1.
Hasankeyf
–
Hasankeyf is an ancient town and district located along the Tigris River in the Batman Province in southeastern Turkey. It was declared a conservation area by Turkey in 1981. Kurdish people form the majority of the city centre today, much of the city and its archeological sites are at risk of being flooded with the completion of the Ilisu Dam. Hasankeyf is an ancient settlement that has many names from a variety of cultures during its history. The variety of names is compounded by the many ways that non-Latin alphabets such as Syriac. Underlying these many names is much continuity between cultures in the identification of the site. The city of Ilānṣurā mentioned in the Akkadian and Northwest Semitic texts of the Mari Tablets may possibly be Hasankeyf, although other sites have also been proposed. By the Roman period, the town was known in Latin as Cephe, Cepha or Ciphas. As the eastern and western portions of the Roman Empire split around AD330, following the Arab conquest of 640, the town became known under the Arabic name حصن كيفا. Hisn means fortress in Arabic, so the name overall means rock fortress, Western reports about the town before the 20th century refer to it by various names that are transliterated from Arabic or Ottoman Turkish. Two early Armenian historians list additional names for the town, Harsenkev is recorded by Matthew of Edessa, as part of Atatürks Reforms in the 1920s and 30s, many place names were modified to more Turkish-sounding forms and the towns official name was changed to Hasankeyf. This version appears occasionally in foreign reports in the mid 20th-century, in the Kurmanji Kurdish language, the town is known as Heskîf. During the Middle Bronze Age the area around Hasankeyf was likely part of the Hurrian kingdoms, the Akkadian and Northwest Semitic texts of the Mari Tablets refer to Ilānṣurā, an important walled city on a large river. Ilānṣurā has been identified with Hasankeyf, although several locations in northeast Syria have also been proposed. By the 14th century BC, the Hasankeyf area was within the Hurrian kingdom of Mitanni, between the 9th and 7th centuries BC it was part of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, and by the mid-6th century it was part of the Median empire. In Roman times, Hasankeyf was a base for legionaries on the frontier with the Sasanian Empire of Persia, for a time the town became the capital of the Roman province of Arzanene, although Nisibis was the headquarters of the Dux Mesopotamiae. Constantius II built a fort at Kepha, but it is whether this was on the current citadel site. However, none of the structure of the bridge appears to date from Roman times
Hasankeyf
–
Hasankeyf
Hasankeyf
Hasankeyf
Hasankeyf
2.
Harput
–
Elazığ ) is a city in Eastern Anatolia, Turkey, and the administrative center of Elazığ Province. It is located in the uppermost Euphrates valley, the plain on which the city extends has an altitude of 1067 metres. Elazığ resembles a peninsula surrounded by the natural Lake Hazar and reservoirs of Keban Dam, Karakaya Dam, Kıralkızı. The population of Elazığ consists of Turks, Elazığ initially developed in 1834 as an extension of the historic city of Harput, which was situated on a hill and difficult to access in winter. The ancient town and citadel of Harput and meaning rock fortress in Armenian, was located five kilometres from modern Elazığ. In the early Middle Ages, it was known by its Byzantine name. In the 19th century, under the reign of Mahmud II, the governor Reşid Mehmed Pasha started an expansion of Mezre, during the reign of Sultan Abdülazîz, military barracks, a hospital and a governors mansion were built to accommodate the seat of a new vilâyet. The town was renamed Mamuretülaziz in 1866 on the occasion of the anniversary of the enthronement of Sultan Abdülaziz. In time the city known as Elâzîz due to its ease of pronunciation. On November 17,1937, President Mustafa Kemal Atatürk changed the name of the city to Elazık, however, since this was hard to pronounce in Turkish, on December 10,1937 the government changed the citys name to its final form, Elazığ. The city of Elazığ was founded among the skirts of the hill on which the historical Harput Castle was constructed, according to the present historical sources, the most ancient inhabitants of Harput was the Hurrian nation who settled in these parts in c2000 B. C. Harput, and its region was part of the kingdom of Urartu at the period of its maximum extension. The ancient town and citadel called Kharput, which means fortress in Armenian, was built by the first Armenian kings about five km from modern Elazığ. However, very little material about this city reached our day. It is possible that Harput stands on or is near the site of Carcathio-certa in Sophene, the early Muslim geographers knew it as Ḥiṣn Ziyād, but the Armenian name, Khartabirt or Kharbirt, whence Kharput and Harput, was generally adopted in time. William of Tyre calls the place Quart Piert or Pierre, Harput and its vicinity fell under Turkish control in the year 1085 as the outcome of the Manzikert battle on August 26,1071. The missionaries built Euphrates College, a seminary, and boys. It operated until 1915 when its buildings were confiscated and used by the Ottoman army as barracks, in November 1895, government backed Turks and Kurds massacred, looted and burned the Armenian villages on the plain
Harput
–
Elazığ
Harput
–
Keban Dam on
Euphrates River
Harput
–
Harput Kalesi (Harput Castle)
Harput
–
Sayray Camii in the town of Elazig
3.
Mardin
–
Mardin is a city in southeastern Turkey. The capital of Mardin Province, it is known for the Artuqid architecture of its old city, the territory of Mardin and Karaca Dağ was known as Izalla in the Late Bronze Age, an originally Hurrian kingdom. The city and its surrounds were absorbed into Assyria proper during the Middle Assyrian Empire, the ancient name was rendered as Izalā in Old Persian, and during the Achaemenid Empire according to the Behistun Inscription it was still regarded as a part of the geo-political entity of Assyria. It survived into the Assyrian Christian period as the name of Mt. Izala, on which in the early 4th century AD stood the monastery of Nisibis, in the Roman period, the city itself was known as Marida, from a Syriac/Neo-Aramaic name translating to fortress. Between c.150 BC and 250 AD (apart from a brief Roman intervention when it became a part of Assyria it became a part of the Neo-Assyrian kingdom of Osroene. A bishopric of the Assyrian Church of the East was centred on the town when it was part of the Roman province of Assyria and it was a suffragan see of Edessa, the provinces metropolitan see. Byzantine Izala fell to the Seljuks in the 11th century, during the Artukid period, many of Mardins historic buildings were constructed, including several mosques, palaces, madrassas and khans. Mardin served as the capital of one of the two Artukid branches during the 11th and 12th centuries, the lands of the Artukid dynasty fell to the Mongol invasion sometime between 1235 and 1243, but the Artukids continued to govern as vassals of the Mongol Empire. During the battle of Ain Jalut in 1260, the Artukid governor revolted against Mongol rule, hulegus general and Chupans ancestor, Koke-Ilge of the Jalayir, stormed the city and Hulegu appointed the rebels son, al-Nasir, governor of Mardin. Although, Hulegu suspected the latters loyalty for a while, thereafter the Artukids remained loyal unlike nomadic Bedoun, the Mongol Ilkhanids considered them important allies. For this loyalty they shown, Artukids were given lands in 1298 and 1304. Mardin later passed to the Akkoyunlu, a federation of Turkic tribes that controlled all the way to the Caspian Sea. In 1517, Mardin was annexed by the Ottomans under Selim I, during this time, Mardin was administered by a governor directly appointed under the Ottoman Sultans authority. In 1923, with the founding of the Republic of Turkey, during World War I Mardin, among other regions close by was one of the sites affected by the Assyrian Genocide and Armenian Genocide. On the eve of World War I, Mardin was home to over 12,000 Syriacs, in June 1915, most of the citys Christian notables and its Armenian male population were slaughtered and thrown into caves near Şeyhan. Others were sent to the camps of Ras al-Ayn, though some managed to escape to the Sinjar Mountain with help from local Chechens. Kurds and Arabs of Mardin typically refer to these events as fırman, the Syriacs managed to strike a deal with the Turks, sparing them from most of the bloodshed. Unfortunately, the Armenians, Catholics, and Chaldeans who did not manage to escape were massacred in totality, many Assyrian survivors of the violence later on left Mardin for nearby Qamishli in the 1940s after their conscription in the Turkish military became compulsory
Mardin
–
The old city of Mardin
Mardin
–
Men in Mardin, around 1900
Mardin
–
Panorama of Mardin
Mardin
–
Main post office building
4.
Turkish language
–
Outside of Turkey, significant smaller groups of speakers exist in Germany, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Northern Cyprus, Greece, the Caucasus, and other parts of Europe and Central Asia. Cyprus has requested that the European Union add Turkish as an official EU language, in 1928, as one of Atatürks Reforms in the early years of the Republic of Turkey, the Ottoman Turkish alphabet was replaced with a Latin alphabet. The distinctive characteristics of Turkish are vowel harmony and extensive agglutination, the basic word order of Turkish is subject–object–verb. Turkish has no classes or grammatical gender. Turkish has a strong T–V distinction and usage of honorifics, Turkish uses second-person pronouns that distinguish varying levels of politeness, social distance, age, courtesy or familiarity toward the addressee. The plural second-person pronoun and verb forms are used referring to a person out of respect. Turkic languages belong to the Altaic language group, the Turkic family comprises some 30 living languages spoken across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Siberia. Turkish is a member of the Oghuz group of languages, a subgroup of the Turkic language family, there is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Turkish and the other Oghuz Turkic languages, including Azerbaijani, Turkmen, Qashqai, Gagauz, and Balkan Gagauz Turkish. The earliest known Old Turkic inscriptions are the three monumental Orkhon inscriptions found in modern Mongolia, erected in honour of the prince Kul Tigin and his brother Emperor Bilge Khagan, these date back to the second Turk Kaghanate. The Seljuqs of the Oghuz Turks, in particular, brought their language, following the adoption of Islam c. Turkish literature during the Ottoman period, particularly Divan poetry, was influenced by Persian, including the adoption of poetic meters. One of the tasks of the newly established association was to initiate a reform to replace loanwords of Arabic. By banning the usage of imported words in the press, the association succeeded in removing several hundred words from the language. While most of the words introduced to the language by the TDK were newly derived from Turkic roots, owing to this sudden change in the language, older and younger people in Turkey started to differ in their vocabularies. While the generations born before the 1940s tend to use the terms of Arabic or Persian origin. The past few decades have seen the work of the TDK to coin new Turkish words to express new concepts and technologies as they enter the language. Many of these new words, particularly information technology terms, have received widespread acceptance, however, the TDK is occasionally criticized for coining words which sound contrived and artificial. Some earlier changes—such as bölem to replace fırka, political party—also failed to meet with popular approval, some words restored from Old Turkic have taken on specialized meanings, for example betik is now used to mean script in computer science
Turkish language
–
Old Turkic inscription with the
Orkhon script (c. 8th century).
