Early Muslim conquests

The early Muslim conquests (Arabic: ‫اﻟﻔﺘﻮﺣﺎت‬

Early Muslim conquests
‫اﻹﺳﻼﻣﻴﺔ‬, al-Futūḥāt al-Islāmiyya), also referred to as
the Arab conquests[4] and early Islamic conquests[5]
began with the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the 7th
century. He established a new unified polity in the
Arabian Peninsula which under the subsequent Rashidun
and Umayyad Caliphates saw a century of rapid
expansion.

The resulting empire stretched from the borders of China

and the Indian subcontinent, across Central Asia, the Expansion from 622–750, with modern borders overlaid
Middle East, North Africa, and parts of Europe (Sicily Date 622–750
and the Iberian Peninsula to the Pyrenees). Edward Location Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, North
Gibbon writes in The History of the Decline and Fall of Africa, Iberia, Gaul, Transoxania, Sindh,
the Roman Empire: Kabulistan, Zamindawar, Zabulistan,
Khorasan, Tukharistan, Sistan and
Under the last of the Umayyads, the Caucasus
Arabian empire extended two hundred
Territorial Islamic expansion:
days journey from east to west, from the
changes
confines of Tartary and India to the shores
under Muhammad, 622–632
of the Atlantic Ocean ... We should vainly
seek the indissoluble union and easy
under Rashidun caliphs, 632–661
obedience that pervaded the government under Umayyad caliphs, 661–750
of Augustus and the Antonines; but the
Belligerents
progress of Islam diffused over this ample
See list See list
space a general resemblance of manners
and opinions. The language and laws of Rashidun Caliphate Sasanian Empire
the Quran were studied with equal Umayyad Caliphate Lakhmids
devotion at Samarcand and Seville: the (after Rashidun period) Byzantine Empire
Moor and the Indian embraced as Abbasid Caliphate Ghassanids
countrymen and brothers in the (after Umayyad period)
Bulgarian Empire
pilgrimage of Mecca; and the Arabian
language was adopted as the popular Kingdom of Makuria
idiom in all the provinces to the westward Dabuyid dynasty
of the Tigris. Khazar Khaganate
Turgesh Khaganate
The Muslim conquests brought about the collapse of the Göktürk Khaganate
Sassanid Empire and a great territorial loss for the Sogdian rebel
Byzantine Empire. The reasons for the Muslim success
Kurdish tribes
are hard to reconstruct in hindsight, primarily because
only fragmentary sources from the period have survived.
Berbers
Fred McGraw Donner suggests that formation of a state Visigoths
in the Arabian peninsula and ideological (i.e., religious) Arab Christians
coherence and mobilization was a primary reason why Kingdom of the Franks
the Muslim armies in the space of a hundred years were
Kingdom of the Lombards
able to establish the largest pre-modern empire until that
time. The estimates for the size of the Islamic Caliphate
Duchy of Aquitaine
suggest it was more than thirteen million square Tang dynasty
kilometers (five million square miles).[6] Most historians Pratihara Empire
agree as well that the Sassanid Persian and Byzantine Chalukya dynasty
Roman empires were militarily and economically
Brahmin dynasty of Sindh
exhausted from decades of fighting one another.[7]
Kabul Shahi[1]
It has been suggested that some Jews and Christians in Zunbils[1]
the Sassanid Empire and Jews and Monophysites in Syria
Hepthalite principalities[2]
were dissatisfied and welcomed the Muslim forces,
largely because of religious conflict in both empires.[8] It Commanders and leaders
has also been suggested that later Syriac Christians See list See list
reinterpreted the events of the conquest to serve a Muhammed Yazdegerd III
political or religious interest.[9] At other times, such as in Abu Bakr Rostam Farrokhzād †
the Battle of Firaz, Arab Christians allied themselves
Umar I Mahbuzan
with the Persians and Byzantines against the
invaders.[10][11] In the case of Byzantine Egypt, Palestine
Khalid ibn Walid Huzail ibn Imran
and Syria, these lands had been reclaimed from the Muthana ibn Haris Hormuz
Persians only a few years before. Abu Ubaid Anoshagan
Saad ibn Abi Waqqas Andarzaghar
Tariq ibn Ziyad Bāhman †
Contents Muhammad bin Qasim Pirouzan
Background Zuhra ibn Al-Hawiyya Jaban
Forces Hashim ibn Uthba Mihran
Muslim
Qa'qa ibn Amr Hormuzan (POW)
Roman
Persian Abu Musa Ashaari Mardan Shah
Ethiopian Ammar ibn Yasir Bahram
Berber Nouman ibn Muqarrin Isandi
Turks
Visigoths
Hudheifa ibn Al Yaman Karinz ibn Karianz
Franks Mugheera ibn Shuba Wahman Mardanshah
Military campaigns Usman ibn Abi al-Aas Jalinus †
Conquest of the Levant: 634–641
Asim ibn Amr Mihran-i Bahram-i Razi
Conquest of Egypt: 639–642
The War at Sea Ahnaf ibn Qais Beerzan †
Conquest of Mesopotamia and Persia: Abdullah ibn Aamir Farrukhzad
633–651
Abu Ubaidah ibn al-Jarrah Heraclius
The end of the Rashidun conquests
Explanations of success of the early Yazid ibn Abu Sufyan Jabalah Ibn Al-Aiham
conquests
Shurahbil ibn Hassana Theodore Trithyrius
Conquest of Sindh: 711–714
Conquest of the Maghreb: 647–742 Al-Samh ibn Malik al- Vahan
Conquest of Hispania and Septimania: Khawlani † Vardan
711–721 Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqi † Thomas
 Conquest of Transoxiana: 673–751 Yusuf ibn 'Abd al-Rahman Buccinator
Modern-day Afghanistan al-Fihri Gregory
Other campaigns and end of early
conquests Amr ibn al-Aas Ardo †
Aftermath Zubair ibn al-Awam Odo of Aquitaine
Significance Miqdad bin Al-Aswad Charles Martel
Socio-political developments
Ubaida bin As-Samit Childebrand
Conversions and tax reform
Policy toward non-Muslims Kharija bin Huzafa Liutprand
See also Abdallah ibn Sa'ad Pépin le Bref
References Musa bin Nusayr Theodorus
Citations
Hasan ibn al-Nu'man Aretion
Sources
Abd ar-Rahman ibn Cyrus of Alexandria
Rabiah
Gregory the Patrician †
Background Maslamah ibn Abd al-Malik
Dihya
al-Jarrah ibn Abdallah al-
Arabia was a region that hosted a number of different Kusaila
Hakami †
cultures, some urban and others nomadic Bedouin.[12] John the Patrician
Marwan ibn Muhammad
Arabian society was divided along tribal and clan lines Barjik †
with the most important divisions being between the Harun al-Rashid
Farrukhan the Great
"southern" and "northern" tribal associations.[13] Both the Al-Rabi' ibn Yunus
Staurakios
Roman and Persian empires competed for influence in Qutayba ibn Muslim
Arabia by sponsoring clients, and in turn Arabian tribes Michael Lachanodrakon
Muslim ibn Sa'id †
sought the patronage of the two rival empires to bolster Tatzates
Al-Kharashi
their own ambitions.[13] The Lakhmid kingdom which Anthony the Domestic
covered parts of what is now southern Iraq and northern Junayd ibn Abd al-Rahman
Suluk Khagan
Saudi Arabia was a client of Persia, and in 602 the al-Murri
Kül Chor
Persians deposed the Lakhmids to take over the defense Sawra ibn al-Hurr al-Abani
of the southern frontier themselves.[14] This left the Gurek
Sa'id ibn Amr al-Harashi
Persians exposed and over-extended, helping to set the
Asad ibn Abd Allah al- al-Harith ibn Surayj
stage for the collapse of Persia later that century.[15] Kapagan Khan[3]
Qasri
Southern Arabia, especially what is now Yemen, had for
Nasr ibn Sayyar Bilge Qaghan
thousands of years been a wealthy region that had been a
Kul Tigin
center of the spice trade.[15] Yemen had been at the center
of an international trading network linking Eurasia to Gao Xianzhi
Africa and Yemen had been visited by merchants from Bappa Rawal
East Africa, Europe, the Middle East, India and even Nagabhata I
from as far away as China.[15] In turn, the Yemeni were
Vikramaditya II
great sailors, travelling up the Red Sea to Egypt and
Raja Dahir
across the Indian Ocean to India and down the east
African coast.[15] Inland, the valleys of Yemen had been Nezak Tarkhan[2]
cultivated by a system of irrigation that had been set back
when the Marib Dam was destroyed by an earthquake in about 450 AD.[15] Frankincense and myrrh had been greatly valued in
the Mediterranean region, being used in religious ceremonies. However, the conversion of the Mediterranean world to
Christianity had significantly reduced the demand for these commodities, causing a major economic slump in southern Arabia
which helped to create the impression that Arabia was a backward region.[15]
Little is known of the pre-Islamic religions of Arabia, but it is
known that the Arabs worshiped a number of gods such as al-Lat,
Manat, al-Uzza and Hubal, with the most important being Allah
(God).[16] There were also Jewish and Christian communities in
Arabia and aspects of Arab religion reflected their influence.[16]
Pilgrimage was a major part of Arabian paganism, and one of the
most important pilgrimage sites was Mecca, which housed the
Kaaba, considered an especially holy place to visit.[16]
Mohammad, a merchant of Mecca, started to have visions in Byzantine and Sasanian Empires in 600 AD

which he claimed that the Archangel Gabriel had told him that he
was the last of the prophets continuing the work of Jesus Christ
and the prophets of Tanakh.[17] After coming into conflict with the elite of Mecca, Mohammad fled to the city of Yathrib, which
was renamed Medina.[17] At Yathrib, Mohammad founded the first Islamic state and by 630 conquered Mecca.[17]

