The History Of Baghdad: The Medieval World's Greatest City

this video was sponsored by curiositystream get access to my video streaming service nebula when you sign up for curiosity stream using the link in the description this is baghdad home to seven million people this sprawling urban jungle is the second largest city in the arab world after cairo but between the skyscrapers and honking cars you can see the remains of this city's magnificent medieval past this once round city's walls crumbled long ago but it was here a thousand years ago that brilliant scientists architects writers and merchants of different races and religions made massive contributions to the knowledge of humanity back when paris and london were home to just 20 000 people over 1 million baghdadis lived here among canals libraries and palm trees so what is the history of baghdad what's a house of wisdom and what does it have to do with medieval robots trying to get everyone drunk well let's find out [Music] so it's 632 ce and the prophet muhammad has just died and he left behind a religion called islam that was adopted by his people the arabs do you know what i was thinking do you know what we should do conquer everything oh our god i was thinking the same thing and well they did this is 11 million 100 000 square kilometers of land spanning tree continents it's been like 90 years since muhammad died how do you do this ancient red bull is it just me or was that easier than you thought was going to be yeah this expansion happened under the rashidun and then the umayyad caliphates their rulers were caliphs or successors and the umayyad caliphate was based here in damascus syria but the umayyads had some internal issues their caliphate excluded non-arabs from positions of power even if they were muslim millions of christians jews and non-arab muslims like iranians egyptians and berbers living in the massive empire's recently conquered lands were not huge fans of this policy spot in this weakness abu al-abbas with huge support from iranians destroyed the umayyad armies wiped out the dynasty and founded the abbasid caliphate in its place in 750 ce the new abbasid caliphate needed a capital away from arabia and syria and closer to where its power base was iran the second abbasid caliph al mansour located a strategic spot in mesopotamia that already had a small market town called suk baghdad this town was ancient it was even mentioned in documents from king hammurabi's time around 1750 bce geographically it was perfect right in the middle of the trade routes between the persian gulf armenia egypt syria china and the byzantine empire plus it was right between the tigris and euphrates rivers founded in 762 ce the city went by a few names like mandinat al-salam the city of peace but it seems like the old market town's name baghdad stuck al-mansur had the city built in a perfect circle around 2.7 kilometers in diameter protected by tree concentric brick walls and a fancy moat the city had four massive gates from which came four roads each gate was named for the city it faced damascus basra kufa and kurasan these connected baghdad to the world but made it clear that this city was the symbolic center of a new world behind each gate were tree arcades lined with markets acting like the arteries of the city between these main streets were the residential neighborhoods at the core of the city was a huge open green space there you could find the caliph's palace of the golden gate topped with a giant green dome with the central mosque by its side the city was surrounded by a network of canals creating fertile land for agriculture the city had thousands of fountains and public baths open to everyone people would walk near the streams spread out on the grass and collect fruit and flowers from the stunning gardens across the city in its large parks you could see horse racing and polo or if you want to do you could visit the zoo displaying lions elephants giraffes and all sorts of wild animals on the canals dotto with palm trees you could see thousands of gondolas dancing like sunbeams on the water carrying the inhabitants of the city from one part of baghdad to the other and according to legend the city had no mosquitoes which is very important because one mosquitoes are pure evil and two malaria not fun while a round city looks cool it only lasted for about 70 years you see his palace in the center were supposed to protect the caliph because there were hundreds of thousands of peasants between the caliph and whoever wanted to kill him it was like a great wall of peasants which is a great idea until you realize that that also meant once enemy troops took over the city there was no way for the caliph to escape the great wall of peasants is kind of sneaky that way the increasingly busy and chaotic markets inside the walls seemed like a security risk so the caliph al mansour moved them outside the walls where suburbs were already growing rapidly the round city was swallowed up by the triven suburbs and soon vanished now the whole area was bagged at the bricks of the round city's walls were used to build this new growing baghdad and it became this cosmopolitan trading hub lincoln the east and the west their ships traded as far as the baltic to madagascar to china first from russia african gold indonesian spices indian steel silks from china you could find all