125-538: States People Centers Other The Qarmatians ( Arabic : قرامطة , romanized : Qarāmiṭa ; Persian : قرمطیان , romanized : Qarmatiyān ) were a militant Isma'ili Shia movement centred in Al-Ahsa in Eastern Arabia , where they established a religious —and, as some scholars have claimed, proto-socialist or utopian socialist —state in 899 CE. Its members were part of
250-405: A derivative of Arabic . However, these areas are not generally considered part of North Africa, but rather Southern Europe, due to their proximity to mainland Europe and their European-based cultures and religion. The Maghreb or western North Africa on the whole is believed to have been inhabited by Berbers and their ancestors since at least 10,000 B.C., while the eastern part of North Africa or
375-575: A collection of related dialects that constitute the precursor of Arabic, first emerged during the Iron Age . Previously, the earliest attestation of Old Arabic was thought to be a single 1st century CE inscription in Sabaic script at Qaryat al-Faw , in southern present-day Saudi Arabia. However, this inscription does not participate in several of the key innovations of the Arabic language group, such as
500-403: A continental scale rather than being confined to a particular corner of Africa. In September 2019, scientists reported the computerized determination, based on 260 CT scans , of a virtual skull shape of the last common human ancestor to modern humans / H. sapiens , representative of the earliest modern humans, and suggested that modern humans arose between 260,000 and 350,000 years ago through
625-435: A corpus of poetic texts, in addition to Qur'an usage and Bedouin informants whom he considered to be reliable speakers of the ʿarabiyya . Arabic spread with the spread of Islam . Following the early Muslim conquests , Arabic gained vocabulary from Middle Persian and Turkish . In the early Abbasid period , many Classical Greek terms entered Arabic through translations carried out at Baghdad's House of Wisdom . By
750-613: A date of up to 1.8 million BCE. Recent finds in Jebel Irhoud in Morocco have been found to contain some of the oldest Homo sapiens remains; This suggests that, rather than arising only in East Africa around 200,000 years ago, early Homo sapiens may already have been present across the length of Africa 100,000 years earlier. According to study author Jean-Jacques Hublin, "The idea is that early Homo sapiens dispersed around
875-1081: A dialect of Arabic and written in the Latin alphabet . The Balkan languages, including Albanian, Greek , Serbo-Croatian, and Bulgarian , have also acquired many words of Arabic origin, mainly through direct contact with Ottoman Turkish . Arabic has influenced languages across the globe throughout its history, especially languages where Islam is the predominant religion and in countries that were conquered by Muslims. The most markedly influenced languages are Persian , Turkish , Hindustani ( Hindi and Urdu ), Kashmiri , Kurdish , Bosnian , Kazakh , Bengali , Malay ( Indonesian and Malaysian ), Maldivian , Pashto , Punjabi , Albanian , Armenian , Azerbaijani , Sicilian, Spanish, Greek, Bulgarian, Tagalog , Sindhi , Odia , Hebrew and African languages such as Hausa , Amharic , Tigrinya , Somali , Tamazight , and Swahili . Conversely, Arabic has borrowed some words (mostly nouns) from other languages, including its sister-language Aramaic, Persian, Greek, and Latin and to
1000-612: A distinctive Maghrebi ancestry formed from a mixture of Near Eastern and African ancestry, which is still found as a part of the genome of modern Northwest Africans. Later during the Neolithic , from around 7,500 years ago onwards, there was a migration into Northwest Africa of European Neolithic Farmers from the Iberian Peninsula (who had originated in Anatolia several thousand years prior), as well as pastoralists from
1125-768: A final blow in 1067 by the combined forces of Abdullah bin Ali Al Uyuni , who with the help of Seljuk army contingents from Iraq, laid siege to Hofuf for seven years and finally forced the Carmathians to surrender. In Bahrain and eastern Arabia, the Qarmatian state was replaced by the Uyunid dynasty , and it is believed that by the mid-11th century, Qarmatian communities in Iraq , Iran , and Transoxiana had either been integrated by Fatimid proselytism or disintegrated. By
1250-660: A large amount of their genetic, ethnic, cultural and linguistic identity and influence with the Middle East / West Asia , a process that began with the Neolithic Revolution c. 10,000 BC and pre Dynastic Egypt. The countries of North Africa are also a major part of the Arab world . The Islamic and Arab influence in North Africa has remained dominant ever since, with the region being major part of
1375-487: A lesser extent and more recently from Turkish, English, French, and Italian. Arabic is spoken by as many as 380 million speakers, both native and non-native, in the Arab world, making it the fifth most spoken language in the world, and the fourth most used language on the internet in terms of users. It also serves as the liturgical language of more than 2 billion Muslims . In 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked Arabic
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#17327648315321500-597: A merging of populations in East and Southern Africa . The cave paintings found at Tassili n'Ajjer , north of Tamanrasset, Algeria, and at other locations depict vibrant and vivid scenes of everyday life in central North Africa during the Neolithic Subpluvial period (about 8000 to 4000 BCE). Some parts of North Africa began to participate in the Neolithic revolution in the 6th millennium BCE, just before
1625-703: A millennium before the modern period . Early lexicographers ( لُغَوِيُّون lughawiyyūn ) sought to explain words in the Quran that were unfamiliar or had a particular contextual meaning, and to identify words of non-Arabic origin that appear in the Quran. They gathered shawāhid ( شَوَاهِد 'instances of attested usage') from poetry and the speech of the Arabs—particularly the Bedouin ʾaʿrāb [ ar ] {{main other| ( أَعْراب ) who were perceived to speak
1750-512: A movement that adhered to a syncretic branch of Sevener Ismaili Shia Islam , and were ruled by a dynasty founded by Abu Sa'id al-Jannabi , a Persian from Jannaba in coastal Fars . They rejected the claim of Fatimid Caliph Abdallah al-Mahdi Billah to imamate and clung to their belief in the coming of the Mahdi , and they revolted against the Fatimid and Abbasid Caliphates . Mecca
1875-473: A position of pre-eminence in the Qarmaṭī state. Henceforth, the grandsons of Abū Sa'īd were also admitted to the ruling council. After the death of Abū Ya'qūb in 366/977, the Qarmaṭī state came to be ruled jointly by six of Abū Sa'īd’s grandsons, known collectively as al-sāda al-ru'asā'. Meanwhile, al-Ḥasan al-A'ṣam, son of Abū Manṣūr Aḥmad and a nephew of Abū Ṭāhir, had become the commander of the Qarmaṭī forces. He
2000-594: A result, many European languages have borrowed words from it. Arabic influence, mainly in vocabulary, is seen in European languages (mainly Spanish and to a lesser extent Portuguese , Catalan , and Sicilian ) owing to the proximity of Europe and the long-lasting Arabic cultural and linguistic presence, mainly in Southern Iberia, during the Al-Andalus era. Maltese is a Semitic language developed from