The prolonged and escalating Byzantine–Sassanid wars of the 6th and 7th
centuries and the recurring outbreaks of bubonic plague (Plague of Justinian)
left both empires exhausted and weakened in the face of the sudden
emergence and expansion of the Arabs. The last of these wars ended with
victory for the Byzantines: Emperor Heraclius regained all lost territories,
and restored the True Cross to Jerusalem in 629.[18] The war against
Zoroastrian Persia, whose people worshiped the fire god Ahura Mazda, had
been portrayed by Heraclius as a holy war in defense of the Christian faith
and the Wood of the Holy Cross, as splinters of wood said to be from the
True Cross were known, had been used to inspire Christian fighting zeal.[19]
The idea of a holy war against the "fire worshipers", as the Christians called
the Zoroastrians, had aroused much enthusiasm, leading to an all-out effort Arab conquests of the Sassanid Empire
and Syria 620-630
to defeat the Persians.[19]

Nevertheless, neither empire was given any chance to recover, as within a

few years they were overrun by the advances of the Arabs (newly united by Islam), which, according to Howard-Johnston, "can
only be likened to a human tsunami".[20][21] According to George Liska, the "unnecessarily prolonged Byzantine–Persian conflict
opened the way for Islam".[22]

In late 620s Muhammad had already managed to conquer and unify much of Arabia under Muslim rule, and it was under his
leadership that the first Muslim-Byzantine skirmishes took place in response to Byzantine incursions. Just a few months after
Heraclius and the Persian general Shahrbaraz agreed on terms for the withdrawal of Persian troops from occupied Byzantine
eastern provinces in 629, Arab and Byzantine troops confronted each other at the Battle of Mu'tah as a result of Byzantine vassals
murdering a Muslim emissary.[23] Muhammad died in 632 and was succeeded by Abu Bakr, the first Caliph with undisputed
control of the entire Arab peninsula after the successful Ridda Wars, which resulted in the consolidation of a powerful Muslim
state throughout the peninsula.[24]

Forces

Muslim
In Arabia, swords from India were greatly esteemed as being made of the finest steel, and were the favorite weapons of the
Mujahideen.[25] The Arab sword known as the sayfy closely resembled the Roman gladius.[17] Swords and spears were the major
weapons of the Muslims and armour was either mail or leather.[25] In northern Arabia, Roman influence predominated, in eastern
Arabia, Persian influence predominated and in Yemen, Indian influence was felt.[25] As the caliphate spread, the Muslims were
influenced by the peoples they conquered--the Turks in Central Asia, the Persians, and the Romans in Syria.[26] The Bedouin
tribes of Arabia favored archery, though, contrary to popular belief, Bedouin archers usually fought on foot instead of
horseback.[27] The Arabs usually fought defensive battles with their archers placed on both flanks.[28] By the Umayyad period,
the caliphate had a standing army, including the elite Ahl al-Sham ("people of Syria"), raised from the Arabs who settled in
Syria.[29] The caliphate was divided into a number of jund, or regional armies, stationed in the provinces being made of mostly
Arab tribes who were paid monthly by the Diwan al-Jaysh (War Ministry).[29]

Roman
The infantry of the Roman Army continued to be recruited from within the empire, but much of the cavalry were either recruited
from "martial" peoples in the Balkans or in Asia Minor or alternatively were Germanic mercenaries.[30] Most of the Roman
troops in Syria were indigenae (local) and it seems that at the time of the Muslim conquest, the Roman forces in Syria were
Arabs.[31] In response to the loss of Syria, the Romans developed the phylarch system of using Armenian and Christian Arab
auxiliaries living on the frontier to provide a "shield" to counter raiding by the Muslims into the empire.[32] Overall, the Roman
Army remained a small, but professional force of foederati.[33] Unlike the foederati who were sent where they were needed, the
stradioti lived in the frontier provinces.[34] The most famous of these units was the Varangian Guard made up of Vikings.

Persian
During the last decades of the Sassanian empire, the frequent use of royal titles by Persian governors in Central Asia, especially
in what is now Afghanistan, indicates a weakening of the power of the Shahinshah (King of Kings), suggesting the empire was
already breaking down at the time of the Muslim conquest.[35] Persian society was rigidly divided into castes with the nobility
being of supposed "Aryan" descent, and this division of Persian society along caste lines was reflected in the military.[35] The
azatan aristocracy provided the cavalry, the paighan infantry came from the peasantry and most of the greater Persian nobility
had slave soldiers, this last being based on the Persian example.[35] Much of the Persian army consisted of tribal mercenaries
recruited from the plains south of the Caspian Sea and from what is now Afghanistan.[36] The Persian tactics were cavalry based
with the Persian forces usually divided into a center, based upon a hill, and two wings of cavalry on either side.[37]

Ethiopian
Little is known about the military forces of the Christian state of Ethiopia other than that they were divided into sarawit
professional troops and the ehzab auxiliaries.[37] The Ethiopians made much use of camels and elephants.[37]

Berber
The Berber peoples of North Africa had often served as a federates (auxiliaries) to the Roman Army.[38] The Berber forces were
based around the horse and camel, but seemed to have hampered by a lack of weapons or protection with both Roman and Arab
sources mentioning the Berbers lacked armour and helmets.[38] The Berbers went to war with their entire communities and the
presence of women and children both slowed down the Berber armies and tied down Berber tribesmen who tried to protect their
families.[38]

Turks
The British historian David Nicolle called the Turkish peoples of Central Asia the "most formidable foes" faced by the
Muslims.[39] The Jewish Turkish Khazar khanate, based in what is now southern Russia and Ukraine, had a powerful heavy
cavalry.[39] The Turkish heartland of Central Asia was divided into five khanates whose khans variously recognized the shahs of
Iran or the emperors of China as their overlords.[40] Turkish society was feudal with the khans only being pater primus among
the aristocracy of dihquans who lived in castles in the countryside, with the rest of Turkish forces being divided into kadivar
(farmers), khidmatgar (servants) and atbai (clients).[40] The heavily armored Turkish cavalry were to play a great role in
influencing subsequent Muslim tactics and weapons; the Turks, who were mostly Buddhists at the time of the Islamic conquest,
were converted to Islam and, ironically, the Turks came to be regarded as the foremost Muslim warriors, to the extent of replacing
the Arabs as the dominant peoples in the Dar-al-Islam (House of Islam).[41]

Visigoths
During the migration period, the Germanic Visigoths had traveled from their homeland north of the Danube to settle in the
Roman province of Hispania, creating a kingdom upon the wreckage of the Western Roman empire.[42] The Visigothic state in
Iberia was based around forces raised by the nobility whom the king could call out in the event of war.[43] The king had his
gardingi and fideles loyal to himself while the nobility had their bucellarii.[43] The Visigoths favored cavalry with their favorite
tactics being to repeatedly charge a foe combined with feigned retreats.[43] The Muslim conquest of most of Iberia in less than a
decade does suggest serious deficiencies with the Visigothic kingdom, though the limited sources make it difficult to discern the
precise reasons for the collapse of the Visigoths.[43]

Franks
Another Germanic people who founded a state upon the ruins of the Western Roman empire were the Franks who settled in Gaul,
which came to be known afterwards as France.[43] Like the Visigoths, the Frankish cavalry played a "significant part" in their
wars.[43] The Frankish kings expected all of their male subjects to perform three months of military service every year, and all
serving under the king's banner were paid a regular salary.[43] Those called up for service had to provide their own weapons and
horses, which contributed to the "militarisation of Frankish society".[43] At least part of the reason for the victories of Charles
Martel was he could call up a force of experienced warriors when faced with Muslim raids.[43]

Military campaigns

Conquest of the Levant: 634–641

The province of Syria was the first to be wrested from Byzantine control. Arab-Muslim raids that followed the Ridda wars
prompted the Byzantines to send a major expedition into southern Palestine, which was defeated by the Arab forces under
command of Khalid ibn al-Walid at the Battle of Ajnadayn (634).[44] Ibn al-Walid, had converted to Islam around 627, becoming
one of Mohammad's most successful generals.[45] Ibn al-Walid had been fighting in Iraq against the Persians when he led his
force on a trek across the deserts to Syria to attack the Romans from the rear.[46] In the "Battle of the Mud" fought outside of
Pella in the Jordan river valley in January 635 the Arabs won another victory.[47] After a siege of six months the Arabs took
Damascus, but Emperor Heraclius later retook it.[47] At the battle of Yarmuk between 16–20 August 636, the Arabs were
victorious, defeating Heraclius.[48] Ibn al-Walid appears to have been the "real military leader" at Yarmuk "under the nominal
command of others".[46] Syria was ordered to be abandoned to the Muslims with Heraclius reportedly saying: "Peace be with you
Syria; what a beautiful land you will be for your enemy".[48] On the heels of their victory, the Arab armies took Damascus again
in 636, with Baalbek, Homs, and Hama to follow soon afterwards.[44] However, other fortified towns continued to resist despite
the rout of the imperial army and had to be conquered individually.[44] Jerusalem fell in 638, Caesarea in 640, while others held
out until 641.[44]

