Islam: The Golden Age

The period from the 8th – 13th century CE was a period in which we saw the emergence of a super empire known as The Muslim empire. The prophet Muhammad around 622 CE founded the Muslim empire. His writings were documented in a holy book called the Qur’an, which is the basis of Islam. During the time between the 8th-13th centuries the Muslim empire had expanded all the way from Spain to India. The empire, headed at the time by the Abbasid caliphate, was one of the largest and most influential empires of its time until its defeat by the Mongols. This time period is known by many as the “Golden Age” of Islam. Using its geographical position, foundations laid down by the prophet Muhammad, and the introduction of new technologies such as paper

The Abbasid Empire came into power in the year 750 after overthrowing the previous Umayyad caliphate, and lasting until 1258 AD. Once they came into power they moved the capital which had previously been in Damascus, to Baghdad. The Abbasid caliphate relied heavily on the writings in the Qur’an, in particular to the writings mentioned before about the transfer of knowledge and the importance of knowledge in the Muslim lifestyle. With the Muslim empire spread largely from the east to the west, the Abbasid caliphate used their connections to China, India and the Byzantines in the west to their advantage. In particular, one caliph, Mamun, according to an Arab statesman, would form relationships with emperors in the Byzantine empire, give them gifts and then in return ask for all their books on philosophy. “These emperors sent him those works of Plato, Aristotle, Hippocrates, Galen, Euclid, and Ptolemy which they had.” . Relying so heavily and placing such an importance on the acquisition and the transfer of knowledge they set up a ‘House of Wisdom’ in the capital, Baghdad, which was a place for intellectual thought and also sharing. The house of wisdom, a university established in 1004, welcomed scholars from all over, Muslim and non-Muslim to come and bring ideas from their home and to share and debate and teach their thoughts amongst

Papermaking had actually been invented by the Chinese but was improved and made more efficient by the Muslim empire. Paper had first been introduced to the empire in Samarkand in around 850 CE. After the battle of Talas against the Chinese in 751, they had taken Chinese prisoners who turned out to be professional paper makers and used them for their advantage. They gave the prisoners space to practice their paper making skills and also learned their skills. They then took those skills from the Chinese prisoners and improved on them to make a more efficient way of making paper. The Chinese first started making paper around 150 CE using mulberry bark. According to Sardar Ziauddin, “The Chinese craft of paper-making introduced in Samarkand could not be transformed into a manufacturing process, not at least because mulberry bark was not widely available in Muslim lands.” With not enough mulberry bark available, The Muslims used flax, cotton and linen rags as a substitute. They also introduced a bamboo mold, “which could be used to drain wet sheets of paper and from which paper could still be removed while still moist.” With these innovations the paper industry was able to spread rapidly. The first paper mill was established in Baghdad in 793 CE. They soon appeared in Damascus, Tiberius, Tripoli, Cairo, Muslim Sicily, Moorish Spain and other parts of the