The Great Arab Conquests by Hugh Kennedy

The Great Arab Conquests by Hugh Kennedy

Todays Arab world was created at breathtaking speed. In just over one hundred years following the death of Mohammed in 632, Arabs had subjugated a territory with an east-west expanse greater than the Roman Empire, and they did it in about one-half the time. By the mid-eighth century, Arab armies had conquered the thousand-year-old Persian Empire, reduced the Byzantine Empire to little more than a city-state based around Constantinople, and destroyed the Visigoth kingdom of Spain. The cultural and linguistic effects of this early Islamic expansion reverberate today. This is the first popular English-language account in many years of this astonishing remaking of the political and religious map of the world. Hugh Kennedys sweeping narrative reveals how the Arab armies conquered almost everything in their path, and brings to light the unique characteristics of Islamic rule. One of the few academic historians with a genuine talent for story telling, Kennedy offers a compelling mix of larger-than-life characters, fierce battles, and the great clash of civilizations and religions.

Hugh Kennedy, School of Oriental and African Studies, Fanny Bessard, Trinity College, Oxford

Hugh Kennedy is a historian of the Islamic Middle East between c. 600 and 1050. From 1972 to 2017, he was lecturer and then Professor in the Department of Mediaeval History in the University of St Andrews. Since 2007 he has been Professor of Arabic at SOAS University of London. He is the author of
numerous books and articles including most recently The Caliphate: A Pelican Introduction (Penguin, 2016).

Fanny Bessard is a historian of early and classical Islam with expertise in Arabic historiography, as well as a practicing archaeologist with a decade of field experience in the Middle East and Central Asia. Before joining the University of Oxford, she held a Newton fellowship at SOAS (2013-15), a
Leverhulme ECF at the University of St Andrews (2015-16), and a Lecturership in the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Bristol (2016-19). Her main research interest lies in the social and economic transformations of the Middle East, 700-1000.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780306815850
ISBN 10	0306815850
Title	The Great Arab Conquests
Author	Hugh Kennedy
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	Hachette Books
Year published	2007-09-11
Number of pages	448
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.