How did they do it? I get that the Romans and Sassanids were severely weakend but still. One day they they invent a religion, go out of the desert and next they conquer an immense territory.
>>863380
>invent a religion
It's a reformation of old Abrahamic faith, removing all the shit added by the Roman nigger
>>863380
Good military with high morale, and great leaders (Umar, Khalid, etc.)
Also, it was quite strategic in that the Romans and Persians were weakened from fighting. Plus, the plague.
>>863380
Look at a map of Semitic people before Rome and then at that map
It was a liberation of Semites from the Yoke of Rum
>>863380
It was also because the Persian government and Zoroastrian priests were immensely corrupt, so the people themselves were fed up.
>>863380
Persians: multiple dynastic civil wars over succession to the throne after Khosrau Parviz's death and a plague that wiped out at least half the population for nearly a decade before the Arabs started invading Persian Mesopotamia.
Romans/Byzantines: severely weakened from the last war with the Persians; Heraclius and later Emperors also had to deal with a severely weakened economy, the long-standing impact of Justin and Justinian's previous wars and expeditations back into Western Europe and North Africa like the Gothic War, and mounting pressure from the Slavs and Avars.
Both Empires were severely weakened and drained.
>>863380
The will of Allah (SWT), dummy
>>863577
Nice dubs.
>>863577
No, it wasn't. That's a made up meme that's been abused now for decades with no validity at this point. The Near East's regular populace under both Persian and Byzantine control were sick of the constant wars, massacres, and lack of stability.
But there was no major corruption.
>>863380
Remove all the desert and it becomes clans of adventurers nominally serving a head chief fanning out and settling outposts from which they serve as mercenaries for local tribes and demand tribute in exchange for peace treaties. With the collapse of Greek and Persian rule the bureaucrats of the old order flocked to these outposts and re-instituted the old tax codes.
>>863676
>But there was no major corruption.
Meme harder friend
>>863763
There is no meme, my shitposting friend.
>>863380
The fact that the Sassanids and Byzantines had fought a some 25 year war that ravaged both empires. The Byzantines were militarily weak, and the Sassanids fell into anarchy as the numerous Sassanids were deposed from the throne. The Sassanids had trouble finding any legitimate heir since one of the then-recent kings had just about every male that could contest his kingship culled off. Eventually Yazdegerd was enthroned and Persia attained some form of stability for the time being, but he was only 13 (?) at the time and once his regent and most able general was slain by the Muslims it all returned to square one.
There's also the fact that the Muslims were fighting on their own home terrain, the desert. And the fact that both the Byzantines and Persians had isolated their Arab vassal states, the Lakhmids and Gassanids, and so any Byzantine or Persian penetration into the desert would have been relatively difficult. Umar, the second Caliph, was very skeptical about leaving the desert. He didn't want his armies to cross over the Nile river in Egypt or over the Zagros in Persia. Both of which he conceded once he was convinced by his generals.
The conquest of Syria was relatively bloodless thanks to the schisms within Orthodox Christianity, and the mass persecutions carried out by the Byzantines. The Christians of Syria realized they would not be as heavily persecuted under Muslim rule, and jizya was cheaper than what the Byzantines were demanding monetarily of them, so most of Syria opened their doors to the invading Bedouins. Egypt sort of fell to the Muslims in a similar fashion. 'Amr ibn al-'As terrorized the countryside so as to scare the Egyptian populace into submission, and the Patriarch of Egypt at the time had declared that God had chosen the Muslims to own the lands over which he presided, and so opened the gates of Alexandria and consolidated Muslim rule over all of Egypt.
>>863934
>The fact that the Sassanids and Byzantines had fought a some 25 year war that ravaged both empires.
Closer to 29 years.
>>863950
Ah, yea, fair enough.
>>863380
It was Allah.
>>863950
Which is inconsequential
The fact of the matter was that they entered into a fractal state in a decentralized region and came with a plan to unify.
Their neighbors were too busy being huge cockers to each other and themselves to make a real resistance. By they time they were able to, they were too late.
>>864112
>Which is inconsequential.
