More than a millennium ago merchant-informants and officials at the service of the Abbasid caliph, from Baghdad or Basra, put to paper eyewitness accounts of North Europeans (Vikings), Indians ...

We treat the Arabian Nights as exotic fiction, but in fact they tell us a lot about real life in the court of the Abbasid caliphs, the supreme rulers of the vast Islamic Empire that in the eighth ...

By Islam Salah The Middle East is home to some of the most remarkable architectural achievements in history. From the ...

It drew upon poetic sources that were preserved in both written and oral form from the pre-Islamic period. As the Abbasid caliphate lost power in the ninth century, several Iranian dynasties of ...

It was built in the 13th century and you can still visit its remains today. During the Abbasid Caliphate (AD750 -1258), Baghdad became the centre for science, medicine, maths and more! This early ...