After a two-year siege, the garrison of Jerusalem surrendered rather than starve to death; under the terms of the surrender Caliph
Umar promised to tolerate the Christians of Jerusalem and not to turn churches into mosques.[49] True to his word, the Caliph
Umar allowed the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to remain, with the caliph praying on a prayer rug outside of the church.[49] The
loss to the Muslims of Jerusalem, the holiest city to Christians, proved to be the
source of much resentment in Christendom. The city of Caesarea Maritima
continued to withstand the Muslim siege--as it could be supplied by sea--until it
was taken by assault in 640.[49]

In the mountains of Asia Minor, the Muslims enjoyed less success, with the
Romans adopting the tactic of "shadowing warfare"--refusing to give battle to
the Muslims, while the people retreated into castles and fortified towns when the Arab campaigns in Anatolia 637–638
Muslims invaded; instead, Roman forces ambushed Muslim raiders as they
returned to Syria carrying plunder and people they had enslaved.[50] In the
frontier area where Anatolia met Syria, the Roman state evacuated the entire population and laid waste to the countryside,
creating a "no-man's land" where any invading army would find no food.[50] For decades afterwards, a guerrilla war was waged
by Christians in the hilly countryside of north-western Syria supported by the Romans.[51] At the same time, the Romans began a
policy of launching raids via sea on the coast of the caliphate with the aim of forcing the Muslims to keep at least some of their
forces to defend their coastlines, thus limiting the number of troops available for an invasion of Anatolia.[51] Unlike Syria with its
plains and deserts-which favored the offensive-the mountainous terrain of Anatolia favored the defensive and for centuries
afterwards, the line between Christian and Muslim lands ran along the border between Anatolia and Syria.[50]

Conquest of Egypt: 639–642

The Byzantine province of Egypt held strategic importance for its
grain production, naval yards, and as a base for further conquests in
Africa.[44] The Muslim general 'Amr ibn al-'As began the conquest
of the province on his own initiative in 639.[52] The majority of the
Roman forces in Egypt were locally-raised Coptic forces, intended to
serve more as a police force; since the vast majority of Egyptians
lived in the Nile river valley, surrounded on both the eastern and
The Byzantine Empire after the Arabs
western sides by desert, Egypt was felt to be a relatively secure
conquered the provinces of Syria and Egypt c.
province.[53] In December 639, al-'As entered the Sinai with a large 650
force and took Pelusium, on the edge of the Nile river valley, and
then defeated a Roman counter-attack at Bibays.[54] Contrary to
expectations, the Arabs did not head for Alexandria, the capital of Egypt, but instead for a major fortress known as Babylon
located at what is now Cairo.[53] Al-'As was planning to divide the Nile river valley in two.[54] The Arab forces won a major
victory at the Battle of Heliopolis (640), but they found it difficult to advance further because major cities in the Nile Delta were
protected by water and because al-'As lacked the machinery to break down city fortifications.[55] The Arabs laid siege to
Babylon, and its starving garrison surrendered on 9 April 641.[54] Nevertheless, the province was scarcely urbanized and the
defenders lost hope of receiving reinforcements from Constantinople when the emperor Heraclius died in 641.[56] Afterwards, the
Arabs turned north into the Nile delta and laid siege to Alexandria.[54] The last major center to fall into Arab hands was
Alexandria, which capitulated in September 642.[57] According to Hugh Kennedy, "Of all the early Muslim conquests, that of
Egypt was the swiftest and most complete. [...] Seldom in history can so massive a political change have happened so swiftly and
been so long lasting."[58] In 644, the Arabs suffered a major defeat by the Caspian Sea when an invading Muslim army was
almost wiped out by the cavalry of the Khazar Khanate, and, seeing a chance to take back Egypt, the Romans launched an
amphibious attack which took back Alexandria for a short period of time.[54] Though most of Egypt is desert, the Nile river
valley has some of the most productive and fertile farmland in the entire world, which had made Egypt the "granary" of the
Roman empire.[54] Control of Egypt meant that the caliphate could weather droughts without the fear of famine, laying the basis
for the future prosperity of the caliphate.[54]
The War at Sea
The Roman empire had traditionally dominated the Mediterranean
and the Black Sea with major naval bases at Constantinople, Acre,
Alexandria and Carthage.[54] In 652, the Arabs won their first victory
at sea off Alexandria, which was followed by the temporary Muslim
conquest of Cyprus.[54] As Yemen had been a center of maritime
trade, Yemeni sailors were brought to Alexandria to start building an
Islamic fleet for the Mediterranean.[59] The Muslim fleet was based
in Alexandria and used Acre, Tyre and Beirut as its forward Map of the main Byzantine-Muslim naval
bases.[59] The core of the fleet's sailors were Yemeni, but the operations and battles in the Mediterranean
shipwrights who built the ships were Iranian and Iraqi.[59] In the
"Battle of the Masts" off Cape Chelidonia in Anatolia in 655, the
Muslims defeated the Roman fleet in a series of boarding actions.[59] As a result, the Romans began a major expansion of their
navy, which was matched by the Arabs, leading to a naval arms race.[59] From the early 8th century onward, the Muslim fleet
would launch annual raids on the coastline on the Roman empire in Anatolia and Greece.[59]

As part of the arms race, both sides sought new technology to improve their warships. The Muslim warships had a larger
forecastle, which was used to mount a stone-throwing engine.[59] The Romans invented "Greek fire", an incendiary weapon that
led the Muslims to cover their ships with water-soaked cotton.[60] A major problem for the Muslim fleet was the shortage of
timber, which led the Muslims to seek qualitative instead of quantitative superiority by building bigger warships.[60] To save
money, the Muslim shipwrights switched from the hull-first method of building ships to the frame-first method.[60]

Conquest of Mesopotamia and Persia: 633–651

After an Arab incursion into Sasanian territories, the energetic shah (king)
Yazdgerd III, who had just ascended the Persian throne, raised an army to resist
the conquerors.[61] Many of the marzbans refused to come out to help the
shahinshah.[62] However, the Persians suffered a devastating defeat at the Battle
of al-Qadisiyyah in 636.[61] Little is known about the Battle of al-Qadisiyyah
other than it lasted for several days by the banks of the river Euphrates in what is
now Iraq and ended with the Persian force being annihilated.[63] Abolishing the
Lakhmid Arab buffer state had forced the Persians to take over the desert
defense themselves, leaving them overextended.[62]

As a result of al-Qadisiyyah, the Arab-Muslims gained control over the whole of

Iraq, including Ctesiphon, the capital city of the Sassanids.[61] The Persians
lacked sufficient forces to make use of the Zagros mountains to stop the Arabs,
having lost the prime of their army at al-Qadisiyyah.[63] The Persian forces
withdrew over the Zagros mountains and the Arab army pursued them across the
Iranian plateau, where the fate of the Sasanian empire was sealed at the Battle of
Nahavand (642).[61] The crushing Muslim victory at Nahavand is known in the
Sasanian weaponry, 7th century
Muslim world as the "Victory of Victories".[62]

After Nahavand, the Persian state collapsed with Yezdegird fleeing further east
and various marzbans bending their knees in submission to the Arabs.[63] As the conquerors slowly covered the vast distances of
Iran punctuated by hostile towns and fortresses, Yazdgerd III retreated, finally taking refuge in Khorasan, where he was
assassinated by a local satrap in 651.[61] In the aftermath of their victory over the imperial army, the Muslims still had to contend
with a collection of militarily weak but geographically inaccessible principalities of Persia.[44] It took decades to bring them all
under control of the caliphate.[44] In what is now Afghanistan--a region where the authority of the shah was always disputed--the
Muslims met fierce guerrilla resistance from the militant Buddhist tribes of the region.[64] Ironically, despite the complete
Muslim triumph over Iran as compared to the only partial defeat of the Roman empire, the Muslims borrowed far more from the
vanished Sassanian state than they ever did from the Romans.[65] However, for the Persians the defeat remained bitter. Some 400
years later, the Persian poet Ferdowsi wrote in his popular poem Shahnameh (Book of Kings):

"Damn this world, damn this time, damn this fate,

That uncivilized Arabs have come to

Make me a Muslim
Where are your valiant warriors and priests
Where are your hunting parties and your feats?
Where is that warlike mien and where are those
Great armies that destroyed our county's foes?
Count Iran as a ruin, as the lair
Of lions and leopards.