2125-462: A script derived from ASA attest to a language known as Hasaitic . On the northwestern frontier of Arabia, various languages known to scholars as Thamudic B , Thamudic D, Safaitic , and Hismaic are attested. The last two share important isoglosses with later forms of Arabic, leading scholars to theorize that Safaitic and Hismaic are early forms of Arabic and that they should be considered Old Arabic . Linguists generally believe that "Old Arabic",
2250-514: A second official language after Arabic. French also serves as an administrative language in Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia. The most spoken dialects are Maghrebi Arabic , a form of ancient Arabic dating back from the 8th century AD, and Egyptian Arabic . The largest and most numerous ethnic group in North Africa are the Arabs . In Algeria and Morocco, Berbers are the second largest ethnic group after
2375-470: A single language, despite mutual incomprehensibility among differing spoken versions. From a linguistic standpoint, it is often said that the various spoken varieties of Arabic differ among each other collectively about as much as the Romance languages . This is an apt comparison in a number of ways. The period of divergence from a single spoken form is similar—perhaps 1500 years for Arabic, 2000 years for
2500-603: A split in the movement. The minority Ismā‘īlīs, whose leader had taken control of the Salamiyah centre, began to proclaim their teachings that Imām Muḥammad had died and that the new leader in Salamiyah ( Abdallah al-Mahdi Billah ) was in fact his descendant come out of hiding and was the Mahdi (a Messianic figure who will appear on Earth before the Day of Judgment and rid the world of wrongdoing, injustice and tyranny). Qarmaṭ and his brother-in-law opposed this and openly broke with
2625-507: A type of Arabic. Cypriot Arabic is recognized as a minority language in Cyprus. The sociolinguistic situation of Arabic in modern times provides a prime example of the linguistic phenomenon of diglossia , which is the normal use of two separate varieties of the same language, usually in different social situations. Tawleed is the process of giving a new shade of meaning to an old classical word. For example, al-hatif lexicographically means
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#17327648315322750-507: A variety of regional vernacular Arabic dialects , which are not necessarily mutually intelligible. Classical Arabic is the language found in the Quran , used from the period of Pre-Islamic Arabia to that of the Abbasid Caliphate . Classical Arabic is prescriptive, according to the syntactic and grammatical norms laid down by classical grammarians (such as Sibawayh ) and the vocabulary defined in classical dictionaries (such as
2875-476: A wider audience." In the wake of the industrial revolution and European hegemony and colonialism , pioneering Arabic presses, such as the Amiri Press established by Muhammad Ali (1819), dramatically changed the diffusion and consumption of Arabic literature and publications. Rifa'a al-Tahtawi proposed the establishment of Madrasat al-Alsun in 1836 and led a translation campaign that highlighted
3000-708: Is "no or scanty evidence" of human presence in the Egyptian Nile Valley during these periods, which may be due to problems in site preservation. Several scholars have argued that the African origins of the Egyptian civilisation derived from pastoral communities which emerged in both the Egyptian and Sudanese regions of the Nile Valley in the fifth millennium BCE. When Egypt entered the Bronze Age,
3125-687: Is a Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world . The ISO assigns language codes to 32 varieties of Arabic , including its standard form of Literary Arabic, known as Modern Standard Arabic , which is derived from Classical Arabic . This distinction exists primarily among Western linguists; Arabic speakers themselves generally do not distinguish between Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic, but rather refer to both as al-ʿarabiyyatu l-fuṣḥā ( اَلعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ "the eloquent Arabic") or simply al-fuṣḥā ( اَلْفُصْحَىٰ ). Arabic
3250-590: Is a minimum level of comprehension between all Arabic dialects, this level can increase or decrease based on geographic proximity: for example, Levantine and Gulf speakers understand each other much better than they do speakers from the Maghreb. The issue of diglossia between spoken and written language is a complicating factor: A single written form, differing sharply from any of the spoken varieties learned natively, unites several sometimes divergent spoken forms. For political reasons, Arabs mostly assert that they all speak
3375-594: Is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of the Western Sahara in the west, to Egypt and Sudan's Red Sea coast in the east. The most common definition for the region's boundaries includes Algeria , Egypt , Libya , Morocco , Tunisia , and Western Sahara ,
3500-603: Is a significant minority of Coptic Christians . The Copts are the largest Christian denomination in the Middle East and North Africa . The Maghreb formerly had a significant Jewish population, almost all of whom emigrated to France or Israel when the North African nations gained independence. Prior to the modern establishment of Israel, there were about 500,000 Jews in Northern Africa, including both Sephardi Jews (refugees from Spain, France and Portugal from
3625-559: Is a sister language rather than their direct ancestor. Arabia had a wide variety of Semitic languages in antiquity. The term "Arab" was initially used to describe those living in the Arabian Peninsula , as perceived by geographers from ancient Greece . In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside the Ancient South Arabian family (e.g. Southern Thamudic) were spoken. It
3750-478: Is believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages (non-Central Semitic languages) were spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hejaz , Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages. In Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested. In eastern Arabia, inscriptions in
3875-408: Is credited with establishing the rules of Arabic prosody . Al-Jahiz (776–868) proposed to Al-Akhfash al-Akbar an overhaul of the grammar of Arabic, but it would not come to pass for two centuries. The standardization of Arabic reached completion around the end of the 8th century. The first comprehensive description of the ʿarabiyya "Arabic", Sībawayhi's al - Kitāb , is based first of all upon
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4000-472: Is credited with standardizing Arabic grammar , or an-naḥw ( النَّحو "the way" ), and pioneering a system of diacritics to differentiate consonants ( نقط الإعجام nuqaṭu‿l-i'jām "pointing for non-Arabs") and indicate vocalization ( التشكيل at-tashkīl ). Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi (718–786) compiled the first Arabic dictionary, Kitāb al-'Ayn ( كتاب العين "The Book of the Letter ع "), and
