1.
Zabid
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Zabid is a town with an urban population of around 52,590 persons on Yemens western coastal plain. It is one of the oldest towns in Yemen, and has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1993, though, in 2000, the Great Mosque was built in 628 AD by Abu Musa Ashaari, one of the followers of Muhammad. The town was the capital of Yemen from the 13th to the 15th century, the town, named after Wadi Zabid, the wadi to its south, is one of the oldest towns in Yemen. Abu Musa Ashaari, one of the Prophet Muhammads companions, came originally from Zabid, according to tradition, this is the 5th mosque built in the history of Islam. Zabid was the capital of Yemen from the 13th to the 15th century and it was the capital of the Ziyadid dynasty from 819–1018 and the Najahid dynasty from 1022–1158. Today, however, it is at the intellectual and economic margins of modern Yemen, Zabid has an urban population of around 52,590 persons on Yemens western coastal plain. Zabid has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO since 1993, zabids Great Mosque occupies a prominent place in the town. The vestiges of its university can also be visited, in 2000, Zabid was listed on the List of World Heritage in Danger, the listing was made on the behest of the Yemeni government due to a state of poor upkeep and conservation. According to a UNESCO report, roughly 40% of the houses have been replaced by concrete buildings, and other houses. If the city has not begun preservation of its cultural heritage within two years of its inscription as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, it faces possible loss of this vaunted status, as of 1920, Zabid was one of two places in Arabia growing indigo. Zabid also grows and produces cotton, the British cite tribal disputes as dampening the economy in Zabid during the early 20th century. UNESCO World Heritage Site listing Encyclopaedia Britannica, Zabid
2.
Yemen
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Yemen, officially known as the Republic of Yemen, is an Arab country in Western Asia, occupying South Arabia, the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. Yemen is the second-largest country in the peninsula, occupying 527,970 km2, the coastline stretches for about 2,000 km. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, the Gulf of Aden and Arabian Sea to the south, although Yemens constitutionally stated capital is the city of Sanaa, the city has been under rebel control since February 2015. Because of this, Yemens capital has been relocated to the port city of Aden. Yemens territory includes more than 200 islands, the largest of these is Socotra, Yemen was the home of the Sabaeans, a trading state that flourished for over a thousand years and probably also included parts of modern-day Ethiopia and Eritrea. In 275 AD, the region came under the rule of the later Jewish-influenced Himyarite Kingdom, Christianity arrived in the fourth century, whereas Judaism and local paganism were already established. Islam spread quickly in the century and Yemenite troops were crucial in the expansion of the early Islamic conquests. Administration of Yemen has long been notoriously difficult, several dynasties emerged from the ninth to 16th centuries, the Rasulid dynasty being the strongest and most prosperous. The country was divided between the Ottoman and British empires in the twentieth century. The Zaydi Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen was established after World War I in North Yemen before the creation of the Yemen Arab Republic in 1962, South Yemen remained a British protectorate known as the Aden Protectorate until 1967 when it became an independent state and later, a Marxist state. The two Yemeni states united to form the modern republic of Yemen in 1990, Yemen is a developing country, and the poorest country in the Middle East. Under the rule of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen was described as a kleptocracy, according to the 2009 international corruption Perception Index by Transparency International, Yemen ranked 164 out of 182 countries surveyed. President Saleh stepped down and the powers of the presidency were transferred to Vice President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, the transitional process was disrupted by conflicts between the Houthis and al-Islah, as well as the al-Qaeda insurgency. In September 2014, the Houthis took over Sanaa, later declaring themselves in control of the government in a coup détat, since then, a Saudi-led intervention has taken place, however, it could not stop the civil war. Instead, the Saudis and the others have destroyed some hospitals, schools and homes, Yemen was mentioned in Old South Arabian inscriptions as Yamnat. In Arabic literature, the term includes much greater territory than that of the republic of Yemen. It stretches from the northern Asir Region in southwestern Saudi Arabia to Dhofar Governorate in southern Oman, one etymology derives Yemen from yumn, meaning felicity, as much of the country is fertile. The Romans called it Arabia Felix, as opposed to Arabia Deserta, al-Yaman significantly plays on the notion of the land to the right, when in Mecca facing the dawn, complementary to Al-Sham, the Land to the Left, referring to the Levant
3.
