The Abbasid dynasty came to power under the leadership of al-Saffah (the blood letter) through a revolution that overthrew the Umayyads in the year A.D. 750.  In their revolution the Shi'i supported the Abbasids because they had been tricked into thinking that those leading the revolution were related to Ali.  The Shi'i movement itself descends from the schism that occurred in Islam during and after the reign of Ali the fourth caliph, but the theological characteristics that distinguish them from later Sunni Islam were still in their formative stages of development.  The Abbasids really were related to Muhammad, but not through his son-in-law Ali as the Shi'i had hoped; instead, they were related to Muhammad through his uncle al-Abbas.

          Once in power, the Abbasids, like the Umayyads and many of the succeeding dynasties, continued to use the iqta system of land grants in order to keep powerful men in line.  They founded the city of Baghdad, and it was during their rule the piety minded (the proto-Sunnis) continued to develop as a distinct group, but as with Shi'i Islam, fully developed Sunni Islam was still a couple of centuries away.  The office of wazir was used to coordinate the various departments within the administration of the court.  The wazir was like a Prime Minister.  The Abbasids also lessened the power of the Arabs in favor of a more universalistic approach to governing the empire, as Lapidus says, "The prominence of the Arabs . . . was no longer a prescriptive right, but was dependent upon loyalty to the dynasty." [1]

          The tenth century is often called the beginning of the Shi'i interlude, because during this period various Shi'i dynasties came to power and dominated the Islamic World.  Ismaili (sevener Shi'i) teaching became popular in Tunisia and out of this ideological and theological synthesis the Fatimid dynasty arose.  This dynasty was Shi'i inspired and claimed descent from Muhammad, thus solidifying its power.  They replaced the Aghlabids in North Africa in A.D. 909 and finally conquered Egypt in A.D. 969.  Just prior to the Fatimid conquest of Egypt, another Shi'i (twelver Shi'i) group called the Buwayhids, who were Daylamites, became powerful.  The Caliph had created a post called the Amir ul-umara in A.D. 936 to protect the empire. [2]  Shortly after this the Daylamite leader named Ziyar was killed and was succeeded by the Buwayhid brothers. The Daylamite nation was in what is today northwestern Iran, and once the Buwayhids had consolidated their power they advanced on Baghdad and took control of the city in A.D. 945.  The Buwayhids kept the Abbasid Caliph as a figurehead, but he was now only a nominal ruler, because the real power lay in the hands of the Buwayhids.  Since the Buwayhids had no claim of descent from Muhammad they claimed a connection to Persian royalty, calling themselves by the Persian title Shah-en-shah.

          It was also at about this time, that "the ulama and the Sufis, who in the earlier imperial age had been the informal spokesmen of Islamic religious values, became the heads of communal organizations." [3]  The ulama had begun working out the foundations of Islamic theology and law.  Four main sources were held as important:  (1) the Qu'ran, the supreme revelation of God's will; (2) the Sunnah, the practice of the prophet; (3) Ijma, the consensus of the community as interpreted by the ulama; and (4) Qiyyas, judgment by analogy.  This synthesis forms the foundation of Sunni Islam.  The Sufis had developed their own system, which did not negate the system of the ulama, but placed greater emphasis on spiritual experience and mysticism.

          The ethnic Turks, a people from the steppes of central Asia, were being brought into the Islamic empire as slave soldiers (ghilman) for quite some time.  They were excellent horsemen and they were used as cavalry units in the military.  The Seljuks, a Turkish group from the Aral Sea region, were settled in Khurasan around the year A.D. 1025, and in A.D. 1035 they began entering Iran.  Two brothers (Tughril Beg and Chagri Beg) came to power and were given the title Amir al-Muminim, and in this way they were made clients of the Caliph.  But by A.D. 1055 the Seljuks captured Baghdad and established themselves as rulers of the empire, and this marks the beginning of what is called the Sunni restoration.  Like the Buwayhids, the Seljuks kept the Abbasid caliph in place as a figurehead, but the actual power was vested in Chagri Beg, who was declared Sultan. 

          In A.D. 1250 the Mamluks, slave soldiers in Egypt, successfully rebelled against the Ayyubid dynasty that had ruled Egypt since the death of Saladin.  The Mamluks perfected the slave military system of earlier years (i.e., the ghilman), and in their system even the ruler of Egypt was a slave, a slave king.  The Mamluks came to power just prior to the conquest of Baghdad by the Mongols in A.D. 1258.  The Mongols had been on the move for some time.  Prior to their invasions, the Islamic world had been disunited and this disunity weakened them facilitating the advance of the Mongol armies.  The Mongols were an entire nation mobilized for war, and they were quite brutal in how they carried out their attacks.  An example of this can be seen in the massacre of the citizens of the city of Merv, which some Muslims viewed as something sent by God, in order to punish them for their sins.  It has been argued that there was a greater amount of religious freedom during the Mongol rule, enough freedom that a Jew named ibn Kammunah was able to write a book comparing the three Abrahamic religions, although it should be noted that he was later killed by a mob.  The Mongol rise to power also allowed small principalities to arise in Anatolia, including the Ottomans.

          Throughout the 1300s A.D. the Ottomans, who take their name from Osman (Uthman) the founder of the dynasty, were on the advance in the Balkans and Anatolia and began uniting the principalities in those regions.  The Byzantine Emperor had invited them into the Balkans in order to maintain order, and this helped them to conquer Constantinople in A.D. 1453.  At about the same time the Safavid movement was founded by Shaykh Safi al-Din in what is today northwestern Iran.  This new dynasty eventually conquered Iran and ruled from it from A.D. 1501 to A.D. 1722, and although its founder was a Sunni, it became Shi'i under Shah Isma'il.  He eventually declared himself the hidden imam.  The Ottomans and the Safavids were in competition with each other throughout their existence.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ira M. Lapidus.  A History of Islamic Societies.  (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).

A Brief History of Islamic Dynasties

by Steven Todd Kaster

San Francisco State University

History 604:  Islamic World I

Professor Fred Astren

20 December 2001

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End Notes:

[1]  Ira M. Lapidus, A History of Islamic Societies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 71.

[2]  Ibid., 132.

[3]  Ibid., 139.

Copyright © 2002-2025 Steven Todd Kaster