4125-574: Is not present in the spoken varieties, but deletes Classical words that sound obsolete in MSA. In addition, MSA has borrowed or coined many terms for concepts that did not exist in Quranic times, and MSA continues to evolve. Some words have been borrowed from other languages—notice that transliteration mainly indicates spelling and not real pronunciation (e.g., فِلْم film 'film' or ديمقراطية dīmuqrāṭiyyah 'democracy'). The current preference
4250-800: Is official in Mali and recognized as a minority language in Morocco, while the Senegalese government adopted the Latin script to write it. Maltese is official in (predominantly Catholic ) Malta and written with the Latin script . Linguists agree that it is a variety of spoken Arabic, descended from Siculo-Arabic , though it has experienced extensive changes as a result of sustained and intensive contact with Italo-Romance varieties, and more recently also with English. Due to "a mix of social, cultural, historical, political, and indeed linguistic factors", many Maltese people today consider their language Semitic but not
4375-642: Is particularly fertile and most of Egypt lives close to the river. Elsewhere, irrigation is essential to improve crop yields on the desert margins. The inhabitants of North Africa are roughly divided in a manner corresponding to the principal geographic regions of North Africa: the Maghreb , the Nile valley, and the Sahel . The countries making up North Africa all have Modern Standard Arabic as their official language. Additionally, Algeria and Morocco recognize Berber as
4500-572: Is the third most widespread official language after English and French, one of six official languages of the United Nations , and the liturgical language of Islam . Arabic is widely taught in schools and universities around the world and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, governments and the media. During the Middle Ages , Arabic was a major vehicle of culture and learning, especially in science, mathematics and philosophy. As
4625-590: Is the variety used in most current, printed Arabic publications, spoken by some of the Arabic media across North Africa and the Middle East, and understood by most educated Arabic speakers. "Literary Arabic" and "Standard Arabic" ( فُصْحَى fuṣḥá ) are less strictly defined terms that may refer to Modern Standard Arabic or Classical Arabic. Some of the differences between Classical Arabic (CA) and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) are as follows: MSA uses much Classical vocabulary (e.g., dhahaba 'to go') that
4750-413: Is to avoid direct borrowings, preferring to either use loan translations (e.g., فرع farʻ 'branch', also used for the branch of a company or organization; جناح janāḥ 'wing', is also used for the wing of an airplane, building, air force, etc.), or to coin new words using forms within existing roots ( استماتة istimātah ' apoptosis ', using the root موت m/w/t 'death' put into
4875-524: Is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the industrial and post-industrial era , especially in modern times. Due to its grounding in Classical Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic is removed over a millennium from everyday speech, which is construed as a multitude of dialects of this language. These dialects and Modern Standard Arabic are described by some scholars as not mutually comprehensible. The former are usually acquired in families, while
5000-445: The Lisān al-ʻArab ). Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) largely follows the grammatical standards of Classical Arabic and uses much of the same vocabulary. However, it has discarded some grammatical constructions and vocabulary that no longer have any counterpart in the spoken varieties and has adopted certain new constructions and vocabulary from the spoken varieties. Much of the new vocabulary
5125-470: The Afroasiatic language family . The Tuareg Berber languages are notably more conservative than those of the coastal cities. Over the years, Berbers have been influenced by contact with other cultures: Egyptians , Greeks , Punic people , Romans , Vandals , Arabs , Europeans , and Africans . The cultures of the Maghreb and the Sahara therefore combines Arab, indigenous Berber and African elements. In
Qarmatians - Misplaced Pages Continue
5250-599: The Aramaic for "short-legged", "red-eyed" or "secret teacher". Other sources, however, say that the name comes from the Arabic verb قرمط ( qarmaṭ ), which means "to make the lines close together in writing" or "to walk with short steps". The word "Qarmatian" can also refer to a type of Arabic script . The Qarāmiṭah in Sawad (southern Iraq ) were also known as "the Greengrocers" ( al-Baqliyyah ) because they followed
5375-484: The Levant , both of whom also significantly contributed to the ancestry of modern Northwest Africans. The proto-Berber tribes evolved from these prehistoric communities during the late Bronze - and early Iron ages. The majority of the people of the Maghreb and the Sahara regions speak varieties of Arabic and almost exclusively follow Islam. The Arabic and Berber languages are distantly related, both being members of
5500-541: The Middle Ages much of the area was loosely under the control of the Ottoman Empire . The Barbary pirates operated from the largely independent Barbary states located on the coast of North Africa. The Spanish Empire conquered several coastal cities between the 16th and 18th centuries. After the 19th century, the imperial and colonial presence of France , the United Kingdom , Spain and Italy left
5625-731: The Muslim world . North Africa is associated with the Middle East in the realm of geopolitics to form the Middle East-North Africa region. North Africa has three main geographic features: the Sahara desert in the south, the Atlas Mountains in the west, and the Nile River and delta in the east. The Atlas Mountains extend across much of northern Algeria , Morocco , and Tunisia . These mountains are part of
5750-653: The Nile Valley has mainly been home to the Egyptians and Nubians . Ancient Egyptians record extensive contact in their Western desert with people that appear to have been Berber or proto-Berber. As the Tassili n'Ajjer and other rock art findings in the Sahara have shown, the Sahara also hosted various populations before its rapid desertification in 3500 B.C and even today continues to host small populations of nomadic trans-Saharan peoples . Laboratory examination of
5875-523: The Strait of Gibraltar , whereupon they overcame the fickle Roman defense. The loss of North Africa is considered a pinnacle point in the fall of the Western Roman Empire as Africa had previously been an important grain province that maintained Roman prosperity despite the barbarian incursions, and the wealth required to create new armies. The issue of regaining North Africa became paramount to
6000-748: The Uan Muhuggiag child mummy and Tin Hanakaten child, suggested that the Central Saharan peoples from the Epipaleolithic , Mesolithic , and Pastoral periods possessed dark skin complexions. The archaeological evidence from the Holocene period has shown that Nilo-Saharan speaking groups had populated the central and southern Sahara before the influx of Berber and Arabic speakers, around 1500 years ago, who now largely populate
