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Early Access - Rise of the Abbasids! (Patreon)

Published:
2023-04-19 18:28:08
Edited:
2023-05-03 08:28:30
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:

Videos

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YouTube link 

Dear Patrons,

I am very pleased to share the premiere of Islam's 'Golden Age' - Rise of the Abbasids!

This is the first episode in a two-part series telling the story of the rise and fall of the Abbasids (roughly, 750-1250). This dynasty ruled one of history's great empires, the Caliphate, during what came to be called 'Islam's Golden Age' (a term not exactly adored by all historians, but we'll roll with it). I learned a lot making it, and I hope you will too!

I've had great help on this project from Darian Safiran of Legendarian, and Prof Antoine Burrat of the University of Maryland. Original artwork is by Marwan Musa, who created his brilliant illustrations in between his other job, which is fighting fires in the remote islands of the Philippines.

I hope you enjoy the video and look forward to comments. We're already working on the next episode of Napoleon's First Campaign - The Bridge at Arcole, which will be out in May.

Typos for Merch is in effect - first one to spot one, in English or Arabic, gets any  item from the merch store as a thank you!

Thanks again for supporting the channel, and I'll be back with Napoleon updates soon.

Toby

Files

Islam's 'Golden Age' - Rise of the Abbasids

Patreon ad-free early access.

Comments

JDusk

oh! This was unexpected! But not unwelcome. I look forward to diving into this era! And best of fortune to Marwan Musa his life sounds already so interesting, my goodness.

Ian Simpkins

Epic History TV does it again!

Kevin Xu

Ah, some expertise from my neck of the woods! Go Terps!

Blake Mcdonald

Love it! Made my day at work so much better. Can’t wait for the second part to drop

Stuart Carver

Love it ❤️ and now for something completely different, nice breath of fresh air. I can tell I’m gonna become obsessed.If they lasted 750-1250 and we are only up to 809 in one video surely we need more than one more part to cover 441 years? I’d take 3 more easily, rather have this than Italy part 4 which feels a little more drawn out out. Russian campaign was 3 do we really need 5 for Italy? Also is that how you say Abbasid is saying it ABBA-Sid like the band a western bastardisation?

Filip Petrovic

Great video as always. I'm happy you mentioned the House of Wisdom. :)

Stuart Carver

Perhaps you should say the word algorithm rather than our word algorithm since this is a documentary that can and will be viewed by anyone in the world not just those in the west? I see what your doing when talking about the elephant with regard to the dates in the top right corner but it does say 807 when talking about it instead of 802 so maybe an annotation under the picture to make it clearer which emissary it came from?

Thomas

Super excited for this one. Thanks!

Emilo the Great

Nice video, really enjoying learning about other cultures, and other kind of history. As someone who lives in Northern Europe we dont learn that much about islamic and muslim history so its nice to learn about it!

Amin Ibrahim

Ooh amazing. The Mamelukes definitely need one of these videos!

Samuel Pattinasarane

Keep up the good work as always! More unexpected surprises like this are indeed welcome, and it feels fitting to share them just when the Eid is around the corner :)

Line_of_Blood

Great Video! Maybe in the beginning it would be better to have the label of the Rashidun caliphate and then replaced with Umayyad Caliphate label kind of how the Sassanid Empire label was shattered when Rashidun caliphate began to expand in the video

EpicHistoryTV

Thanks Raymond! That was a deliberate call, just trying to limit the number of empires the viewer has to deal with in the prelude... especially ones that don't stick around!

EpicHistoryTV

Thanks Stuart. Determined to get this one done in two eps..

EpicHistoryTV

Thanks Stuart, I've looked again at both of these points but I think they're clear enough.

Zr0w3n

Middle Eastern history during this time period is so interesting. Very cool video

Line_of_Blood

Oh ok, one more quick empire wouldn't hurt, but not the end of the world lol

David Klein

I’m just playing lol it was nice to see this video & eat a chicken salad. Very fun to watch

Stuart Carver

If rashid ruled 786-809 that would be 23 years not 22. I know it’s not exact but when I looked it up it’s just over 22.5 so it would therefore be rounded up not down.

