Part of a series on |
Islam |
---|
The history of Islam is believed by most historians[1] to have originated with Muhammad's mission in Mecca and Medina at the start of the 7th century CE,[2][3] although Muslims regard this time as a return to the original faith passed down by the Abrahamic prophets, such as Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Solomon, and Jesus, with the submission (Islām) to the will of God.[4][5][6]
According to the traditional account,[2][3][7] the Islamic prophet Muhammad began receiving what Muslims consider to be divine revelations in 610 CE, calling for submission to the one God, preparation for the imminent Last Judgement, and charity for the poor and needy.[5][Note 1] As Muhammad's message began to attract followers (the ṣaḥāba) he also met with increasing hostility and persecution from Meccan elites.[5][Note 2] In 622 CE Muhammad migrated to the city of Yathrib (now known as Medina), where he began to unify the tribes of Arabia under Islam,[9] returning to Mecca to take control in 630[10][11] and order the destruction of all pagan idols.[12][13] By the time Muhammad died c. 11 AH (632 CE), almost all the tribes of the Arabian Peninsula had converted to Islam,[14] but disagreement broke out over who would succeed him as leader of the Muslim community during the Rashidun Caliphate.[2][15][16][17]
The early Muslim conquests were responsible for the spread of Islam.[2][3][7][15] By the 8th century CE, the Umayyad Caliphate extended from Iberian Al-Andalus in the west to the Indus River in the east. Polities such as those ruled by the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates (in the Middle East and later in Spain and Southern Italy), the Fatimids, Seljuks, Ayyubids, and Mamluks were among the most influential powers in the world. Highly Persianized empires built by the Samanids, Ghaznavids, and Ghurids significantly contributed to technological and administrative developments. The Islamic Golden Age gave rise to many centers of culture and science and produced notable polymaths, astronomers, mathematicians, physicians, and philosophers during the Middle Ages.[3]
By the early 13th century, the Delhi Sultanate conquered the northern Indian subcontinent, while Turkic dynasties like the Sultanate of Rum and Artuqids conquered much of Anatolia from the Byzantine Empire throughout the 11th and 12th centuries. In the 13th and 14th centuries, destructive Mongol invasions, along with the loss of population due to the Black Death, greatly weakened the traditional centers of the Muslim world, stretching from Persia to Egypt, but saw the emergence of the Timurid Renaissance and major economic powers such as the Mali Empire in West Africa and the Bengal Sultanate in South Asia.[18][19] Following the deportation and enslavement of the Muslim Moors from the Emirate of Sicily and elsewhere in southern Italy,[20] the Islamic Iberia was gradually conquered by Christian forces during the Reconquista. Nonetheless, in the early modern period, the gunpowder empires—the Ottomans, Timurids, Mughals, and Safavids—emerged as world powers.
During the 19th and early 20th centuries, most of the Muslim world fell under the influence or direct control of the European Great Powers.[3] Some of their efforts to win independence and build modern nation-states over the course of the last two centuries continue to reverberate to the present day, as well as fuel conflict-zones in regions such as Palestine, Kashmir, Xinjiang, Chechnya, Central Africa, Bosnia, and Myanmar. The oil boom stabilized the Arab States of the Gulf Cooperation Council (comprising Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates), making them the world's largest oil producers and exporters, which focus on capitalism, free trade, and tourism.[21][22]
Bengal [...] was rich in the production and export of grain, salt, fruit, liquors and wines, precious metals and ornaments besides the output of its handlooms in silk and cotton. Europe referred to Bengal as the richest country to trade with.
Cite error: There are <ref group=Note>
tags on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=Note}}
template (see the help page).