Look now and despair".[66]

The end of the Rashidun conquests

Right from the start of the caliphate, it was realized that there was a need to write down the sayings and story of Muhammad,
which had been memorized by his followers before they all died.[67] Most people in Arabia were illiterate and the Arabs had a
strong culture of remembering history orally.[67] To preserve the story of Mohammad and to prevent any corruptions from
entering the oral history, the Caliph 'Abu Bakr had ordered scribes to write down the story of Mohammad as told to them by his
followers, which was the origin of the Koran.[68] Disputes had emerged over which version of the Koran was the correct one and,
by 644, different versions of the Koran were accepted in Damascus, Basra, Hims, and Kufa.[68] To settle the dispute, the Caliph
'Uthman had proclaimed the version of the Koran possessed by one of Mohammad's widows, Hafsa, to be the definitive and
correct version, which offended some Muslims who held to the rival versions.[68] This, together with the favoritism shown by
'Uthman to his own clan, the Banu Umayya, in government appointments, led to a mutiny in Medina in 656 and 'Uthman's
murder.[68]

'Uthman's successor as Caliph, Mohammad's son-in-law, Ali, was faced with a civil war, known to Muslims as the fitna, when the
governor of Syria, Mu'awiya Ibn Abi Sufyan, revolted against him.[69] During this time, the first period of Muslim conquests
stopped, as the armies of Islam turned against one another.[69] A fundamentalist group known as the Kharaji decided to end the
civil war by assassinating the leaders of both sides.[69] However, the fitna ended in January 661 when the Caliph Ali was killed
by a Kharaji assassin, allowing Mu'awiya to become Caliph and found the Umayyad dynasty.[70] The fitna also marked the
beginning of the split between Shia Muslims, who supported Ali, and Sunni Muslims, who opposed him.[69] Mu'awiya moved the
capital of the caliphate from Medina to Damascus, which had a major effect on the politics and culture of the caliphate.[71]
Mu'awiya followed the conquest of Iran by invading Central Asia and trying to finish off the Roman Empire by taking
Constantinople.[72] In 670, a Muslim fleet seized Rhodes and then laid siege to Constantinople.[72] Nicolle wrote the siege of
Constantinople from 670 to 677 was "more accurately" a blockade rather than a siege proper, which ended in failure as the
"mighty" walls built by the Emperor Theodosius II in the 5th century AD proved their worth.[72]

The majority of the people in Syria remained Christian, and a substantial Jewish minority remained, as well; both communities
were to teach the Arabs much about science, trade and the arts.[72] The Umayyad caliphs are well-remembered for sponsoring a
cultural "golden age" in Islamic history--for example, by building the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, and for making Damascus
into the capital of a "superpower" that stretched from Portugal to Central Asia, covering the vast territory from the Atlantic Ocean
to the borders of China.[72]

Explanations of success of the early conquests

The rapidity of the early conquests has received various explanations.[73] Contemporary Christian writers conceived them as
God's punishment visited on their fellow Christians for their sins.[74] Early Muslim historians viewed them as a reflection of the
religious zeal of the conquerors and evidence of divine favor.[75] The theory that the conquests are explainable as an Arab
migration triggered by economic pressures enjoyed popularity early in the 20th century, but has largely fallen out of favor among
historians, especially those who distinguish the migration from the conquests that preceded and enabled it.[76]

There are indications that the conquests started as initially disorganized pillaging raids launched partly by non-Muslim Arab
tribes in the aftermath of the Ridda wars, and were soon extended into a war of conquest by the Rashidun caliphs,[77] although
other scholars argue that the conquests were a planned military venture already underway during Muhammad's lifetime.[78] Fred
Donner writes that the advent of Islam "revolutionized both the ideological bases and the political structures of the Arabian
society, giving rise for the first time to a state capable of an expansionist movement."[79] According to Chase F. Robinson, it is
likely that Muslim forces were often outnumbered, but, unlike their opponents, they were fast, well coordinated and highly
motivated.[80]

Another key reason was the weakness of the Byzantine and Sasanian empires, caused by the wars they had waged against each
other in the preceding decades with alternating success.[81] It was aggravated by a plague that had struck densely populated areas
and impeded conscription of new imperial troops, while the Arab armies could draw recruits from nomadic populations.[74] The
Sasanian empire, which had lost the latest round of hostilities with the Byzantines, was also affected by a crisis of confidence, and
its elites suspected that the ruling dynasty had forfeited the favor of the gods.[74] The Arab military advantage was increased
when Christianized Arab tribes who had served imperial armies as regular or auxiliary troops switched sides and joined the West
Arabian coalition.[74] Arab commanders also made liberal use of agreements to spare lives and property of inhabitants in case of
surrender and extended exemptions from paying tribute to groups who provided military services to the conquerors.[82]
Additionally, the Byzantine persecution of Christians opposed to the Chalcedonian creed in Syria and Egypt alienated elements of
those communities and made them more open to accommodation with the Arabs once it became clear that the latter would let
them practice their faith undisturbed as long as they paid tribute.[83]

The conquests were further secured by the subsequent large-scale migration of Arabian peoples into the conquered lands.[84]
Robert Hoyland argues that the failure of the Sasanian empire to recover was due in large part to the geographically and
politically disconnected nature of Persia, which made coordinated action difficult once the established Sasanian rule
collapsed.[85] Similarly, the difficult terrain of Anatolia made it difficult for the Byzantines to mount a large-scale attack to
recover the lost lands, and their offensive action was largely limited to organizing guerrilla operations against the Arabs in the
Levant.[85]

Conquest of Sindh: 711–714

Although there were sporadic incursions by Arab generals in the direction of India in the 660s and a small Arab garrison was
established in the arid region of Makran in the 670s,[86] the first large-scale Arab campaign in the Indus valley occurred when the
general Muhammad bin Qasim invaded Sindh in 711 after a coastal march through Makran.[87] Three years later the Arabs
controlled all of the lower Indus valley.[87] Most of the towns seem to have submitted to Arab rule under peace treaties, although
there was fierce resistance in other areas, including by the forces of Raja Dahir at the capital city Debal.[87][88] Arab incursions
southward from Sindh were repulsed by the armies of Gurjara and Chalukya kingdoms, and further Islamic expansion was
checked by the Rashtrakuta empire, which gained control of the region shortly after.[88]
Conquest of the Maghreb: 647–742
Arab forces began launching sporadic raiding expeditions into Cyrenaica (modern northeast Libya) and beyond soon after their
conquest of Egypt.[89] Byzantine rule in northwest Africa at the time was largely confined to the coastal plains, while
autonomous Berber polities controlled the rest.[90] In 670 Arabs founded the settlement of Qayrawan, which gave them a forward
base for further expansion.[90] Muslim historians credit the general Uqba ibn Nafi with subsequent conquest of lands extending to
the Atlantic coast, although it appears to have been a temporary incursion.[90][91] The Berber chief Kusayla and an enigmatic
leader referred to as Kahina (prophetess or priestess) seem to have mounted effective, if short-lived resistance to Muslim rule at
the end of the 7th century, but the sources do not give a clear picture of these events.[92] Arab forces were able to capture
Carthage in 698 and Tangiers by 708.[92] After the fall of Tangiers, many Berbers joined the Muslim army.[91] In 740 Umayyad
rule in the region was shaken by a major Berber revolt, which also involved Berber Kharijite Muslims.[93] After a series of
defeats, the caliphate was finally able to crush the rebellion in 742, although local Berber dynasties continued to drift away from
imperial control from that time on.[93]

Conquest of Hispania and Septimania: 711–721

The Muslim conquest of Iberia is notable for the brevity and unreliability
of the available sources.[94][95] After the Visigothic king of Spain Wittiza
died in 710, the kingdom experienced a period of political division.[95] The
Visigothic nobility was divided between the followers of Wittiza and the
new king Roderic.[96] Akhila, Wittiza's son, had fled to Morocco after
losing the succession struggle and Muslim tradition states that he asked the
Muslims to invade Spain.[96] Starting in the summer of 710, the Muslim Bilingual Latin-Arabic dinar minted in
Iberia AH 98 (716/7 AD)
forces in Morocco had launched several successful raids into Spain, which
demonstrated the weakness of the Visigothic state.[97]

Taking advantage of the situation, the Muslim Berber commander, Tariq ibn Ziyad, who was stationed in Tangiers at the time,
crossed the straits with an army of Arabs and Berbers in 711.[95] Most of the invasion force of 15,000 were Berbers, with the
Arabs serving as an "elite" force.[97] Ziyad landed on the Rock of Gibraltar on 29 April 711.[64] After defeating the forces of king
Roderic at the river Guaddalete on 19 July 711, Muslim forces advanced, capturing cities of the Gothic kingdom one after
another.[94] The capital of Toledo surrendered peacefully.[97] Some of the cities surrendered with agreements to pay tribute and
local aristocracy retained a measure of former influence.[95] The Spanish Jewish community welcomed the Muslims as liberators
from the oppression of the Catholic Visigothic kings.[98]

