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Maslama Ibn Abd Al-Malik
Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik (, in Greek sources , ''Masalmas''; – 24 December 738) was an Umayyad prince and one of the most prominent Arab generals of the early decades of the 8th century, leading several campaigns against the Byzantine Empire and the Khazar Khaganate. He achieved great fame especially for leading the second and last Arab siege of the Byzantine capital Constantinople. He launched his military career leading the annual summer raids against the Byzantines in Anatolia. By 709, he was governor over Qinnasrin (northern Syria), the Jazira (Upper Mesopotamia), Armenia, and Adharbayjan, giving him control over the Caliphate's northern frontier. From this position, he launched the first Arab expeditions against the Khazars across the Caucasus. Maslama's brother, Caliph Sulayman, appointed him to lead the campaign to capture Constantinople in 715, but it ended in disaster for the Arabs and he was ordered to withdraw by Sulayman's successor, Umar II, in 718. After hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Governor
A governor is an politician, administrative leader and head of a polity or Region#Political regions, political region, in some cases, such as governor-general, governors-general, as the head of a state's official representative. Depending on the type of political region or polity, a ''governor'' may be either appointed or elected, and the governor's powers can vary significantly, depending on the public laws in place locally. The adjective pertaining to a governor is gubernatorial, from the Latin root ''gubernare''. In a federated state, the governor may serve as head of state and head of government for their regional polity, while still operating under the laws of the federation, which has its own head of state for the entire federation. Ancient empires Pre-Roman empires Though the legal and administrative framework of provinces, each administered by a governor, was created by the ancient Rome, Romans, the term ''governor'' has been a convenient term for historians to describe si ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Umar Ibn Hubayra Al-Fazari
Umar ibn Hubayra al-Fazari (; ) was a prominent Umayyad general and governor of Iraq, who played an important role in the Qays–Yaman conflict of this period. Origin and early career A Qaysi from the Jazira, Umar claimed to belong to the traditional Arab nobility by virtue of his maternal grandfather, who was supposedly chief of the Banu Uday branch of the Fazara tribe. However, the family is unknown from the sources until the emergence of Umar himself in 696, when he served in Iraq under Sufyan ibn al-Abrad al-Kalbi. Umar participated in the campaigns against the Byzantine Empire in the 710s, and under the command of Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik, commanded the Muslim fleet in 715/716, during the initial stages of the unsuccessful campaign to capture the Byzantine capital, Constantinople. In the next year, Maslama sent him as envoy to the Byzantine emperor, Leo III the Isaurian. Governorship of the Jazira and of Iraq Despite the failure of the campaign, he was appointed govern ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Greek Language
Greek (, ; , ) is an Indo-European languages, Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic languages, Hellenic branch within the Indo-European language family. It is native to Greece, Cyprus, Italy (in Calabria and Salento), southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, Caucasus, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the list of languages by first written accounts, longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The Greek language holds a very important place in the history of the Western world. Beginning with the epics of Homer, ancient Greek literature includes many works of lasting importance in the European canon. Greek is also the language in which many of the foundational texts ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Second Arab–Khazar War
The second (symbol: s) is a unit of time derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes, and finally to 60 seconds each (24 × 60 × 60 = 86400). The current and formal definition in the International System of Units (SI) is more precise: The second ..is defined by taking the fixed numerical value of the caesium frequency, Δ''ν''Cs, the unperturbed ground-state hyperfine transition frequency of the caesium 133 atom, to be when expressed in the unit Hz, which is equal to s−1. This current definition was adopted in 1967 when it became feasible to define the second based on fundamental properties of nature with caesium clocks. As the speed of Earth's rotation varies and is slowing ever so slightly, a leap second is added at irregular intervals to civil time to keep clocks in sync with Earth's rotation. The definition that is based on of a rotation of the earth is still used by the Universal Time 1 (UT1) system. Etymology "Minute" comes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Siege Of Tyana
The siege of Tyana was carried out by the Umayyad Caliphate in 707–708 or 708–709 in retaliation for a heavy defeat of an Umayyad army under Maimun the Mardaite by the Byzantine Empire in c. 706. The Arab army invaded Byzantine territory and laid siege to the city in summer 707 or 708. The date is uncertain, as virtually each of the extant Greek, Arabic, and Syriac parallel sources has in this respect a different date. Tyana initially withstood the siege with success, and the Arab army faced great hardship during the ensuing winter and was on the point of abandoning the siege in spring, when a relief army sent by Emperor Justinian II arrived. Quarrels among the Byzantine generals, as well as the inexperience of a large part of their army, contributed to a crushing Umayyad victory. Thereupon the inhabitants of the city were forced to surrender. Despite the agreement of terms, the city was plundered and largely destroyed, and according to Byzantine sources its people were made ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arab–Byzantine Wars