of it in baghdad they traded so widely that this bronze cross with an arabic inscription that says bismillah which means in the name of god was discovered in a bog in ireland which is a fair bit away from baghdad between the years 900 and 1000 of the common era the city reached one million inhabitants making it the world's largest city truly the metropolis of its time and baghdad peaked under the rule of its most famous caliph harun al-rasheed haroon was the son of the third caliph al-mahdi by one of his wives al-khazuran who is a fascinating woman by the way al-khazuran was a slave given to ahmadi by his father at the time many of the concubines of nobles were well educated some learned writing poetry music dance history philosophy and science almady fell madly in love with hazuran she convinced him not only to free her from slavery but also to make her his official wife and she used this to build considerable power she sat with her husband a cart which was unusual at the time and met with his ministers behind the scenes she discussed state business with generals and foreign diplomats and managed the empire's administration she made sure her sons musa al hadi and harun al-rashid were placed ahead of the caleb's other sons as heirs to the empire she used her wealth to fund canal building in baghdad and it is said that a quarter of the city was named after her she built welds and shade giving trees along pilgrimage roads to mecca and on one of her own pilgrimages she bought the house in which the prophet muhammad was born and turned it into a mosque you can still go see it today but it's a library now al-mahdi died suddenly in 785 ce which threw the empire into chaos but hazuran took control of the situation and secured a smooth transition of power to her older son musa al-hadi she stopped a military rebellion and had all of the military officers and court officials swear allegiance to her son who wasn't even in baghdad yet and how does al-hari repay his mother he gets jealous of her power tries to push her out of political life publicly humiliates her several times and some sources say he even tried to have his own mother poisoned after a year of ruling at 24 years old al hadi died of poisoning so be nice to your mother the new caliph harun al-rasheed adored his mother when hazuran died in november of 789 haroon helped carry her body barefoot through the mud on a rainy day as a sign of respect for the woman behind the reign of tree caliphs during his reign haroon fought off invasions and rebellions to maintain his empire that spanned from india to north africa he forced the byzantine empire to pay him tribute and during his reign welt poured into baghdad he was helped by the fact that the abbasid military made a lot of improvements on the battlefield from little things like adopting the stirrups in cavalry which attached a rider to the horse to the use of nafta a refined version of petroleum used in fire based warfare they developed these fire grenades called the nafta shields to throw at the enemy and the section of the abbasid army were called nafta firemen archers that specialize in flame and arrows who very wisely wore fireproof suits that let them rush into the cities and castles that they had just set on fire they also had a camel based ambulance car this line is just in here because i liked it they're camels the dilemmas of the desert the abbasids oversaw a global network of merchants spies and diplomats stretching from france to china harun al-rashid once sent gifts to the holy roman emperor charlemagne these gifts included silks spices books and abul abbas who was an elephant getting the elephant to france was probably pretty difficult but once it arrived charlemagne was obsessed legend says he took abul abbas to battlefields and on travels and when charlemagne died his remains were wrapped in a silk with an elephant print which is just adorable haroon and charlemagne sent each other a lot of gifts and bonded over their shared hatred of the byzantine empire harun actually wrote a fairly sassy letter to the byzantine emperor that i love it says the least of the territories ruled by the least of my subjects provides a revenue larger than your whole dominion heron was a great patron of the arts under his rule baghdad was full of artists scholars and poets from three continents this is how harun al-rasheed ended up in one of the greatest pieces of literature of all time aflayla or the 1001 knights or arabian knights the 1000 one night is a collection of folk stories the story of its origin said that an iranian king called shah rayar marries a woman and then she cheats on him and so he murders her he marries many many many many more times but he has trust issues now and so he kills every single one of his new brides side note therapy did not exist yet he then marries a woman called shahrazad on the first night after their marriage she tells him a story that ends in a cliffhanger that she will only finish the next day she does this for a thousand nights and a night the stories interest king shariah so much that he doesn't kill her and they also make him wiser less murdery and make him fall deeply in love with shahrazad and they live happily ever after she was fine with all of the previous murder apparently because shahrazad told so many tales it was easy for anyone to add or subtract stories to the