6125-568: The Xth form , or جامعة jāmiʻah 'university', based on جمع jamaʻa 'to gather, unite'; جمهورية jumhūriyyah 'republic', based on جمهور jumhūr 'multitude'). An earlier tendency was to redefine an older word although this has fallen into disuse (e.g., هاتف hātif 'telephone' < 'invisible caller (in Sufism)'; جريدة jarīdah 'newspaper' < 'palm-leaf stalk'). Colloquial or dialectal Arabic refers to
6250-535: The eastern part of North Africa has been home to the Egyptians . In the seventh and eighth centuries, Arabs from the Arabian Peninsula swept across the region during the early Muslim conquests . The Arab migrations to the Maghreb began immediately after, which started a long process of Islamization and Arabization that has defined the cultural landscape of North Africa ever since. Many but not all Berbers and Egyptians gradually merged into Arab - Islamic culture . The countries and people of North Africa share
6375-538: The fold mountain system that also runs through much of Southern Europe . They recede to the south and east, becoming a steppe landscape before meeting the Sahara desert, which covers more than 75 percent of the region. The tallest peaks are in the High Atlas range in south-central Morocco, which has many snow-capped peaks. South of the Atlas Mountains is the dry and barren expanse of the Sahara desert,
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#17327648315326500-494: The northern Hejaz . These features are evidence of common descent from a hypothetical ancestor , Proto-Arabic . The following features of Proto-Arabic can be reconstructed with confidence: On the other hand, several Arabic varieties are closer to other Semitic languages and maintain features not found in Classical Arabic, indicating that these varieties cannot have developed from Classical Arabic. Thus, Arabic vernaculars do not descend from Classical Arabic: Classical Arabic
6625-419: The "learned" tradition (Classical Arabic). This variety and both its classicizing and "lay" iterations have been termed Middle Arabic in the past, but they are thought to continue an Old Higazi register. It is clear that the orthography of the Quran was not developed for the standardized form of Classical Arabic; rather, it shows the attempt on the part of writers to record an archaic form of Old Higazi. In
6750-749: The "purest," most eloquent form of Arabic—initiating a process of jamʿu‿l-luɣah ( جمع اللغة 'compiling the language') which took place over the 8th and early 9th centuries. Kitāb al-'Ayn ( c. 8th century ), attributed to Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi , is considered the first lexicon to include all Arabic roots ; it sought to exhaust all possible root permutations —later called taqālīb ( تقاليب ) — calling those that are actually used mustaʿmal ( مستعمَل ) and those that are not used muhmal ( مُهمَل ). Lisān al-ʿArab (1290) by Ibn Manzur gives 9,273 roots, while Tāj al-ʿArūs (1774) by Murtada az-Zabidi gives 11,978 roots. North Africa North Africa (sometimes Northern Africa )
6875-454: The 11th and 12th centuries in al-Andalus , the zajal and muwashah poetry forms developed in the dialectical Arabic of Cordoba and the Maghreb. The Nahda was a cultural and especially literary renaissance of the 19th century in which writers sought "to fuse Arabic and European forms of expression." According to James L. Gelvin , " Nahda writers attempted to simplify the Arabic language and script so that it might be accessible to
7000-571: The 4th to the 6th centuries, the Nabataean script evolved into the Arabic script recognizable from the early Islamic era. There are inscriptions in an undotted, 17-letter Arabic script dating to the 6th century CE, found at four locations in Syria ( Zabad , Jebel Usays , Harran , Umm el-Jimal ). The oldest surviving papyrus in Arabic dates to 643 CE, and it uses dots to produce the modern 28-letter Arabic alphabet. The language of that papyrus and of
7125-616: The 8th century, knowledge of Classical Arabic had become an essential prerequisite for rising into the higher classes throughout the Islamic world, both for Muslims and non-Muslims. For example, Maimonides , the Andalusi Jewish philosopher, authored works in Judeo-Arabic —Arabic written in Hebrew script . Ibn Jinni of Mosul , a pioneer in phonology , wrote prolifically in the 10th century on Arabic morphology and phonology in works such as Kitāb Al-Munṣif , Kitāb Al-Muḥtasab , and Kitāb Al-Khaṣāʾiṣ [ ar ] {{main other|. Ibn Mada' of Cordoba (1116–1196) realized
7250-461: The Arab majority. Arabs constitute 70% to 80% of the population of Algeria, 92% 97% of Libya, 67% to 70% of Morocco and 98% of Tunisia's population. The Berbers comprise 20% of Algeria, 10% of Libya, 35% of Morocco and 1% of Tunisia's population. The region is predominantly Muslim with a Jewish minority in Morocco and Tunisia , and significant Christian minority—the Copts —in Egypt , Algeria , Morocco, Libya, and Tunisia. In 2001,
7375-405: The Carmathian state shrank to local dimensions. Bahrain broke away in CE 1058 under the leadership of Abu al-Bahlul al-Awwam who re-established orthodox Islam on the islands. Similar revolts removed from Carmathian control at about the same time. Deprived of all outside income and control of the coasts, the Carmathians retreated to their stronghold at the Hofuf Oasis. Their dynasty was finally dealt
7500-625: The Ismā‘īlī leader al-Husayn al-Ahwāzī converted the Kūfan man Ḥamdān in 874 CE, who took the name Qarmaṭ after his new faith. Qarmaṭ and his theologian brother-in-law ‘Abdān prepared southern Iraq for the coming of the Mahdi by creating a military and religious stronghold. Other such locations grew up in Yemen, in Eastern Arabia (Arabic Bahrayn ) in 899, and in North Africa . They attracted many new Shi'i followers because of their activist and messianic teachings. The new proto-Qarmaṭī movement continued to spread into Greater Iran and then into Transoxiana . A change in leadership in Salamiyah in 899 led to
7625-514: The Maghreb remained focused on small-scale subsistence in small, highly mobile groups. Some Phoenician and Greek colonies were established along the Mediterranean coast during the 7th century BCE. The most notable nations of antiquity in western North Africa are Carthage , Numidia and Mauretania . The Phoenicians colonized much of North Africa including Carthage and parts of present-day Morocco (including Chellah , Essaouira and Volubilis ). The Carthaginians were of Phoenician origin, with
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#17327648315327750-412: The Middle East and North Africa have become a badge of sophistication and modernity and ... feigning, or asserting, weakness or lack of facility in Arabic is sometimes paraded as a sign of status, class, and perversely, even education through a mélange of code-switching practises." Arabic has been taught worldwide in many elementary and secondary schools, especially Muslim schools. Universities around
7875-530: The Mubārakiyyah group, most of whom resided in Kufa . The split among the Mubārakiyyah came with the death of Muḥammad ibn Ismā‘īl (ca. 813 CE). The majority of the group denied his death; they recognized him as the Mahdi . The minority believed in his death and would eventually emerge in later times as the Isma'ili Fatimid Caliphate , the precursors to all modern groups. The majority Ismā‘īlī missionary movement settled in Salamiyah (now in Syria ) and had great success in Khuzestan (southwestern Iran ), where
