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capital at Ramleh. The population of Syria, Palestine and Egypt
remained grouped in this rough pattern for the next four centuries.
     
    The Ommayad
Caliphate
    The fifth of the Caliphs, Moawiya the Ommayad,
had been governor of Syria; and after his accession in A.D. 660 he established
his capital at Damascus. His descendants reigned there for nearly a century. It
was a period of prosperity for Syria and Palestine. The Ommayad Caliphs were
with few exceptions men of unusual ability and a broad-minded tolerance. The
presence of their court in the province ensured its good government and a
lively commercial activity; and they encouraged the culture that they found
there. This was a Hellenistic-Christian culture, influenced by tastes and ideas
that we associate with the name of Byzantium. Greek-speaking Christians were
employed in the civil service. For many decades the state accounts were kept in
Greek. Christian artists and craftsmen worked for the Caliphs. The Dome of the
Rock at Jerusalem, completed for the Caliph Abdul-Malik in 691, is the supreme
example of the rotunda-style of building in Byzantine architecture. Its mosaics,
and the even lovelier mosaics set up in the courtyard of the Great Mosque of
Damascus for his son, Walid I, are amongst the finest products of Byzantine
art. How far they were the work of native artisans and how far they were helped
by the technicians and material that Walid certainly imported from Byzantium is
a matter of dispute. These mosaics carefully respected the Prophet’s ban on the
depiction of living creatures. But in their country palaces, discreetly removed
from the eyes of disapproving mullahs — for instance, at the hunting-box
of Kasr al-Amra, in the steppes beyond the Jordan — the Ommayads freely
permitted frescoes depicting the human form, even in the nude. Their rule,
indeed, brought no interruption to the development of the Hellenistic culture
of the near Orient; which now achieved its finest, but its final, flowering.
    The Christians had therefore no cause to regret
the triumph of Islam. Despite an occasional brief bout of persecution and
despite a few humiliating regulations, they were better off than they had been
under the Christian Emperors. Order was better kept. Trade was good; and the
taxes were far lower. Moreover, during the greater part of the eighth century
the Christian Emperor was a heretic, an iconoclast, an oppressor of all the Orthodox
that paid respect to holy images. Good Christians were happier under infidel
rule.
    But this happy period did not endure. The
decline of the Ommayads and the civil wars that led to the establishment of the
Abbasid Caliphs at Baghdad in 750 brought chaos to Syria and Palestine.
Unscrupulous and uncontrolled local governors raised money by confiscating
Christian churches which the Christians had then to redeem. There were waves of
fanaticism, with persecutions and forced conversions. The victory of the
Abbasids restored order; but there was a difference. Baghdad was far away.
There was less supervision of the provincial administration. Trade was still
active along the caravan routes; but there was no great market to stimulate it
locally. The Abbasids were stricter Moslems than the Ommayads. They were less
tolerant of the Christians. Though they too were dependent on an older culture,
it was not Hellenistic but Persian. Baghdad lay within the ancient territory of
the Sassanid kingdom. Persians acquired the chief places in the government.
Persian ideals in art and Persian habits of daily life were adopted. As with
the Ommayads, Christian officials were employed. But these Christians were with
few exceptions Nestorians, whose outlook was towards the East and not the West.
The Abbasid court had on the whole a greater interest in intellectual matters
than the Ommayad. The Nestorians were freely used to translate philosophical
and technical works from the ancient Greek; and scientists and mathematicians
were encouraged to come, even from