Arabic
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Arabic is a Central Semitic language that was first spoken in Iron Age northwestern Arabia and is now the lingua franca of the Arab world. Arabic is also the language of 1.7 billion Muslims. It is one of six languages of the United Nations. The modern written language is derived from the language of the Quran and it is widely taught in schools and universities, and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, government, and the media. The two formal varieties are grouped together as Literary Arabic, which is the language of 26 states. Modern Standard Arabic largely follows the standards of Quranic Arabic. Much of the new vocabulary is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the post-Quranic era, Arabic has influenced many languages around the globe throughout its history. During the Middle Ages, Literary Arabic was a vehicle of culture in Europe, especially in science, mathematics. As a result, many European languages have borrowed many words from it. Many words of Arabic origin are found in ancient languages like Latin. Balkan languages, including Greek, have acquired a significant number of Arabic words through contact with Ottoman Turkish. Arabic has also borrowed words from languages including Greek and Persian in medieval times. Arabic is a Central Semitic language, closely related to the Northwest Semitic languages, the Ancient South Arabian languages, the Semitic languages changed a great deal between Proto-Semitic and the establishment of the Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include, The conversion of the suffix-conjugated stative formation into a past tense, the conversion of the prefix-conjugated preterite-tense formation into a present tense. The elimination of other prefix-conjugated mood/aspect forms in favor of new moods formed by endings attached to the prefix-conjugation forms, the development of an internal passive. These features are evidence of descent from a hypothetical ancestor. In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside of the Ancient South Arabian family were spoken and it is also believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages were also spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hijaz, Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages, in Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested
4.
Arabs
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Arabs are an ethnic group inhabiting the Arab world. They primarily live in the Arab states in Western Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, the Arabs are first mentioned in the mid-ninth century BCE as a tribal people dwelling in the central Arabian Peninsula. The Arabs appear to have been under the vassalage of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, tradition holds that Arabs descend from Ishmael, the son of Abraham. The Arabian Desert is the birthplace of Arab, there are other Arab groups as well that spread in the land and existed for millennia. Before the expansion of the Caliphate, Arab referred to any of the largely nomadic Semitic people from the northern to the central Arabian Peninsula and Syrian Desert. Presently, Arab refers to a number of people whose native regions form the Arab world due to spread of Arabs throughout the region during the early Arab conquests of the 7th and 8th centuries. The Arabs forged the Rashidun, Umayyad and the Abbasid caliphates, whose borders reached southern France in the west, China in the east, Anatolia in the north, and this was one of the largest land empires in history. The Great Arab Revolt has had as big an impact on the modern Middle East as the World War I, the war signaled the end of the Ottoman Empire. They are modern states and became significant as distinct political entities after the fall and defeat, following adoption of the Alexandria Protocol in 1944, the Arab League was founded on 22 March 1945. The Charter of the Arab League endorsed the principle of an Arab homeland whilst respecting the sovereignty of its member states. Beyond the boundaries of the League of Arab States, Arabs can also be found in the global diaspora, the ties that bind Arabs are ethnic, linguistic, cultural, historical, identical, nationalist, geographical and political. The Arabs have their own customs, language, architecture, art, literature, music, dance, media, cuisine, dress, society, sports, the total number of Arabs are an estimated 450 million. This makes them the second largest ethnic group after the Han Chinese. Arabs are a group in terms of religious affiliations and practices. In the pre-Islamic era, most Arabs followed polytheistic religions, some tribes had adopted Christianity or Judaism, and a few individuals, the hanifs, apparently observed monotheism. Today, Arabs are mainly adherents of Islam, with sizable Christian minorities, Arab Muslims primarily belong to the Sunni, Shiite, Ibadi, Alawite, Druze and Ismaili denominations. Arab Christians generally follow one of the Eastern Christian Churches, such as the Maronite, Coptic Orthodox, Greek Orthodox, Greek Catholic, or Chaldean churches. Listed among the booty captured by the army of king Shalmaneser III of Assyria in the Battle of Qarqar are 1000 camels of Gi-in-di-buu the ar-ba-a-a or Gindibu belonging to the Arab
5.