Its not. It is hugely consequential that entire generations of manpower were last to an ultimately fruitless war for both the Byzantines and Persians and weakened each other to the state that the Arabs could annihilate the Byzantine/Roman presence in the Levant and North Africa permanently and crush the Sassanid dynasty after 30 years of war.
>>863380
Because the populace in those conquered territories were disillusioned from heavy taxes and other effects of a long war between the two superpowers . So they were open to a change in leadership and didn't really oppose the Islamic armies, so the arabs were able to rapidly move from city to city without committing much garrison .
Don't forget that this religion became spearheaded by traders who participated in far-flung trading networks that expanded beyond the Arabian Peninsula. A level of communication like that would be crucial for expansion in this period.
>>864176
>ignore everything after
I said, that the war was inconsequential
the nail in the coffin was that they continued to ignore them after the war to keep fucking each other over
It would have been nothing for both nations to simultaneously come through and mow down resistance. They didn't consider them a threat until they were too powerful to resist.
>>864232
It's doubtful either, or both, could have forestalled the Arabs. Neither had the military means to penetrate the Arabian desert after they had gotten rid of their Arab vassals, the Gassanids and Lakhmids. The Sassanids and Lakhmids were fighting for years well after the ~30 year war between Byzantium and Sassanid Persia, and Persia could not dislodge them whatsoever.
Rome once marched down Hejaz towards Yemen with the intentions of conquest, but were compelled to abandon the campaign because of how much of a toll the terrain took on their armies.
>>864362
Actually the Persians were extremely effective at raiding the Arab territories even before they took Mesopotamia from both the Byzantines and Persians.
It was the difficulty in pitched battles that proved problematic. And the main reason for that was the Persians had lost most of their veteran military commanders due to either the previous war with the Byzantines or the plague that wiped out half the population of Persia.
>Romans and Sassanids were severely weakend
That's all.
Same with the Mongols, who were no different than regular nomadshit popping up once every century and got rekt by either China or Persia, when they won a lottery catching both China and Persia splitting into rivaling states
Daily reminder that 95% of the "genius generals" were basically fed with weak or retarded opponents.
>>864406
Khwazermanian Turks ruling Persia were literally retarded
>>864392
The Persians marched into the Himyarite kingdom at some point before the war, didn't they. That makes sense then.
>>863380
By the will of Allah.
>muh we were weakened from fighting... thats right! we were just tired!
lmao arabs were still outnumbered massively in almost every big battle. It was the skill of their generals that earned their expansion.
>>864406
While that is true of Zizka, his pioneering tactic although localized in a portion of europe that was to be forgotten, did some truly amazing things in the early 1400s
>>863556
>It was a liberation of Semites from the Yoke of Rum
>liberation of semites
By massacring Jews, Pagans, Christians right and left? And setting up shop in the spiritual centers of the various semitic religions you bastardized/copied so you can claim ownership 1000 years later? Thanks to ARAB Muslim invaders, a diverse array of semitic cultures and languages were wiped out. REMOVE KEBAB, REBUILD TEMPLE AND GREATER ISRAEL NOW!
>>864453
>lmao arbs were still outnumbered massively in almost every big battle
t. arab medieval sources that are trusted by modern historians
>>864466
*that aren't
>>864453
Actually the funny part is that they probably weren't that outnumbered. The byzantines and Persians were both severely weakened. Don't you think it is funny that the Byzantines lost the entire Levent because of pitched battle.
>>864478
Not the guy, but no. That was there only Standing army in the area (By which I mean all the way to the Taurus Mountains). That was basically it. There were garrisons, but that was it.
Charismatic leadership compounded by rolling victories. It's the same pattern as Attila, Temujin, and Timur: nomadic warrior race with charismatic leader wins a victory and that brings greater morale and cohesion not to mention loot, and the warrior race's certainty of victory grows stronger. One serious defeat can shatter it, see Attila at the Cataulonian fields, but the idea of their invincibility is self enforcing and spreads.
In other words, real-life meme magic, on a massive scale.
