Word: caliphs
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Christian domination over the Holy City ended three centuries later; in A.D. 638, the troops of the Byzantine Emperor surrendered after an onslaught to the Moslem cavalry of the Caliph Omar. In memory of Mohammed's heavenly visit, the victorious Moslems built the Dome of the Rock over the site of the Old Temple. More often than not, they tolerantly allowed Christians and Jews free access to the shrines of the city. In 1095, however, inspired by rumors of Islamic persecution of pilgrims, Pope Urban II proclaimed a holy crusade to reconquer Jerusalem for Christ. Four years later, mail...
...Arabs' empire failed because they lacked the skill of political synthesis. In conquered territory, Arab rulers hewed to the Koran and tended to let the conquered govern themselves. Mohammed designated no successor (caliph); his squabbling heirs split Islam into rival sects. For a time, independent Moslem states retained Mohammed's vigor. While Europe slept, great Arab universities flourished in Cordova, Baghdad and Cairo; in Spain, the Arab philosopher Averroes revitalized Aristotle. After the death of the Caliph Harun al-Rashid in 809, the Baghdad caliphate plunged into civil war; in succeeding centuries, marauding Mongols poured into the Arab...
...intricate metalwork and cabinetry. The turn-of-the-century architect, Antoni Gaudi, resorted in his unfinished Church of the Holy Family in Barcelona to restless linear rhythms that recall the Moorish Alhambra. Andalusian laments still recall an Arab origin, and even the haunting cries of flamenco suit a caliph better than a king...
...Egypt's powerful Moslem Brotherhood, an organization of religious fanatics who want to ban such modern immoralities as pictures of the human form, return to the laws of the Koran. Their aim: to set up a sort of Prophet's Republic, whose President would be declared caliph of the Moslem world...
...early days of Islam, when conquering Arab armies swept across Christian Syria, mosque making consisted of seizing Christian churches, closing their western entrances, opening new doors to the north, and praying facing south across the aisles toward Mecca. A few decades later, Moslem caliphs began to raise the first authentic mosques, blending Byzantine and Persian architecture, and in 691 A.D. the Caliph of Damascus, Abdul Malik Ibn Marwan, completed the great shrine called the Dome of the Rock...