Maqama
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Maqāmah are an Arabic prosimetric literary genre which alternates the Arabic rhymed prose known as Saj‘ with intervals of poetry in which rhetorical extravagance is conspicuous. The origins of the usage of the word as a genre-label are debated, but according to Amina Shah, The meaning of the word Makamat is derived from a place where one stands upright and hence the place where one is at any time. Next it is used metonymically to denote the persons assembled at any place and finally, by another translation, the discourses delivered or conversations held in any such assembly. According to J. Hämeen-Anttila, the typical maqāmāt can be schematized into “isnād”, “general introduction, ” “link, ” “episode proper, ” “recognition scene, ” “envoi, ” and “finale. ”That is followed by a formula, like “one day, when I. ”, “and so on till. ”, leading to the “episode proper. ”Then through the eyes of ʿĪsā we are introduced to an anonymous trickster who shows remarkable erudition and eloquence. In many of the Hamadhānian maqāmāt, an envoi marks the end of the story, there is still much scholarly debate concerning the origins of the genre of the maqāma. However, the tenth-century author Badī al-Zaman al-Hamadhāni is wisely said to have invented the form with his Maqamat Badi az-Zaman al-Hamadhani and this was extended by al-Hariri of Basra in the next century. Both authors maqāmāt center on trickster figures whose wanderings and exploits in speaking to assemblies of the powerful are conveyed by a narrator, despite this serial abuse, the narrator-dupe character continues to seek out the trickster, fascinated by his rhetorical flow. Manuscripts of al-Harīrīs Maqāmāt, anecdotes of a roguish wanderer Abu Zayd from Saruj, were illustrated with miniatures. A noted illustrator was Yahya ibn Mahmud al-Wasiti, the maqāma genre was also cultivated in Hebrew in Spain between beginning with Yehūda al-Ḥarīzīs translation of al-Harīrīs maqāmāt into Hebrew, which he titled maḥberōt ītīēl. Two years later, he composed his own maḥbārōt, titled Sēfer Taḥkemōnī, later Hebrew maqāmāt made more significant departures, structurally and stylistically, from the classical Arabic maqāmāt of al-Hamadhānī and al-Harīrī. The Maqamat of Badi al-zaman al-hamadhani, Translated from the Arabic with an Introduction, al-Hariri, Abu Muhammad al-Qasim ibn Ali. Beirut, Dar Sadr, Dar Beirut,1970, al-Saraqusti, Abu l-Tahir Muhammad ibn Yusuf. Alexandria, al-Hayat al-Misriyat al-Ammah li-l-Kitab,2001, alexandria, al-Haya al-Misriyya al-amma lil-Kitab,1982. Las sesiones del Zaragocí, Relatos picarescos, la maqama de la fiesta de Ibn al-Murabi al-Azdi. Etudes dOrientalisme Dedieés a la mémoire de Lévi-Provençal, maría Rosa Menocal, Michael Sells and Raymond P. Scheindlin. Maqama, A History of a Genre, Hamilton, Michelle M. Poetry and Desire, Sexual and Cultural Temptation in the Hebrew Maqama Tradition. Wine, Women and Song, Hebrew and Arabic Literature of Medieval Iberia, Michelle M. Hamilton, Sarah J. Portnoy and David A. Wacks. Estudios de Literature Medieval Number,2, Juan de la Cuesta, Newark, minhat Yehudah, Ezrat ha-nashim ve-En mishpat
6.
