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400 the Prophet. Ali was the last of the four so-called "Orthodox Caliphs," all of whom were relatives or companions of the Prophet.

Moawiyah, a usurper, was now recognized as Caliph (661). He succeeded in making the office hereditary, instead of elective, as it hitherto had been, and thus established what is known as the dynasty of the Ommiades, the rulers of which family for nearly a century issued their commands from the city of Damascus.

The house of the Ommiades was overthrown by the adherents of the house of Ali, who established a new dynasty (750), known as that of the Abbassides, so called from Abbas, an uncle of Mohammed. The new family, soon after coming to power, established the seat of the royal residence on the lower Tigris, and upon the banks of that river founded the renowned city of Bagdad, which was destined to remain the abode of the Abbasside Caliphs for a period of five hundred years,—until the subversion of the house by the Tartars of the North.

The golden age of the caliphate of Bagdad covers the latter part of the eighth and the ninth century of our era, and was illustrated by the reign of the renowned Haroun-al-Raschid (786–809), the hero of the Arabian Nights. During this period science, philosophy, and literature were most assiduously cultivated by the Arabian scholars, and the court of the Caliphs presented in culture and luxury a striking contrast to the rude and barbarous courts of the kings and princes of Western Christendom.

The Dismemberment of the Caliphate.—"At the close of the first century of the Hegira," writes Gibbon, "the Caliphs were the most potent and absolute monarchs of the globe. The word that went forth from the palace at Damascus was obeyed on the Indus, on the Jaxartes, and on the Tagus." Scarcely less potent was the word that at first went forth from Bagdad. But in a short time the extended empire of the Abbassides, through the quarrels of sectaries and the ambitions of rival aspirants for the honors of the caliphate, was broken in fragments, and from three capitals—