8000-455: The Qarmaṭians came close to capturing Baghdad in 927, and sacked Mecca in 930, The Qarmatians also sacked Medina. In their attack on Islam's holiest sites, the Qarmatians desecrated the Zamzam Well with corpses of Hajj pilgrims and took the Black Stone from Mecca to Ain Al Kuayba in Qatif. Holding the Black Stone to ransom, they forced the Abbasids to pay a huge sum for its return in 952, They also besieged Damascus and devastated many of
8125-474: The Qur'an is referred to by linguists as "Quranic Arabic", as distinct from its codification soon thereafter into " Classical Arabic ". In late pre-Islamic times, a transdialectal and transcommunal variety of Arabic emerged in the Hejaz , which continued living its parallel life after literary Arabic had been institutionally standardized in the 2nd and 3rd century of the Hijra , most strongly in Judeo-Christian texts, keeping alive ancient features eliminated from
8250-520: The Renaissance era) as well as indigenous Mizrahi Jews . Today, less than 3,000 remain in the region, almost all in Morocco and Tunisia, and are mostly part of a French-speaking urban elite. (See Jewish exodus from Arab and Muslim countries .) Due to the recent African origin of modern humans , the history of Prehistoric North Africa is important to the understanding of pre-hominid and early modern human history in Africa. Some researchers have postulated that North Africa rather than East Africa served as
8375-450: The Roman myth of their origin being that Dido , a Phoenician princess, was granted land by a local ruler based on how much land she could cover with a piece of cowhide. She ingeniously devised a method to extend the cowhide to a high proportion, thus gaining a large territory. She was also rejected by the Trojan prince Aeneas according to Virgil , thus creating a historical enmity between Carthage and Rome , as Aeneas would eventually lay
8500-413: The Romance languages. Also, while it is comprehensible to people from the Maghreb , a linguistically innovative variety such as Moroccan Arabic is essentially incomprehensible to Arabs from the Mashriq , much as French is incomprehensible to Spanish or Italian speakers but relatively easily learned by them. This suggests that the spoken varieties may linguistically be considered separate languages. With
8625-449: The Romans, resulting in the Carthaginian North African territories becoming the Roman province of Africa in 146 B.C. This led to tension and eventually conflict between Numidia and Rome. The Numidian wars are notable for launching the careers of both Gaius Marius , and Sulla , and stretching the constitutional burden of the Roman republic as Marius required a professional army, something previously contrary to Roman values, to overcome
8750-420: The Sahara in the modern era. After migrating to North Africa in the 1st millennium BC, Semitic Phoenician settlers from the Levant established over 300 coastal colonies throughout the region and built a powerful empire that controlled most of the region from the 8th century BC until the middle of the 2nd century BC. Several waves of Arab migrations to the Maghreb began in the 7th century, including
8875-444: The Sahara, the distinction between sedentary oasis inhabitants and nomadic Bedouin Arabs and Tuaregs is particularly marked. Egyptians over the centuries have shifted their language from Egyptian (in its late form, varieties of Coptic ) to modern Egyptian Arabic while retaining a sense of national identity that has historically set them apart from other people in the region. Most Egyptians are Sunni Muslim , although there
9000-603: The Salamiyids; when ‘Abdān was assassinated, he went into hiding and subsequently repented. Qarmaṭ became a missionary of the new Imām, Abdallah al-Mahdi Billah (873–934), who founded the Fatimid Caliphate in North Africa in 909. Nonetheless, the dissident group retained the name Qarmaṭī. Its greatest stronghold remained in Bahrain , which then included much of eastern Arabia as well as the islands that comprise
9125-541: The Spanish cities of Ceuta and Melilla , and the plazas de soberanía . It can also be considered to include Malta , as well as other Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish regions such as Lampedusa and Lampione , Madeira , and the Canary Islands , which are all closer or as close to the African continent than Europe. Northwest Africa has been inhabited by Berbers since the beginning of recorded history , while
9250-749: The Western Empire, but was frustrated by Vandal victories. The focus of Roman energy had to be on the emerging threat of the Huns . In 468 AD, the Romans made one last serious attempt to invade North Africa but were repelled. This perhaps marks the point of terminal decline for the Western Roman Empire . The last Roman emperor was deposed in 476 by the Heruli general Odoacer . Trade routes between Europe and North Africa remained intact until
9375-619: The beginning of the end of their revolutionary movements. After their defeat by the Abbasids in 976, the Qarmatians began to look inwards and their status was reduced to that of a local power. This had severe consequences for the Qarmatians' ability to extract tribute from the region; according to Arabist historian Curtis Larsen: As tribute payments were progressively cut off, either by the subsequent government in Iraq or by rival Arab tribes,
9500-671: The caliph in Baghdad as well as from a rival Isma'ili imam in Cairo , the head of the Fatimid Caliphate , whose power they did not recognize. The land over which they ruled was extremely wealthy with a huge slave-based economy according to academic Yitzhak Nakash: The Qarmatian state had vast fruit and grain estates both on the islands and in Hasa and Qatif. Nasir Khusraw , who visited Hasa in 1051, recounted that these estates were cultivated by some thirty thousand Ethiopian slaves. He mentions that
9625-604: The cities to the north. They took opportunity to sack Salamiyya, as well as Tiberias, before the Abbasid authorities were able to regain control. The revolution and desecration shocked the Muslim world and humiliated the Abbasids, but little could be done. For much of the tenth century the Qarmatians were the most powerful force in the Persian Gulf and Middle East and controlled the coast of Oman and collecting tribute from
9750-525: The coming of Islam. Some Berbers were members of the Early African Church (but evolved their own Donatist doctrine ), some were Berber Jews , and some adhered to traditional Berber religion . African pope Victor I served during the reign of Roman emperor Septimius Severus . Furthermore, during the rule of the Romans, Byzantines, Vandals, Ottomans and Carthaginians the Kabyle people were
9875-540: The condition that he adhere to Sunnism . According to the maritime historian Dionisius A. Agius , the Qarmatians finally disappeared in 1067, after they lost their fleet at Bahrain Island and were expelled from Hasa near the Arabian coast by the chief of Banu, Murra ibn Amir. According to Qarmatians, the number of imams was fixed, with Seven Imāms preordained by God. These groups considers Muhammad ibn Isma'il to be