>>864496
Charasmatic conquerers is a sound analysis. But this part:
>nomadic warrior race
Doesn't really make sense
>>864478
The funnier part is that every single Arab source made decades if not centuries after the early initial conquests and expansion of the Caliphate is basically Arabs claiming the Byznatines and Persians were fielding constantly "hundreds of thousands" of men as if the previous war that ended merely a decade or so earlier didn't happen.
Arab sources claims of numerical superiority of their opponents are bloated with hyperbole and exaggeration is what we can take from this.
>>864503
"Race" isn't the right word exactly, not in the modern sense. I'm talking specifically about the Bedouin.
>>864533
No, I was talking about the nomadic part.
Nice dubs, though.
>>864420
Yeah, the persianate king just returned from a failed conquest against caliph in Baghdad by freezing half of their troops to death in Zagros and his Turkic wife cucked him by refusing to send any Turkic troops in all Mongol sieges.
>>863380
Don't forget it only took a few thousand man to conquer large portions of land. Alexander the Great and the Roman conquered even bigger territories in a time of even less technology.
As for the Islamic golden age: a unifying religion, respect for traditions in conquered territories and a complete division in the "European" political scene that led to no real answer.
>>863380
everyone was inventing religions around about this time, they just invented yet another one shortly before they discovered that cavalry gives them an overwhelming military advantage similar to the huns and the mongols
>>864535
"The Bedouin (/ˈbɛdᵿ.Jn/; Arabic: بَدَوِي badawī) are an Arab seminomadic group, descended from nomads who have historically inhabited the Arabian and Syrian deserts. Their name means "desert dwellers" in Arabic language."
What's the problem?
>>864567
It's sort of a misplacement. The Bedouins were important, but they weren't the main ones. The commanders, generals, and top leaders in general weren't Bedouins, for example.
>>864457
>WE WUZ GENERALS AND SHIET
Some slav uprising in eastern "also europe" doesn't matter.
>>864638
pretty much sadly
i'd hinge that the reformation happened because the czech turned back crusade after crusade which eroded the churchs power and prestige
>>864644
>WE
>WUZ
Czechs are less than nothing. Less than a foot note in history. A whore of nation choosen by God to be used and abused by His favored children.
>>864638
Bohemia wasn't Eastern Europe at the time, it was as Western as it gets.
>>864676
It wasn't as western as it gets, it was being incorporated more heavily into the HRE at the time yes. Germans were settling there and displacing the local czech
>>864708
We're talking 15th century here, not some early medieval period when there were just some half-naked pagan Slavs roaming around. By 1400 Prague was the 3rd largest city in Europe and the place was no less western than say, Bavaria.
>>864727
Only after it was used as capital of the HRE sometime in the 1300's
you'll have to forgive my loose dating
and it was still surrounded by czechs in the hills, while the city was german
>>864737
Other way around, Germans were the ones settling in the hilly region of Sudetenland. An ancient Czech slang word for Germans can literally be translated as "people-from-the-hills".
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/skop%C4%8D%C3%A1k
>>864665
damn you're salty
some czech fucked your crush or something?
>>864676
Funny how it became so firmly eastern in mere half a century it will never be western again, just another WE WUZ poorfags serving their betters from actuall west.
>>864777
>it will never be western again
What do you mean by western? If wealth then they already leaped over the traditionally western countries like Portugal years ago.
>>864785
>Portugal
>traditionaly western
If they make the wealth leap, their culture will be a culture of new money (think South Korea) as opposed to traditionally wealthy western nations.
I'm astounded how the conversation in this thread has completely shifted from the OP, and to Eastern Europe.
>>864802
Wannabe westerner slavic filth ruins everything.
>>864801
So what are you arbitrary criteria that guarantee they will NEVER EVER become western?
Calling Bohemia non-western historically take some idiotically high amount of historical ignorance.
t. not a Czech
>>863380
>I get that the Romans and Sassanids were severely weakend
This is just an assblasted Christian meme, they weren't that weakened. The Rashidun just had based as fuck personnel, tactics and enthusiasm for a new world view and government.
>>863934
>There's also the fact that the Muslims were fighting on their own home terrain, the desert.
It's pretty obvious that the territories they claim extend far, far beyond deserts.
