The Feeding of the five Hundred Thousand: Cities and Agriculture in Early Islamic Mesopotamia

Abstract

This paper discusses the impact of the foundation of major cities in Mesopotamia in the early Islamic period (c. 636-900 CE) and their impact on the agricultural economy and rural settlement in the area. It considers the potential agricultural productivity of the area, the availability of river transport, the fiscal structure of the early Islamic state and the way in which it created demand for foodstuffs, and the development of the qaṭīca as a form of landholding which provided security of tenure and hence the encouragement of long-term investment in agricultural infrastructure.

TheRedSea under theCaliphalDynasties, c. 639–1171

“…The “long” eighth century—from the creation of an Islamic state by ʿAbd al‐Malik after 685 to the foundation of Sāmarrāʾ in 836—has generally been understood as a sustained episode of economic growth for the Middle East (Kennedy, , , ; Power, , 208–212; Walmsley, ). Yet this does not seem to have been the case for the Red Sea region, where a troika of rapacious taxation, forced labour, and land confiscation fuelled spiralling rebellion and sedition in Egypt and Yemen.…”

13 Comparative Landscape Analysis: Contrasting the Middle East and Maya Regions

“…Therefore although eighth–ninth century C.E. Baghdad may have housed a population of around 500,000, and perhaps as high as 1.6 million, this figure was sustained for less than two centuries (Fletcher ; but see Kennedy :189 for more modest estimates). The overall relationship for larger pre‐industrial compact cities globally is illustrated in Figure , which demonstrates how the largest cities lasted for little more than 60 years, whereas smaller cities in the region of 20–40 square kilometers endured for 660–730 years .…”

“…In the case of the mega cities of the Islamic Middle East, this not only presented a major problem for the administration of the caliphate, but the rate of rise and fall of such cities must have imposed an additional burden on supply systems. Thanks to both historical and archaeological sources, there is good evidence to indicate that the systems of water supply and irrigation were expanded significantly in order to provision these Abbasid cities (Kennedy ; Wilkinson and Rayne ). Moreover, it would have been necessary for such systems of supply to have been extremely flexible in order to re‐direct the supply of bulk produce if cities were moved to new locations and demand in that sector collapsed, as was the case of Baghdad and Samarra.…”

“…Moreover, it would have been necessary for such systems of supply to have been extremely flexible in order to re‐direct the supply of bulk produce if cities were moved to new locations and demand in that sector collapsed, as was the case of Baghdad and Samarra. In the case of the Early Islamic Middle East, the supply of bulk foodstuffs was effected by integrated and efficient transportation networks, specifically by maritime and riverine boats (Kennedy ) . That this challenge of supply extended beyond the capital cities is illustrated by the case of trading cities such as Siraf (Iran), which had a very limited agricultural hinterland in contrast to Sohar (Oman) which possessed extensive areas of fields and gardens.…”

“…Despite (or perhaps because of) their size, the mega cities of the Middle East did not endure for long periods. This was in part because the rulers chose to re‐locate their cities (Fletcher :129; Kennedy ), but also because of internal socioeconomic factors or political and environmental crises. This raises the question: can settlement duration be equated with sustainability?…”