10000-438: The continent and elements of human modernity appeared in different places, and so different parts of Africa contributed to the emergence of what we call modern humans today." Early humans may have comprised a large, interbreeding population dispersed across Africa whose spread was facilitated by a wetter climate that created a "green Sahara", around 330,000 to 300,000 years ago. The rise of modern humans may thus have taken place on
10125-574: The conversion of Semitic mimation to nunation in the singular. It is best reassessed as a separate language on the Central Semitic dialect continuum. It was also thought that Old Arabic coexisted alongside—and then gradually displaced— epigraphic Ancient North Arabian (ANA), which was theorized to have been the regional tongue for many centuries. ANA, despite its name, was considered a very distinct language, and mutually unintelligible, from "Arabic". Scholars named its variant dialects after
10250-780: The desert: Tripolitania in the northwest and Cyrenaica in the northeast. Most of Egypt is also desert, with the exception of the Nile River and the irrigated land along its banks. The Nile Valley forms a narrow fertile thread that runs along the length of the country. Sheltered valleys in the Atlas Mountains, the Nile Valley and Delta , and the Mediterranean coast are the main sources of fertile farming land. A wide variety of valuable crops including cereals, rice and cotton, and woods such as cedar and cork , are grown. Typical Mediterranean crops, such as olives, figs, dates and citrus fruits, also thrive in these areas. The Nile Valley
10375-573: The eleventh century, a reformist movement made up of members that called themselves the Almoravid dynasty expanded south into Sub-Saharan Africa . North Africa's populous and flourishing civilization collapsed after exhausting its resources in internal fighting and suffering devastation from the invasion of the Banu Sulaym and Banu Hilal . Ibn Khaldun noted that the lands ravaged by Banu Hilal invaders had become completely arid desert. After
10500-587: The emergence of Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include: There are several features which Classical Arabic, the modern Arabic varieties, as well as the Safaitic and Hismaic inscriptions share which are unattested in any other Central Semitic language variety, including the Dadanitic and Taymanitic languages of
10625-721: The entirety of the region under one form of European occupation. In World War II from 1940 to 1943 the area was the setting for the North African Campaign . During the 1950s and 1960s all of the North African states gained independence. There remains a dispute over Western Sahara between Morocco and the Algerian -backed Polisario Front . The wider protest movement known as the Arab Spring began with revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt which ultimately led to
10750-728: The eve of the conquests: Northern and Central (Al-Jallad 2009). The modern dialects emerged from a new contact situation produced following the conquests. Instead of the emergence of a single or multiple koines, the dialects contain several sedimentary layers of borrowed and areal features, which they absorbed at different points in their linguistic histories. According to Veersteegh and Bickerton, colloquial Arabic dialects arose from pidginized Arabic formed from contact between Arabs and conquered peoples. Pidginization and subsequent creolization among Arabs and arabized peoples could explain relative morphological and phonological simplicity of vernacular Arabic compared to Classical and MSA. In around
10875-535: The exit point for the modern humans who first trekked out of the continent in the Out of Africa migration. The earliest inhabitants of central North Africa have left behind significant remains: early remnants of hominid occupation in North Africa, for example, were found in Ain el Hanech, near Saïda ( c. 200,000 BCE ); in fact, more recent investigations have found signs of Oldowan technology there, and indicate
11000-607: The fact that they participate in the innovations common to all forms of Arabic. The earliest attestation of continuous Arabic text in an ancestor of the modern Arabic script are three lines of poetry by a man named Garm(')allāhe found in En Avdat, Israel , and dated to around 125 CE. This is followed by the Namara inscription , an epitaph of the Lakhmid king Imru' al-Qays bar 'Amro, dating to 328 CE, found at Namaraa, Syria. From
11125-645: The fate of the successors of Abu Tahir al-Jannabi : It may be noted that at the time the Qarmaṭī state was still being ruled jointly by Abū Ṭāhir’s brothers. Abū Ṭāhir’s eldest son Sābūr (Shāpūr), who aspired to a ruling position and the command of the army, rebelled against his uncles in 358/969, but he was captured and executed in the same year. But the ruling sons of Abū Sa'īd al-Jannābī themselves did not survive much longer. Abū Manṣūr Aḥmad died in 359/970, probably of poisoning, and his eldest brother Abu’l-Qāsim Sa'īd died two years later. By 361/972, there remained of Abū Ṭāhir’s brothers only Abū Ya'qūb Yūsuf, who retained
11250-530: The foundations for Rome. Ancient Carthage was a commercial power and had a strong navy, but relied on mercenaries for land soldiers. The Carthaginians developed an empire in the Iberian Peninsula , Malta , Sardinia , Corsica and northwest Sicily , the latter being the cause of First Punic War with the Romans . Over a hundred years and more, all Carthaginian territory was eventually conquered by
11375-510: The fourth most useful language for business, after English, Mandarin Chinese , and French. Arabic is written with the Arabic alphabet , an abjad script that is written from right to left . Arabic is usually classified as a Central Semitic language . Linguists still differ as to the best classification of Semitic language sub-groups. The Semitic languages changed between Proto-Semitic and
11500-597: The inclusion of new words into their published standard dictionaries. They also publish old and historical Arabic manuscripts. In 1997, a bureau of Arabization standardization was added to the Educational, Cultural, and Scientific Organization of the Arab League . These academies and organizations have worked toward the Arabization of the sciences, creating terms in Arabic to describe new concepts, toward
11625-613: The language. Software and books with tapes are an important part of Arabic learning, as many of Arabic learners may live in places where there are no academic or Arabic language school classes available. Radio series of Arabic language classes are also provided from some radio stations. A number of websites on the Internet provide online classes for all levels as a means of distance education; most teach Modern Standard Arabic, but some teach regional varieties from numerous countries. The tradition of Arabic lexicography extended for about
11750-496: The largest sand desert in the world. In places the desert is cut by irregular watercourses called wadis —streams that flow only after rainfall but are usually dry. The Sahara's major landforms include ergs , large seas of sand that sometimes form into huge dunes ; the hammada , a level rocky plateau without soil or sand; and the reg , a desert pavement . The Sahara covers the southern part of Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia, and most of Libya. Only two regions of Libya are outside