Stuart Carver

Good luck loads to cram in there 🙂

Yatty

The Russian campaign only took six months and Napoleon only commanded in five or so battles. The Italian campaign took a year and Napoleon commanded in some twenty battles. The Russian campaign is also relatively easy to narrate, as it is neatly divided into a linear rise-and-fall of the French army advancing, entering Moscow, and retreating. The Italian campaign is a lot less cleanly divided, as for one it sees Napoleon fighting his way through what are essentially at least six major campaigns in their own right (Montenotte, the first, second, third, and fourth campaigns around Mantua, and then Napoleon crossing the Alps into Austria). Moreover, Napoleon ultimately comes out on top in every campaign - there is no clean narrative turning point, and the most important victories are spread out across the whole year. It's also awkward to pick and choose which campaigns to cover, as all of them were crucial to the final outcome, and they don't really make sense without the context of the other campaigns. To use another example, it's like how the Gallic Wars wouldn't be covered very well by a video on Alesia - that doesn't really explain how Caesar went from governing Cisalpine Gaul to controlling all the land between the Rhine and Pyrenees. You can narratively cut the Gallic Wars into either one over-simplified video that summarizes the whole war with Alesia as the climax, or you can serialize it into Bibracte, the Sabis, etc. separately. You can't, however, cover Alesia in one video and pick-and-choose from the other major battles that have relatively similar importance among each other to focus on for the other two videos - that would be a very awkward viewing experience. Napoleon's Italian campaign was going to have a lot of parts the moment it was decided to cover the Montenotte campaign + Lodi in one part, instead of having the whole year's worth of events summarized in one video.

The Imperialist

You guys have done a marvellous job I hope you do a series about the rashidun caliphates expansion or the history of the ottoman empire would be just mind blowing

EpicHistoryTV

Hi Stuart, always impressed by your attention to detail - keeps me on my toes! I think this one is also ok as it stands - in maths, yes we'd round up to 23, but I think '22 year reign' is a better short way of describing a 22 year 6 month reign than '23 year reign'.

EpicHistoryTV

Thanks Imperialist! And thanks for supporting the channel!

Mohammed Alsaadoon

A quick note: Sunnis do not celebrate Ashura due to the Death of Husayn because it was celebrated earlier by the Prophet Muhammed (PBUH), obviously before any Fitna. The reason of the celebration is to commemorate the Prophet Moses and the Israelites escaping the Pharaoh's Army and the famous incident of splitting the Red Sea. Also, I find it interesting that the Umayyadss are depicted as the decadent dynasty by the Abbassids when today the image is reversed. The Umayyads are seen as the more nomadic truly Arab Dynasty while the Abbassids are seen as the more settled, learned luxurious dynasty. Proof can be seen in the video: Islamic expansion under the Rashidun continued with the Umayyads but ground to a halt under the Abbassids, with their claim to fame being science and luxury.

EpicHistoryTV

Thank you for the clarifications Mohammed! I'll look at the script again regarding Ashura, make sure that's clear. Yes, the Abbasids were very keen to paint a bad picture of the Umayyads, obviously trying to discredit the dynasty they had supplanted.

Tom Vansel

Thank you for this excellent video Toby! Immensely educational as always! ~ Tom

Stuart Carver

Alright that’s fine. Well any good history enthusiast wants everything to be correct so I do love knowing that it is.

Stuart Carver

It was more of a throwaway comment though I would have thought perhaps doing it in 3 one for each commander Napoleon faced might have worked fairly well even if everything didn’t line up exactly. Yes there were more battle and time but the Russian campaign was obviously larger to required more detail. It’s not always straightforward in terms of x amount of time or number of battles = certain number of videos.

Mohamed Musbah

Excellent video, thank you for covering this part of history. Can you go into details into the battles? Each can almost be a video in itself. Also, Abdurahman's escape and founding of Cordoba was an incredible journey. That said, it is impressive how much you covered in one video. Thanks again for making this.

EpicHistoryTV

Thanks Mohamed! It would be tricky, as far as I understand we have very few reliable sources for most of these battles, and even fewer that are contemporaneous. Not like covering a Napoleonic battle!

jack daniels

Small quibble: at 00:14 and 00:55 the positions of the Lombards and Gepids seem to be a little off. By 632 the Lombards had abandoned Pannonia to the Avars and the Gepids had been obliterated. But a wonderful video this is! The music and animation is really slick.

DC*

Great video! A refreshing topic that I don't know much about. Can't wait for part 2.

EpicHistoryTV

Thank you jack! I did actually fix this but the wrong sequence ended up in the final cut, so I'll class this as a typo, and you are first to spot one! I'll message you about your prize.

Hisham Yousif

Excellent variety, Toby. Chapters of history little explored otherwise. Happy to support. Cheers!

Hethwill Wargames

Wonderful work team ! Good research and visual production. A very welcome theme.

allan bluman

Can't wait to watch my Father and I enjoy your content glad to support.

David Hennessy

As eurocentric as epichistory normally is (and thats the way I like it to be honest) its always nice to take the occasional detour and learn about some of the stuff I'm only broadly aware of.