Kyzyl, Russia
Turkish language
–
Countries where Turkish is an official language
Turkish language
–
Road signs in
Prizren,
Republic of Kosovo. Official languages are:
Albanian (top),
Serbian (middle) and Turkish (bottom).
Turkish language
–
Map of the main subgroups of
Turkish dialects.
5.
Sunni Islam
–
Sunni Islam is the largest group of Islam. Its name comes from the word Sunnah, referring to the behavior of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. According to Sunni tradition, Muhammad did not clearly designate a successor and this contrasts with the Shia view, which holds that Muhammad intended his son-in-law and cousin Ali ibn Abi Talib to succeed him. Political tensions between Sunnis and Shias continued with varying intensity throughout Islamic history and they have been exacerbated in recent times by ethnic conflicts, as of 2009, Sunni Muslims constituted 87–90% of the worlds Muslim population. Sunni Islam is the worlds largest religious denomination, followed by Catholicism and its adherents are referred to in Arabic as ahl as-sunnah wa l-jamāʻah or ahl as-sunnah for short. In English, its doctrines and practices are sometimes called Sunnism, while adherents are known as Sunni Muslims, Sunnis, Sunnites, Sunni Islam is sometimes referred to as orthodox Islam. The Quran, together with hadith and binding juristic consensus form the basis of all traditional jurisprudence within Sunni Islam, sunnī, also commonly referred to as Sunnīism, is a term derived from sunnah meaning habit, usual practice, custom, tradition. The Muslim use of this term refers to the sayings and living habits of the prophet Muhammad, in Arabic, this branch of Islam is referred to as ahl as-sunnah wa l-jamāʻah, the people of the sunnah and the community, which is commonly shortened to ahl as-sunnah. One common mistake is to assume that Sunni Islam represents a normative Islam that emerged during the period after Muhammads death, and that Sufism and Shiism developed out of Sunni Islam. This perception is due to the reliance on highly ideological sources that have been accepted as reliable historical works. Both Sunnism and Shiaism are the end products of centuries of competition between ideologies. Both sects used each other to further cement their own identities and doctrines, the first four caliphs are known among Sunnis as the Rashidun or Rightly-Guided Ones. Sunni recognition includes the aforementioned Abu Bakr as the first, Umar who established the Islamic calendar as the second, Uthman as the third, Sunnis believe that the companions of Muhammad were the best of Muslims. Support for this view is found in the Quran, according to Sunnis. Sunnis also believe that the companions were true believers since it was the companions who were given the task of compiling the Quran, furthermore, narrations that were narrated by the companions are considered by Sunnis to be a second source of knowledge of the Muslim faith. A study conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2010 and released January 2011 found that there are 1.62 billion Muslims around the world, Islam does not have a formal hierarchy or clergy. Leaders are informal, and gain influence through study to become a scholar of Islamic law, according to the Islamic Center of Columbia, South Carolina, anyone with the intelligence and the will can become an Islamic scholar. During Midday Mosque services on Fridays, the congregation will choose a person to lead the service
Sunni Islam
Sunni Islam
–
Malaysian Sunni Muslims in a
Mawlid procession in capital
Putrajaya, 2013.
Sunni Islam
–
The
Great Mosque of Kairouan (also known as the Mosque of Uqba) was, in particular during the 9th, 10th and 11th centuries, an important center of Islamic learning with an emphasis on the
Maliki Madh'hab. It is located in the city of
Kairouan in
Tunisia
6.
Anatolian beyliks
–
Anatolian beyliks, sometimes known as Turkmen beyliks, were small Turkish principalities in Anatolia governed by Beys, the first of which were founded at the end of the 11th century. A second more extensive period of foundations took place as a result of the decline of the Seljuq Sultanate of Rûm in the half of the 13th century. One of the beyliks, the Ottomans, expanded from its capital in Bursa and completed its conquest of the other beyliks by the late 15th century, the word beylik denotes a territory under the jurisdiction of a Bey, equivalent in other European societies to a Lord. The term has a context within the 16th century Ottoman governmental institutions in the then regencies along the coastline of Tunisia and Algeria. Following the 1071 Seljuq victory over the Byzantine Empire at the Battle of Manzikert and these clans, led by beys, would receive military and financial aid from the Seljuqs in return for their services and full allegiance. Seljuq power deteriorated with the Mongol invasions from the east, the Ilkhanate commanders in Anatolia then gained strength and authority and this encouraged the beys to declare sovereignty. To maintain control of their new territory, these reestablished emirs employed Ghazi warriors from Persia, as the Byzantine empire weakened, their cities in Asia Minor could resist the assaults of the beyliks less and less, and many Turks gradually settled in the western parts of Anatolia. By 1300, Turks had reached the Aegean coastline, held momentarily two centuries before, in the beginning, the most powerful states were the Karamanids and the Germiyanids in the central area. The Beylik of Osmanoğlu Dynasty who were later to found the Ottoman Empire was situated to the northwest, around Söğüt, along the Aegean coast, from north to south, stretched Karasids, Sarukhanids, Aydinids, Menteşe and Teke principalities. The Jandarids controlled the Black Sea region around Kastamonu and Sinop, under its eponymous founder, Osman I, the Beylik of Osmanoğlu expanded at Byzantine expense south and west of the Sea of Marmara in the first decades of the 14th century. Towards the end of the 14th century, the Ottomans advanced further into Anatolia by acquiring towns, meanwhile, the Karamanids assaulted the Ottomans many times with the help of other beyliks, Mamluks, Aq Qoyunlu, Byzantines, Pontics and Hungarians, failing and losing power every time. By the close of the century, the early Ottoman leaders had conquered parts of land from Karamanids. These had a respite when their territories were restored to them after the Ottoman defeat suffered against Tamerlane in 1402 in the Battle of Ankara. But the Ottoman state quickly collected itself under Mehmed I and his son Murad II re-incorporated most of these beyliks into Ottoman territory in a space of around 25 years. The final blow for the Karamanids was struck by Mehmed II who conquered their lands, many of the former Anatolian beyliks became the basis for administrative subdivisions in the Ottoman Empire. In 1337 Alaşehir was granted autonomy under Aydınids and this lasted until the total Ottoman conquest, combined with the Seljuqs and the immigration of Turkic tribes into the Anatolian mainland the Anatolian Beyliks spread Turkish and Islamic influence in Anatolia. Unlike the Seljuqs, whose language of administration was Persian, the Anatolian emirates adopted spoken Turkish as their literary language. The Turkish language achieved widespread use in these principalities and reached its highest sophistication during the Ottoman era, in spite of their limited sources and the political climate of their era, art during the Anatolian beyliks flourished, probably building the basis for Ottoman art
Anatolian beyliks
–
History of the Turkic peoples Pre-14th century
Anatolian beyliks
–
A map of the independent Turkish beyliks in Anatolia during the early 14th century
Anatolian beyliks
–
Yivli Minare Mosque, symbol of
Antalya, built by the
Beylik of Teke circa 1375.
Anatolian beyliks
–
Divriği Great Mosque in
UNESCO World Heritage List, built in 1299 by a descendant of the first period
Mengujekids.
7.
Seljuk Empire
–
The Seljuk Empire or Great Seljuk Empire was a medieval Turko-Persian Sunni Muslim empire, originating from the Qynyq branch of Oghuz Turks. The Seljuk Empire controlled a vast area stretching from the Hindu Kush to eastern Anatolia, from their homelands near the Aral sea, the Seljuks advanced first into Khorasan and then into mainland Persia before eventually conquering eastern Anatolia. The Seljuk empire was founded by Tughril Beg in 1037, Tughril was raised by his grandfather, Seljuk-Beg, who was in a high position in the Oghuz Yabgu State. Seljuk gave his name to both the Seljuk empire and the Seljuk dynasty, the Seljuks united the fractured political scene of the eastern Islamic world and played a key role in the first and second crusades. Highly Persianized in culture and language, the Seljuks also played an important role in the development of the Turko-Persian tradition, the Seljuqs were allied with the Persian Samanid shahs against the Qarakhanids. The Samanid fell to the Qarakhanids in Transoxania, however, whereafter the Ghaznavids arose, the Seljuqs became involved in this power struggle in the region before establishing their own independent base. Tughril was the grandson of Seljuq and brother of Chaghri, under whom the Seljuks wrested an empire from the Ghaznavids, initially the Seljuqs were repulsed by Mahmud and retired to Khwarezm, but Tughril and Chaghri led them to capture Merv and Nishapur. Later they repeatedly raided and traded territory with his successors across Khorasan and Balkh, in 1040 at the Battle of Dandanaqan, they decisively defeated Masud I of the Ghaznavids, forcing him to abandon most of his western territories to the Seljuqs. In 1055, Tughril captured Baghdad from the Shia Buyids under a commission from the Abbasids, arslans decisive victory at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071 effectively neutralized the Byzantine resistance to the Turkish invasion of Anatolia. He authorized his Turkmen generals to carve their own out of formerly Byzantine Anatolia. Malikshāh moved the capital from Rey to Isfahan and it was during his reign that the Great Seljuk Empire reached its zenith. The Iqta military system and the Nizāmīyyah University at Baghdad were established by Nizām al-Mulk, the Abbasid Caliph titled him The Sultan of the East and West in 1087. The Seljuq power was at its zenith under Malikshāh I, the Seljuq dominion was established over the ancient Sasanian domains, in Iran and Iraq, and included Anatolia as well as parts of Central Asia and modern Afghanistan. The Seljuk rule was modelled after the organization common in Turkic and Mongol nomads. Under this organization, the member of the paramount family assigned family members portions of his domains as autonomous appanages. When Malikshāh I died in 1092, the split as his brother. Malikshāh I was succeeded in Anatolia by Kilij Arslan I, who founded the Sultanate of Rum, and in Syria by his brother Tutush I. In Persia he was succeeded by his son Mahmud I, whose reign was contested by his three brothers Barkiyaruq in Iraq, Muhammad I in Baghdad, and Ahmad Sanjar in Khorasan
Seljuk Empire
–
History of the Turkic peoples Pre-14th century
Seljuk Empire
–
Great Seljuq Empire in its zenith in 1092, upon the death of
Malik Shah I
Seljuk Empire
Seljuk Empire
–
Head of male royal figure, 12–13th century, found in
Iran.