In 712, another larger force of 18,000 from Morocco, led by Musa Ibn Nusayr, crossed the Straits of Gibraltar to link up with
Ziyad's force at Talavera.[98] The invasion seemed to have entirely on the initiative of Tariq ibn Ziyad: the caliph, al-Walid, in
Damascus reacted as if it was a surprise to him.[99] By 713 Iberia was almost entirely under Muslim control.[94] In 714, al-Walid
summoned Ziyad to Damascus to explain his campaign in Spain, but Ziyad took his time travelling through North Africa and
Palestine, and was finally imprisoned when he arrived in Damascus.[64] The events of the subsequent ten years, the details of
which are obscure, included the capture of Barcelona and Narbonne, and a raid against Toulouse, followed by an expedition into
Burgundy in 725.[94] The last large-scale raid to the north ended with a Muslim defeat at the Battle of Tours at the hands of the
Franks in 732.[94] The victory of the Franks, led by Charles Martel, over 'Abd al-Rahman Ibn 'Abd Allah al-Ghafiqi has often
been misrepresented as the decisive battle that stopped the Muslim conquest of France, but the Umayyad force had been raiding
Aquitaine with a particular interest in sacking churches and monasteries, not seeking its conquest.[100] The battle itself is a
shadowy affair with the few sources describing it in poetic terms that are frustrating for the historian.[101] The battle occurred
between 18–25 October 732 with the climax being an attack on the Muslim camp led by Martel that ended with al-Ghafiqi being
killed and the Muslims withdrawing when night fell.[101] Martel's victory ended whatever plans there may have been to conquer
France, but a series of Berber revolts in North Africa and in Spain against Arab rule may have played a greater role in ruling out
conquests north of the Pyrenees.[101]
Conquest of Transoxiana: 673–751
Transoxiana is the region northeast of Iran beyond the Amu Darya or Oxus
River roughly corresponding with modern-day Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and
parts of Kazakhstan. Initial incursions across the Oxus river were aimed at
Bukhara (673) and Samarqand (675) and their results were limited to
promises of tribute payments.[102] In 674, a Muslim force led by
Ubaidullah Ibn Zayyad attacked Bukhara, the capital of Soghdia, which
ended with the Sogdians agreeing to recognize the Umayadd caliph
Mu'awiaya as their overlord and to pay tribute.[72] In general, the
campaigns in Central Asia were "hard fought" with the Buddhist Turkic
Battle of Talas between Tang dynasty and
peoples fiercely resisting efforts to incorporate them into the caliphate.
Abbasid Caliphate c. 751
China, which saw Central Asia as its own sphere of influence, particularly
due to the economic importance of the Silk Road, supported the Turkic
defenders.[72] Further advances were hindered for a quarter century by political upheavals within the Umayyad caliphate.[102]
This was followed by a decade of rapid military progress under the leadership of the new governor of Khurasan, Qutayba ibn
Muslim, which included the conquest of Bukhara and Samarqand in 706–712.[103] The expansion lost its momentum when
Qutayba was killed during an army mutiny and the Arabs were placed on the defensive by an alliance of Sogdian and Türgesh
forces with support from Tang China.[103] However, reinforcements from Syria helped turn the tide and most of the lost lands
were reconquered by 741.[103] Muslim rule over Transoxania was consolidated a decade later when a Chinese-led army was
defeated at the Battle of Talas (751).[104]

Modern-day Afghanistan
Medieveal Islamic scholars divided modern-day Afghanistan into two regions – the provinces of Khorasan and Sistan. Khorasan
was the eastern satrapy of the Sasanian Empire, containing Balkh and Herat. Sistan included a number of Afghan cities and
regions, including Ghazna, Zarang, Bost, Qandahar (also called al-Rukhkhaj or Zamindawar), Kabul, Kabulistan and
Zabulistan.[105]

Before Muslim rule, the regions of Balkh (Bactria or Tokharistan), Herat and Sistan were under Sasanian rule. Further south in
the Balkh region, in Bamiyan, indication of Sasanian authority diminishes, with a local dynasty apparently ruling from late
antiquity, probably Hepthalites subject to the Yabgu of the Western Turkic Khaganate. While Herat was controlled by the
Sasanians, its hinterlands were controlled by northern Hepthalites who continued to rule the Ghurid mountains and river valleys
well into the Islamic era. Sistan was under Sasanian administration but Qandahar remained out of Arab hands. Kabul and
Zabulistan housed Indic religions, with the Zunbils and Kabul Shahis offering stiff resistance to Muslim rule for two centuries
until the Saffarid and Ghaznavid conquests.[106]

Other campaigns and end of early conquests

In 646 a Byzantine naval expedition was able to briefly recapture Alexandria.[107] The same year Mu'awiya, the governor of
Syria and future founder of the Umayyad dynasty, ordered construction of a fleet.[107] Three years later it was put to use in a
pillaging raid of Cyprus, soon followed by a second raid in 650 that concluded with a treaty under which Cypriots surrendered
many of their riches and slaves.[107] In 688 the island was made into a joint dominion of the caliphate and the Byzantine empire
under a pact which was to last for almost 300 years.[108]

In 639–640 Arab forces began to make advances into Armenia, which had been partitioned into a Byzantine province and a
Sasanian province.[109] There is considerable disagreement among ancient and modern historians about events of the following
years, and nominal control of the region may have passed several times between Arabs and Byzantines.[109] Although Muslim
dominion was finally established by the time the Umayyads acceded to power in 661, it was not able to implant itself solidly in
the country, and Armenia experienced a national and literary efflorescence over the next century.[109] As with Armenia, Arab
advances into other lands of the Caucasus region, including Georgia, had as their end assurances of tribute payment and these
principalities retained a large degree of autonomy.[110] This period also saw a series of clashes with the Khazar kingdom whose
center of power was in the lower Volga steppes, and which vied with the caliphate over control of the Caucasus.[110]

Other Muslim military ventures were met with outright

failure. Despite a naval victory over the Byzantines in
654 at the Battle of the Masts, the subsequent attempt to
besiege Constantinople was frustrated by a storm which
damaged the Arab fleet.[111] Later sieges of
Constantinople in 668–669 (674–78 according to other
estimates) and 717–718 were thwarted with the help of
the recently invented Greek fire.[112] In the east,
although Arabs were able to establish control over most
Byzantine manuscript illustration showing Greek fire in Sasanian-controlled areas of modern Afghanistan after
action the fall of Persia, the Kabul region resisted repeated
attempts at invasion and would continue to do so until it
was conquered by the Saffarids three centuries
later.[113]

By the time of the Abbasid revolution in the middle of the 8th century, Muslim armies had come against a combination of natural
barriers and powerful states that impeded any further military progress.[114] The wars produced diminishing returns in personal
gains and fighters increasingly left the army for civilian occupations.[114] The priorities of the rulers also shifted from conquest of
new lands to administration of the acquired empire.[114] Although the Abbasid era witnessed some new territorial gains, such as
the conquests of Sicily and Crete, the period of rapid centralized expansion would now give way to an era when further spread of
Islam would be slow and accomplished through the efforts of local dynasties, missionaries, and traders.[114]

Aftermath

Significance
Nicolle wrote that the series of Islamic conquests of the 7th and 8th centuries was "one of the most significant events in world
history", leading to the creation of "a new civilisation", the Islamicised and Arabised Middle East.[115] Islam, which had
previously been confined to Arabia, became a major world religion, while the synthesis of Arab, Roman, and Persian elements
led to distinctive new styles of art and architecture emerging in the Middle East.[116]

Socio-political developments
The military victories of armies from the Arabian Peninsula heralded the expansion of the Arabs' culture and religion. The
conquests were followed by a large-scale migration of families and whole tribes from Arabia into the lands of the Middle
East.[84] The conquering Arabs had already possessed a complex and sophisticated society.[84] Emigrants from Yemen brought
with them agricultural, urban, and monarchical traditions; members of the Ghassanid and Lakhmid tribal confederations had
experience collaborating with the empires.[84] The rank and file of the armies was drawn from both nomadic and sedentary tribes,
while the leadership came mainly from the merchant class of the Hejaz.[84]

Two fundamental policies were implemented during the reign of the second caliph Umar (634–44): the bedouins would not be
allowed to damage agricultural production of the conquered lands and the leadership would cooperate with the local elites.[117]
To that end, the Arab-Muslim armies were settled in segregated quarters or new garrison towns such as Basra, Kufa and
Fustat.[117] The latter two became the new administrative centers of Iraq and Egypt, respectively.[117] Soldiers were paid a
stipend and prohibited from seizing lands.[117] Arab governors supervised collection and distribution of taxes, but otherwise left
the old religious and social order intact.[117] At first, many provinces retained a large degree of autonomy under the terms of
agreements made with Arab commanders.[117]

As the time passed, the conquerors sought to increase their control over local affairs and make existing administrative machinery
work for the new regime.[118] This involved several types of reorganization. In the Mediterranean region, city-states which
traditionally governed themselves and their surrounding areas were replaced by a territorial bureaucracy separating town and
rural administration.[119] In Egypt, fiscally independent estates and municipalities were abolished in favor of a simplified
administrative system.[120] In the early eighth century, Syrian Arabs began to replace Coptic functionaries and communal levies
gave way to individual taxation.[121] In Iran, the administrative reorganization and construction of protective walls prompted
agglomeration of quarters and villages into large cities such as Isfahan, Qazvin, and Qum.[122] Local notables of Iran, who at first
had almost complete autonomy, were incorporated into the central bureaucracy by the ʿAbbasid period.[122] The similarity of
Egyptian and Khurasanian official paperwork at the time of the caliph al-Mansur (754–75) suggests a highly centralized empire-
wide administration.[122]