>>863380
The plagues of the past century had devastated the urban cultures of the Near East, leaving nomadic tribes to enter the countryside. The Arabs were just the most organized and most powerful of these tribes, and subjugated the other tribes of North Africa, Syria, Iraq, and Iran.
They probably didn't invent a religion either, but may have been energized by a holy man preaching reform to Judaic Christianity we now call Muhammad. Believing themselves to be the chosen ones and likely influenced by Semitic traditions of extolling their patron deity through victory, the Arabs fanned out, took over failing government posts, and brought in slaves from across their new empire to help manage it. These slaves learned about Muhammad and set about creating a new religion distinct from but also open to absorbing customs of the old religions of Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism.
>>864846
>tribes of Iraq and Iran
What?
>>864504
IIRC one of the more prominent sources, Al-Tabari talked about how the Byzantines were so drained on experienced soldiers that they used farmers to defend the walls of Constantinople.
That would explain some of the inflation atleast and the fact that the arabs were just fighting peasants.
>>864854
>that they used farmers to defend the walls of Constantinople
I can only imagine the banter that went on between Muslims and Byzantines during this time.
>>864814
They are eastern european. Eastern european "panculture" arose as a result of communism and its fall in former warsaw pact and diverged greatly from the western panculture it arose from.
Just visit that country and you'll see that they have about as much in common with the west as southeast asians do.
>>864851
The Lakhmid Arabs for one, the Aramaic speaking people of the northern Jazira as well, and in Iran the Iranic tribes that became Arab clients.
>>864834
Rome lost nearly all significant military power in the West Kingdom and could'nt
>>864863
I've been all over eastern, western, southern and northern Europe actually as well as the US and Canada. I'm thinking you're just trying to shit talk them without any meaningful substance.
>>864846
Plagues that effected the Byzantines were in the mid and late 5th century. The plague that devestated the Sassanids happened right around the conclusion of the 602-629 AD final Byzo-Persian War.
Kavadh II died once the plague started a few months after the war ended; which was recorded by Persian historians as massive flooding and innuated watersheds of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers which lead to much of the most fertile heartlands of Persian crops and farmlands being destroyed which lead to a further onset of famine while pestilance wiped out what was estimated to between 1/3rd to 1/2th the Empire's total population. The disease didn't end until about a year before Arab incursions into Persian and Byzantine territories.
>>864869
The terminology of using "tribes" for a settled and extremely urbanized people is probably why he's replying to you.
>>864878
>Plagues that effected the Byzantines were in the mid and late 5th century
The Plague of Justinian hit in the mid 6th century, and continued throughout the century affecting the Sassanids by the early 7th century.
The disease also continued throughout the Arab conquests. It could have even been on of the reasons why so many Arabs were leaving the peninsula to escape it.
>>864863
Communist mentality will slowly go away when the people who were born into communism die off.
Unless you meant their refusal to become a hypertolerant liberal shithole, which is not even a western trait, it's just mental cuckoldry.
>>864878
>The terminology of using "tribes" for a settled and extremely urbanized people is probably why he's replying to you.
That's silly. A tribe is a tribe, settled or not.
Unfortunately the explanation isn't materialistic, so /his/ shitlords can't even hear it.
>>864910
>Do you refer to Romans falling under Germanic suzerainty as "Italic" tribals?
Before they were united by Roman citizenship that replaced them, Italic tribes were a thing. Sassanid rule didn't get rid of the Iranic tribes, it just united them into a confederation that the Arabs shattered.
>>864895
Yeah I misdated the time frame of the Byzantian plague but I did mean that the plague of the Persians isn't recorded originating from the Byzantines and seemed to occur as an isolated instance out of seeming spontaneity with a bunch of other natural disasters in Persian lands.
>>864919
Uh, most of Sassanid territories were unified, cohesively urbanized and developing alongside one another. There was very little evidence outside of few nomadic aligned tribes of Iranian peoples that the rest weren't integrated into a greater Iranian singular one.
I just kind of feel its a weird term to use for settled civilized people compared to say nomadic Arab or Hunnic/Turkic tribes roaving around Arabia or the Steppes. Also usually a "tribe" tends to have a population less then 50,000 going by the UN definition of it.