8.
Kara Koyunlu
–
The Kara Koyunlu Turkomans at one point established their capital in Herat in eastern Iran. They were vassals of the Jalairid Sultanate in Baghdad and Tabriz from about 1375, however, they rebelled against the Jalairids, and secured their independence from the dynasty with the conquest of Tabriz by Qara Yusuf. In 1400, Timur defeated the Kara Koyunlu, and Qara Yusuf fled to Egypt and he gathered an army and by 1406 had taken back Tabriz. In 1410, the Kara Koyunlu captured Baghdad, the installation of a subsidiary Black Sheep line there hastened the downfall of the Jalairids they had once served. Jahan Shah made peace with the Timurid Shahrukh Mirza, however, when Shahrukh Mirza died in 1447, the Black Sheep Turkomans annexed portions of Iraq and the eastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula as well as Timurid-controlled western Iran. Though much territory was gained during his rule, Jahān Shāhs reign was troubled by his rebellious sons and the almost autonomous rulers of Baghdad, by 1468, at their height under Uzun Hassan, Aq Qoyunlu defeated the Qara Qoyunlu and conquered Iraq, Azerbaijan, and western Iran. Armenia fell under the control of the Kara Koyunlu in 1410, the principal Armenian sources available in this period come from the historian Tovma Metsopetsi and several colophons to contemporary manuscripts. According to Tovma, although the Kara Koyunlu levied heavy taxes against the Armenians and this peaceful period was, however, shattered with the rise of Qara Iskander, who reportedly made Armenia a desert and subjected it to devastation and plunder, to slaughter, and captivity. Iskander did attempt to reconcile with the Armenians by appointing an Armenian from a family, Rustum. When the Timurids launched their final incursion into the region, they convinced Jihanshah, Iskanders brother, Jihanshah pursued a policy of persecution against the Armenians in Syunik and colophons to Armenian manuscripts record the sacking of the Tatev monastery by his forces. For all this, Jihanshah continued to attack Armenian towns and take Armenian captives as the country saw further devastation in the years of Jihanshahs failed struggles with the Aq Qoyunlu. One of the most prominent monuments built by Black Sheep dynasty remains today in the vicinity of the Armenian capital, turkmenistan and Armenia both contribute to the restoration and preservation of this medieval piece of architecture. List of rulers of Kara Koyunlu Turkmen invasions of Georgia List of Shia Muslim dynasties Elgood, firearms of the Islamic World, In the Tared Rajab Museum, Kuwait. Armenia from the fall of the Cilician Kingdom to the emigration under Shah Abbas. The Armenian People From Ancient to Modern Times, Volume I, The Dynastic Periods, minorsky, V. Jihān-Shāh Qara-Qoyunlu and His Poetry. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, ԺԵ դարի հայերեն ձեռագրերի հիշատակարաններ, մաս1. The Oxford Dynasties of the World,2002, Sanjian, Avedis K. Colophons of Armenian manuscripts, 1301-1480, A Source for Middle Eastern History, Selected, Translated, and Annotated by Avedis K. Sanjian
Kara Koyunlu
–
Kara Koyunlu flag
Kara Koyunlu
9.
Dinar
–
The dinar or denar is a main currency unit in modern circulation in seven mostly-Islamic and two mostly-Orthodox countries, and has historic use in several more. The English word dinar is the transliteration of the Arabic دينار, a gold coin known as the dīnāra was also introduced to India by the Kushan Empire in the 1st century AD, and adopted by the Gupta Empire and its successors up to the 6th century. The modern gold dinar is a modern bullion gold coin, the 8th century English king Offa of Mercia minted copies of Abbasid dinars struck in 774 by Caliph Al-Mansur with Offa Rex centered on the reverse. The moneyer visibly had no understanding of Arabic as the Arabic text contains many errors, such coins may have been produced for trade with Islamic Spain. Currency Economy of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation Islamic gold dinar Kelantanese dinar List of circulating currencies Middle East economic integration
Dinar
–
Serbian silver Dinar during the reign of
Stephen Uroš I of Serbia in the 13th century
Dinar
–
Nations in dark green currently use the dinar. Nations in light green previously used the dinar. Yugoslavian states are inset to the lower left.
Dinar
–
100
Serbian dinars bearing the likeness of
Nikola Tesla.
Dinar
–
Umayyad Caliphate Golden Dinar.
10.
Turkey
–
Turkey, officially the Republic of Turkey, is a transcontinental country in Eurasia, mainly in Anatolia in Western Asia, with a smaller portion on the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. Turkey is a democratic, secular, unitary, parliamentary republic with a cultural heritage. The country is encircled by seas on three sides, the Aegean Sea is to the west, the Black Sea to the north, and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. The Bosphorus, the Sea of Marmara, and the Dardanelles, Ankara is the capital while Istanbul is the countrys largest city and main cultural and commercial centre. Approximately 70-80% of the countrys citizens identify themselves as ethnic Turks, other ethnic groups include legally recognised and unrecognised minorities. Kurds are the largest ethnic minority group, making up approximately 20% of the population, the area of Turkey has been inhabited since the Paleolithic by various ancient Anatolian civilisations, as well as Assyrians, Greeks, Thracians, Phrygians, Urartians and Armenians. After Alexander the Greats conquest, the area was Hellenized, a process continued under the Roman Empire. The Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm ruled Anatolia until the Mongol invasion in 1243, the empire reached the peak of its power in the 16th century, especially during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent. During the war, the Ottoman government committed genocides against its Armenian, Assyrian, following the war, the conglomeration of territories and peoples that formerly comprised the Ottoman Empire was partitioned into several new states. Turkey is a member of the UN, an early member of NATO. Turkeys growing economy and diplomatic initiatives have led to its recognition as a regional power while her location has given it geopolitical, the name of Turkey is based on the ethnonym Türk. The first recorded use of the term Türk or Türük as an autonym is contained in the Old Turkic inscriptions of the Göktürks of Central Asia, the English name Turkey first appeared in the late 14th century and is derived from Medieval Latin Turchia. Similarly, the medieval Khazar Empire, a Turkic state on the shores of the Black. The medieval Arabs referred to the Mamluk Sultanate as al-Dawla al-Turkiyya, the Ottoman Empire was sometimes referred to as Turkey or the Turkish Empire among its European contemporaries. The Anatolian peninsula, comprising most of modern Turkey, is one of the oldest permanently settled regions in the world, various ancient Anatolian populations have lived in Anatolia, from at least the Neolithic period until the Hellenistic period. Many of these peoples spoke the Anatolian languages, a branch of the larger Indo-European language family, in fact, given the antiquity of the Indo-European Hittite and Luwian languages, some scholars have proposed Anatolia as the hypothetical centre from which the Indo-European languages radiated. The European part of Turkey, called Eastern Thrace, has also been inhabited since at least forty years ago. It is the largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date, the settlement of Troy started in the Neolithic Age and continued into the Iron Age
Turkey
–
Some
henges at
Göbekli Tepe were erected as far back as 12,000 BC, predating those of
Stonehenge,
England by almost ten millennia.
Turkey
–
Flag
Turkey
–
The Lion Gate in
Hattusa, capital of the
Hittite Empire. The city's history dates back to the 6th millennium BC.
Turkey
–
The
Library of Celsus in
Ephesus was built by the
Romans in 135 AD. The
Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, built by king
Croesus of
Lydia in the 6th century BC, was one of the
Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
11.
Syria
–
Syrias capital and largest city is Damascus. Religious groups include Sunnis, Christians, Alawites, Druze, Mandeans, Shiites, Salafis, Sunni Arabs make up the largest religious group in Syria. Its capital Damascus and largest city Aleppo are among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, in the Islamic era, Damascus was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate and a provincial capital of the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt. The post-independence period was tumultuous, and a number of military coups. In 1958, Syria entered a union with Egypt called the United Arab Republic. Syria was under Emergency Law from 1963 to 2011, effectively suspending most constitutional protections for citizens, Bashar al-Assad has been president since 2000 and was preceded by his father Hafez al-Assad, who was in office from 1970 to 2000. Mainstream modern academic opinion strongly favours the argument that the Greek word is related to the cognate Ἀσσυρία, Assyria, in the past, others believed that it was derived from Siryon, the name that the Sidonians gave to Mount Hermon. However, the discovery of the inscription in 2000 seems to support the theory that the term Syria derives from Assyria. The area designated by the word has changed over time, since approximately 10,000 BC, Syria was one of centers of Neolithic culture where agriculture and cattle breeding appeared for the first time in the world. The following Neolithic period is represented by houses of Mureybet culture. At the time of the pre-pottery Neolithic, people used vessels made of stone, gyps, finds of obsidian tools from Anatolia are evidences of early trade relations. Cities of Hamoukar and Emar played an important role during the late Neolithic, archaeologists have demonstrated that civilization in Syria was one of the most ancient on earth, perhaps preceded by only those of Mesopotamia. The earliest recorded indigenous civilisation in the region was the Kingdom of Ebla near present-day Idlib, gifts from Pharaohs, found during excavations, confirm Eblas contact with Egypt. One of the earliest written texts from Syria is an agreement between Vizier Ibrium of Ebla and an ambiguous kingdom called Abarsal c.2300 BC. The Northwest Semitic language of the Amorites is the earliest attested of the Canaanite languages, Mari reemerged during this period, and saw renewed prosperity until conquered by Hammurabi of Babylon. Ugarit also arose during this time, circa 1800 BC, close to modern Latakia, Ugaritic was a Semitic language loosely related to the Canaanite languages, and developed the Ugaritic alphabet. The Ugarites kingdom survived until its destruction at the hands of the marauding Indo-European Sea Peoples in the 12th century BC, Yamhad was described in the tablets of Mari as the mightiest state in the near east and as having more vassals than Hammurabi of Babylon. Yamhad imposed its authority over Alalakh, Qatna, the Hurrians states, the army of Yamhad campaigned as far away as Dēr on the border of Elam
Syria
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Female figurine, 5000 BC.
Ancient Orient Museum.
Syria
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Flag
Syria
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God head, the kingdom of
Yamhad (c. 1600 BC)
Syria
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Ebla royal palace c. 2400 BC
12.