11875-604: The late 6th century AD, a relatively uniform intertribal "poetic koine" distinct from the spoken vernaculars developed based on the Bedouin dialects of Najd , probably in connection with the court of al-Ḥīra . During the first Islamic century, the majority of Arabic poets and Arabic-writing persons spoke Arabic as their mother tongue. Their texts, although mainly preserved in far later manuscripts, contain traces of non-standardized Classical Arabic elements in morphology and syntax. Abu al-Aswad al-Du'ali ( c. 603 –689)
12000-420: The latter is taught in formal education settings. However, there have been studies reporting some degree of comprehension of stories told in the standard variety among preschool-aged children. The relation between Modern Standard Arabic and these dialects is sometimes compared to that of Classical Latin and Vulgar Latin vernaculars (which became Romance languages ) in medieval and early modern Europe. MSA
12125-883: The many national or regional varieties which constitute the everyday spoken language. Colloquial Arabic has many regional variants; geographically distant varieties usually differ enough to be mutually unintelligible , and some linguists consider them distinct languages. However, research indicates a high degree of mutual intelligibility between closely related Arabic variants for native speakers listening to words, sentences, and texts; and between more distantly related dialects in interactional situations. The varieties are typically unwritten. They are often used in informal spoken media, such as soap operas and talk shows , as well as occasionally in certain forms of written media such as poetry and printed advertising. Hassaniya Arabic , Maltese , and Cypriot Arabic are only varieties of modern Arabic to have acquired official recognition. Hassaniya
12250-478: The messenger – prophet ( Rasūl ), Imām al-Qā'im and Mahdi to be preserved in hiding, which is referred to as Occultation . In addition, the following Ismaili imams after Muhammad ibn Isma'il had been considered heretics of dubious origins by certain Qarmatian groups, who refused to acknowledge the imamate of the Fatimids and clung to their belief in the coming of the Mahdi . Farhad Daftary writes about
12375-457: The mid-10th century, persecution forced the Qarmatians to leave what is now Egypt and Iraq and move to the city of Multan , now in Pakistan . However, prejudice against the Qarmatians did not dwindle, as Mahmud of Ghazni led an expedition against Multan 's Qarmatian ruler Abdul Fateh Daud in 1005. The city was surrendered, and Fateh Daud was permitted to retain control over the city with
12500-589: The migration of the Banu Hilal and the Banu Sulaym westward into the Maghreb in the eleventh century, which introduced Arab culture and language to the countryside. Historians mark their movement as a critical moment in the Arabization of North Africa. As Arab nomads spread, the territories of the local Berber tribes were moved and shrank. The Zenata were pushed to the west and the Kabyles were pushed to
12625-644: The most prominent group were called the Mubārakiyyah . According to the Ismaili school of thought, Imām Ja'far al-Sadiq (702–765) designated his second son, Isma'il ibn Ja'far (ca. 721–755), as heir to the Imamate . However, Ismā‘īl predeceased his father. Some claimed he had gone into hiding, but the proto-Ismā‘īlī group accepted his death and therefore accordingly recognized Ismā‘īl's eldest son, Muhammad ibn Isma'il (746–809), as Imām. He remained in contact with
12750-744: The need for a lexical injection in Arabic, to suit concepts of the industrial and post-industrial age (such as sayyārah سَيَّارَة 'automobile' or bākhirah باخِرة 'steamship'). In response, a number of Arabic academies modeled after the Académie française were established with the aim of developing standardized additions to the Arabic lexicon to suit these transformations, first in Damascus (1919), then in Cairo (1932), Baghdad (1948), Rabat (1960), Amman (1977), Khartum [ ar ] {{main other| (1993), and Tunis (1993). They review language development, monitor new words and approve
12875-482: The north. The Berbers took refuge in the mountains whereas the plains were Arabized. This heavily shifted the demographics of the Maghreb. The trans-Saharan slave trade resulted in increased levels of sub-Saharan African ancestry in North Africa. The Haratin are commonly perceived as an endogamous group of former slaves or descendants of slaves. DNA studies of Iberomaurusian peoples at Taforalt , Morocco dating to around 15,000 years ago have found them to have
13000-544: The number of Christians in North Africa was estimated at 9 million, the majority of whom live in Egypt, with the remainder live in Maghreb countries. The inhabitants of the Spanish Canary Islands are of mixed Spanish and North African Berber ancestry, and the people of Malta are of primarily Southern Italian/Sicilian, as well as, to a lesser extent, North African and Middle Eastern ancestry and speak
13125-424: The one whose sound is heard but whose person remains unseen. Now the term al-hatif is used for a telephone. Therefore, the process of tawleed can express the needs of modern civilization in a manner that would appear to be originally Arabic. In the case of Arabic, educated Arabs of any nationality can be assumed to speak both their school-taught Standard Arabic as well as their native dialects, which depending on
13250-485: The only or one of the few in North Africa who remained independent. The Kabyle people were incredibly resistible so much so that even during the Arab conquest of North Africa they still had control and possession over their mountains. The early Muslim conquests included North Africa by 640. By 700, most of North Africa had come under Muslim rule. Indigenous Berbers subsequently started to form their own polities in response in places such as Fez and Sijilmasa . In
13375-604: The overhaul of Arabic grammar first proposed by Al-Jahiz 200 years prior. The Maghrebi lexicographer Ibn Manzur compiled Lisān al-ʿArab ( لسان العرب , "Tongue of Arabs"), a major reference dictionary of Arabic, in 1290. Charles Ferguson 's koine theory claims that the modern Arabic dialects collectively descend from a single military koine that sprang up during the Islamic conquests; this view has been challenged in recent times. Ahmad al-Jallad proposes that there were at least two considerably distinct types of Arabic on
13500-489: The people of Hasa were exempt from taxes. Those impoverished or in debt could obtain a loan until they put their affairs in order. No interest was taken on loans, and token lead money was used for all local transactions. The Qarmathian state had a powerful and long-lasting legacy. This is evidenced by a coin known as Tawila, minted around 920 by one of the Qarmathian rulers, and which was still in circulation in Hasa early in
