It amazes me how Liberals can just gloss over the Islamic conquest of Constantinople and other Christian and Jewish sites of importance, but scream bloody murder if anyone dare suggest such Triumphalism is still in effect to this day.
The destruction of important archaeological material at the site of the Temple Mount/Dome of the Rock is a really good example of how Islam rolls even today.
The medical achievements were mostly from the subject Jews, whose names are still on the treatises, but as usual the Muslims take credit for it.
Furthermore, that part of Spain was basically the heir to what remained of Roman learning; over the years, up to his death in 630 (well prior to the Muslim invasions and in fact, prior to Islam’s rise), St Isidore of Sevilla worked on a massive written work covering “all human knowledge” which drew upon what remained of Classical sources and was the sole source of these in the West for many years. He studied the trivium and quadrivium at the Cathedral school as a child.
Also, the Islamic system was still new and not fully consolidated. The Baghdadis were not Arabs but had had a very advanced civilization (particularly in the area of math and science) before its fall to Islam. During the first years of the Baghdadi caliphate, figurative art was even allowed. However, even the Baghdadis could never have been said to have encouraged learning, but simply to have permitted it to the extent useful. Still, as Islam became more systematized, other Muslims began to regard the Baghdadis as heretical, and in fact they fell to invasions by North African Muslims.
Islam has NOTHING to boast about - it’s very good at claiming other peoples’ achievements, however,