WITH MAPS, MANY ILLUSTRATIONS, A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE "I like the Mussulman; he is not ashamed of his God; his life is a fairly NEW YORK G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS LONDON: T. FISHER UNWIN COPYRIGHT BY G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 1886 Electrotyped, Printed and Bound by G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 0456 PREFACE. WHEN the Greeks and Romans mentioned the tribes that ranged the deserts west of the Euphrates, they called them Saracens (Zapaиnvo:-Saraceni), a name of which no philologist has yet given the signification. Perhaps it meant "The People of the Desert," from the Arabic sahra, a desert; or, “The People of the East," from sharq, the rising sun.* After this name had been used in an indefinite manner for all the unknown tribes of the desert, it was given to the followers of Mohammed; and it is used in that sense in the following pages, thus comprising many different nations, scattered at times. from the Atlantic to the Pacific. When Pierre Vattier, counsellor and physician to the Duke of Orleans, ventured, in the year 1657, to translate into French Elmacin's story of the kalifs, he thought it necessary to apologize to his polite readers for introducing to them a host of barbarians, enemies of the Christian faith. He argued well, however, that Frenchmen were accustomed to study * It may be objected that it is improbable that the Arabs should have originated their own name in that way. It is possible that they might have called themselves "Sons of the Desert," but, certainly, they were not to themselves "The Eastern People." with interest the history of Rome, which was a country of sworn enemies to the true religion, and that the kalifs would be found much more Christian, in their dealings with other nations, than the Roman emperors were. One is no longer obliged thus to apologize for conducting any historical investigation, and we may study the career of the Saracens as one of the most interesting that the past can spread before us. Though the present volume is mainly devoted to the period before the Crusades lent brilliancy to the subject, and does not include the thrilling narrative of the Moors in Spain, the greatest embarrassment of the author has arisen from the amplitude of the theme. The life of the founder of Islam has alone given rise to many volumes more extensive than this one is allowed to be; and the conquests of the roving tribes of Asia as they progressed westward, might well occupy more pages than are now at command. The author can only hope that he has not carried the process of condensation to a point that will deprive his most interesting story of the value that intrinsically belongs to it. CAMBRIDGE, September 6, 1886. A. G. |