Baghdad
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Baghdad is the capital of the Republic of Iraq. The population of Baghdad, as of 2016, is approximately 8,765,000 making it the largest city in Iraq, the second largest city in the Arab world, and the second largest city in Western Asia. Located along the Tigris River, the city was founded in the 8th century, within a short time of its inception, Baghdad evolved into a significant cultural, commercial, and intellectual center for the Islamic world. This, in addition to housing several key institutions, garnered the city a worldwide reputation as the Centre of Learning. Throughout the High Middle Ages, Baghdad was considered to be the largest city in the world with a population of 1,200,000 people. The city was destroyed at the hands of the Mongol Empire in 1258, resulting in a decline that would linger through many centuries due to frequent plagues. With the recognition of Iraq as an independent state in 1938, in contemporary times, the city has often faced severe infrastructural damage, most recently due to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and the subsequent Iraq War that lasted until December 2011. In recent years, the city has been subjected to insurgency attacks. As of 2012, Baghdad was listed as one of the least hospitable places in the world to live, the site where the city of Baghdad developed has been populated for millennia. By the 8th century AD, several villages had developed there, including a Persian hamlet called Baghdad, the name is of Indo-European origin and a Middle Persian compound of Bagh god and dād given by, translating to Bestowed by God or Gods gift. In Old Persian the first element can be traced to boghu and is related to Slavic bog god, a similar term in Middle Persian is the name Mithradāt, known in English by its Hellenistic form Mithridates, meaning gift of Mithra. There are a number of locations in the wider region whose names are compounds of the word bagh, including Baghlan. The name of the town Baghdati in Georgia shares the same etymological origins, when the Abbasid caliph, al-Mansur, founded a completely new city for his capital, he chose the name Madinat al-Salaam or City of Peace. This was the name on coins, weights, and other official usage. By the 11th century, Baghdad became almost the exclusive name for the world-renowned metropolis, after the fall of the Umayyads, the first Muslim dynasty, the victorious Abbasid rulers wanted their own capital whence they could rule. They chose a site north of the Sassanid capital of Ctesiphon, on 30 July 762, the caliph Al-Mansur commissioned the construction of the city, mansur believed that Baghdad was the perfect city to be the capital of the Islamic empire under the Abbasids. Mansur loved the site so much he is quoted saying, This is indeed the city that I am to found, where I am to live, and where my descendants will reign afterward. The citys growth was helped by its excellent location, based on at least two factors, it had control over strategic and trading routes along the Tigris, the abundance of water in a dry climate
7.
Arabic literature
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Arabic literature is the writing, both prose and poetry, produced by writers in the Arabic language. The Arabic word used for literature is Adab, which is derived from a meaning of etiquette, Arabic literature emerged in the 5th century with only fragments of the written language appearing before then. The Quran, widely regarded by people as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language, would have the greatest lasting effect on Arabic culture and its literature. Arabic literature flourished during the Islamic Golden Age, but has remained vibrant to the present day, with poets, the Quran had a significant influence on the Arab language. The language used in it is called classical Arabic, and while modern Arabic is very similar and it contains injunctions, narratives, homilies, parables, direct addresses from God, instructions and even comments on itself on how it will be received and understood. It is also, paradoxically, admired for its layers of metaphor as well as its clarity, the word Quran means recitation, and in early times the text was transmitted orally. The first attempt at a written version was during the reign of the third Rightly Guided Caliph. Although it contains elements of both prose and poetry, and therefore is closest to Saj or rhymed prose, the Quran is regarded as entirely apart from these classifications, the text is believed to be divine revelation and is seen by Muslims as being eternal or uncreated. This leads to the doctrine of ijaz or inimitability of the Quran which implies that nobody can copy the works style, say, Bring you then ten chapters like unto it, and call whomsoever you can, other