Emerging from rebellion, the Abbasids forged an empire of knowledge, power, and faith. Their rise marked the dawn of Islam’s greatest age.

Baghdad, the majestic capital city of the great Abbasid Caliphate. For centuries, the city was a center of culture, learning, ...

Who she was, nobody knows. She was buried almost 1200 years ago in Birka, 25 kilometres west of modern-day Stockholm. Birka, on the strategic Björkö Island, was an important trading centre during the ...

They were keen and curious observers. More than a millennium ago merchant-informants and officials at the service of the Abbasid caliph, from Baghdad or Basra, put to paper eyewitness accounts of ...