The Attempts of the Abbaside Khalifas to Leave Baghdad and its Effect on the Power of the State (132-334H)
Shaden M. Al-Wahsh, Human Sciences Department, Al-Zaytoonah University of Jordan, Amman, Jordan.
Abstract
The capital of any state is its most important pillar that shows its strength, spread and flourishment. It shows how is the country is civilized and sophisticated. It is also the place where anybody may come and meet the leaders or deal with its institutions.
It is known that the collapse of the capital of any country, be modern or ancient, means its end, as it was with the first Islamic capital Al- Medina Al – Munawara which lasted until the murder of Othman Bin Affan because it, eventually, moved to Al- kofa. Also, during the Omayyad reign, Damascus was the capital for long time until the appearance of the Abbasids and then it collapsed after they moved to AL- Andalus and proclaimed Qurduba as their new capital.
The capital which had been chosen by the Abbasids formed an obvious phenomenon and testified that the Abbasids built too many cities and changed too many political capitals. The frequent movement and selection of the Abbasid's capitals had its features and reasons.One of these reasons was the recovery of the state and its treasury. But, the competition between Baghdad and Samirra'a weakened the state.
The result of all that was that many capitals of Abbasids disorganized. Why some khalifs, like Al-Mansur, AR-Rashid, Al-Ma'amon, AL-Mu'tasim and AL-Mutawakil, changed their places was because of the many problems faced in their capitals. That big number of scattered capitals and contradicted messages from the capitals, like Baghdad weakened the reign of the Abbasids and built an image of the weakness of the khalifs, like Haroon ar-rashid, and the appearance of sub-counties. Moreover, it paved the road to strengthen the position of the "the prince of the princess", and the entrance of the Bowayhiyyen to Baghdad.