Part 42 (1/2)

[Sidenote: General characteristics of the period.]

Before proceeding to speak of the terrible catastrophe which filled the whole of Western Asia with ruin and desolation, I may offer a few preliminary remarks concerning the general character of the period which we shall briefly survey in this final chapter. It forms, one must admit, a melancholy conclusion to a glorious history. The Caliphate, which symbolised the supremacy of the Prophet's people, is swept away.

Mongols, Turks, Persians, all in turn build up great Mu?ammadan empires, but the Arabs have lost even the shadow of a leading part and appear only as subordinate actors on a provincial stage. The chief centres of Arabian life, such as it is, are henceforth Syria and Egypt, which were held by the Turkish Mamelukes until 1517 A.D., when they pa.s.sed under Ottoman rule. In North Africa the petty Berber dynasties (?af?ids, Ziyanids, and Marinids) gave place in the sixteenth century to the Ottoman Turks. Only in Spain, where the Na?rids of Granada survived until 1492 A.D., in Morocco, where the Sharifs (descendants of 'Ali b. Abi ?alib) a.s.sumed the sovereignty in 1544 A.D., and to some extent in Arabia itself, did the Arabs preserve their political independence. In such circ.u.mstances it would be vain to look for any large developments of literature and culture worthy to rank with those of the past. This is an age of imitation and compilation. Learned men abound, whose erudition embraces every subject under the sun. The ma.s.s of writing shows no visible diminution, and much of it is valuable and meritorious work. But with one or two conspicuous exceptions--_e.g._ the historian Ibn Khaldun and the mystic Sha'rani--we cannot point to any new departure, any fruitful ideas, any trace of original and illuminating thought. The fifteenth and sixteenth centuries ”witnessed the rise and triumph of that wonderful movement known as the Renaissance,... but no ripple of this great upheaval, which changed the whole current of intellectual and moral life in the West, reached the sh.o.r.es of Islam.”[817] Until comparatively recent times, when Egypt and Syria first became open to European civilisation, the Arab retained his mediaeval outlook and habit of mind, and was in no respect more enlightened than his forefathers who lived under the 'Abbasid Caliphate.

And since the Mongol Invasion I am afraid we must say that instead of advancing farther along the old path he was being forced back by the inevitable pressure of events. East of the Euphrates the Mongols did their work of destruction so thoroughly that no seeds were left from which a flouris.h.i.+ng civilisation could arise; and, moreover, the Arabic language was rapidly extinguished by the Persian. In Spain, as we have seen, the power of the Arabs had already begun to decline; Africa was dominated by the Berbers, a rude, unlettered race, Egypt and Syria by the blighting military despotism of the Turks. Nowhere in the history of this period can we discern either of the two elements which are most productive of literary greatness: the quickening influence of a higher culture or the inspiration of a free and vigorous national life.[818]

[Sidenote: The Mongol Invasion.]

Between the middle of the eleventh century and the end of the fourteenth the nomad tribes dwelling beyond the Oxus burst over Western Asia in three successive waves. First came the Seljuq Turks, then the Mongols under Chingiz Khan and Hulagu, then the hordes, mainly Turkish, of Timur. Regarding the Seljuqs all that is necessary for our purpose has been said in a former chapter. The conquests of Timur are a frightful episode which I may be pardoned for omitting from this history, inasmuch as their permanent results (apart from the enormous damage which they inflicted) were inconsiderable; and although the Indian empire of the Great Moguls, which Babur, a descendant of Timur, established in the first half of the sixteenth century, ran a prosperous and brilliant course, its culture was borrowed almost exclusively from Persian models and does not come within the scope of the present work. We shall, therefore, confine our view to the second wave of the vast Asiatic migration, which bore the Mongols, led by Chingiz Khan and Hulagu, from the steppes of China and Tartary to the Mediterranean.

[Sidenote: Chingiz Khan and Hulagu.]

In 1219 A.D. Chingiz Khan, having consolidated his power in the Far East, turned his face westward and suddenly advanced into Transoxania, which at that time formed a province of the wide dominions of the Shahs of Khwarizm (Khiva). The reigning monarch, 'Ala'u 'l-Din Mu?ammad, was unable to make an effective resistance; and notwithstanding that his son, the gallant Jalalu 'l-Din, carried on a desperate guerilla for twelve years, the invaders swarmed over Khurasan and Persia, ma.s.sacring the panic-stricken inhabitants wholesale and leaving a wilderness behind them. Hitherto Baghdad had not been seriously threatened, but on the first day of January, 1256 A.D.--an epoch-marking date--Hulagu, the grandson of Chingiz Khan, crossed the Oxus, with the intention of occupying the 'Abbasid capital. I translate the following narrative from a ma.n.u.script in my possession of the _Ta'rikh al-Khamis_ by Diyarbakri ( 1574 A.D.):--

[Sidenote: Hulagu before Baghdad (1258 A.D.).]

[Sidenote: Sack of Baghdad.]

In the year 654 (A.H. = 1256 A.D.) the stubborn tyrant, Hulagu, the destroyer of the nations (_Mubidu 'l-Umam_), set forth and took the castle of Alamut from the Isma'ilis[819] and slew them and laid waste the lands of Rayy.... And in the year 655 there broke out at Baghdad a fearful riot between the Sunnis and the s.h.i.+'ites, which led to great plunder and destruction of property. A number of s.h.i.+'ites were killed, and this so incensed and infuriated the Vizier Ibnu 'l-'Alqami that he encouraged the Tartars to invade 'Iraq, by which means he hoped to take ample vengeance on the Sunnis.[820] And in the beginning of the year 656 the tyrant Hulagu b. Tuli b.