13625-546: The present state. It was under Abbasid control at the end of the ninth century, but the Zanj Rebellion in Basra disrupted the power of Baghdad. The Qarmaṭians seized their opportunity under their leader, Abu Sa'id al-Jannabi , a Persian who hailed from Jannaba in coastal Fars . Eventually, from Qatar, he captured Bahrain's capital Hajr and al-Hasa in 899, which he made the capital of his state and once in control of
13750-464: The rapid desertification of the Sahara around 3500 B.C. largely due to a tilt in the Earth's orbit. It was during this period that domesticated plants and animals were introduced in the region, spreading from the north and east to the southwest. There has been an inferred connection between areas of rapid drying and the introduction of livestock in which the natural (orbital) aridification was amplified by
13875-410: The region may be mutually unintelligible. Some of these dialects can be considered to constitute separate languages which may have "sub-dialects" of their own. When educated Arabs of different dialects engage in conversation (for example, a Moroccan speaking with a Lebanese), many speakers code-switch back and forth between the dialectal and standard varieties of the language, sometimes even within
14000-458: The same sentence. The issue of whether Arabic is one language or many languages is politically charged, in the same way it is for the varieties of Chinese , Hindi and Urdu , Serbian and Croatian , Scots and English, etc. In contrast to speakers of Hindi and Urdu who claim they cannot understand each other even when they can, speakers of the varieties of Arabic will claim they can all understand each other even when they cannot. While there
14125-458: The sole example of Medieval linguist Abu Hayyan al-Gharnati – who, while a scholar of the Arabic language, was not ethnically Arab – Medieval scholars of the Arabic language made no efforts at studying comparative linguistics, considering all other languages inferior. In modern times, the educated upper classes in the Arab world have taken a nearly opposite view. Yasir Suleiman wrote in 2011 that "studying and knowing English or French in most of
14250-616: The spread of shrubs and open land due to grazing. Nevertheless, changes in northern Africa's ecology after 3500 BCE provided the backdrop for the formation of dynastic civilizations and the construction of monumental architecture such as the Pyramids of Giza . Archaeological evidence has attested that population settlements occurred in Nubia as early as the Late Pleistocene era and from the 5th millennium BC onwards, whereas there
14375-563: The standardization of these new terms throughout the Arabic-speaking world, and toward the development of Arabic as a world language . This gave rise to what Western scholars call Modern Standard Arabic. From the 1950s, Arabization became a postcolonial nationalist policy in countries such as Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Sudan. Arabic usually refers to Standard Arabic, which Western linguists divide into Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic. It could also refer to any of
14500-548: The state he sought to set up a utopian society. The Qarmaṭians instigated what one scholar termed a "century of terror" in Kufa. They considered the pilgrimage to Mecca a superstition, and once in control of the Bahrayni state, they launched raids along the pilgrim routes crossing the Arabian Peninsula . In 906, they ambushed the pilgrim caravan returning from Mecca and massacred 20,000 pilgrims. Under al-Jannabi (ruled 923–944),
14625-576: The talented military leader Jugurtha . Kingdom of Mauretania remained independent until being annexed to the Roman Empire by Emperor Claudius in 42 AD. North Africa remained a part of the Roman Empire, producing notable citizens, including Augustine of Hippo , until incompetent leadership from Roman commanders in the early fifth century allowed the Germanic peoples , the Vandals , to cross
14750-417: The teachings of Abū Hātim al-Zutti , who in 908 forbade animal slaughter . He also forbade radishes and alliums such as garlic, onions, and leeks. By 928, it is uncertain whether the people still held on to those teachings. Under the Abbasid Caliphate (750–1258 CE), various Shiite groups organised in secret opposition to their rule. Among them were the supporters of the proto-Ismā‘īlī community, of whom
14875-637: The territory disputed between Morocco and the partially recognized Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic . The United Nations ' definition includes all these countries as well as the Sudan . The African Union defines the region similarly, only differing from the UN in excluding the Sudan. The Sahel , south of the Sahara Desert , can be considered as the southern boundary of North Africa. North Africa includes
15000-501: The towns where the inscriptions were discovered (Dadanitic, Taymanitic, Hismaic, Safaitic). However, most arguments for a single ANA language or language family were based on the shape of the definite article, a prefixed h-. It has been argued that the h- is an archaism and not a shared innovation, and thus unsuitable for language classification, rendering the hypothesis of an ANA language family untenable. Safaitic and Hismaic, previously considered ANA, should be considered Old Arabic due to
15125-472: The twentieth century. According to Farhad Daftary , the catalyst of the collapse of Qarmatian movement as a whole happened in the year 931, when Abu Tahir al-Janabi , the Qarmatian leader in Bahrain, handed over the reins of the state in Bahrain to Abu'l-Fadl al-Isfahani , a young Persian man who had been believed by the Qarmatians to be the Mahdi . However, Abu Tahir soon realized al-Isfahani's appointment
15250-451: The world have classes that teach Arabic as part of their foreign languages , Middle Eastern studies , and religious studies courses. Arabic language schools exist to assist students to learn Arabic outside the academic world. There are many Arabic language schools in the Arab world and other Muslim countries. Because the Quran is written in Arabic and all Islamic terms are in Arabic, millions of Muslims (both Arab and non-Arab) study
15375-585: Was sacked by a Qarmatian leader, Abu Tahir al-Jannabi , outraging the Muslim world , particularly with their theft of the Black Stone and desecration of the Zamzam Well with corpses during the Hajj season of 930 CE. The origin of the name "Qarmatian" is uncertain. According to some sources, the name derives from the surname of the sect's founder, Hamdan Qarmat . The name qarmat probably comes from
15500-399: Was a disastrous mistake, after the "Mahdi" executed some nobles and insulted Muhammad and the other prophets . The incident shocked the Qarmatians and the Islamic community as a whole, and Abu Tahir ordered the youth's execution. Al-Isfahani lasted as leader only 80 days before his execution but greatly weakened the credibility of Qarmatians within the Muslim community in general and heralded
15625-502: Was usually selected for leading the Qarmaṭīs in military campaigns outside Baḥrayn, including their entanglements with the Fāṭimids. Arabic language Arabic (endonym: اَلْعَرَبِيَّةُ , romanized : al-ʿarabiyyah , pronounced [al ʕaraˈbijːa] , or عَرَبِيّ , ʿarabīy , pronounced [ˈʕarabiː] or [ʕaraˈbij] )
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