>>864896
Nope, they pass it over to their children.
t. Czech
>>864931
You're just confusing nomad with tribe. That's why we say nomad-ic tribe in the first place. The Kurds and Dailamites are definitely tribes, and they definitely existed at the time of the Arab invasion.
We still use the word tribe to describe the settled people of Northern Iraq despite everyone there living in towns and cities.
>>864839
Yes, but the initial expansion was confined to more or less desert terrain, which the Arabs excelled at surviving and fighting in. I brought up Umar's hesitancy at moving beyond the desert because of how alien such terrain was. And if the Arabs confined themselves to the desert, then aggressors would have had a difficult time navigating (nomadic Bedouins were absolutely necessary to hire if you were to cross the desert), and penetrating Arab held desert. Umar did not want to leave the desert, he was satisfied confining himself between the Nile to the west, the Euphrates to the East and the Taurus Mountains to the north. You can see Umar's initial empire on the map with the battle markers delineating him from the Byzantines and the Sassanids. It wasn't until the Lakhmids and 'Amr ibn al-'As convinced Umar to press beyond those boundaries.
I'm not versed in much of anything past the early expansions, but under Umar most of Persia was conquered, and past Egypt into Libya as well. Persia fell quickly thanks to the fact that once Persia's most able generals were gone, total command of the country's armies devolved onto a teenage boy who barely knew how to command an army. let alone run a whole country.
Once Uthman succeeded Umar to the caliphate, a capable naval fleet was finally constructed that could rival that of the Byzantine's. And in fact did more than just rival, but displaced the Byzantine's control over the Mediterranean. Once that obstacle was removed, I'm sure Arab expansion over the rest of North Africa was made more secure, since the Byzantines would forever never be able to mount a counter offensive in that region.
Visigothic Spain fell because the invading Muslim armies took advantage of a civil war going on in that country.
>>864931
Whether it was the same plague or a completely random and unrelated disease is irrelevant. The point is both populations were devastated by these events, and it weakened urbanization and allowed the spread of tribes throughout the Mediterranean and the Middle East. The Arabs, as tribes themselves, could conquer and organize them far better than the Greeks or Persians could from their cities.
>>864965
Actually Caliphate forces failed a lot of times after the western half of the Persian Empire fell because of how the mountainous terrains and density of Persian forts made it a slaughterhouse for the Rashidun and Ummayad Caliphates. Eventually after awhile they "won" by getting those surviving Iranian resistance (usually under one of the remaining Seven Royal Houses) to simply acknowledge them as their overlords rather then through military force.
>>864989
>Actually Caliphate forces failed a lot of times after the western half of the Persian Empire fell
Can you cite the battles you're referring to?
>>864931
>Yeah I misdated the time frame of the Byzantian plague but I did mean that the plague of the Persians isn't recorded originating from the Byzantines and seemed to occur as an isolated instance out of seeming spontaneity with a bunch of other natural disasters in Persian lands.
It was most likely a recurrence of the outbreak from Egypt. The Black Death for example persisted for centuries, and we know Justinian's Plague was related to that.
>>864996
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabaristan
Its not on the wikipedia page and I don't have my books but in general that entire Persian/Iranian region generally was bolstered enough that there were several failed attempts since 651 AD to subject it that failed.
>>865015
>Manzandaran
Yep, heard of it. A lot of famous historical figures in Iranian folklore, both real or fictional, are born from that region and mentioned extensively in the Shah Nameh.
Also Bakak Khorramdin's rebellion in Azerbaijan:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babak_Khorramdin
Wasn't it so that after the fitna happened entire arab tribes uplifted themselves and started rampaging through africa until they settled somewhere and the caliphate government didn't even have to do anything?
>>864584
>The commanders, generals, and top leaders in general weren't Bedouins, for example.
IF you are going by the description of Nomad, the cultural aspect when the nomads at their peek needs to be addressed.