Turkmen people
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The Turkmens are a Turkic people located primarily in Central Asia, in the state of Turkmenistan, as well as in Iran, Afghanistan, North Caucasus, and northern Pakistan. They speak the Turkmen language, which is classified as a part of the Eastern Oghuz branch of the Turkic languages, examples of other Oghuz languages are Turkish, Azerbaijani, Qashqai, Gagauz, Khorasani, and Salar. Originally, all Turkic tribes that were not part of the Turkic dynastic mythological system were designated Turkmens, only later did this word come to refer to a specific ethnonym. The etymology of the term derives from Türk plus the Sogdian affix of similarity -myn, -men, a prominent Turkic scholar, Mahmud Kashgari, also mentions the etymology Türk manand. The language and ethnicity of the Turkmen were much influenced by their migration to the west, Kashgari calls the Karluks Turkmen as well, but the first time the etymology Turkmen was used was by Makdisi in the second half of the 10th century AD. Like Kashgari, he wrote that the Karluks and Oghuz Turks were called Turkmen, some modern scholars have proposed that the element -man/-men acts as an intensifier, and have translated the word as pure Turk or most Turk-like of the Turks. During the Ottoman period these nomads were known by the names of Türkmen and these names were generally used to describe their nomadic way of life, rather than their ethnic origins. However, these terms were used interchangeably by foreigners. At the same time, various other exonym words were used for these nomads, such as Konar-göçer, Göçebe, Göçer-yörük, Göçerler, the most common one among these was Konar-göçer – nomadic Turcoman Turks. All of these words are found in Ottoman archival documents and carry only the meaning of nomad, Oghuz tribes had moved westward from the Altay mountains in the 7th century AD, through the Siberian steppes, and settled in this region. They also penetrated as far west as the Volga basin and the Balkans and these early Turkmens are believed to have mixed with native Sogdian peoples and lived as pastoral nomads until the Russian conquest of the 19th century. Signs of advanced settlements have been found throughout Turkmenistan including the Djeitun settlement where neolithic buildings have been excavated and dated to the 7th millennium BCE, by 2000 BCE, various Indo-European peoples began to settle throughout the region, as indicated by the finds at the Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex. Notable early tribes included the nomadic Dahae, Massagetae and Scythians, the Parni, a Dahae tribe came to dominate the region, and established the Parthian Empire, which also later fractured as a result of invasions from the north. Ephthalites, Huns, and Göktürks came in a parade of invasions. Finally, the Sassanid Empire based in Persia ruled the area prior to the coming of the Muslim Arabs during the Umayyad Caliphate by 716 CE, the majority of the inhabitants were converted to Islam as the region grew in prominence. Next came the Oghuz Turks, who imparted their language upon the local population, a tribe of the Oghuz, the Seljuks, established a Turko-Iranian culture that culminated in the Khwarezmid Empire by the 12th century. Mongol hordes led by Genghis Khan conquered the area between 1219 and 1221 and devastated many of the cities led to a rapid decline of the remaining Iranian urban population. The Turkmen largely survived the Mongol period due to their lifestyle and became traders along the Caspian
Turkmen people
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Oghuz Khan
Turkmen people
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Ahmad Sanjar
Turkmen people
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Magtymguly Pyragy
Turkmen people
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Jafar al-Askari
13.
Syria (region)
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The historic region of Syria is an area located east of the Mediterranean sea. The oldest attestation of the name Syria is from the 8th century BC in an inscription in Hieroglyphic Luwian and Phoenician. In this inscription the Luwian word Sura/i was translated to Phoenician ʔšr Assyria, for Herodotus in the 5th century BC, Syria extended as far north as the Halys river and as far south as Arabia and Egypt. For Pliny the Elder and Pomponius Mela, Syria covered the entire Fertile Crescent and this late definition is equivalent to the region known in Classical Arabic by the name ash-Shām الشام /ʔaʃ-ʃaːm/, which means the north. After World War I, the name Syria was applied to the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon, the area was passed to French and British Mandates following World War I and divided into Greater Lebanon, various Syrian-mandate states, Mandatory Palestine and Transjordan. The Syrian-mandate states were unified as the State of Syria. Throughout this period, pan-Syrian nationalists advocated for the creation of a Greater Syria, the name Syria derives from the ancient Greek name for Syrians, Σύριοι Syrioi, which the Greeks applied without distinction to various Near Eastern peoples living under the rule of Assyria. Modern scholarship confirms the Greek word traces back to the cognate Ἀσσυρία, Assyria, the classical Arabic pronunciation of Syria is Sūriyya. This name was not widely used among Muslims before about 1870, according to the Syrian Orthodox Church, Syrian used to mean Christian in early Christianity. In English, Syrian historically meant a Syrian Christian, following the declaration of Syria in 1936, the term Syrian became to designate citizens of that state regardless of ethnicity. The adjective Syriac has come into use since as a demonym to avoid the ambiguity of Syrian. To some opinions, the origin of the Hellenistic term Syria is bound in the etymology of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, Syria in this wider sense could correspond to Greater Assyria and include all of the Levant and Mesopotamia. Currently, the Arabic term Suriyya refers to the state of Syria. The term etymologically means land of the hand, referring to the fact that for someone in the Hejaz facing east. Sham comes from the Arabic consonantal root shin-hamza-mim ش ء م, as seen in alternative Arabic spellings such as شأم, there is no connection with the name of Shem son of Noah, as is sometimes assumed. Herodotus uses Συρία to refer to the stretch of land from the Halys river, including Cappadocia in todays Turkey to the Mount Casius, which Herodotus says is located just south of Lake Serbonis. According to Herodotus various remarks in different locations, he describes Syria to include the stretch of Phoenician coastal line as well as cities such Cadytis. In Greek usage, Syria and Assyria were used almost interchangeably, various writers used the term to describe the entire Levant region during this period, the New Testament used the name in this sense on numerous occasions
Syria (region)
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An 1810 map of the Ottoman Empire in Asia, showing the region of
Ottoman Syria
14.
Mesopotamia
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In the Iron Age, it was controlled by the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian Empires. The Sumerians and Akkadians dominated Mesopotamia from the beginning of history to the fall of Babylon in 539 BC. It fell to Alexander the Great in 332 BC, and after his death, around 150 BC, Mesopotamia was under the control of the Parthian Empire. Mesopotamia became a battleground between the Romans and Parthians, with parts of Mesopotamia coming under ephemeral Roman control. In AD226, eastern part of it fell to the Sassanid Persians, division of Mesopotamia between Roman and Sassanid Empires lasted until the 7th century Muslim conquest of Persia of the Sasanian Empire and Muslim conquest of the Levant from Byzantines. A number of primarily neo-Assyrian and Christian native Mesopotamian states existed between the 1st century BC and 3rd century AD, including Adiabene, Osroene, and Hatra, Mesopotamia is the site of the earliest developments of the Neolithic Revolution from around 10,000 BC. The regional toponym Mesopotamia comes from the ancient Greek root words μέσος middle and ποταμός river and it is used throughout the Greek Septuagint to translate the Hebrew equivalent Naharaim. In the Anabasis, Mesopotamia was used to designate the land east of the Euphrates in north Syria, the Aramaic term biritum/birit narim corresponded to a similar geographical concept. The neighbouring steppes to the west of the Euphrates and the part of the Zagros Mountains are also often included under the wider term Mesopotamia. A further distinction is made between Northern or Upper Mesopotamia and Southern or Lower Mesopotamia. Upper Mesopotamia, also known as the Jazira, is the area between the Euphrates and the Tigris from their sources down to Baghdad, Lower Mesopotamia is the area from Baghdad to the Persian Gulf and includes Kuwait and parts of western Iran. In modern academic usage, the term Mesopotamia often also has a chronological connotation and it is usually used to designate the area until the Muslim conquests, with names like Syria, Jazirah, and Iraq being used to describe the region after that date. It has been argued that these later euphemisms are Eurocentric terms attributed to the region in the midst of various 19th-century Western encroachments, Mesopotamia encompasses the land between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, both of which have their headwaters in the Armenian Highlands. Both rivers are fed by tributaries, and the entire river system drains a vast mountainous region. Overland routes in Mesopotamia usually follow the Euphrates because the banks of the Tigris are frequently steep and difficult. The climate of the region is semi-arid with a vast desert expanse in the north which gives way to a 15,000 square kilometres region of marshes, lagoons, mud flats, in the extreme south, the Euphrates and the Tigris unite and empty into the Persian Gulf. In the marshlands to the south of the area, a complex water-borne fishing culture has existed since prehistoric times, periodic breakdowns in the cultural system have occurred for a number of reasons. Alternatively, military vulnerability to invasion from marginal hill tribes or nomadic pastoralists has led to periods of trade collapse and these trends have continued to the present day in Iraq
Mesopotamia
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Known world of the Mesopotamian, Babylonian, and Assyrian cultures from documentary sources
Mesopotamia
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Map showing the extent of Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia
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One of 18
Statues of Gudea, a ruler around 2090 BC
Mesopotamia
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One of the
Nimrud ivories shows a lion eating a man. Neo-Assyrian period, 9th to 7th centuries BC.
15.
Mayyafariqin
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Silvan is a city in the Diyarbakır Province of Turkey. In 69 BCE, the army of Republican Rome defeated Tigrans troops in the battle of Tigranocerta, the city lost its importance as a thriving center for trade and Hellenistic culture in the following decades. In 387 CE, with the Peace of Acilisene, Tigranakert was made part of the Byzantine Empire, around 400 CE, the citys bishop, Marutha, brought a large number of relics back from Sassanid Persia. These were relics of Christian martyrs persecuted under Sassanid rule, for this reason it was renamed Martyropolis, city of the martyrs. Following the reforms of Justinian I, the city was made the capital of the province of Fourth Armenia, the city suffered heavily in the Battle of Martyropolis in 588 CE, but soon prospered again. It was known by the name of Meiafarakin after the Arabs took over this region in the 7th century and it declined in importance over the centuries and had been reduced to a small settlement by the 12th century. It was part of successively Umayyads, Abbasids, Buyids, Marwanids, Seljuks, Ahlatshahs, Mardin branch of Artukids, Ayyubids, Sultanate of Rum, Ilkhanate, Akkoyunlu, Safavids and Ottomans. Silvan was the site of clashes between Turkish government forces and Kurdish Kurdistan Workers Party separatists in August 2015 during the wider Operation Martyr Yalçın. The Marwanid Dynasty at Mayyafariqin in the Tenth and Eleventh centuries AD, JRAS,1903, caucasica in the History of Mayyafariqin
Mayyafariqin
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Silvan
16.