The Arab–Byzantine wars or Muslim–Byzantine wars were a series of wars from the 7th to 11th centuries between multiple Arab dynasties and the Byzantine Empire. The Muslim Arab Caliphates conquered large parts of the Christian Byzantine empire and unsuccessfully attacked the Byzantine capital of Constantinople. The frontier between the warring states remained almost static for three centuries of frequent warfare, before the Byzantines were able to recapture some of the lost territory. The conflicts began during the early Muslim conquests under the expansionist Rashidun Caliphate, part of the initial spread of Islam. In the 630s, Rashidun forces from Arabia attacked and quickly overran Byzantium's southern provinces. Muslim conquest of the Levant, Syria was captured in 639 and Arab conquest of Egypt, Egypt was conquered in 642. The Exarchate of Africa was Muslim conquest of the Maghreb, gradually captured between 647 and 670. From the 650s onwards, Arab navies entered the Medit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Al-Abbas Ibn Al-Walid
al-ʿAbbās ibn al-Walīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malik () was an Umayyad prince and general, the eldest son of Caliph al-Walid I. He distinguished himself as a military leader in the Byzantine–Arab Wars of the early 8th century, especially in the Siege of Tyana in 707–708, and was often a partner of his uncle Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik during these campaigns. He or his father are credited for founding the short-lived city of Anjar in modern Lebanon. His fortunes declined under his father's successors, except for a relatively brief revival under Yazid II (). Nevertheless, he maintained a strong base in his old governorship of Homs and by the time of Caliph Hisham's death in 743, he was probably the leading figure in the ruling family, despite being ineligible for the caliphate himself due to his mother being a slave concubine. He became involved in the civil wars of the mid-740s, at first supporting then opposing Caliph al-Walid II, who was assassinated in 744. Abbas's brothers ac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hisn Maslama
Ḥiṣn Maslama ("the fort of Maslama") was a small city in the upper Balikh River valley that was inhabited during the early Islamic period. It was located at the present-day ruin site of Madīnat al-Fār, located 6 km east of the Balikh river near its junction with the Wadi Hamar. The site consists of a northern enclosure and a southern extension. Originally founded as a rural estate by the Umayyad general Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik in the 700s, it expanded significantly during the Abbasid period and grew into a small city. No coins from Maslama's lifetime have been found at Hisn Maslama – he died in 738, and the earliest coin finds are from the 740s. This is probably because Hisn Maslama was then a self-sufficient rural estate that had no need for local markets and therefore coins. Hisn Maslama itself was probably the administrative center of Maslama's rural estates in the region, and when he retired from military service in 732 he probably came here. The nearby small tow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Balis (Syria)
Balis (), also known as Barbalissos () and Barbalissus (Latin), was an ancient and medieval fortress on the Euphrates River near the ruins of the still more ancient Emar. It is particularly known for the 253 Battle of Barbalissos, where the Roman army was defeated by Sassanid Persia. The fortress town's own ruins are located at the modern Qala'at Balis () in the Aleppo Governorate of northern Syria. History The nearby bend of the Euphrates and its trade routes had been controlled in the 2nd millennium BC by nearby Emar, which was finally destroyed in The area also seems to have had a prehistoric ford at times. By the time of the Persian Empire, the area had been resettled and become known by the Aramaic name .. It is likely the area was used during the invasions by Cyrus and Alexander. Under the Roman Empire, Barbalissus was a city in the province of Euphratensis. An outpost near the Roman border with Parthia and Persia, it served as the garrison town for the Dalmatian Cavalry ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Umayyad Caliphate
The Umayyad Caliphate or Umayyad Empire (, ; ) was the second caliphate established after the death of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty. Uthman ibn Affan, the third of the Rashidun caliphs, was also a member of the clan. The family established dynastic, hereditary rule with Mu'awiya I, the long-time governor of Bilad al-Sham, Greater Syria, who became caliph after the end of the First Fitna in 661. After Mu'awiya's death in 680, conflicts over the succession resulted in the Second Fitna, and power eventually fell to Marwan I, from another branch of the clan. Syria remained the Umayyads' main power base thereafter, with Damascus as their capital. The Umayyads continued the Early Muslim conquests, Muslim conquests, conquering Ifriqiya, Transoxiana, Sind (caliphal province), Sind, the Maghreb and Hispania (al-Andalus). At its greatest extent (661–750), the Umayyad Caliphate covered , making it one of the largest empires in history in terms of ar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bilad Al-Sham
Bilad al-Sham (), often referred to as Islamic Syria or simply Syria in English-language sources, was a province of the Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid, and Fatimid caliphates. It roughly corresponded with the Byzantine Diocese of the East, conquered by the Muslims in 634–647. Under the Umayyads (661–750), Bilad al-Sham was the metropolitan province of the Caliphate and different localities throughout the province served as the seats of the Umayyad caliphs and princes. Bilad al-Sham was first organized into the four '' ajnad'' (military districts; singular ''jund'') of Dimashq (Damascus), Hims (Homs), al-Urdunn (Jordan), and Filastin (Palestine), between 637 and 640 by Caliph Umar following the Muslim conquest. The ''jund'' of Qinnasrin was created out of the northern part of Hims by caliphs Mu'awiya I () or Yazid I (). The Jazira (Upper Mesopotamia) was made an independent province from the Mesopotamian part of Qinnasrin by Caliph Abd al-Malik in 692. In 786, the ''j ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