than God, if you speak the truth. This doctrine of ijaz possibly had a limiting effect on Arabic literature. And as to the poets, those who go astray follow them Do you not see that they wander about bewildered in every valley and this may have exerted dominance over the pre-Islamic poets of the 6th century whose popularity may have vied with the Quran amongst the people. There were a lack of significant poets until the 8th century. One notable exception was Hassan ibn Thabit who wrote poems in praise of Muhammad and was known as the prophets poet, just as the Bible has held an important place in the literature of other languages, The Quran is important to Arabic. It is the source of ideas, allusions and quotes. Aside from the Quran the hadith or tradition of what Muhammed is supposed to have said, the entire body of these acts and words are called sunnah or way and the ones regarded as sahih or genuine of them are collected into hadith. Some of the most significant collections of hadith include those by Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj, the research into the life and times of Muhammad, and determining the genuine parts of the sunnah, was an important early reason for scholarship in or about the Arabic language. Muhammad also inspired the first Arabic biographies, known as al-sirah al-nabawiyyah, the earliest was by Wahb ibn Munabbih, whilst covering the life of the prophet they also told of the battles and events of early Islam and have numerous digressions on older biblical traditions. Some of the earliest work studying the Arabic language was started in the name of Islam, tradition has it that the caliph Ali, after reading a copy of Quran with errors in it, asked Abu al-Aswad al-Duali to write a work codifying Arabic grammar
8.
Culture of Iraq
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Iraq has one of the worlds oldest cultural histories. Iraq is where the Ancient Mesopotamian civilizations were, whose legacy went on to influence, culturally, Iraq has a very rich heritage. The country is known for its poets and its painters and sculptors are among the best in the Arab world, Iraq is known for producing fine handicrafts, including rugs and carpets. Unlike many Arab countries, Iraq embraces and celebrates the achievements of its past in pre-Islamic times, what is now Iraq was once the Cradle of Civilization in Ancient Mesopotamia and the culture of Sumer, where writing and the wheel were invented. In the 8th and 9th centuries, the Islamic Abbasid Caliphs presided over what was one of the worlds richest civilizations. While Iraqs first film took place in 1909, cinema was not truly regarded as a cultural activity or pastime until the 1920s. The first cinemas, like the famous al-Zawra cinema on Baghdads bustling thoroughfare al-Rashid, in the 1940s under the rule of King Faisal II of Iraq, a real Iraqi cinema began. Supported by British and French financiers, movie production companies established themselves in Baghdad, the Baghdad Studio was established in 1948, but soon came apart when tensions between the Arab and Jewish founders flared up. For the most part, the product was purely commercial, fluffy romances with plenty of singing and dancing often set in small villages, the World of Arts studio, which was founded by actors, reached for more serious fare. In 1955, they produced Haidar Al-Omars Fitna wa Hassan, an Iraqi retelling of Romeo and Juliet, but for the most part, the strong-fist rule of the state discouraged any socially relevant films. The 1968 revolution that put the Baath party in power further solidified the control of film material. Saddam Husseins ascension to power in 1979 pushed the Iraqi cinema in a different direction. The drain on resources from the 1980 Iraq-Iran war brought film production to a near halt. The few films put into production were mainly intent on glorifying a mythic Iraqi history or celebrating Husseins rule, in 1981, the government commissioned Egyptian filmmaker Salah Abouseif to make Al-Qadisiya, a period epic recounting the triumph of the Arabs over the Persians in 636 AD. Likewise Mohamed Shukri Jameels melodramatic The Great Question cast British actor Oliver Reed as the vicious Lt-Col Gerard Leachman who is killed in the 1920 Iraqi revolution. Interestingly the film was edited and partially directed by Terence Young, hussein is played by Saddam Kamel, a cousin and son-in-law of Husseins, who eventually ran afoul of the dictator and was murdered in 1996. In the late 1970s, a period of economic upturn, prominent writers in Iraq were provided with an apartment and car by Saddam Husseins government, in exchange, literature was expected to express and galvanise support for the ruling Baath Party. The Iran–Iraq War fuelled a demand for patriotic literature, but also pushed a number of writers into opting for exile
