21.2 The near east: a.d. 601 to 700  (Page 2/2)

As the Arab armies overran Mesopotamia and Iran, sizable groups of Jews were pretty well left alone as protected minorities. All aspects of their civil and religious life were administered by Jewish officials in accordance with the Babylonian Talmud. At this time Hindu numerals were in use in Syria and later these became known as "Arabic numerals". (Ref. 49 )

Iran: persia

As the century began Chosroes II ruled the Persians with avarice, suspicion and cruelty and a ruinous taxation to support his own splendid living. His armies fought their way to the Bosporus and to Egypt and came within sight of Constantinople but some 10 years later Emperor Honorius, in alliance with the Khazars just east of the Caspian, struck back, attacking the Persian homeland (623-624). The Persians retaliated by attacking Constantinople once again with Avar help in 626 but the east Roman navy kept the two land forces apart and the attack was a failure. Chosroes II was then murdered by his nobles and his son, Kavadh II, made the final peace, surrendering Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Asia Minor and western Mesopotamia back to the Byzantine Empire. Then pestilence broke out in Persia and thousands died, including the king. There followed a fight for the throne and in this atmosphere of disease and general moral decay and decline came the Arab armies of Islam about 636 and Persia quickly became part of the Moslem realm. The decisive action with the Arabs occurred at Al Qadisiya, Iraq, when the Persian army was literally smashed, allowing Arab capture of the capital, Ctesiphon (very near Selucia in Mesopotamia), in A.D. 635, thus opening the road to the main Iranian plateau. After the take-over a few Persian nobles maintained their independence in the mountains of Tabaristan at the south end of the Caspian. (Ref. 8 , 137 )

The Arabs did not force their conquered subjects to embrace Islam but did require them to accept the Koran as divine teaching and obliged them to learn Arabic, thus building an empire united by a common tongue. (Ref. 137 , 222 ) There were probably many factors in the easy fall of the great Persian Empire to the surging Arab armies. In addition to the factors listed in the paragraph above, it should be realized that both Byzantium and

Sassanian Persia had exhausted themselves battling each other for many years. But there was also an economic cause of decline as the use of the Silk Route to China diminished. The Byzantines had smuggled silk cocoons from China and could now supply themselves with silk and the economy suffered all along the old route.

Byzantium had become the original heir of classical Greek medicine but during the persecutions of a number of learned heretics they fled to Persia, where, at Jundishapur, they met Syrian, Persian and Hindu scholars and working together, they translated many important works into Syriac, the new language of learning in the Near East. When Persia fell to the Arabs, many works of medicine were then translated from Syriac into Arabic, including large works of Galen. (Ref. 211 )

Asia minor

Turkey

After Emperor Justinian's death at the close of the preceding century (595) the eastern Roman Empire collapsed with nothing left except a few Asiatic ports, some fragments of Italy, Africa and Greece. The capital itself was besieged by the Persians under Chosroes II, helped in the north by an army of Avars. In A.D. 602 the "Roman" army fighting the Avars revolted, returned to Constantinople and murdered Emperor Maurice, while the Avars devastated the Balkans. The cross-bow reached Byzantium from central Asia at about this time, perhaps borrowed from the Avars. (Ref. 137 , 213 )

The whole of the Asia Minor peninsula had been ploughed and furrowed by Persian armies and the great cities had been plundered and sacked, but the Byzantines still had an unbeaten navy and after 10 years, Heraclius, the new emperor, built a new army, sailed across the Black Sea, marched across Armenia and attacked and defeated Persia from the rear (A.D. 624). The victory was a hollow one, however, as the Arabs soon advanced into this territory with Khalid ibn al-Walid defeating a Byzantine army at the battle of the Yarmuk. The Byzantine frontiers were backed into Turkey, proper, again and after 673 the Moslems even blocked Constantinople both by land and sea, allowing it to be attacked every year for the next five. Only the strength of the city's walls and the appearance of "Greek fire", an explosive of unknown composition, saved the empire.

Although we have used the terms "Byzantine" and "Byzantium" freely in the last few chapters, actually it was not until the second half of this century that earlier historians applied these names in reference to the eastern Roman Empire. "Byzantion" was the old Greek name for Constantinople, and as the language of this eastern empire became chiefly Greek, the term "Byzantium" came into use. (Ref. 137 )

Armenia

Throughout most of this century Armenia was in the middle of a three-cornered war involving Arabs, Khazars and Byzantines, but they managed to remain virtually sovereign and zealously Christian. (Ref. 137 ) After first being overrun by the eastern Roman army on its way to Persia, later the Arabs invaded. In the first several decades the higher classes had great prosperity incident to the exportation of manufactured goods and raw mining products. It was also a period of intellectual activity with philosophical, mathematical, astronomical and cartographic studies. Ananias, of Shirak, was a great scientist. Many Armenians served as mercenaries for Byzantium, particularly after the Arabs appeared on the scene and by late century the mainstays of that army were Armenian. (Ref. 222 )

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