The society of new Arab settlements gradually became

stratified into classes based on wealth and power.[123] It
was also reorganized into new communal units that
preserved clan and tribal names but were in fact only
loosely based around old kinship bonds.[123] Arab
settlers turned to civilian occupations and in eastern
regions established themselves as a landed
aristocracy.[123] At the same time, distinctions between
the conquerors and local populations began to blur.[123]
In Iran, the Arabs largely assimilated into local culture,
adopting the Persian language and customs, and
marrying Persian women.[123] In Iraq, non-Arab settlers
flocked to garrison towns.[123] Soldiers and
administrators of the old regime came to seek their Mosaic from Hisham's Palace, an Umayyad residence near
fortunes with the new masters, while slaves, laborers Jericho (c. 724–743)
and peasants fled there seeking to escape the harsh
conditions of life in the countryside.[123] Non-Arab
converts to Islam were absorbed into the Arab-Muslim society through an adaptation of the tribal Arabian institution of clientage,
in which protection of the powerful was exchanged for loyalty of the subordinates.[123] The clients (mawali) and their heirs were
regarded as virtual members of the clan.[123] The clans became increasingly economically and socially stratified.[123] For
example, while the noble clans of the Tamim tribe acquired Persian cavalry units as their mawali, other clans of the same tribe
had slave laborers as theirs.[123] Slaves often became mawali of their former masters when they were freed.[123]

Contrary to the belief of earlier historians, there is no evidence of mass conversions to Islam in the immediate aftermath of the
conquests.[124] The first groups to convert were Christian Arab tribes, although some of them retained their religion into the
Abbasid era even while serving as troops of the caliphate.[124] They were followed by former elites of the Sasanian empire,
whose conversion ratified their old privileges.[124] With time, the weakening of non-Muslim elites facilitated the breakdown of
old communal ties and reinforced the incentives of conversion which promised economic advantages and social mobility.[124] By
the beginning of the eighth century, conversions became a policy issue for the caliphate.[125] They were favored by religious
activists, and many Arabs accepted the equality of Arabs and non-Arabs.[125] However, conversion was associated with
economic and political advantages, and Muslim elites were reluctant to see their privileges diluted.[125] Public policy towards
converts varied depending on the region and was changed by successive Umayyad caliphs.[125] These circumstances provoked
opposition from non-Arab converts, whose ranks included many active soldiers, and helped set the stage for the civil war which
ended with the fall of the Umayyad dynasty.[126]

Conversions and tax reform

The Arab-Muslim conquests followed a general pattern of nomadic conquests of settled regions, whereby conquering peoples
became the new military elite and reached a compromise with the old elites by allowing them to retain local political, religious,
and financial authority.[118] Peasants, workers, and merchants paid taxes, while members of the old and new elites collected
them.[118] Payment of taxes, which for peasants often reached half of the value of their produce, was not only an economic
burden, but also a mark of social inferiority.[118] Scholars differ in their assessment of relative tax burdens before and after the
conquests. John Esposito states that in effect this meant lower taxes.[127] According to Bernard Lewis, available evidence
suggests that the change from Byzantine to Arab rule was "welcomed by many among the subject peoples, who found the new
yoke far lighter than the old, both in taxation and in other matters".[128] In contrast, Norman Stillman writes that although the tax
burden of the Jews under early Islamic rule was comparable to that under previous rulers, Christians of the Byzantine Empire
(though not Christians of the Persian empire, whose status was similar to that of the Jews) and Zoroastrians of Iran shouldered a
considerably heavier burden in the immediate aftermath of the conquests.[129]

In the wake of the early conquests taxes could be levied on individuals, on the
land, or as collective tribute.[130] During the first century of Islamic expansion,
the words jizya and kharaj were used in all three senses, with context
distinguishing between individual and land taxes.[131] Regional variations in
taxation at first reflected the diversity of previous systems.[132] The Sasanian
Empire had a general tax on land and a poll tax having several rates based on
wealth, with an exemption for aristocracy.[132] This poll tax was adapted by
Arab rulers, so that the aristocracy exemption was assumed by the new Arab-
Egyptian papyrus PERF 558 Muslim elite and shared by local aristocracy who converted to Islam.[133] The
containing a bilingual Greek-Arabic nature of Byzantine taxation remains partly unclear, but it appears to have been
tax receipt dated from 643 AD
levied as a collective tribute on population centers and this practice was
generally followed under the Arab rule in former Byzantine provinces.[132]
Collection of taxes was delegated to autonomous local communities on the condition that the burden be divided among its
members in the most equitable manner.[132] In most of Iran and Central Asia local rulers paid a fixed tribute and maintained their
autonomy in tax collection.[132]

Difficulties in tax collection soon appeared.[132] Egyptian Copts, who had been skilled in tax evasion since Roman times, were
able to avoid paying the taxes by entering monasteries, which were initially exempt from taxation, or simply by leaving the
district where they were registered.[132] This prompted imposition of taxes on monks and introduction of movement controls.[132]
In Iraq, many peasants who had fallen behind with their tax payments converted to Islam and abandoned their land for Arab
garrison towns in hope of escaping taxation.[134] Faced with a decline in agriculture and a treasury shortfall, the governor of Iraq,
al-Hajjaj, forced peasant converts to return to their lands and subjected them to the taxes again, effectively forbidding them from
converting to Islam.[135] In Khorasan, a similar phenomenon forced the native aristocracy to compensate for the shortfall in tax
collection out of their own pockets, and they responded by persecuting peasant converts and imposing heavier taxes on poor
Muslims.[135]

The situation where conversion to Islam was penalized in an Islamic state could not last, and the devout Umayyad caliph Umar II
(717–720) has been credited with changing the taxation system.[135] Modern historians doubt this account, although details of the
transition to the system of taxation elaborated by Abbasid-era jurists are still unclear.[135] Umar II ordered governors to cease
collection of taxes from Muslim converts, but his successors obstructed this policy and some governors sought to stem the tide of
conversions by introducing additional requirements such as circumcision and the ability to recite passages from the Quran.[136]
Taxation-related grievances of non-Arab Muslims contributed to the opposition movements which resulted in the Abbasid
revolution.[137] Under the new system that was eventually established, kharaj came to be regarded as a tax levied on the land,
regardless of the taxpayer's religion.[135] The poll-tax was no longer levied on Muslims, but the treasury did not necessarily suffer
and converts did not gain as a result, since they had to pay zakat, which was probably instituted as a compulsory tax on Muslims
around 730.[138] The terminology became specialized during the Abbasid era, so that kharaj no longer meant anything more than
land tax, while the term jizya was restricted to the poll-tax on dhimmis.[135]

The influence of jizya on conversion has been a subject of scholarly debate.[139] Julius Wellhausen held that the poll tax
amounted to so little that exemption from it did not constitute sufficient economic motive for conversion.[140] Similarly, Thomas
Arnold states that jizya was "too moderate" to constitute a burden, "seeing that it released them from the compulsory military
service that was incumbent on their Muslim fellow subjects." He further adds that converts escaping taxation would have to pay
the legal alms, zakat, that is annually levied on most kinds of movable and immovable property.[141] Other early 20th century
scholars suggested that non-Muslims converted to Islam en masse in order to escape the poll tax, but this theory has been
challenged by more recent research.[139] Daniel Dennett has shown that other factors, such as desire to retain social status, had
greater influence on this choice in the early Islamic period.[139]

Policy toward non-Muslims

The Arab conquerors did not repeat the mistake made by the Byzantine and Sasanian empires, who had tried and failed to impose
an official religion on subject populations, which had caused resentments that made the Muslim conquests more acceptable to
them.[142] Instead, the rulers of the new empire generally respected the traditional middle-Eastern pattern of religious pluralism,
which was not one of equality but rather of dominance by one group over the others.[142] After the end of military operations,
which involved sacking of some monasteries and confiscation of Zoroastrian fire temples in Syria and Iraq, the early caliphate
was characterized by religious tolerance and peoples of all ethnicities and religions blended in public life.[143] Before Muslims
were ready to build mosques in Syria, they accepted Christian churches as holy places and shared them with local Christians.[124]
In Iraq and Egypt, Muslim authorities cooperated with Christian religious leaders.[124] Numerous churches were repaired and
new ones built during the Umayyad era.[144]

The first Umayyad caliph Muawiyah sought to reassure the conquered peoples that he was not hostile to their religions and made
an effort to enlist support from Christian Arab elites.[145] There is no evidence for public display of Islam by the state before the
reign of Abd al-Malik (685–705), when Quranic verses and references to Muhammad suddenly became prominent on coins and
official documents.[146] This change was motivated by a desire to unify the Muslim community after the second civil war and
rally them against their chief common enemy, the Byzantine empire.[146]

A further change of policy occurred during the reign of Umar II (717–720).[147] The disastrous failure of the siege of
Constantinople in 718 which was accompanied by massive Arab casualties led to a spike of popular animosity among Muslims
toward Byzantium and Christians in general.[147] At the same time, many Arab soldiers left the army for civilian occupations and
they wished to emphasize their high social status among the conquered peoples.[147] These events prompted introduction of
restrictions on non-Muslims, which, according to Hoyland, were modeled both on Byzantine curbs on Jews, starting with the
Theodosian Code and later codes, which contained prohibitions against building new synagogues and giving testimony against
Christians, and on Sassanid regulations that prescribed distinctive attire for different social classes.[147]

