more, the Library of Alexandria, northern Egypt, is popularly believed to have...
Article
Ten Ancient Persia Facts You Need to Know
Ancient Persian culture exerted a powerful influence throughout the Near East, and beyond, for over a thousand years between c. 550 BCE - 651 CE and many aspects of their culture continued to influence others afterwards and up through the...
Article
The Camel Caravans of the Ancient Sahara
The camel caravans which crossed the great dunes of the Sahara desert began in antiquity but reached their golden period from the 9th century CE onwards. In their heyday caravans consisted of thousands of camels travelling from North Africa...
Video
Battle of al-Qadisiyyah 636 - Muslim-Sassanid War of 633-654 DOCUMENTARY
In one of our previous videos, we covered the battle of Yarmouk (https://youtu.be/5Ct4OSmdZ3M) between the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic Rashidun Caliphate. This battle largely defined the fate of Eastern Mediterranean, but to the East...
Video
Battle of Talas 751 - Abbasid - Tang War DOCUMENTARY
There are certain historical battles, which had very little influence immediately but changed things through the centuries. The battle of Talas between the Abbasid Caliphate and the Chinese Tang Empire in 751 is a good example of such a conflict...