What is the line between the “ancient” world and the “medieval” world? Is it 476? 330? 632? 800? Most historians acknowledge there is no crisp line and that these are arbitrary distinctions, but they are made anyway, taking on lives of their own. I believe they are much the same world, except for the pervading influence of one flavor of monotheism or another. This thesis endeavors to study top-down, monotheistic conversions in Pontic-Caspian Eurasia and their respective mythologizations, preserved both textually and archaeologically, which serve as a primary factor for what we might call “state formation.” These narratives also function, in many cases, as the bases of many modern nationalisms, however haphazard they may be. I have attempted to apply this idea to Christian Rome (Byzantium)’s diachronic missionary policy around the Black Sea to reveal how what we today call the “Age of Migrations” (the so-called “Germanic” invasions of the Roman Empire), was actually in perpetual continuity all the way up to the Mongolian invasions and perhaps even later. In this way, I hope to enhance the context by which we understand the entirety of not only Western history, but to effectively bind it to a broader context of global monotheization.

Ethnicity and statehood in Pontic-Caspian Eurasia (8-13th c.) : contributing to a reassessment

The New Cambridge History of Islam

Al-Hallaj, Martyr Mystique de l'Islam, execute a Bagdad le 26 Mars 922: Etude d'Histoire Religieuse@@@Essai sur les Origines du Lexique Technique de la Mystique Musulmane

Syria is usually where empires end, not where they begin. Like its Seleucid ancestor, the Marwanid experiment in Syria showed that a far-flung Middle Eastern empire was still possible without Iraq or Egypt to serve as its centre. Despite the tensions surrounding succession within the Marwanid family, the territorial expansion of the caliphate proceeded apace without any noticeable slowing until the eve of the third fitna. In keeping with the imperial vision established by the time of Abd al-Malik, Marwanid imperial designs were in theory limitless. For all that the Marwanid caliphs saw themselves as God's caliphs, from France to Farghana it was the Syrian tribal armies who were the real world conquerors. The Hijaz and Yemen were excluded from the superprovinces, no doubt because they lacked any active military fronts or waves of settlement. Nowhere can the aspirations of the Marwanid elites be better glimpsed than in the qusur built by caliphs and ashraf throughout the caliphate.

The empire in Syria, 705–763

As opposed to the Arsacids, the Sasanians, like their Achaemenid 'ancestors', tell a great deal about their notions of government, their public appearances and their political aspirations in both the domestic and foreign spheres. All lands of the former Parthian empire, except for Armenia, came under Sasanian control during the reign of the founder of the dynasty, Ardashir. Yazdgerd III was made king by Rustam's aristocratic party, thus becoming the Sasanians' last ruler. It was a decidedly Iranian attitude that characterised the Sasanian image of the ruler and his qualities. The late Sasanian period was altogether a time of literary flowering, much of it commissioned or sponsored by the royal court. The Sasanian empire was also characterised by the magnitude and diversity of its religious groups and communities. Whereas the fourth century was characterised by numerous military conflicts between the superpowers Iran and Byzantium.

The late Sasanian Near East

During the 3rd/9th century, four generations of the Tāhirid family succeeded each other hereditarily as governors for the 'Abbāsid caliphs. The practical effects of the trends inaugurated by the Tāhirids were seen in the governmental policies and cultural climate of succeeding dynasties, the Saffārids and Sāmānids in eastern Persia, the various Dailamite and Kurdish dynasties in the west. The founders of the Tāhirid family fortunes were typical of the Persians who had lent their support, first to the anti-Umayyad da'wa of Abū Muslim, and then to the new regime of the 'Abbāsid which in 132/749 emerged from that upheaval. One of the most important aspects of early Saffārid policy, of significance for the spread of Islam in Afghanistan and on the borders of India long after their empire had collapsed, was that of expansion into eastern Afghanistan.

C. E. Bosworth

Papers

The ṭāhirids and ṣaffārids