1. Muslim Empire
Lesson 3
Golden Age

2. Agenda
Essential Question – What are the legacies of the Muslim Golden Age?
Goals - Students will be able to list the achievements of the Golden Age of Islam
Tasks
Please Do Now: Art Pre Analysis Worksheet-Left Column
Clear desks/phones for Map Quiz
Power Point Presentation of Golden Age
Post Analysis
Empire of Faith Part 2
Homework
Section 11.2 Two-column notes & Guided Reading due lesson 4
Attendance/art analysis – 10 min
Quiz – 15 min
Power Point – 20 min
Post analysis – 10 min
Video – 10 min

3. Type of Source: Is it a document, artifact, or piece of art
Type of Source: Is it a document, artifact, or piece of art? Primary or secondary source? Description: What do you see? Date, creator, intended audience, purpose: Provide an educated guess with reasons why you think this way, ie, evidence from your observation. What question(s) are you left with?

4. Abbassids
Overthrew Umayyads in 750 by murdering all of them at a dinner banquet
Created central bureaucracy to govern
Moved capital to Baghdad, Iraq
Caliph Harun al-Rashid
Golden Age of Islam
Umayyads were accused of being more concerned with secular (worldly) concerns than spiritual ones. Lifestyle was too lavish (extravagant).
Review Bureaucracy - a system of government in which most of the important decisions are made by state officials rather than by elected representatives.
Baghdad grew larger than Constantinople in size and wealth
Cultural center; scholars from all over the empire came to share ideas
“City of Peace”
Islam was becoming a universal religion (not just for Arabs). Earlier preferential treatment of Arabs diminished under the Abbassids.
Al-Rashid was model ruler and supporter of the arts who brought the Golden Age of Islam.
“City of Peace” - Baghdad’s circular design

5. Islam remained a strong unifier
Abbassid Decline
Fragmented into independent dynasties
External threats from
Turks & Mongols
European Christian Crusaders
1099 Siege on Jerusalem
Islam remained a strong unifier
Umayyads were the last to control a centralized empire. Under the Abbassids, the empire fragmented politically but remained united under Islam.
Spain (Umayyads)
Egypt (Fatimids)
Mongols & Turks from Central Asia
Crusaders: Christians took Jerusalem from the Muslims in 1099 but Saladin regained it in 1187;
Crusader – soldier of the Holy Wars to take over Holy Land from Muslims

6. Abbassid Decline
Like the Song Dynasty in China, the Abbassid dynasty was smaller but reached it’s height in education, arts, and technology.
Map on the left shows the Abbassid and Umayyad dynasties during the 9th century.
Map on the right shows how it fragmented into smaller dynasties from the end of the 9th to the end of the tenth centuries.

7. Golden Age 700s-1200s
Islam absorbed traditions from many cultures resulting in a vital new civilization
International trade network
Paper/books
Arabic numerals
Sugar
Banks with sakks (checks)
People united by religion and language
Acceptance of all people
Stability brought increased trade and a sharing of ideas/products.
Paper from China; numbers and sugar from India
Also, increased trade brought new ways of doing business such as credit, banks, partnerships, and checks or sakks.
4 Social classes - Muslims by birth, converts, “Protected People” (Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians had highest tax rate,) slaves (no Muslims)
Social Mobility: people could improve their status in society
Even slaves who gained freedom held high government positions
Female slaves who married master gained freedom, as did children of converts and those who purchased their freedom

8. Golden Age 700s-1200s Manufacturing Guilds
Regulated prices, weights, and measures
Determined methods of production and quality control
Steel swords, leather goods, cotton textiles, carpets, glassware, furniture, tapestries
How do you interpret this quote from Muhammad: “The honest, truthful Muslim merchant will stand with the martyrs on the Day of Judgment”?
Merchants were honored, unlike in China, where they were at the lowest status.
Guild: Associations of the same trade

9. Golden Age 786-1258 Agriculture Massive irrigation projects
Drained swamplands
Grain, olives, dates, sugar cane, cotton, dyes, herbs, fruits, vegetables, flowers
Nomadic herding in the desert

10. Golden Age
Art
Islam prohibited the worship of idols - art could not include representations of Allah or humans
Abstract and geometric patterns
Calligraphy using Quran text
Quran frontspieces
Religion shapes art in many civilizations
How do you think the religion of Islam influenced these pieces of art? Prohibited worship of idols, therefore, art could not include Allah or humans.
(Non-religious art sometimes included humans and animals)
Arabesque, or intricate designs with curved lines based on plants/flowers
Math influenced art; geometric, repeating, symmetrical patterns
Calligraphers were among the most highly regarded artists in Islamic societies, and this remains the case in many places today. Their status was based on the excellence of their work, but also on the eminence of their teachers.
Calligraphy stretches the limits of the written word. It also shows how Arabic script satisfied an aesthetic emphasizing the purity of linear design and its capacity to express non-verbal messages. It elevates the importance of the written word, more specifically the word of the Quran.
The zoomorphic Islamic calligraphy art form is a mode of script metamorphosing into living forms which are also readable letters and of using script to delineate such forms. Usually with text from the Quran.
The flexibility of the Arabic letters allow themselves to be bent and extended in a way which is impossible with other alphabets.
The practice established itself only relatively late in Islamic art and developed in Ottoman Turkey, India and Qajar Iran around 1458.
Frontispiece is an illustrated page opposite the title page of a book (Quran)

11. Golden Age Architecture Adapted Byzantine buildings to include
Large domes
Minarets
Courtyards with fountains and gardens
Intricate plaster work
The Dome of the Rock, Jerusalem
Mosque of Samarra, Iraq
Minarets: Towers from which the muezzin would call the faithful to prayer five times a day.
Fountains were used for ritual cleansing before prayer.
The Dome of the Rock, Jerusalem – built in 7th century over a rock where Muslims believe Muhammad ascended to Heaven, and where Jews believe Abraham offered his son Isaac to God.

12. Miniature for The Rubaiyat
Golden Age
Miniature for The Rubaiyat
Literature
Poetry
Al-Adawiyya – Sufi poet
Firdawsi – Persian poet, The Book of Kings
Khayyam – The Rubaiyat
The Thousand and One Nights
Long tradition of oral poetry, sometimes chanted to music, romanticizing nomadic life and chivalry
Chivalry - courage, honor, loyalty, and consideration for others, especially women
Firdawsi – History of Persia in poems
1,001 Nights – Collection of tales such as Aladdin & His Magic Lamp, Ali Baba & the 40 Thieves, Sinbad the Sailor
Miniature paintings were not religious, but created to illustrate poems and literature and make them easier to understand. They were miniature so they could fit into books.
May have come from Mongols. They reached their height between 13-16th centuries in Persia.

13. Rethink the following and fill in the right column… Date, creator, intended audience, purpose: Provide an educated guess with reasons why you think this way, ie, evidence from your observation. What question(s) are you left with?
The art presented depicts a lion with a remarkable symmetry in the composition. It also contains beautiful stylized flower and leaf designs that are drawn from mosque tiles created during the Ottoman empire.

14. PBS Empire of Faith Part II The Spread of Islam
Baghdad & House of Wisdom & Achievements 4:05-13:00

15. Homework Read section 11.2 (267-272)
Take notes & complete Guided Reading (GR)
due lesson 4