E.G the Hunnic soldiers werent genetically Hun, they were a confederation of Nordic, Scythian and turkic tribes that submitted to Attila's authority, by all account the Huns utilized many Greeks, Sarmtians, Scythians and Goths they captured, subjugated or allied as advisors generals and soldiers.
>>865153
He means the Rashidun and Umayyad armies were not desert nomads at all, but the settled tribes and clans of the Hedjaz, Yemen, and Petra who farmed and lived in towns.
>>865153
I'm not really sure how this addresses what I said.
>>865180
Thank you, this is what I meant.
Everyone from Mecca and Medina were not nomad.
>>863676
>But there was no major corruption.
There was in both states. In the Roman Empire especially corruption was absolutely rife, hell the governor of Egypt straight up betrayed it to the Arabs.
>>865279
Maybe, that's definitely a possibility.
>>865279
Probably not, considering the sparse population of the desert interior, the number of horses the Arabs fought with, and the infantry tactics and equipment they had. Also, the early Arab governors despised the Beduoin, and the campaign into Roman Palestine and Syria came out of the passes leading into the Hedjaz, not the desert, with just one exception being al-Walid's army which only crossed the northern desert from Iraq.
>>863380
Hardened fremen from Arrakis beats Imperial sardaukar. They won fair and square because they were from a terrible hostile environment.
>>864504
>>864478
>Arab sources claims of numerical superiority of their opponents are bloated with hyperbole and exaggeration is what we can take from this.
historians didnt only took the numbers from arab sources though,even byzantine sources (theophanes the confessor) put the numbers of byzantine forces at 140.000 in the battle of yarmouk, of which about 50% were slaughtered in that battle alone, of course they cannot hold syria after losing such crushing defeat. the byzzies commander are really just incompetent, had heraclius himself participated in this battle they would have won, the byzantines are just really unlucky with having their finest general falling ill right during muslim conquest of levant
>>866826
>unlucky
It's the will of Allah, infidel.
>>866826
>even byzantine sources (theophanes the confessor)
Post citations and excerpts.
![Željko_Ražnatović[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/NNUfzgb.jpg "Željko_Ražnatović[1].jpg")
>>863380
>mfw the muslims elect a caliph, unite and reform, and go after europe again within the next decade
>>866868
>mfw they didn't need to elect a caliph, they don't want to to reform, and a full scale invasion is already going on
>>866741
this t.b.h
The Arabs were tough-as-nails hardy sons of bitches who basically just chewed up and shit out whatever the soft and effeminate cuckolded Greco-Romans and Sassanids threw at them.
>>866875
Nah, if someone declares himself caliph and doesnt get assassinated within a week all muslims worldwide are more or less obliged to join him and do what he says.
As long as he doesnt smoke or eat pork, and prays regularly, that is.
>>866887
The "effeminate cuckolded Greco-Romans and Sassanids" just got done with a long campaign of killing each other for decades.
They were exhausted and didnt expect, nor could handle an invasion.
Its a classic case of entering the war late and winning.
>>866888
Not enough to just declare yourself caliph, otherwise you'd end up marginalized and ostracized like that ISIS faggot.
You have to be seen as legitimate by the majority of the world's Muslims.
>>866891
>he's spouting that meme again
>>866897
Thing is if ISIS elects a caliph, the population of Saudi Arabia will force its leadership to support him.
Similar in Iran, the people will force the government into this unfavorable move.
>>866856
>http://www.amazon.com/The-Chronicle-Theophanes-Confessor-Byzantine/dp/0198225687
>http://www.amazon.com/Decline-Fall-Roman-Empire-Vol/dp/1605063711
i cant find the excerpt anywhere online but here is the citations
>Theophanes (p. 337–338): 80,000 Roman troops (Kennedy, 2006, p. 145) and 60,000 allied Ghassanid troops (Gibbon, Vol. 5, p. 325).
>>866903
They already did elect a caliph but barely anybody followed him.
He wasn't seen as legitimate.
>>866912
I didnt even know they have a caliph. They need better marketing.
Oh well, I guess I should pack my things and go support my divine ruler. Takbir, /his/.
>>867019
one stands on one of the most fertile and richest region on the world while the other literally lives on a fucking desert. surely each of them could still field more army against a literal desert people, disease or not.
