Hinojo, Nicole Macazaga, Florencia Mastrolorenzo, Marco M1 “A”

Hinojo, NicoleMacazaga, Florencia

Mastrolorenzo, MarcoM1 “A”

Arabia and the Arabs

Mohammed

The Faith of Islam The Spread of Islam

Government and Economy

The Turks

End

The Penninsula of Arabia is mostly a desert with very little vegetation. In the past, it could only support nomadic herds men with their flocks of sheep.

These nomadic arabs are called Bedouins and they were organised in tribes whose leader has absolute power and was called the “sheik”.

In some coastal areas of Arabia there

was more vegetation and it could

support more people there, a lot of

towns grew up and many of them

became important trade centers.

Different sort of goods came form Africa and Asia. The cities of Jidda (it was also a port) and Mecca. From there the caravans of traders move from their locations to the cities to sell and buy goods.

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Mohammed was born in Mecca about 570, orphaned at an easly age and spent his youth in poverty. He had little formal education and was a good caravan trader.

While he was still a young man, he began to think more about problems of religion and conduct. By the time the Arabs workshipped many gods, Mohammed became convinced that there was only one God, whom he called Allah.

At the age of forty, he had a great religious experience. He believed the archangel Gabriel had ordered him to bring the Arabs religious purity, but he did not claim to have supernatural powers. He, like Moses, considered himself a prophet and teacher.

But his preaching met bitter opposition with the rulers of Mecca. Because of this, he took his little group of followers to a close town called Medina. This event is known as the Hegira, which means “flight”. It was such an important event in his life, that this date, 622, became the first year on the Muslim calendar.In Medina, he made many converts, and became the leader of these people. In a few years, he was made the head of an army and he captured Mecca. Thanks to toleration, wise policies and force, he coverted the Bedouin tribes to his religion. When he died in 632, almost all Arabia had accepted Allah.Menu

The name that Mohammed gave to the new religion was “Islam” that means “to obey God” and “to be submissed to God”.

The people who have the belief of Islam is called Muslim.

The Holy Book for the muslims is the Corán that

means “book of recital”. In this book there are

teachings that come from the Bible and from

Mohammed himself. It is written in Arab so that

everyone could understand the message.

The Muslim people had four main obligations:

1)They have to pray to God five times a day facing the direction of La Mecca.

2) They must make a pilgrimage to Mecca once in his lifetime.

3) They must give alms to the needy.

4) They must fast from sunrise to sunset during the month of Ramadan. The month of Ramadan is considered the

month when Mohammed had his spiritual vision.

Mohammed considered the values of humility, tolerance, obedience, generosity and justice as the most important once that all Muslims should have.

A Muslim man was allowed to have up to 4 wives only if he could offer them the same material aspects.

The Muslim religion does not allow to consume alcohol.

The Muslims accepted the concepts of Holy War: in the case the community felt threatened by enemies, they were allowed to declaire war and that God would protect them.

It is not allowed in this religion to have representations or images of God or Mohammed.

There are not priests, no nuns, no monks, no pope in the Muslim religion. There is only a “Mullah” that is a Muslim person that guides the players. The most important religious building for the Islamic people is the Mosque (Mezquita).

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When Mohammed died in 632 AD his successors expanded the new religion in all Arabia, northern part of Africa and in the Byzantine Empire.

At the other end of the Mediterranean Sea the Muslims could enter into Europe through the straight of Gibraltar. In 711 AD the Muslim general called Tarik defeated the King of the Visigoths and since then the Arab culture and people influenced greatly in the Spanish territory.

The Muslims who live in Spain are called Moors.

By 732 AD the Moors who were trying to expand over France were defeated by the father of Charles the Great.

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At the head of the Government there was the supreme civil, military and religious leader of all the Islamic Empire. He was called Caliph.The territory of the Empire was organised into provinces.Later the Empire was divided into three parts. Each part was ruled by a Caliph: one was in Bagdad, another in Cairo (Egypt), and the last one was in Cordova (Spain).

Trade was the most important activity for the Islamic Empire. There was a big variety of goods for trading.

For the Arabs, there was development of agriculture everywhere.

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Even though they were divided politically, the Moslem remained united in one great civilization. At first, the Arabs were backward people but still intelligent. If they formed

ideas, customs and institutions, they were always willing to keep the best ones.

The Moslem culture was very advanced. Scientists wrote books on many subjects their geographers and navigators were the finest in the world.

They learned paper – making from Chinesse.

Moslems had a lot of medical knowledge. In the 900’s at Bagdad, a Moslem physician called Rhazes wrote about small pox, surgey diseases of the eye

and measles.

They were also excellent mathematicians. Two of the contributions to maths from the Arabs were:1)They perfected algebra as a science.2)The introduction to the Western world of Arabic numerals.

The great era of the Moslem culture lasted from 700 to 1000

AD. After that, men who believed in “following the letter of the

Koran” became powerful in the Moslem world. They could have free thoughts and foreign ideas. But invasions from the Turks and

Mongols bowered the cultural level of the Moslems. Since Spain was more independent, Moslem culture flourished longer there.

There were two ways in which the Europeans come into contact with the Moslem culture. One was through Spain and the other through Crusades.

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Before the 1300, the Arabs had a peaceful relationship with most of the people who lived in their Empire.

But at the beginning of the 1300, a new group of Turks called Ottoman invaded succesfully most of the Islamic territories.

Then Turks invaded a place that was very close to the capital of the Byzantine Empire (Constantinople).

By 1453 they attacked Constantinople itself and made it the capital of the new Ottoman Empire. Before that the Emperor of the Byzantine Empire asked for help to the Christian Kingdoms of

Europe to expellied “the enemies of Christianity”. This military expeditions that went to Palestain and Eastern Asia are called “The Crusades”.

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