Abbasid capitol moved to Samarra

Abbasid capitol moved to Samarra
836 AD founded

Samarra is founded by the eighth Abbasid caliph al-Mu'tasim (r. 833–842).

Al-Mu'tasim's immediate motivation for the decision was a need to find housing for his newly formed Turkish and other army regiments. These troops, who were from groups that had previously held only a marginal role in the Islamic world, were deeply unpopular among the residents of Baghdad, and violent incidents had repeatedly broken out between the soldiers and Baghdadis.

Al-Mu'tasim therefore resolved in ca. 835 to depart from Baghdad, the usual seat of the Abbasid caliphs since 762, and create a new capital city of his choosing.

Following a period of searching for an ideal spot, al-Mu'tasim settled on a site approximately 80 mi (130 km) north of Baghdad on the east side of the Tigris, near the head of the Nahrawan Canal. After sending men to buy up the local properties, including a Christian monastery, the caliph had his engineers survey the most suitable places for development. By 836, buildings had been erected at the site and al-Mu'tasim moved into the new city.

From the start, construction at Samarra was undertaken on a massive scale. Space was no object; land was plentiful and cheap, with little in the way of preexisting settlements to hinder expansion.

Al-Mu'tasim marked out various allotments in the new city and granted these spaces to various elites of the army and administration for them to develop. Numerous cantonments were established for the army regiments, who in many cases were intentionally segregated from the residences for the general populace. Markets, mosques and baths for the people were built, together with a number of palaces for the caliph and other prominent individuals. Materials and laborers were shipped in from various parts of the Muslim world to help with the work; iron-workers, carpenters, marble sculptors and artisans all assisted in the construction.

Founding a new capital was a public statement of the establishment of a new regime, while allowing the court to be "at a distance from the populace of Baghdad and protected by a new guard of foreign troops, and amid a new royal culture revolving around sprawling palatial grounds, public spectacle and a seemingly ceaseless quest for leisurely indulgence" (T. El-Hibri), an arrangement compared by Oleg Grabar to the relationship between Paris and Versailles after Louis XIV.

In addition, by creating a new city in a previously uninhabited area, al-Mu'tasim could reward his followers with land and commercial opportunities without cost to himself and free from any constraints, unlike Baghdad with its established interest groups. In fact, the sale of land seems to have produced considerable profit for the treasury: as Hugh Kennedy writes, it was "a sort of gigantic property speculation in which both government and its followers could expect to benefit".

Samarra

Lattitude: 34.1659° N
Longitude: 43.9055° E
Region: Middle East

Modern Day Iraq

Events in 836 MORE