>>867019
... Theopanes the confessor is the primary source, cant you read?
>>863380
Sassanid warmongering fucking shits.
>>863380
They got extremely lucky in many regards.
One of which was having one of if not the best general in recorded history, nigga defeated armies that outnumbered him 10-1 and capitalized on those victories.
>>867096
>lucky
This word again. Why is it so hard for you infidels to acknowledge that Allah (May He be exalted) wills it.
>>867111
Maybe but we must ask what Ali wishes first.
>>867111
TAKBIR
>literal terrorist on my /his/
>>867089
>
Takes 2 to tango, romans were not the victims, they started quite a bit of the Roman - Sassanid wars.
Because the Jews wanted to weaken the biggest threat in the Middle East by encouraging them to conquer all the way to an impenetrable Europe.
All these years we've been thinking that Muslims are our enemy, when they're just like us, pawns in the great Zionist game.
>>867056
I'm asking for a specific cited excerpt, not just naming the individual. Can you put up or not?
>small group of barbarians spends centuries fighting one another
>local empires weaken
>barbarians conquer the known world
See: Macedonians, Arabs, Mongols, etc.
>>868341
>Because the Jews wanted to weaken the biggest threat in the Middle East by encouraging them to conquer all the way to an impenetrable Europe.
>All these years we've been thinking that Muslims are our enemy, when they're just like us, pawns in the great Zionist game.
You're ruled by 5'5 Semitic manlets. Good job Asgardian Warrior.
>>870757
You mean 865 AD.
>>864541
Pretty sure that the Caliphate was the biggest Empire ever at the time, and the fact that it happened in ~100 years is absolutely insane.
>>866826
The byzantines could not field a 140,000 man army for battle that is just preposturous. That is like saying Persia invaded Greece with 3 million men
>>864492
Do you really believe that a 5000 man army took on 60,000 better trained and disciplined troops. Or that a 10,000 man raiding party took on a 20000 man field army. Also a good portion of the field army would be made up of Arabs from Syria.
>>870799
Relatively speaking: the Achaemenid Persian Empire's main expansion happened under Cyrus the Great in less then 20 years, so I'm not surprised by it. Also given the geographic location of the Arabian peninsula and its borders to the Near East, access to Central Asia, the Caucasus, and North Africa gave it an even bigger boost.
>>869058
Not him, but I looked it up:
"In this year the Saracens—an enormous multitude of them—(setting out from) Arabia, made an expedition to the region of Damascus. When Baanes had learnt of this, he sent a message to the imperial sakellarios, asking the latter to come with his army to his help, seeing that the Arabs were very numerous. So the sakellarios joined Baanes 338 and, setting forth from Emesa, they met the Arabs. Battle was given and, on the first day, which was a Tuesday, the 23rd of the month Loos, the men of the sakellarios were defeated. Now the soldiers of Baanes rebelled and proclaimed Baanes emperor, while they abjured Herakleios. Then the men of the sakellarios withdrew, and the Saracens, seizing this opportunity, joined battle. And as a south wind was blowing in the direction of the Romans, they could not face the enemy on account of the dust and were defeated. Casting themselves into the narrows of the river Hiermouchthas, they all perished, the army of both generals numbering 40,000. Having won this brilliant victory, the Saracens came to Damascus and captured it, as well as the country of Phoenicia, and they settled there and made an expedition against Egypt."
Sauce: Theophanes, Chronicle (Oxford University Press: 1997), 469-470.
Theophanes seems to only mention two Roman generals whose army numbered 40,000 each. I haven't checked the (in-)famous Gibbon book yet.
>>870845
>Hiermouchthas
It's Yarmouk, of course.
>>866826
>BUT MUH 140,000
Anyone who actually does even a cursory study of the empire is going to find the idea of them EVER having 140,000 men under arms and actively serving in the empire-not at one battle, but in the empire-humorous at best. They didn't have the wealth or manpower to mobilize a force of that size.
Even if they could, they had too many enemies ot commit that many men to a single place-even if you abandon italy and siciliy entirely, the northern front in europe was a shitshow that HAD to be defended at all times.
