Minaret at Samarra, 847 AD The first Abbasid caliphs In 750 AD, the Abbasid caliphs murdered all of the surviving Umayyad men but one. Who were the Umayyads? All our medieval Islam articles [...]
Kairouan's minaret - the oldest minaret still standing today. What is a minaret? A minaret is a tower that Islamic holy men called muezzins climb in order to call out [...]
Kairouan (about 800 AD) The first Islamic buildings Greek architects designed the first buildings in the new Islamic Empire. They had already been living in the area when the Arabs conquered it. Because [...]
Minaret at Samarra, 847 AD The Abbasids built Baghdad When the Abbasid dynasty moved the capital of the Islamic Empire to Baghdad from Damascus in 762 AD, of course they needed a lot of [...]