In the following decades Islamic jurists elaborated a legal framework in which other religions would have a protected but
subordinate status.[146] Islamic law followed the Byzantine precedent of classifying subjects of the state according to their
religion, in contrast to the Sasanian model which put more weight on social than on religious distinctions.[147] In theory, like the
Byzantine empire, the caliphate placed severe restrictions on paganism, but in practice most non-Abrahamic communities of the
former Sasanian territories were classified as possessors of a scripture (ahl al-kitab) and granted protected (dhimmi) status.[147]
In Islam, Christians and Jews are seen as "Peoples of the Book" as the Muslims accept both Jesus Christ and the Jewish prophets
as their own prophets, which accorded them a respect that was not reserved to the "heathen" peoples of Iran, Central Asia and
India.[148] In places like the Levant and Egypt, both Christians and Jews were allowed to maintain their churches and synagogues
and keep their own religious organizations in exchange for paying the jizya tax.[148] At times, the caliphs engaged in triumphalist
gestures, like building the famous Dome of the Rock mosque in Jerusalem from 690-692 on the site of the Jewish Second
Temple, which had been destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD--though the use of Roman and Sassanian symbols of power in the
mosque suggests its purpose was partly to celebrate the Arab victories over the two empires.[149]

Those Christians out of favor with the prevailing orthodoxy in the Roman empire often preferred to live under Muslim rule as it
meant the end of persecution.[150] As both the Jewish and Christian communities of the Levant and North Africa were better
educated than their conquerors, they were often employed as civil servants in the early years of the caliphate.[72] However, a
reported saying of Muhammad that "Two religions may not dwell together in Arabia" led to different policies being pursued in
Arabia with conversion to Islam being imposed rather than merely encouraged.[150] With the notable exception of Yemen, where
a large Jewish community existed right up until the middle of the 20th century, all of the Christian and Jewish communities in
Arabia "completely disappeared".[150] The Jewish community of Yemen seems to have survived as Yemen was not regarded as
part of Arabia proper in the same way that the Hejaz and the Nejd were.[150]

Mark R. Cohen writes that the jizya paid by Jews under Islamic rule provided a "surer guarantee of protection from non-Jewish
hostility" than that possessed by Jews in the Latin West, where Jews "paid numerous and often unreasonably high and arbitrary
taxes" in return for official protection, and where treatment of Jews was governed by charters which new rulers could alter at will
upon accession or refuse to renew altogether.[151] The Pact of Umar, which stipulated that Muslims must "do battle to guard" the
dhimmis and "put no burden on them greater than they can bear", was not always upheld, but it remained "a steadfast cornerstone
of Islamic policy" into early modern times.[151]