>>870757
>Caliphs aren't a thing and haven't been a thing since 786 ad.
>>870771
>You mean 865 AD.
>Abbasid Caliphate (750–1258, 1261–1517)
>Umayyad Caliphate of Córdoba (929–1031)
>Almohad Caliphate (1147–1269)
>Ottoman Caliphate (1517–1924)
>Sokoto Caliphate (1804–1903)
>Khilafat Movement (1919–24)
>Sharifian Caliphate (1924–25)
Muslims not having a caliphate is a very recent development.
As you can tell by the political unrest and their constant civil wars, they arent taking it well.
We, the west, should force a caliph on them so that person can reform Islam and tell everyone that Allah wants them to chill.
>>871553
What about Donald Trump? Just like how the British kings were the Raj of India too, Trump would be Emperor of America and the Mesopotamia too.
>>871571
America already has an Emperor, you filthy pleb.
>>870845
whats wrong with Gibbon?
>>871584
>>871588
It contradicts my personal beliefs, thus its leftist shit.
>>871588
I meant the Decline is kinda infamous for blaming Christianity as the reason why Roman Empire declined. That's why I put the bracket. I'm not even Christian. I have no reason for hating him. However, nobody here cited any non-Arab sources that mentioned the supposedly huge Byzantine armies at the Battle of Yarmouk, as one guy demanded. Theophanes even wrote a century later, so he's not an eyewitness account.
However, the Arab primary sources generally agreed to each other that the Rashidun army was severely outnumbered. I'm reading Kitab Futuh now by Al-Baladhuri. He's also not an eyewitness, since he lived in the 9th century.
>>871673
>Christianity as the reason why Roman Empire declined
but he's right though
I'm >>871673. Here it is:
"Heraclius gathered largebodies of Greeks, Syrians, Mesopotamians and Armenians numbering about 200,ooo. 1 This army he put under the command of one of his choice menand sent as a vanguard Jabalah ibn-al-Aiham al-Ghassani at the head of the " naturalized" Arabs [musta'ribah] of Syria of the tribes of Lakhm, Judham and others, resolving to fight the Moslems so that he might either win or withdraw to the land of the Greeks 3 and live in Constantinople."
Sauce: al-Baladuhri, The Origins (New York: 1916), 207.
Interesting. Also, al-Baladhuri seems to be compared to al-Tabari by experts, judging by the footnote the translator put. Same sauce they used?
Here's Gibbon:
"It was incumbent on the Saracens to exert the full powers of their valor and enthusiasm against the forces of the emperor, who was taught, by repeated losses, that the rovers of the desert had undertaken, and would speedily achieve, a regular and permanent conquest. From the provinces of Europe and Asia, fourscore thousand soldiers were transported by sea and land to Antioch and Cæsarea: the light troops of the army consisted of sixty thousand Christian Arabs of the tribe of Gassan."
Gibbon, Vol V (Gutenberg: 2012), Ch. LI.
>>871553
only two of those were recognized as legitimate caliphate though
>>871763
Gibbons is a meme historian
>>872634
He's a great storyteller, though.
>>872634
youre a meme historian
>>871583
If only he'd left behind a dynasty
With allah will of course
>>871583
Best emperor. Norton II when?
sassafags and byzzies chimped out on eachother a tad too much. plus sandniggers had pretty good generals
so it's the same 'batbarians conquering sht' thing again
>>866908
How about you read the thread, Muhammad?
>>864665
By this reasoning Africans are less than a point in the history book given their contribution to the world civilisation
>>864834
> 25 years war between Persians and Romans
'They weren't that weakened'.
That's why the Persian Empire that existed in a similar form (read Zoroastrian) since 500 BC collapsed in a few years.
My congrats on your perfect use of logic.
>>876489
>That's why the Persian Empire that existed in a similar form (read Zoroastrian) since 500 BC
Iranian diaspora pls go. Two major errors in one simple sentence.
>>876506
I'm not Iranian lol
Nice arguments anyway, now let adults speak while you can keep on playing with your toys.
>>876534
>>XD nice ad hominem bro i can do this all day