collection aladdin simbad the sailor and alibaba and the forty thieves are all tales from this book that were added at a later point some of the major protagonists of 1001 knights are haroon al-rasheed and his vizier jafar yeah this is the jafar that inspired the disney villain the real jafar actually came from a powerful family called the barmakids who were originally buddhist from afghanistan jafar convinced haroon to open the first paper making houses in baghdad as the arabs had just learned how to make paper from the chinese and paper was much more efficient as it was cheaper and easier to make than parchment made from animal skin and don't even get me started on papyrus paper combined with baghdad's many different people cultures and languages created an intellectual revolution arabic was the language of the empire but scholars in baghdad became experts in translation in baghdad you could find people reading the words of aristotle or the buddha all the way to the hindu vedas and zoroaster jews manichaeans christians zoroastrians buddhists and hindus met and exchanged ideas one result of this exchange was arabic numerals the ones that we used today including the revolutionary number zero these originated in india were improved on by scholars in baghdad and then spread from the middle east to europe baghdad was a crossroads of knowledge filled with schools and libraries the most important of which was the house of wisdom we don't know much about it but it looks like this was a combined library academy and research institute that welcomes scholars from around the world to translate preserve and debate their works on the haroon sun the caliph alma moon the house of wisdom became the world's largest library and the most important storage site of knowledge since the library of alexandria with books in arabic greek latin persian syriac chinese and sanskrit many ancient greek texts only survived due to arabic translations of them which made their way into europe during the renaissance greek philosophy influenced the middle east so heavily that the arabic word for philosophy is just falstafa which is just philosophy said differently here you can see an arabic painting of socrates or in arabic socrat teaching his students caliph alma moon paid scholars to travel abroad and bring back books once those books got to baghdad they were copied translated and sent to other scholars across the empire after wars ma'moon would actually demand books when negotiating peace trees he became so obsessed with collecting genius he apparently offered the byzantine emperor 2 000 pounds of gold for a mathematician called leo living in constantinople they refused the offer if leo had moved to baghdad though he would have had quite the life one scholar then historian christian hunyan ibn ashak lived in a mansion and received the massage and manicure daily one scholar said about baghdad nowhere in the world have i seen better financial arrangements to assist a scholar this thirst for knowledge sparked the islamic golden age just a quick note about this name it's called the islamic golden age but many zoroastrians christians and jews contributed the golden age included people from central asia to iberia it was so successful because the caliphs built a multicultural empire obsessed with learning some scholars have actually suggested using the name arabic golden age because the main language was arabic but it's still being debated the house of wisdom brought together different scientific traditions from around the world and they saw the differences between iranian indian and greek texts which meant they couldn't all be right so these scholars didn't just copy and translate books they tested them they commented on them and they developed new ideas around them like algebra invented by al-khwarizmi he combined indian and greek mathematical ideas and made something new mathematics without numbers like when you calculate with x and y this completely revolutionized science and made me fail math class it's only thanks to kharizmi that we can use algorithms for example the word algorithm is just a mangled latinized version of al-khwarizmi's name from al-qurismi to algorithms to algorithm baghdad led the world in cartography and astronomy scholars in baghdad upgraded the astrolabe a device that measures the incline of an object and can help navigate over sea and land an experiment funded by calif mahmoud which included an astronomer called al fargani calculated the circumference of the earth to be about 38 000 kilometers which is about four percent off the real number some italian guy called christopher columbus actually used al fergani's calculations for a voyage that he was planning but he converted the arabic miles incorrectly and thought the earth was about half the size it actually was he got very lucky that he crashed into a continent calif mamoon funded the construction of the world's first scientific observatory in baghdad and scholars there became experts in the stars that's why there are so many stars with arabic names the big dipper's seven stars all have arabic names over time some star names have been latinized but most of these stars got their names more than a thousand years ago alchemy alkali alcohol algebra algorithm are all arabic names they also developed distillation a way of separating liquids through differences in their boiling