See also
Ghazi
History of Islam
Spread of Islam

References

Citations
1. Nile Green (2016-12-12). Afghanistan's Islam: From Conversion to the Taliban (https://books.google.com/?id=g6s
wDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA46#v=onepage&f=false). Cambridge University Press. p. 47. ISBN 9780520294134.
2. M. A. Sabhan (1979-03-08). The 'Abbāsid Revolution (https://books.google.com/?id=1_03AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA11#
v=onepage&f=false). Cambridge University Press. p. 11. ISBN 9780521295345.
3. Pike, John. "Göktürk Empire" (https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/centralasia/gokturk.htm).
www.globalsecurity.org.
4. Hoyland (2014), Kennedy (2007)
5. Kaegi (1995), Donner (2014)
6. Blankinship, Khalid Yahya (1994). The End of the Jihad State, the Reign of Hisham Ibn 'Abd-al Malik and the
collapse of the Umayyads (https://books.google.com/?id=Jz0Yy053WS4C&pg=PA37&dq=umayyad+caliphate+sq
uare+miles). State University of New York Press. p. 37. ISBN 978-0-7914-1827-7.
7. Gardner, Hall; Kobtzeff, Oleg, eds. (2012). The Ashgate Research Companion to War: Origins and Prevention.
Ashgate Publishing. pp. 208–209.
 8. Rosenwein, Barbara H. (2004). A Short History of the Middle Ages. Ontario. pp. 71–72. ISBN 978-1-55111-290-
9.
9. Penn, Michael Philip (2017). Envisioning Islam. Philadelphia. pp. 45–50. ISBN 978-0-81224-722-0.
10. Jandora, John W. (1985). "The battle of the Yarmūk: A reconstruction". Journal of Asian History. 19 (1): 8–21.
JSTOR 41930557 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/41930557).
11. Grant, Reg G. (2011). "Yarmuk" (https://books.google.com/books?id=s4njwZGrZg4C&pg=PA108&lpg=PA108&dq
=battle+of+firaz&source=bl&ots=aPZe1tbOQI&sig=6I0-c19kNJxh5CVPOW9nDRQ9Ua8&hl=en&sa=X&ei=B_-pU
46XKdSlqAaBjYH4CA&ved=0CF8Q6AEwCg#v=onepage&q=battle%20of%20firaz&f=false). 1001 Battles That
Changed the Course of World History. p. 108. ISBN 978-0-7893-2233-3.
12. Nicolle (2009), pp. 14–15.
13. Nicolle (2009), p. 15.
14. Nicolle (2009), pp. 17–18.
15. Nicolle (2009), p. 18.
16. Nicolle (2009), p. 19.
17. Nicolle (2009), p. 22.
18. Theophanes, Chronicle, 317–327
* Greatrex–Lieu (2002), II, 217–227; Haldon (1997), 46; Baynes (1912), passim; Speck (1984), 178
19. Nicolle 2009, p. 49.
20. Foss, Clive (1975). "The Persians in Asia Minor and the end of antiquity". The English Historical Review. 90
(357): 721–747. doi:10.1093/ehr/XC.CCCLVII.721 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fehr%2FXC.CCCLVII.721).
JSTOR 567292 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/567292).
21. Howard-Johnston, James (2006). East Rome, Sasanian Persia And the End of Antiquity: Historiographical And
Historical Studies (https://books.google.com/?id=1U4rUaLdYnQC&dq=Howard-Johnston,+East+Rome,+Sasania
n+Persia+and+the+End+of+Antiquity). Ashgate Publishing. p. xv. ISBN 978-0-86078-992-5.
22. Liska, George (1998). "Projection contra prediction: Alternative futures and options" (https://books.google.com/?i
d=oaPlJgAACAAJ&dq=Liska,+Expanding+Realism). Expanding Realism: The Historical Dimension of World
Politics. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 170. ISBN 978-0-8476-8680-3.
23. Kaegi (1995), p. 66
24. Nicolle (1994), p. 14
25. Nicolle (2009), p. 26.
26. Nicolle (2009), pp. 26–27.
27. Nicolle (2009), p. 28.
28. Nicolle (2009), pp. 28–29.
29. Nicolle (2009), p. 30.
30. Nicolle (2009), pp. 31–32.
31. Nicolle (2009), p. 33.
32. Nicolle (2009), pp. 34–35.
33. Nicolle (2009), pp. 36–37.
34. Nicolle (2009), p. 37.
35. Nicolle (2009), p. 38.
36. Nicolle (2009), pp. 38–39.
37. Nicolle (2009), p. 41.
38. Nicolle (2009), p. 43.
39. Nicolle (2009), p. 44.
40. Nicolle (2009), p. 45.
41. Nicolle (2009), pp. 46–47.
42. Nicolle (2009), pp. 46.
43. Nicolle (2009), p. 47.
44. Lapidus (2014), p. 49
45. Nicolle 2009, pp. 63.
46. Nicolle 2009, pp. 64.
47. Nicolle (2009), p. 50.
48. Nicolle (2009), p. 51.
49. Nicolle (2009), p. 54.
50. Nicolle (2009), p. 52.
51. Nicolle (2009), p. 52
52. Hoyland (2014), p. 70; in 641 according to Lapidus (2014), p. 49
53. Nicolle 2009, p. 55.
54. Nicolle 2009, p. 56.
55. Hoyland (2014), pp. 70–72
56. Hoyland (2014), pp. 73–75, Lapidus (2014), p. 49
57. Hoyland (2014), pp. 73–75; in 643 according to Lapidus (2014), p. 49
58. Kennedy (2007), p. 165
59. Nicolle 2009, p. 57.
60. Nicolle 2009, p. 58.
61. Vaglieri (1977), pp. 60–61
62. Nicolle (2009), p. 58
63. Nicolle (2009), p. 59
64. Nicolle (2009), p. 66
65. Nicolle (2009), p. 60
66. Pagden (2008), p. 178
67. Nicolle (2009), p. 60-61
68. Nicolle (2009), p. 61
69. Nicolle (2009), p. 62
70. Nicolle (2009), p. 629
71. Nicolle (2009), p. 66-68
72. Nicolle (2009), p. 68
73. Donner (2014), pp. 3–7
74. Hoyland (2014), pp. 93–95
75. Donner (2014), p. 3, Hoyland (2014), p. 93
76. Donner (2014), p. 5, Hoyland (2014), p. 62
77. "The immediate outcome of the Muslim victories [in the Ridda wars] was turmoil. Medina's victories led allied
tribes to attack the non-aligned to compensate for their own losses. The pressure drove tribes [...] across the
imperial frontiers. The Bakr tribe, which had defeated a Persian detachment in 606, joined forces with the
Muslims and led them on a raid in southern Iraq [...] A similar spilling over of tribal raiding occurred on the Syrian
frontiers. Abu Bakr encouraged these movements [...] What began as inter-tribal skirmishing to consolidate a
political confederation in Arabia ended as a full-scale war against the two empires." Lapidus (2014), p. 48 See
also Donner (2014), pp. 5–7
78. Lapidus (2014), p. 48, Hoyland (2014), p. 38
79. Donner (2014), p. 8
 80. Robinson, Chase F. (2010). "The rise of Islam, 600 705". In Robinson, Chase F. (ed.). The New Cambridge
History of Islam, Volume 1: The Formation of the Islamic World, Sixth to Eleventh Centuries. Cambridge
University Press. p. 197. ISBN 9780521838238. "it is probably safe to assume that Muslims were often
outnumbered. Unlike their adversaries, however, Muslim armies were fast, agile, well coordinated and highly
motivated."
81. Lapidus (2014), p. 50, Hoyland (2014), p. 93
82. Hoyland (2014), p. 97
83. Lapidus (2014), p. 50, Hoyland (2014), p. 97
84. Lapidus (2014), p. 50
85. Hoyland (2014), p. 127
86. Hoyland (2014), p. 190
87. T.W. Haig, C.E. Bosworth. Encyclopedia of Islam 2nd ed, Brill. "Sind", vol. 9, p. 632
88. Hoyland (2014), pp. 192–194
89. Hoyland (2014), p. 78
90. Hoyland (2014), pp. 124–126
91. G. Yver. Encyclopedia of Islam 2nd ed, Brill. "Maghreb", vol. 5, p. 1189.
92. Hoyland (2014), pp. 142–145
93. Hoyland (2014), p. 180
94. Évariste Lévi-Provençal. Encyclopedia of Islam 2nd ed, Brill. "Al-Andalus", vol. 1, p. 492
95. Hoyland (2014), pp. 146–147
96. Nicolle 2009, pp. 65.
97. Nicolle (2009), p. 71
98. Nicolle (2009), p. 65
99. Nicolle (2009), p. 71-72
100. Nicolle 2009, p. 72-73.
101. Nicolle 2009, p. 75.
102. Daniel (2010), p. 456
103. Daniel (2010), p. 457
104. Daniel (2010), p. 458
105. Nile Green (2016-12-12). Afghanistan's Islam: From Conversion to the Taliban (https://books.google.com/?id=g6s
wDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA43#v=onepage&f=false). Cambridge University Press. pp. 43, 44. ISBN 9780520294134.
106. Nile Green (2016-12-12). Afghanistan's Islam: From Conversion to the Taliban (https://books.google.com/?id=g6s
wDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA46#v=onepage&f=false). Cambridge University Press. pp. 44, 46–47.
ISBN 9780520294134.
107. Hoyland (2014), pp. 90–93
108. "Cyprus – Government and society – history – geography" (http://www.britannica.com/place/Cyprus/Government-
and-society#toc214648).
109. M. Canard. Encyclopedia of Islam 2nd ed, Brill. "Arminiya", vol. 1, pp. 636–637
110. C.E. Bosworth. Encyclopedia of Islam 2nd ed, Brill. "Al-Qabq", vol. 4, pp. 343–344
111. Hoyland (2014), pp. 106–108
112. Hoyland (2014), pp. 108–109, 175–177
113. M. Longworth Dames. Encyclopedia of Islam 2nd ed, Brill. "Afghanistan", vol. 1, p. 226.
114. Hoyland (2014), p. 207
115. Nicolle 2009, pp. 91.
116. Nicolle 2009, pp. 80-84.
117. Lapidus (2014), p. 52
118. Lapidus (2014), p. 53
119. Lapidus (2014), p. 56
120. Lapidus (2014), p. 57
121. Lapidus (2014), p. 79
122. Lapidus (2014), p. 58
123. Lapidus (2014), pp. 58–60
124. Lapidus (2014), pp. 60–61
125. Lapidus (2014), pp. 61–62
126. Lapidus (2014), p. 71
127. Esposito (1998), p. 34. "They replaced the conquered countries, indigenous rulers and armies, but preserved
much of their government, bureaucracy, and culture. For many in the conquered territories, it was no more than
an exchange of masters, one that brought peace to peoples demoralized and disaffected by the casualties and
heavy taxation that resulted from the years of Byzantine-Persian warfare. Local communities were free to
continue to follow their own way of life in internal, domestic affairs. In many ways, local populations found Muslim
rule more flexible and tolerant than that of Byzantium and Persia. Religious communities were free to practice
their faith to worship and be governed by their religious leaders and laws in such areas as marriage, divorce, and
inheritance. In exchange, they were required to pay tribute, a poll tax (jizya) that entitled them to Muslim
protection from outside aggression and exempted them from military service. Thus, they were called the
"protected ones" (dhimmi). In effect, this often meant lower taxes, greater local autonomy, rule by fellow Semites
with closer linguistic and cultural ties than the hellenized, Greco-Roman élites of Byzantium, and greater religious
freedom for Jews and indigenous Christians."
128. Lewis, Bernard (2002). Arabs in History (https://archive.org/details/arabsinhistory00bern). p. 57. ISBN 978-0-
19280-31-08.
129. Stillman (1979), p. 28
130. Cahen (1991), p. 559
131. Cahen (1991), p. 560; Anver M. Emon, Religious Pluralism and Islamic Law: Dhimmis and Others in the Empire
of Law, p. 98, note 3. Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0199661633. Quote: "Some studies question the nearly
synonymous use of the terms kharaj and jizya in the historical sources. The general view suggests that while the
terms kharaj and jizya seem to have been used interchangeably in early historical sources, what they referred to
in any given case depended on the linguistic context. If one finds references to "a kharaj on their heads," the
reference was to a poll tax, despite the use of the term kharaj, which later became the term of art for land tax.
Likewise, if one fins the phrase "jizya on their land," this referred to a land tax, despite the use of jizya which later
come to refer to the poll tax. Early history therefore shows that although each term did not have a determinate
technical meaning at first, the concepts of poll tax and land tax existed early in Islamic history." Denner,
Conversion and the Poll Tax, 3–10; Ajiaz Hassan Qureshi, "The Terms Kharaj and Jizya and Their Implication,"
Journal of the Punjab University Historical Society 12 (1961): 27–38; Hossein Modarressi Rabatab'i, Kharaj in
Islamic Law (London: Anchor Press Ltd, 1983).
132. Cahen (1991), p. 560
133. Cahen (1991), p. 560; Hoyland (2014), p. 99
134. Cahen (1991), p. 560; Hoyland (2014), p. 199
135. Cahen (1991), p. 561
136. Hoyland (2014), p. 199
137. Hoyland (2014), pp. 201–202
138. Cahen (1991), p. 561; Hoyland (2014), p. 200
139. Tramontana, Felicita (2013). "The Poll Tax and the Decline of the Christian Presence in the Palestinian
Countryside in the 17th Century". Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient. 56 (4–5): 631–652.
doi:10.1163/15685209-12341337 (https://doi.org/10.1163%2F15685209-12341337). "The (cor)relation between
the payment of the poll-tax and conversion to Islam, has long been the subject of scholarly debate. At the
beginning of the twentieth century scholars suggested that after the Muslim conquest the local populations
converted en masse to evade the payment of the poll tax. This assumption has been challenged by subsequent
research. Indeed Dennett's study clearly showed that the payment of the poll tax was not a sufficient reason to
convert after the Muslim conquest and that other factors—such as the wish to retain social status—had greater
influence. According to Inalcik the wish to evade payment of the jizya was an important incentive for conversion
to Islam in the Balkans, but Anton Minkov has recently argued that taxation was only one of a number of
motivations."
140. Dennett (1950), p. 10. "Wellhausen makes the assumption that the poll tax amounted to so little that exemption
from it did not constitute sufficient economic motive for conversion."
141. Walker Arnold, Thomas (1913). Preaching of Islam: A History of the Propagation of the Muslim Faith (https://archi
ve.org/details/preachingofislam00arno). Constable & Robinson Ltd. p. 59. "... but this jizyah was too moderate to
constitute a burden, seeing that it released them from the compulsory military service that was incumbent on their
Muslim fellow-subjects. Conversion to Islam was certainly attended by a certain pecuniary advantage, but his
former religion could have had but little hold on a convert who abandoned it merely to gain exemption from the
jizyah; and now, instead of jizyah, the convert had to pay the legal alms, zakāt, annually levied on most kinds of
movable and immovable property." (online (https://archive.org/stream/preachingofislam00arno#page/58/mode/2u
p))
142. Lewis, Bernard (2014). The Jews of Islam (https://books.google.com/books?id=c0S4lOyfKSYC&pg=PA19).
Princeton University Press. p. 19. ISBN 9781400820290.
143. Lapidus (2014), pp. 61, 153
144. Lapidus (2014), p. 156
145. Hoyland (2014), p. 130
146. Hoyland (2014), p. 195
147. Hoyland (2014), pp. 196–198
148. Nicolle (2009), p. 84
149. Nicolle (2009), p. 81-82
150. Nicolle (2009), p. 85
151. Cohen (2008), pp. 72–73

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