Malik Shah I
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Jalāl al-Dawla Muizz al-Dunyā Wal-Din Abul-Fatḥ ibn Alp Arslān, better known by his regnal name of Malik-Shah I, was sultan of the Seljuq Empire from 1072 to 1092. During his youth, he spent his time participating in the campaigns of his father Alp Arslan, during one of such campaigns in 1072, Alp Arslan was fatally wounded and died only a few days later. After that, Malik-Shah was crowned as the new sultan of the empire, however, Malik-Shah did not access the throne peacefully, and had to fight his uncle Qavurt, who claimed the throne. Although Malik-Shah was the head of the Seljuq state, the vizier Nizam al-Mulk held near absolute power during his reign. Malik-Shah spent the rest of rest waging war against the Karakhanids on the eastern side, Malik-Shahs death to this day remains under dispute, according to some scholars, he was poisoned by the Caliph, while others say that he was poisoned by the supporters of Nizam al-Mulk. Although he was known by names, he was mostly known as Malik-Shah, a combination of the Arabic word malik. Malik-Shah was born on 16 August 1055 and spent his youth in Isfahan, according to the 12th-century Persian historian Muhammad bin Ali Rawandi, Malik-Shah had fair skin, was tall and somewhat bulky. In 1064, Malik-Shah, only 9 years old by then, along with Nizam al-Mulk, the same year, Malik-Shah was married to Terken Khatun, the daughter of the Karakhanid khan Ibrahim Tamghach-Khan. In 1066, Alp Arslan arranged a ceremony near Merv, where he appointed Malik-Shah as his heir, in 1071, Malik-Shah took part in the Syrian campaign of his father, and stayed in Aleppo when his father fought the Byzantine emperor Romanos IV Diogenes at Manzikert. In 1072, Malik-Shah and Nizam al-Mulk accompanied Alp-Arslan during his campaign in Transoxiana against the Karakhanids, however, Alp-Arslan was badly wounded during his expedition, and Malik-Shah shortly took over the army. Alp-Arslan died some days later, and Malik-Shah was declared as the new sultan of the empire, Malik-Shah then replied by sending the following message, A brother does not inherit when there is a son. This message enraged Qavurt, who thereafter occupied Isfahan, in 1073 a battle took place near Hamadan, which lasted three days. Qavurt was accompanied by his seven sons, and his army consisted of Turkmens, while the army of Malik-Shah consisted of ghulams and contingents of Kurdish, during the battle, the Turks of Malik-Shahs army mutinied against him, but he nevertheless managed to defeat and capture Qavurt. Qavurt then begged for mercy and in return promised to retire to Oman, however, Nizam al-Mulk declined the offer, claiming that sparing him was an indication of weakness. After some time, Qavurt was strangled to death with a bowstring, after having dealt with that problem, Malik-Shah appointed Qutlugh-Tegin as the governor of Fars and Sav-Tegin as the governor of Kerman. Malik-Shah eventually managed to repel the Karakhanids and captured Tirmidh, giving Sav-Tegin the key of the city, Malik-Shah then appointed his other brother Shihab al-Din Tekish as the ruler of Tukharistan and Balkh. In 1074, Malik-Shah ordered the Turkic warlord Arghar to restore what he had destroyed during his raids in the territory of the Shirvanshah Fariburz I, during the same year, he appointed Qavurts son Rukn al-Dawla Sultan-Shah as the ruler of Kerman. One year later, Malik-Shah sent an army under Sav-Tegin to Arran, Sav-Tegin managed to easily conquer the region, thus ending Shaddadid rule
Malik Shah I
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Miniature of Malik-Shah I
17.
Seljuq Turks
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The Seljuqs established both the Seljuk Empire and Sultanate of Rum, which at their heights stretched from Anatolia through Iran and were targets of the First Crusade. During the 10th century, due to events, the Oghuz had come into close contact with Muslim cities. Around 985, Seljuq converted to Islam, in the 11th century the Seljuqs migrated from their ancestral homelands into mainland Persia, in the province of Khurasan, where they encountered the Ghaznavid empire. In 1025,40,000 families of Oghuz Turks migrated to the area of Caucasian Albania, the Seljuqs defeated the Ghaznavids at the battle of Nasa plains in 1035. Tughril, Chaghri, and Yabghu received the insignias of governor, grants of land, at the battle of Dandanaqan they defeated a Ghaznavid army, and after a successful siege of Isfahan by Tughril in 1050/51, they established an empire later called the Great Seljuk Empire. The Seljuqs mixed with the population and adopted the Persian culture. The Great Seljuqs were heads of the family, in theory their authority extended over all the other Seljuq lines, turkish custom called for the senior member of the family to be the Great Seljuq, although usually the position was associated with the ruler of western Persia. Muhammads son Mahmud II succeeded him in western Persia, but Ahmad Sanjar, the rulers of western Persia, who maintained a very loose grip on the Abbasids of Baghdad. Several Turkic emirs gained a level of influence in the region. Kerman was a province in southern Persia, between 1053 and 1154, the territory also included Umman. Kerman was eventually annexed by the Khwarezmid Empire in 1196, the Empire of the Steppes, a History of Central Asia. Early Seljuq History, A New Interpretation, New York, NY, Routledge,2010 Previté-Orton, C. W
Seljuq Turks
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History of the Turkic peoples Pre-14th century
Seljuq Turks
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Seljuq dynasty
Seljuq Turks
18.
Damascus
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Damascus is the capital and likely the largest city of Syria, following the decline in population of Aleppo due to the ongoing battle for the city. It is commonly known in Syria as ash-Sham and nicknamed as the City of Jasmine, in addition to being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Damascus is a major cultural and religious centre of the Levant. The city has an population of 1,711,000 as of 2009. Located in south-western Syria, Damascus is the centre of a metropolitan area of 2.6 million people. The Barada River flows through Damascus, first settled in the second millennium BC, it was chosen as the capital of the Umayyad Caliphate from 661 to 750. After the victory of the Abbasid dynasty, the seat of Islamic power was moved to Baghdad, Damascus saw a political decline throughout the Abbasid era, only to regain significant importance in the Ayyubid and Mamluk periods. Today, it is the seat of the government and all of the government ministries. The name of Damascus first appeared in the geographical list of Thutmose III as T-m-ś-q in the 15th century BC, the etymology of the ancient name T-m-ś-q is uncertain, but it is suspected to be pre-Semitic. It is attested as Dimašqa in Akkadian, T-ms-ḳw in Egyptian, Dammaśq in Old Aramaic, the Akkadian spelling is found in the Amarna letters, from the 14th century BC. Later Aramaic spellings of the name include a intrusive resh, perhaps influenced by the root dr. Thus, the English and Latin name of the city is Damascus which was imported from originated from the Qumranic Darmeśeq, and Darmsûq in Syriac, meaning a well-watered land. In Arabic, the city is called Dimašqu š-Šāmi, although this is shortened to either Dimašq or aš-Šām by the citizens of Damascus, of Syria and other Arab neighbours. Aš-Šām is an Arabic term for Levant and for Syria, the latter, the Anti-Lebanon mountains mark the border between Syria and Lebanon. The range has peaks of over 10,000 ft. and blocks precipitation from the Mediterranean sea, however, in ancient times this was mitigated by the Barada River, which originates from mountain streams fed by melting snow. Damascus is surrounded by the Ghouta, irrigated farmland where many vegetables, cereals, maps of Roman Syria indicate that the Barada river emptied into a lake of some size east of Damascus. Today it is called Bahira Atayba, the hesitant lake, because in years of severe drought it does not even exist, the modern city has an area of 105 km2, out of which 77 km2 is urban, while Jabal Qasioun occupies the rest. The old city of Damascus, enclosed by the city walls, to the south-east, north and north-east it is surrounded by suburban areas whose history stretches back to the Middle Ages, Midan in the south-west, Sarouja and Imara in the north and north-west. These neighbourhoods originally arose on roads leading out of the city and these new neighbourhoods were initially settled by Kurdish soldiery and Muslim refugees from the European regions of the Ottoman Empire which had fallen under Christian rule
Damascus
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View of Damascus from
Mount Qassioun
Damascus
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Damascus in spring seen from
Spot satellite
Damascus
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One of the rare periods the
Barada river is high, seen here next to the
Four Seasons hotel in downtown Damascus
Damascus
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Umayyad Mosque façade
19.
Jerusalem
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Jerusalem is a city located on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is considered a city in the three major Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. During its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed at least twice, besieged 23 times, attacked 52 times, the part of Jerusalem called the City of David was settled in the 4th millennium BCE. In 1538, walls were built around Jerusalem under Suleiman the Magnificent, today those walls define the Old City, which has been traditionally divided into four quarters—known since the early 19th century as the Armenian, Christian, Jewish, and Muslim Quarters. The Old City became a World Heritage Site in 1981, and is on the List of World Heritage in Danger, Modern Jerusalem has grown far beyond the Old Citys boundaries. These foundational events, straddling the dawn of the 1st millennium BCE, the sobriquet of holy city was probably attached to Jerusalem in post-exilic times. The holiness of Jerusalem in Christianity, conserved in the Septuagint which Christians adopted as their own authority, was reinforced by the New Testament account of Jesuss crucifixion there, in Sunni Islam, Jerusalem is the third-holiest city, after Mecca and Medina. As a result, despite having an area of only 0, outside the Old City stands the Garden Tomb. Today, the status of Jerusalem remains one of the issues in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. During the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, West Jerusalem was among the captured and later annexed by Israel while East Jerusalem, including the Old City, was captured. Israel captured East Jerusalem from Jordan during the 1967 Six-Day War and subsequently annexed it into Jerusalem, one of Israels Basic Laws, the 1980 Jerusalem Law, refers to Jerusalem as the countrys undivided capital. All branches of the Israeli government are located in Jerusalem, including the Knesset, the residences of the Prime Minister and President, the international community does not recognize Jerusalem as Israels capital, and the city hosts no foreign embassies. Jerusalem is also home to some non-governmental Israeli institutions of importance, such as the Hebrew University. In 2011, Jerusalem had a population of 801,000, of which Jews comprised 497,000, Muslims 281,000, a city called Rušalim in the Execration texts of the Middle Kingdom of Egypt is widely, but not universally, identified as Jerusalem. Jerusalem is called Urušalim in the Amarna letters of Abdi-Heba, the name Jerusalem is variously etymologized to mean foundation of the god Shalem, the god Shalem was thus the original tutelary deity of the Bronze Age city. The form Yerushalem or Yerushalayim first appears in the Bible, in the Book of Joshua, according to a Midrash, the name is a combination of Yhwh Yireh and the town Shalem. The earliest extra-biblical Hebrew writing of the word Jerusalem is dated to the sixth or seventh century BCE and was discovered in Khirbet Beit Lei near Beit Guvrin in 1961. The inscription states, I am Yahweh thy God, I will accept the cities of Judah and I will redeem Jerusalem, or as other scholars suggest, the mountains of Judah belong to him, to the God of Jerusalem
Jerusalem
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From upper left: Jerusalem skyline viewed from Givat ha'Arba,
Mamilla, the
Old City and the
Dome of the Rock, a
souq in the
Old City, the
Knesset, the
Western Wall, the
Tower of David and the
Ottoman Old City walls
Jerusalem
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Hebrew: יְרוּשָׁלַיִם (Yerushalayim)
Arabic: القُدس (al-Quds)
Aramaic: יְרוּשְׁלֶם (Yərushəlem)
Jerusalem
Jerusalem
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Stepped Stone Structure in
Ophel /
City of David, the oldest part of Jerusalem
20.