points this meant that they could make some really strong alcohol which wasn't banned in islam yet but actually the main application of distillation was to produce scents distilled rose water for example was used as perfume especially beard perfume but was also added to cosmetics foods and drinks they also popularized hard soap and had massive soap factories as a person has to get on packed trains regularly i am extremely grateful for this hmm is that rose water they perfected the distillation of crude oil into kerosene for lamps a process without which we wouldn't have gasoline asphalt or plastic we have reports from the early 13th century of muslims paving their streets with asphalt something that wouldn't be seen anywhere else till paris paved their streets and asphalt in 1838 in 805 ce the first general hospital opened in baghdad soon there were 30 more throughout the empire some developments included separating warns by disease having in-hospital pharmacies and keeping patient medical records they even had psychiatric wards this was revolutionary in a time when the mentally ill were taught to be possessed by demons in many parts of the world these were the first modern hospitals where doctors followed the code of obligation towards their patients regardless of their wealth religion or background all doctors had to pass examinations in order to practice these were the first medical diplomas they also invented peer-reviewed studies clinical trials and testing medicine on animals before humans these doctors invented hundreds of surgical instruments and new techniques for example cataracts is a condition that clouds the lenses of the eye and it ruined many lives in the ancient world but we have descriptions from the 10th century islamic world of a procedure that involves sucking the cataracts out of the eye through a syringe a procedure similar to what modern medicine used up until laser surgery took over in the late 20th century they also had these devices that foreign historians called automata but i'm no historian their rules don't bind me these are robots super cool medieval robots some of these automated machines are described in an amazingly titled book called the book of knowledge of ingenious mechanical devices some devices described are an automatic water and soap dispenser a giant elephant clock a boat with a full robot band and a programmable flute that plays itself which seems to be humanity's first programmable machine they also describe a very elaborate way of playing spin the bottle this multi-story robot was a whole party in itself it was placed in the middle of a room the first floor had a girl pouring wine the second floor provided the music with four women playing instruments the third floor was the entertainment a male dancer and at the top was a horseman carrying a lance he would spin round and round and every 20 minutes the horseman would stop the lucky person that ended up in front of the lance would drink the whole liter of wine that the first robot girl was pouring this just sounds like a really fun party to me this golden age tried for a couple of centuries but in 1258 ce the mongol leader huligo grandson of genghis khan conquered the city they burned it down destroyed the house of wisdom massacred the population and killed the caliph legends say that the tigris river ran red with the blood of the city's citizens and then afterwards it ran black with the ink of its libraries the fall of baghdad to the mongols ended the abbasid caliphate but baghdad as a city still attracted scholars well into the 15 and 1600s it never completely vanished and so the city stand-in today has been occupied since at least the times of hammurabi today little of what the ambassadors built remains one of the few survivors is the great mosque of samara which gives us a glimpse of what they were capable of baghdad and most of iraq would go on to be conquered by the ottomans and then colonized by the british empire the city was chosen to be the capital of the republic of iraq in 1958 terrorism and a decade-long occupation by the united states military have destroyed much of the city but today in a recovering baghdad you can still walk down mountain abbey street a thousand-year-old street dedicated to booksellers and readers and take part in baghdad's ancient obsession with sharing knowledge sharing knowledge is so important that kagito and a bunch of our career friends got together and made nebula a streamy nominated video streaming service where you can watch some of the best educational content ad free uncensored and earlier than on youtube and now we've partnered with curiositystream if you are a nebulous subscriber then you could have watched this video ad free days before it was on youtube on nebula videos don't 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Channel: Cogito

Views: 854,212

Keywords: baghdad, history of baghdad, Abbasid Caliphate, Islamic Golden Age, Golden of Islam, Rashidun, Byzantine Empire, Al-Mansur, Round City Of Baghdad, Medieval History, Harun al-Rashid, Arabian Nights, Al-Khwarizmi, Algebra, animation, 3d animation, blender, Scheherazade, House of Wisdom, Islamic Science, The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices, animated history, muslim history

Id: ovbkDxYWhpY

Length: 25min 54sec (1554 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 16 2022