[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nalanda#Decline_and_destructio...
Edit - As I can't reply to stuff like this (it deserved to die) but in case I get anything more like it:
> Find me an "empire" that wasn't destructive. You're disingenuous, and likely racist as all hell. Fuck off.
I'm making that exact point, all empires are destructive, hence the it's not exceptional in either sense. Thanks to all those who can read and all those who don't go around calling others racists for no good reason.
There was definitely a period when western Europe was very backwards whereas a lot of meaningful and important progress was made in Muslim countries. There have been Islamic empires that were relatively tolerant about differences, and certainly didn't destroy everything they deemed heretic.
We have a strong tendency to generalise: everything that's a bit distant from us has to be either one thing of the other thing. We're terrible at nuance, yet it's vital in order to understand history.
1. I'm not singling out anything but the subject. If you want a different response to compare it with, pick a different subject.
2. It's not venomous, and even if it were, it's irrelevant to everything here (quite the feat). You're supposed to show prejudice, venom with reason and/or evidence is not prejudice.
3. Since a) my point was not about a race and b) the subject is not a race, then it's not a racist argument. Far from it.
4. Hence, I'm not a racist. Or maybe I am but you certainly can't ascertain it from your fatuous logic nor anything I've written here.
5. Also hence, and however, you are an apologist.
You need to up your game.
These cities were conquered. Some were sacked and destroyed. There was major loss of life, economic destruction, and loss of property, including written works. The conquerors, at the time, did not much appreciate the value of what they were destroying.
The fact that the region later somewhat recovered does not take away from the fact that, if we’re talking about setbacks for human progress, the early Muslim conquests were one. Yes, there was a great reawakening where the conquerors began to appreciate the legacy that remained, and began translating and building on the works that escaped their destruction. That doesn’t make the intervening period better. And certainly the poster is correct that cities like Alexandria and Carthage never again achieved their old prominence.
> These cities were conquered. Some were sacked and destroyed. There was major loss of life, economic destruction, and loss of property, including written works. The conquerors, at the time, did not much appreciate the value of what they were destroying.
It's just life. North Africa was just a bunch of tribes/cities. It is easier for an invader to tackle them one city at a time than taking a full united civilization.
At the time of the expansion of Islam, there was no longer even a Western Roman Empire.
Later in one of the most dashing military campaigns, the Eastern Roman Empire(Byzantines) forces under Belisarius captured most of the territory of the former Western Roman Empire, including the African provinces after defeating Vandals. The African provinces were then organized into the Exarchate, which is what Muslim armies eventually overcame in the 690s AD.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Muslim_conquests
As for your claims about Alexandria:
> Following the Arab conquest of Egypt in AD 641, the city was plundered and lost its significance before re-emerging in the modern era
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandria
Once can also hardly read accounts of the conquest of Alexandria and think “my, what an improvement.” A lot of people died. Parts of the city burned. You are also wrong that the schools were closed prior. That was certainly not the case. Alexandria was a major center of learning up until the conquest.
Carthage was sacked and deliberately destroyed to prevent it from being retaken.
Look, yes, there’s a group of people out there that understates they Islamic Golden Age. But that doesn’t take away from the reality that the early Muslim conquests were absolutely ruinous. People were still writing those “important classical texts” you mention when they were killed and their texts burned. I doubt they would have much appreciated that the conquerors much later translated what survived the flames.
What your classics academia instruction seems to have short changed you is in the entire period of history where arab conquest reduced most mesopotamian and north african development to rubble, mostly in the name of religion.
Happily since I was a philosophy undergrad, I am easily able to spot a straw man. The claim was that the Arab Conquest transformed N Africa from a wealthy region to a backwater. This is was really what I was more responding to. During the Arab Golden Age N. Africa was far more prosperous than during the collapse of late Western Rome. If you learned about the history of the region you could discover how inaccurate the premise is as well as the conclusion. Anyway, this conversation ended yesterday so research if you'd like to learn, but I'm out.
* https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/878061.Moorish_Spain
* https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/336859.The_Golden_Trade_...
* https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4398835-the-berbers-and-...
This is a very misleading distortion of history. The limestone casing on the Great Pyramid was destroyed in an earthquake in 1308 CE. The limestone rubble was pulled from the base of the pyramid and repurposed for building though much of it was also burned in kilns for lime like the marble of many ancient buildings and temples from the ancient world all around the Mediterranean by people of many and various religions and nationalities.
>When the Arab armies conquered North Africa, it was one of the richest and most developed areas in the Mediterranean. After the Arab conquest, it became a backwater and never achieved the prominence it had before.
You really ought to read up on the Islamic Golden Age.