From the Gates of Vienna is a well researched video that makes the points that the downfall of classical civilization didn’t happen because of Goths or the Germans but rather the Moslems circa 640 AD.
http://gatesofvienna.blogspot.com/2012/09/why-we-are-afraid-1400-year-secret.html
Dr. Bill Warner is the founder of the Center for the Study of Political Islam (CSPI). The video below records a talk he gave recently about the real history of Islam, and why there is such a powerful tendency towards collective amnesia about it in the West.
His account of the destruction of classical civilization by the Great Jihad is a superb follow-up to Mohammed and Charlemagne Revisited by Emmet Scott, which was examined at length here last month.
This is possibly the best concise exposition of the history of Islamic violence that I have ever heard:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=t_Qpy0mXg8Y
It took the Western Europeans about 900 years to recover. The Iberian and Italian peninsulas recovered faster than the North, but even then conditons deteriorated to such a degree that a bunch of mud islands in a tidal marsh on the Adriatic became an important city ~ for the times ~ we call it Venice.
The Byzantines produced no works of art for 60 years ~ the climate was better there ~ and the folks in Damascus actually didn't have much to say about the weather during most of that period.
Still, by the time the Meccan Arabs were on the move the Byzantines hadn't paid their armies in 100 years!
China shut down for 300 years. Central Asia shut down until 1300 give or take a few years waiting on the Mongol Empire to rise and reopen it.
Much of history after 535 can be dealt with readily with a model that takes a look at which societies recovered first ~ economically ~ and what they did with their advantage over their neighbors. For example, the Bretons and Cornish were moving out smartly by the mid 600s and had begun resettling Northern Spain. The Arabs beat them to the punch ~ but they met in Spain and engaged in a battle that lasted for over 800 years (SEE: Reconquista).
There are other examples, but any analysis that fails to note the destruction of civilization in the West in the 6th century is deficient in ways I find almost imagineable!
I won’t quibble with your reasoning about Islam, and the sources look very good. But I don’t want to conflate “Arabs” with “Muslims.” Arabs are quite capable of amazing cruelty without the excuses for it provided by Islam. It’s a case of the 99% making the 1% look bad (please note the order in which I placed those stats).
Thanks for posting that link to Dr Bill Warner, I have watched it, can’t recommend it highly enough. Want to know what the DARK AGES really were? It’s chilling. And they are still at it.
Yes. And “Christians”, like the editor of the “Christian” paper “Vårt Land”, have been moaning that the wrong people won at Vienna - shoulda been our friends the muslims.
That particular editor usually hangs out with HAMAS friends in betlehem. They’re good people. They ply him with sweet coffee.
How my screen has escaped projectile vomit over these years, I don’t know.
excellent find - thanks for sharing - bookmarked and watching now!