Chingiz Khan, the Moghul, arrived at Baghdad with his army, including the Georgians (_al-Kurj_) and the troops of Mosul. The Dawidar[821] marched out of the city and met Hulagu's vanguard, which was commanded by Baju.[822] The Moslems, being few, suffered defeat; whereupon Baju advanced and pitched his camp to the west of Baghdad, while Hulagu took up a position on the eastern side. Then the Vizier Ibnu 'l-'Alqami said to the Caliph Musta'?im Billah: ”I will go to the Supreme Khan to arrange peace.” So the hound[823]

went and obtained security for himself, and on his return said to the Caliph: ”The Khan desires to marry his daughter to your son and to render homage to you, like the Seljuq kings, and then to depart.”

Musta'?im set out, attended by the n.o.bles of his court and the grandees of his time, in order to witness the contract of marriage.

The whole party were beheaded except the Caliph, who was trampled to death. The Tartars entered Baghdad and distributed themselves in bands throughout the city. For thirty-four days the sword was never sheathed. Few escaped. The slain amounted to 1,800,000 and more.

Then quarter was called.... Thus it is related in the _Duwalu 'l-Islam_.[824]... And on this wise did the Caliphate pa.s.s from Baghdad. As the poet sings:--

”_Khalati 'l-manabiru wa-'l-asirralu minhumu wa-'alayhimu hatta 'l-mamati salamu._”

”_The pulpits and the thrones are empty of them; I bid them, till the hour of death, farewell!_”

[Sidenote: Battle of 'Ayn Jalut (September, 1260 A.D.).]

[Sidenote: Arabic ceases to be the language of the whole Moslem world.]

It seemed as if all Mu?ammadan Asia lay at the feet of the pagan conqueror. Resuming his advance, Hulagu occupied Mesopotamia and sacked Aleppo. He then returned to the East, leaving his lieutenant, Ketbogha, to complete the reduction of Syria. Meanwhile, however, an Egyptian army under the Mameluke Sultan Mu?affar Qu?uz was hastening to oppose the invaders. On Friday, the 25th of Rama?an, 658 A.H., a decisive battle was fought at 'Ayn Jalut (Goliath's Spring), west of the Jordan.

The Tartars were routed with immense slaughter, and their subsequent attempts to wrest Syria from the Mamelukes met with no success. The submission of Asia Minor was hardly more than nominal, but in Persia the descendants of Hulagu, the il-Khans, reigned over a great empire, which the conversion of one of their number, Ghazan (1295-1304 A.D.), restored to Moslem rule. We are not concerned here with the further history of the Mongols in Persia nor with that of the Persians themselves. Since the days of Hulagu the lands east and west of the Tigris are separated by an ever-widening gulf. The two races--Persians and Arabs--to whose co-operation the mediaeval world, from Samarcand to Seville, for a long time owed its highest literary and scientific culture, have now finally dissolved their partners.h.i.+p. It is true that the cleavage began many centuries earlier, and before the fall of Baghdad the Persian genius had already expressed itself in a splendid national literature. But from this date onward the use of Arabic by Persians is practically limited to theological and philosophical writings. The Persian language has driven its rival out of the field. Accordingly Egypt and Syria will now demand the princ.i.p.al share of our attention, more especially as the history of the Arabs of Granada, which properly belongs to this period, has been related in the preceding chapter.

[Sidenote: The Mamelukes of Egypt (1250-1517 A.D.).]

[Sidenote: Sultan Baybars (1260-1277 A.D.).]

[Sidenote: The 'Abbasid Caliphs of Egypt.]

The dynasty of the Mameluke[825] Sultans of Egypt was founded in 1250 A.D. by Aybak, a Turkish slave, who commenced his career in the service of the Ayyubid, Malik ?ali? Najmu 'l-Din. His successors[826] held sway in Egypt and Syria until the conquest of these countries by the Ottomans. The Mamelukes were rough soldiers, who seldom indulged in any useless refinement, but they had a royal taste for architecture, as the visitor to Cairo may still see. Their administration, though disturbed by frequent mutinies and murders, was tolerably prosperous on the whole, and their victories over the Mongol hosts, as well as the crus.h.i.+ng blows which they dealt to the Crusaders, gave Islam new prestige. The ablest of them all was Baybars, who richly deserved his t.i.tle Malik al-?ahir, _i.e._, the Victorious King. His name has pa.s.sed into the legends of the people, and his warlike exploits into romances written in the vulgar dialect which are recited by story-tellers to this day.[827]

The violent and brutal acts which he sometimes committed--for he shrank from no crime when he suspected danger--made him a terror to the ambitious n.o.bles around him, but did not harm his reputation as a just ruler. Although he held the throne in virtue of having murdered the late monarch with his own hand, he sought to give the appearance of legitimacy to his usurpation. He therefore recognised as Caliph a certain Abu 'l-Qasim A?mad, a pretended scion of the 'Abbasid house, invited him to Cairo, and took the oath of allegiance to him in due form. The Caliph on his part invested the Sultan with sovereignty over Egypt, Syria, Arabia, and all the provinces that he might obtain by future conquests. This A?mad, ent.i.tled al-Mustan?ir, was the first of a long series of mock Caliphs who were appointed by the Mameluke Sultans and generally kept under close surveillance in the citadel of Cairo. There is no authority for the statement, originally made by Mouradgea d'Ohsson in 1787 and often repeated since, that the last of the line bequeathed his rights of succession to the Ottoman Sultan Selim I, thus enabling the Sultans of Turkey to claim the t.i.tle and dignity of Caliph.[828]

[Sidenote: Arabic poetry after the Mongol Invasion.]