Sublime

Manchu adeptness in steppe diplomacy helped to turn Inner Mongolia into a buffer zone, and to drive China’s imperial power deep into Inner Asia. The northern inland threat to China’s stability was efficiently neutralized. With a once-disruptive Japan now safety withdrawn into neo-Confucian seclusion, and Confucianism firmly in command in Korea and

Shravasti: This was the capital of the ancient kingdom of Kaushala.

Islamic law and theology, and the cultural aspirations of rulers in Egypt, Iran and the Fertile Crescent, had permitted a remarkable flowering of literature, art (especially architecture), science and philosophy. Islam’s cosmopolitan individualism and the wide dissemination of its legal traditions also favoured the growth of a far-flung commercial

An agrarian surplus sustained urban elites and their elaborate high culture. In the towns, an artisan class of legendary skill had sprung up to cater for these elites’ material demands.

Islamic rule under the early khalifas (caliphs) depended on tribal garrisons watching over the unreliable townsmen. It was not a lasting solution. Under urban conditions, tribal unity weakened. There was no aristocracy to apply a feudal remedy, and the problem of government was control of the towns. The answer was found in recruiting military slave

Finally no more blocks descended and the way was clear for the followers of the Prophet. But where were the treasures? From room to room the frantic workmen rushed, looking in vain for loot. The discontent of the Moslems reached such a height that Caliph al Mamoun—who had inherited much of the wisdom of his illustrious father, the Caliph al Raschid