Social Effects Did the Early Essay

The education system of the Byzantine region spread through to the other nations, with them adopting new words from the Arab language, hence enriching their language. The social status of the slaves improved, whereas that of the elite and those who fought against the invasion deteriorated as they lost control over their territories.

The effects on Arab society

The interactions between the Arabs and the non-Arab community resulted in several changes within the Arab society. At the time of the conquest, the Arab received support from the Christians of the Syrian and Egypt territories because the Arabs promised them less taxation as compared to that of the Byzentine (Rogan 157). Therefore, the Arabs, after the conquest was over, feared that the interactions between the Muslim and the non-Muslim community would lead to undesirable results. For this reason, the Umayyad sought to keep the Muslim worriers concentrated in the garrison towns and prevented them from mixing with the local population. This happened with the aim that the isolation would keep the Muslim warriors from assimilating the cultures of the subjugated communities. They knew that intermarriages meant conversion of the local people into Islam and, therefore, they could lose the taxable subjects, as they could tax their own people.

The attempt to isolate them had little opportunity to succeed. No sooner had the elite Arabs settled, than the interactions extensively took course. The Arabs intensively intermarried with the local populations of the areas they conquered (Rogan 157). Equally, significant effect to note is that an increasing number of the people voluntarily converted into Islam despite the fact that the Muslims did little to acquire converts. The conversion did not advance the converts much socially as they still paid property taxes though at a lower rate.

The interactions further resulted to changes in the social setting of the Arab and widening Islamic community. The social changes include the observable shifts in the positioning of the women in the family and society. Initially, the Islam rule believed in the domination of males, and this was widely the norm in the Middle East (Van 189). However, in the period of expansion the position of the women in the society was strengthening, prevailing over the domination of the males. Muhammad and the Quran stressed on the moral and ethical concerns of marriage as a unit; as opposed to the adulterous nature of the pre-Islamic Arabia.However, with the interaction with the new cultures, their practice and respect for the teachings of Islam faced a challenge as the practice of the other societies also seemed inviting to the Muslim elites, as well.

Among other practices, that the Arab adopted is some writing letters and symbols from the Greek culture of the Byzantine people. They also adopted the use of the concepts of mathematics and history study from the interaction with the Byzantine people. In their initial system, the number zero had little value; however, they got a new value for the digit zero and thus, were able to perform difficult computations beyond the previous system of using letters to signify numbers. Therefore, much of Arab literature received much influence from Persia and the empire they conquered. The Greeks also substantially contributed to the Muslim culture in the continuum of philosophy, science and architecture. The Muslims received architectural skills and their style of building from the Greek people of the Byzantine Empire (Van 219). For instance, the Moslem mosque and the Byzantine church of Hagia Sophia were very similar, drawing the relations between the two ancient cultures. The Arab adopted the games of Backgammon, Chess and Polo from the interaction during this conquest.

Conclusion

The conquest of the Early Arabs into the Byzantine Empire in the period from 632 to 750 began when the Arab army gained control over most of the neighboring territories. This interaction between the empires had several impacts in the social development of the empires. These effects on the different societies marked a period of civilization for both cultures, with each of the cultures adopting new traits and practices from the other. Therefore, the interaction influenced the two societies equally, the conqueror and the conquered.

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