Fatimid
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The Fatimid Caliphate was an Ismaili Shia Islamic caliphate that spanned a large area of North Africa, from the Red Sea in the east to the Atlantic Ocean in the west. The dynasty ruled across the Mediterranean coast of Africa and ultimately made Egypt the centre of the caliphate, at its height the caliphate included in addition to Egypt varying areas of the Maghreb, Sudan, Sicily, the Levant, and Hijaz. The Fatimids claimed descent from Fatima bint Muhammad, the daughter of Islamic prophet Muhammad, in 921 the Fatimids established the Tunisian city of Mahdia as their new capital. In 948 they shifted their capital to Al-Mansuriya, near Kairouan in Tunisia, in 969 they conquered Egypt and established Cairo as the capital of their caliphate, Egypt became the political, cultural, and religious centre of their empire. The ruling class belonged to the Ismaili branch of Shiism, as did the leaders of the dynasty, the existence of the caliphate marked the only time the descendants of Ali through Fatimah were united to any degree and the name Fatimid refers to Fatimah. The different term Fatimite is sometimes used to refer to the caliphates subjects, after the initial conquests, the caliphate often allowed a degree of religious tolerance towards non-Ismaili sects of Islam, as well as to Jews, Maltese Christians, and Egyptian Coptic Christians. The Fatimid caliphate was also distinguished by the role of Berbers in its initial establishment and in helping its development, especially on the military. During the late eleventh and twelfth centuries the Fatimid caliphate declined rapidly and he founded the Ayyubid dynasty and incorporated the Fatimid state into the Abbasid Caliphate. The Fatimid regime lasted until the twelfth century, though its leaders made little headway in persuading the Egyptian population. The Fatimid Caliphates religious ideology originated in an Ismaili Shia movement launched in the 9th century in Salamiyah, Syria by their eighth Imam and he claimed descent through Ismail, the seventh Ismaili Imam, from Fatimah and her husband ʻAlī ibn-Abī-Tālib, the first Shīʻa Imām. Thus his name was al-Fātimiyyūn Fatimid, the eighth to tenth Imams, remained hidden and worked for the movement against the periods times rulers. According to legend, Abdullah and his son were fulfilling a prophecy that the mahdi would come from Mesopotamia to Sijilmasa. They hid among the population of Sijilmasa, then an independent emirate, for four years under the countenance of the Midrar rulers, al-Mahdi was supported by dedicated Shiite Abu Abdullah al-Shii, and al-Shii started his preaching after he encountered a group of Muslim North African during his hajj. These men bragged about the country of the Kutama in western Ifriqiya, and the hostility of the Kutama towards, and their independence from. This triggered al-Shii to travel to the region, where he started to preach the Ismaili doctrine, the Berber peasants, who had been oppressed for decades by the corrupt Aghlabid rule, would prove themselves to be a perfect basis for sedition. Instantly, al-Shii began conquering cities in the region, first Mila, then Sétif, Kairouan, and eventually Raqqada, in 909 Al-Shii sent a large expedition force to rescue the Mahdi, conquering the Khariji state of Tahert on its way there. After gaining his freedom, Abdullah al-Mahdi Billah became the leader of the state and assumed the position of imam. The Fatimids existed during the Islamic Golden Age, the dynasty was founded in 909 by the eleventh Imam ʻAbdullāh al-Mahdī Billah
Fatimid
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Fatimid green banner.
Fatimid
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The
Al-Hakim Mosque in Cairo, of
Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, the sixth caliph, as renovated by
Dawoodi Bohra
Fatimid
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Fragment of a bowl depicting a mounted warrior, 11th century. Fatimid dynasty, found in Fustat, Egypt.
Brooklyn Museum
21.
Crusade
–
The First Crusade arose after a call to arms in a 1095 sermon by Pope Urban II. Urban urged military support for the Byzantine Empire and its Emperor, Alexios I, the response to Urbans preaching by people of many different classes across Western Europe established the precedent for later Crusades. Volunteers became Crusaders by taking a vow and receiving plenary indulgences from the church. Some were hoping for apotheosis at Jerusalem, or forgiveness from God for all their sins, others participated to satisfy feudal obligations, gain glory and honour, or find opportunities for economic and political gain. Many modern Historians have polarised opinions of the Crusaders behaviour under Papal sanction, to some it was incongruous with the stated aims and implied moral authority of the papacy and the Crusades, to the extent that on occasions that the Pope excommunicated Crusaders. Crusaders often pillaged as they travelled, while their leaders retained control of captured territory rather than returning it to the Byzantines. During the Peoples Crusade thousands of Jews were murdered in what is now called the Rhineland massacres, Constantinople was sacked during the Fourth Crusade rendering the reunification of Christendom impossible. These tales consequently galvanised medieval romance, philosophy and literature, but the Crusades also reinforced the connection between Western Christendom, feudalism, and militarism. Crusade is not a term, instead the terms iter for journey or peregrinatio for pilgrimage were used. Not until the word crucesignatus for one who was signed with the cross was adopted at the close of the century was specific terminology developed. The Middle English equivalents were derived from old French, croiserie in the 13th–15th centuries, croisade appeared in English c1575, and continued to be the leading form till c1760. By convention historians adopt the term for the Christian holy wars from 1095, the Crusades in the Holy Land are traditionally counted as nine distinct campaigns, numbered from the First Crusade of 1095–99 to the Ninth Crusade of 1271/2. Usage of the term Crusade may differ depending on the author, pluralists use the term Crusade of any campaign explicitly sanctioned by the reigning Pope. This reflects the view of the Roman Catholic Church that every military campaign given Papal sanction is equally valid as a Crusade, regardless of its cause, justification, generalists see Crusades as any and all holy wars connected with the Latin Church and fought in defence of their faith. Popularists limit the Crusades to only those that were characterised by popular groundswells of religious fervour – that is, only the First Crusade, Medieval Muslim historiographers such as Ali ibn al-Athir refer to the Crusades as the Frankish Wars. The term used in modern Arabic, ḥamalāt ṣalībiyya حملات صليبية, campaigns of the cross, is a loan translation of the term Crusade as used in Western historiography. The Islamic prophet Muhammad founded Islam in the Arabian Peninsula, the resulting unified polity in the seventh and eighth centuries led to a rapid expansion of Arab power. This influence stretched from the northwest Indian subcontinent, across Central Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, southern Italy, tolerance, trade, and political relationships between the Arabs and the Christian states of Europe waxed and waned
Crusade
–
Madrid Skylitzes illuminated manuscript depicting Byzantine Greeks punishing ninth-century
Cretan Saracens
Crusade
–
Map of the
Eastern Mediterranean in 1135, showing crusader-held and neighbouring territories
Crusade
–
Fifteenth-century illustrated French translation of
Boccaccio 's
De Casibus Virorum Illustrium, showing
Seljuk emperor
Alp Arslan ritually humiliating
Romanos IV in 1071 after Manzikert; Alp Arslan allowed Romanos to return to
Constantinople, where he was killed by the Byzantines.
Crusade
–
Illumination from the Livre des Passages d'Outre-mer (c. 1490) of Urban II at the Council of Clermont (from the
Bibliothèque Nationale)
22.
Al-Jazira, Mesopotamia
–
Upper Mesopotamia is the name used for the uplands and great outwash plain of northwestern Iraq, northeastern Syria and southeastern Turkey, in the northern Middle East. This region is approximately correspondent with what was Assyria from the 25th century BC through to the mid-7th century AD and it extends down the Tigris to Samarra and down the Euphrates to Hit. The Khabur River runs for over 400 km across the plain, from Turkey in the north, the major settlements are Mosul, Deir ez-Zor, Raqqa, Al Hasakah, Diyarbakır and Qamishli. The western, Syrian part, is contiguous with the Syrian Al-Hasakah Governorate and is described as Syrias breadbasket. The eastern, Iraqi part, includes and extends slightly beyond the Iraqi Ninewa Governorate, in the north it includes the Turkish provinces of Şanlıurfa, Mardin, and parts of Diyarbakır Province. The name al-Jazira has been used since the 7th century CE by Islamic sources to refer to the section of Mesopotamia. The name means island, and at one time referred to the land between the two rivers, which in Aramaic is Bit Nahren. Historically the name referred to as little as the Sinjar plain coming down from the Sinjar Mountains, in pre-Abbasid times the western and eastern boundaries seem to have fluctuated, sometimes including what is now northern Syria to the west and Adiabene in the east. Al-Jazira is characterised as an outwash or alluvial plain, quite distinct from the Syrian Desert and lower-lying central Mesopotamia, however the area includes eroded hills, the region has several parts to it. In the northwest is one of the largest salt flats in the world, further south, extending from Mosul to near Basra is a sandy desert not unlike the Empty Quarter. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries the region has been plagued by drought and this is the area where the earliest signs of agriculture and domestication of animals have been found, and thus the starting point leading to civilization and the modern world. Al-Jazirah includes the mountain Karaca Dağ in southern Turkey, where the closest relative to modern wheat still grows wild, domestication of goats and sheep followed within a few generations, but didnt become widespread for more than a millennium. Weaving and pottery followed about two years later. Further surprises followed in the 1990s with the finds of the megalithic structures at Göbekli Tepe in south-eastern Turkey. The earliest of these apparently ritual buildings are from before 9000 BC—over five thousand years older than Stonehenge—and thus the absolute oldest known megalithic structures anywhere, as far as we know today no well-established farming societies existed at the time. Farming seemed to be experimental and only a smallish supplement to continued hunting and gathering. After all, Göbekli Tepe lies just 32 km from Karaca Dağ, the questions raised by Göbekli Tepe have led to intense and creative discussions among archeologists of the Middle East. Excavations at Göbekli Tepe continues, only about 5 percent has been revealed so far, Upper Mesopotamia is the heartland of ancient Assyria, founded circa the 25th century BC
Al-Jazira, Mesopotamia
–
Monumental stone buildings at
Göbekli Tepe, ca. 9000 BC
Al-Jazira, Mesopotamia
–
Al-Jazira—Upper Mesopotamia Region, within the
Middle East.
