204 cities: The Islamic World walls were used regularly to defend a city against attack, a threat that ensured that the defenses of the city would be well maintained Some such defensive walls, however, were badly damaged through war or were allowed to crumble By the end of the medieval period a number of cities had begun to decay, and a reduction in overland trade between Europe and China coupled with a general shift in trade routes to the sea led to significant changes At the same time, there was a decline in the ability to irrigate fields to provide food for many of the cities, a problem exacerbated in many places by the depredations of the Mongols beginning in the 13th century Configuration of Cities in the I slamic W orld The dominant feature of all the cities of the Islamic world was the mosque in the city’s center, typically surrounded by markets and trading areas The minarets for the mosque dominated the city, and it was from the minarets that the faithful were called to prayer (In the eastern part of the Islamic world—modern-day Iran, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan—the minarets atop the entrances were not used to call the faithful to prayer and are largely decorative.) Many survive to this day The minarets varied widely, from larger structures, such as those of the Great Mosque at Samarra, in modern-day Iraq, to the more traditional and narrower towers of the Grand Mosque in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) Islamic architectural traditions—arches, hemispherical roofs, and decorations with calligraphic script or flower forms—became common throughout the region, albeit with distinct local variations in style These elements were used in many important buildings in cities throughout the Islamic world (apart from mosques), such as baths, gardens, public hospitals, bazaars and covered market places, domestic housing, and palaces Most North African cities had medinas— areas of cities that were largely inhabited by Arabs—featuring terraced houses with plain fronts and with entrances leading into courtyards Crucial to most of these cities during medieval times were also surrounding walls to protect from attack by European crusaders, other Muslim groups, or the Mongols Outside the city walls large cemeteries were laid out When some of the cities expanded, the cemeteries often served to divide the old part of cities, within the medina, from the newer parts Major Cities of the Middle East In Arabia the major cities were Mecca and Medina, trading centers located along caravan routes near the Red Sea Mecca was 45 miles inland from the port city of Jeddah, and Medina was about 110 miles inland Indeed, Mecca had been a center of commerce long before the birth of the prophet Muhammad It was captured by the Umayyads in 692 and sacked by the Qarmatians (members of a Shiite Muslim sect known as the Ismailites) in 930 Medina (called Yathrib in medieval times) was the capital of the Umayyad Dynasty until they moved to Damascus in 661, leading to a decline in the importance of the city until the 19th century Elsewhere in Arabia were numerous other important cities Jeddah, the main port, developed during the later medieval period as a stop for pilgrims going to and from Mecca In the south of the Arabian Peninsula the city of Sanaa had been founded in ancient times on the plains between the mountains and the desert at the crossroads of several old caravan routes With the advent of Islam in the early seventh century, the Great Mosque of Sanaa, al-Jama’a al-Kabir, was built in the center of the city Sanaa had been a walled city before the arrival of Islam, and subsequently the city was enlarged westward The city suffered several floods, with one in 875 severely damaging the Great Mosque, which sustained further damage in 911 when Sanaa was attacked by the Qarmatians On the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula the city of Muscat occupied a strip of land along the Gulf of Oman From the seventh century, many Arab seafarers preferred to use the nearby island of Hormuz in modern-day Iran, but from the ninth century Muscat began to regain some of its earlier economic power Two forts were positioned on either side of the city, and the landward side of the city was protected by walls The rapid increase in the popularity of the city and the safety it afforded meant that it was not long before many of its buildings towered over the city walls The city of Jerusalem was captured by the Arabs in 638, and although it was occupied by the crusaders from 1099 until 1187, it remained, in essence, an Islamic city The city was dominated by the Dome of the Rock, which was constructed on Moriah, a hill in the eastern part of the city, beginning in 688 Christian churches and Jewish synagogues were permitted to remain, and worship continued in them until the end of the 10th century, when many were destroyed under the direction of the caliph Hakim The brief crusader period saw the defenses of the city massively enlarged, but this did not prevent the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem from being overwhelmed by the Seljuk Turks almost 90 years after it had been created For most of the medieval period the city was also a center of pilgrimage for Christians and Jews—the former visiting the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and the latter the Western Wall There are surviving written accounts by Christian pilgrims who visited the city throughout the medieval period Numerous hostels in the city catered to them