Al-Jazira, Mesopotamia
–
Uruk period (ca. 4000 to 3100 BCE).
Al-Jazira, Mesopotamia
–
Geography
23.
Great Seljuq
–
The Seljuqs established both the Seljuk Empire and Sultanate of Rum, which at their heights stretched from Anatolia through Iran and were targets of the First Crusade. During the 10th century, due to events, the Oghuz had come into close contact with Muslim cities. Around 985, Seljuq converted to Islam, in the 11th century the Seljuqs migrated from their ancestral homelands into mainland Persia, in the province of Khurasan, where they encountered the Ghaznavid empire. In 1025,40,000 families of Oghuz Turks migrated to the area of Caucasian Albania, the Seljuqs defeated the Ghaznavids at the battle of Nasa plains in 1035. Tughril, Chaghri, and Yabghu received the insignias of governor, grants of land, at the battle of Dandanaqan they defeated a Ghaznavid army, and after a successful siege of Isfahan by Tughril in 1050/51, they established an empire later called the Great Seljuk Empire. The Seljuqs mixed with the population and adopted the Persian culture. The Great Seljuqs were heads of the family, in theory their authority extended over all the other Seljuq lines, turkish custom called for the senior member of the family to be the Great Seljuq, although usually the position was associated with the ruler of western Persia. Muhammads son Mahmud II succeeded him in western Persia, but Ahmad Sanjar, the rulers of western Persia, who maintained a very loose grip on the Abbasids of Baghdad. Several Turkic emirs gained a level of influence in the region. Kerman was a province in southern Persia, between 1053 and 1154, the territory also included Umman. Kerman was eventually annexed by the Khwarezmid Empire in 1196, the Empire of the Steppes, a History of Central Asia. Early Seljuq History, A New Interpretation, New York, NY, Routledge,2010 Previté-Orton, C. W
Great Seljuq
–
History of the Turkic peoples Pre-14th century
Great Seljuq
–
Seljuq dynasty
Great Seljuq
24.
Aleppo
–
Aleppo is a city in Syria, serving as the capital of the Aleppo Governorate, the most populous Syrian governorate. With an official population of 2,132,100, Aleppo was the largest Syrian city before the Syrian Civil War, however, now Aleppo is likely the second-largest city in Syria after the capital Damascus. Aleppo is an ancient city, and one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, such a long history is attributed to its strategic location as a trading center midway between the Mediterranean Sea and Mesopotamia. For centuries, Aleppo was the largest city in the Syrian region, and it was also one of the largest cities in the Levant before the advent of the Syrian Civil War. The citys significance in history has been its location at one end of the Silk Road, when the Suez Canal was inaugurated in 1869, trade was diverted to sea and Aleppo began its slow decline. At the fall of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, Aleppo ceded its northern hinterland to modern Turkey, in the 1940s, it lost its main access to the sea, Antakya and İskenderun, also to Turkey. Finally, the isolation of Syria in the past few decades further exacerbated the situation and this decline may have helped to preserve the old city of Aleppo, its medieval architecture and traditional heritage. It won the title of the Islamic Capital of Culture 2006, during the Battle of Aleppo the city suffered massive destruction, and has been the worst-hit city in the Syrian Civil War. In December 2016, the Syrian government achieved full control of Aleppo following a successful offensive, modern-day English-speakers commonly refer to the city as Aleppo. It was known in antiquity as Khalpe, Khalibon, and to the Greeks, during the Crusades, and again during the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon of 1923–1946, the name Alep was used. Aleppo represents the Italianised version of this, the original ancient name, Halab, has survived as the current Arabic name of the city. Some have proposed that halab means iron or copper in Amorite languages, the modern-day Arabic nickname of the city, ash-Shahbaa, which means the white-colored, also allegedly derives from the famous white marble of Aleppo. From the 11th century it was common usage to apply the term Aram-Zobah to the area of Aleppo. Aleppo has scarcely been touched by archaeologists, since the city occupies its ancient site. The site has been occupied from around 5000 BC, as shown by excavations in Tallet Alsauda, Aleppo appears in historical records as an important city much earlier than Damascus. The first record of Aleppo comes from the third millennium BC, some historians, such as Wayne Horowitz, identify Aleppo with the capital of an independent kingdom closely related to Ebla, known as Armi, although this identification is contested. The main temple of the storm god Hadad was located on the hill in the center of the city. In the Old Babylonian and Old Assyrian Empire period, Aleppos name appears in its form as Ḥalab for the first time
Aleppo
–
Ancient City of Aleppo Aleppo Citadel • The entrance to
al-Madina Souq Great Mosque of Aleppo •
Baron Hotel Saint Elias Cathedral •
Queiq River Panorama of Aleppo at night
Aleppo
–
Queiq River
Aleppo
–
Ancient Aleppo
25.
Principality of Antioch
–
The Principality of Antioch was one of the crusader states created during the First Crusade which included parts of modern-day Turkey and Syria. The principality was much smaller than the County of Edessa or the Kingdom of Jerusalem and it had roughly 20,000 inhabitants in the 12th century, most of whom were Armenians and Greek Orthodox Christians, with a few Muslims outside the city itself. Few of the inhabitants apart from the Crusaders were Roman Catholic even though the city was turned into a Latin Patriarchate in 1100. While Baldwin of Boulogne and Tancred headed east from Asia Minor to set up the County of Edessa, Bohemond of Taranto commanded the siege which commenced in October 1097. With over four hundred towers, the defenses were formidable. Bohemond convinced a guard in one of the towers, an Armenian and former Christian named Firouz, only four days later, a Muslim army from Mosul, led by Kerbogha, arrived to besiege the Crusaders themselves. Alexius I Comnenus, the Byzantine emperor, was on his way to assist the Crusaders, the Crusaders withstood the siege, with help from a mystic named Peter Bartholomew. Peter claimed he had visited by St. Andrew, who told him that the Holy Lance. The cathedral of St. Peter was excavated, and the Lance was discovered by Peter himself, although Peter most likely planted it there himself, it helped raise the spirits of the Crusaders. There was a dispute over who should control the city. Bohemond and the Italian Normans eventually won, and Bohemond named himself prince, meanwhile, an unknown epidemic spread throughout the Crusader camp, Adhemar of Le Puy was one of the victims. Following Bohemonds capture in battle with the Danishmends in 1100, his nephew Tancred became regent, Tancred expanded the borders of the Principality, seizing the cities of Tarsus and Latakia from the Byzantine Empire. However those newly captured cities along with other territory were lost after the Battle of Harran when Baldwin II of Edessa was captured, Bohemond was released in 1103 and went to Italy to raise more troops in 1104, during which time Tancred remained regent of Antioch. Bohemond used the troops he raised to attack the Byzantines in 1107, Bohemond was defeated at Dyrrhachium in 1108 and was forced by Alexius I to sign the Treaty of Devol, making Antioch a vassal state of the Byzantine Empire upon Bohemonds death. Bohemond had promised to any land that was seized from the Muslims when the Crusaders passed through Constantinople in 1097. Bohemond also fought at Aleppo with Baldwin and Joscelin of the County of Edessa, Bohemond left Tancred as regent once more and returned to Italy, where he died in 1111. Alexius wanted Tancred to return the Principality in its entirety to Byzantium, but Tancred was supported by the County of Tripoli, Tancred, in fact, had been the only Crusade leader who did not swear to return conquered land to Alexius. Tancred died in 1112 and was succeeded by Bohemond II, under the regency of Tancreds nephew Roger of Salerno, on June 27,1119, Roger was killed at the Ager Sanguinis, and Antioch became a vassal state of Jerusalem with King Baldwin II as regent until 1126
Principality of Antioch
–
The
Siege of Antioch, from a
medieval miniature painting.
Principality of Antioch
–
The Principality of Antioch in the context of the other states of the
Near East in 1135
AD.
Principality of Antioch
–
Coin of the
Latin Patriarch of Antioch Aymery of Limoges (1139–1193), with bust of Aimery on the obverse
Principality of Antioch
–
"Helmet"
denier of Antioch (1163–1216).
British Museum
26.
Battle of Ager Sanguinis
–
Antioch and the other Crusader States were constantly at war with the Muslim states of Northern Syria and the Jazeerah, principally Aleppo and Mosul. When Ridwan of Aleppo died in 1113, there was a period of peace, in 1115, Roger defeated a Seljuk Turkish invasion force led by Bursuq bin Bursuq at the Battle of Sarmin. In 1117 Aleppo came under the rule of the Artuqid atabeg Ilghazi, in 1118 Roger captured Azaz, which left Aleppo open to attack from the Crusaders, in response, Ilghazi invaded the Principality in 1119. Roger marched out from Artah with Bernard of Valence, the Latin Patriarch of Antioch, Bernard suggested they remain there, as Artah was a well-defended fortress only a short distance away from Antioch, and Ilghazi would not be able to pass if they were stationed there. The Patriarch also advised Roger to call for help from Baldwin, now king of Jerusalem, and Pons, Roger camped in the pass of Sarmada, while Ilghazi besieged the fort of al-Atharib. A force under Robert of Vieux-Pont set out to break the siege, Ilghazi was also waiting for reinforcements from Toghtekin, the Burid emir of Damascus, but he too was tired of waiting. Using little-used paths, his army quickly surrounded Rogers camp during the night of June 27, the prince had recklessly chosen a campsite in a wooded valley with steep sides and few avenues of escape. Rogers army of 700 knights and 3,000 foot soldiers, including turcopoles and these drew up in a V-shaped line with the tip farthest from the Muslim battle array. From left to right, the divisions were commanded by Robert of St. Lo, Prince Roger, Guy de Frenelle, Geoffrey the Monk, meanwhile, Roger told off a sixth division under Renaud Mansoer to protect the Antiochene rear. As the Muslim army waited, the qadi Abu al-Fadl ibn al-Khashshab, wearing his lawyers turban but brandishing a lance, rode out in front of the troopers. That morning, June 28, the battle was begun by a duel between the Antiochene infantry, posted in front of the knights, and the Turkish bowmen. The crusader army was at first successful when the divisions of Peter. Guy de Frenelles center division had some success also, but the battle was decided on the left flank. Robert of St. Lo and the Turcopoles were driven back into Rogers division, a north wind blew dust in the faces of the Antioch knights and footmen, confusing them further. Soon, Artuqid flanking forces enveloped the crusaders, during the fighting, Roger was killed by a sword in the face at the foot of the great jewelled cross which had served as his standard. The rest of the army was killed or captured, only two knights survived, Renaud Mansoer, took refuge in the fort of Sarmada to wait for King Baldwin, but was later taken captive by Ilghazi. Among the other prisoners was likely Walter the Chancellor, who wrote an account of the battle. The massacre led to the name of the battle, ager sanguinis, the battle proved that the Muslims could defeat a Crusader army without the help of the Seljuks
Battle of Ager Sanguinis
–
Battle of Ager-Sanguinis, 1337 miniature
27.
Mehmed I of Great Seljuq
–
Muhammad I was a son of Seljuq Sultan Malik Shah I. In Turkish, Tapar means he who obtains, finds and he succeeded his nephew, Malik Shah II, as Seljuq Sultan in Baghdad, and thus was theoretically the head of the dynasty, although his brother Ahmed Sanjar in Khorasan held more practical power. Mehmed I probably allied himself with Radwan of Aleppo in the battle of Khabur river against Kilij Arslan I, following the internecine conflict with his half brother, Barkiyaruq, he was given the title of malik and the provinces of Armenia and Azerbaijan. Dissatisfied by this he revolted again, but had to back to Armenia. By 1104, Barkiyaruq, ill and tired of war, agreed to divide the sultanate with Muhammad, Muhammad became sole sultan following the death of Barkiyaruq in 1105. In 1106, Muhammad conquered the Ismaili fortress of Shahdiz, Shahriyar, greatly angered and feeling offended by the message Muhammad sent him, refused to aid him against the Ismailis. Shortly after Muhammad sent an army headed by Amir Chavli who tried to capture Sari but was defeated by an army under Shahriyar. Muhammad then sent a letter, which requested Shahriyar to send one of his sons child to the Seljuq court in Isfahan, Qarin III then went to Isfahan court and married her. In 1106/1107, Ahmad ibn Nizam al-Mulk, the son of the famous vizier Nizam al-Mulk, when Ahmad arrived to the court, Muhammad I appointed him as his vizier, replacing Sad al-Mulk Abul-Mahasen Abi who had been recently executed on suspicion of heresy. The appointment was due mainly to the reputation of his Ahmads father and he was then given various titles which his father held. Muhammad I, along with his vizier Ahmad, later made a campaign in Iraq, where defeated and killed the Mazyadid ruler Sayf al-dawla Sadaqa ibn Mansur. In 1109, Muhammad I sent Ahmad and Chavli Saqavu to capture the Ismaili fortresses of Alamut and Ostavand, Ahmad was shortly replaced by Khatir al-Mulk Abu Mansur Maybudi as vizier of the Sejluq Empire. According to Ali ibn al-Athir, Ahmad then retired to a life in Baghdad. Muhammad I died in 1118 and was succeeded by Mahmud II, buweihid Dynasty, Bagdad under Seljuqs, Toghril Beg, Al-Muktadi and four following Caliphs, Crusades, Capture of Jerusalem, End of Fatimids. The Caliphate, its rise, decline and fall, the Political and Dynastic History of the Iranian World. The Cambridge History of Iran, Volume 5, The Saljuq and Mongol periods
Mehmed I of Great Seljuq
–
Muhammad I
28.
Kingdom of Georgia
–
The Kingdom of Georgia, also known as the Georgian Empire, was a medieval monarchy which emerged in circa 1008 AD. It reached its Golden Age of political and economic strength during the reign of King David IV, a predominantly Christian, Georgian-speaking realm, it was the principal historical precursor of present-day Georgia. Lasting for several centuries, the fell to the Mongol invasions in the 13th century. The Kingdoms geopolitical situation further worsened after the Fall of Constantinople, as a result of these processes, by the end of the 15th century Georgia turned into an isolated, fractured Christian enclave, surrounded by hostile Turco-Iranic neighbors. The ascendancy of the Bagrationi dynasty can be traced to the 8th century, the restoration of the Georgian kingship begins in AD888, when Adarnase IV of Iberia took the title of King of Georgians. The United Kingdom of Georgia was established in 1008, in this year, Bagrat III, son of Gurgen II, became the ruler of the Kingdom of Western Georgia, including the Principalities of Imereti, Samegrelo, Abkhazeti, Guria and Svaneti. Bagrats mother was Queen Gurandukht, a daughter of George II of Abkhazia, the first decades of the 9th century saw the rise of a new Georgian state in Tao-Klarjeti. Ashot Courapalate of the family of Bagrationi liberated from the Arabs the territories of former southern Iberia. In practice, however, the region functioned as an independent country with its capital in Artanuji. The hereditary title of Curopalates was kept by the Bagrationi family, the first united Georgian monarchy was formed at the end of the 10th century when Curopalate David invaded the Earldom of Kartli-Iberia. Three years later, after the death of his uncle Theodosius the Blind, King of Egrisi-Abkhazia, in 1001 Bagrat added Tao-Klarjeti to his domain as a result of Davids death. In 1008–1010, Bagrat annexed Kakheti and Hereti, thus becoming the first king of a united Georgia in both the east and west, in 1071, the Seljuq army destroyed the united Byzantine-Armenian and Georgian forces in the Battle of Manzikert. By 1081, all of Armenia, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Syria, in Georgia, only the mountainous areas of Abkhazia, Svaneti, Racha, and Khevi–Khevsureti remained out of Seljuq control and served as a relatively safe havens for numerous refugees. The rest of the country was dominated by the conquerors who destroyed the cities and fortresses, looted the villages, in fact, by the end of the 1080s, Georgians were outnumbered in the region by the invaders. The Golden Age began with the reign of David IV, the son of George II and Queen Helena, in 1121, he decisively defeated much larger Turkish armies during the Battle of Didgori, with fleeing Seljuq Turks being run down by pursuing Georgian cavalry for several days. A huge amount of booty and prisoners were captured by Davids army, David IV made particular emphasis on removing the vestiges of unwanted eastern influences, which the Georgians considered forced, in favor of the traditional Christian and Byzantine overtones. As part of this effort he founded the Gelati Monastery, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, David also played a personal role in reviving Georgian religious hymnography, composing the Hymns of Repentance, a sequence of eight free-verse psalms. In this emotional repentance of his sins, David sees himself as reincarnating the Biblical David, with a relationship to God
Kingdom of Georgia
–
Queen Tamar and her father King
George III (restored fresco from the
Betania monastery)
Kingdom of Georgia
–
Flag
Kingdom of Georgia
–
Detail from the
Nautical chart by
Pietro Vesconte, depicting Georgian
Black Sea coast, 1321
Kingdom of Georgia
–
Detail from the
Nautical chart by
Angelino Dulcert, depicting Georgian Black Sea coast and
Tiflis, 1339
29.
Battle of Didgori
–
The Battle of Didgori was fought between the armies of the Kingdom of Georgia and the declining Great Seljuq Empire at the place of Didgori,40 km west of Tbilisi, on August 12,1121. The battle resulted in King David IV of Georgia’s decisive victory over a Seljuk invasion army under Ilghazi and the subsequent reconquest of a Muslim-held Tbilisi, the victory at Didgori inaugurated the medieval Georgian Golden Age and is celebrated in the Georgian chronicles as a miraculous victory. Modern Georgians continue to remember the event as an annual September festival known as Didgoroba, the Kingdom of Georgia had been a tributary to the Great Seljuq Empire since the 1080s. David renounced the tribute to the Seljuqs in 1096/7, put an end to the migrations of the Turks into Georgia. By June 1121, Tbilisi had actually been under a Georgian siege, the resurgence of Georgians’ military energies brought about a coordinated Muslim response. Both Georgian and Islamic sources testify that, on the complaints of the Muslims of Tbilisi, muhammad sent an expedition into Georgia in which the Artuqid Ilghazi of Mardin, the Mazyadid Dubays II b. Sadaqa of Al Hillah and the sultan’s brother Tughrul, lord of Arran and Nakhichevan and this combined army under the overall command of Ilghazi entered the valley of Trialeti in eastern Georgia and encamped in the vicinities of Didgori and Manglisi in mid-August 1121. It is also claimed that the Seljuq light cavalry rode in front of the Georgians and started to shoot, there is no evidence of heavy cavalry present on Ilghazis side or any type of cavalry which could have matched the Georgian counterpart. On the other side the Georgians were facing a superior foe in terms of numbers. King Davids decisive reforms turned the Georgian army into an organized and structured military force which saw little analogue in that period. The smallest formations would be equivalents of nowadays squads and platoons, then a group of 100 and so forth all led by servants of higher status, in this particular engagement they were further reinforced with hundreds of crusaders sent by Baldwin II of Jerusalem. Each formation was headed by a great and dense line of horsemen, at the sign of collapse David would then send forward his Kipchak cavalry. Initially the king and all his entourage stayed in the center, during battle David IV would assume command over his armys left wing, while Demetrius was leading the right. The course of the battle is differently related in the historical records. According to the Arab chronicler Ibn al-Athir, David sent a detachment of his men in order to simulate negotiation. Other accounts speak of a hundred supposed deserters requesting an audience with the Seljuq commander, meanwhile, the Georgians successfully managed to deploy a large portion of their force where they would almost encircle the enemy in a pincer movement. Their opponents remained unaware of such activities, the Georgians then began to quickly advance on the flanks in full formation. Najm ad-Din Ilghazi ibn Artuq and his son survived the attack on the vanguard but were severely injured during the fight and left the battlefield leaving the Seljuq army virtually leaderless
Battle of Didgori
–
Monument at the Didgori field, Georgia
Battle of Didgori
–
Section of the Didgori monument with swords stuck in the ground
Battle of Didgori
–
Site of the battle
Turkey
Syria
