Jack of Harts

The Arab invasion and eventual conquering of three quarters of the Roman Empire was one of the most successful mass migrations of all time. It started out beyond the fringes of the Empire in the Arabian Desert when Mohammad first united the Arabian tribes into one coherent army under his command. What followed was a lightning campaign, by historical measures, that conquered all of the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean, North Africa, and the Iberian Peninsula from the Roman Empire in approximately a century. The also destroyed the Persian Empire and their conquering armies traveled all the way to India in the East. It took the proto-French cavalry to stop the invasion into modern-day France, and that saved the rest of Western Europe from a major Islamic invasion for the next millennium and more.

The Arabs settled into and ruled the lands they conquered, and from that time on they kept track of who was Arab and who wasn’t. Who was Muslim and who wasn’t. While other races and religions were officially tolerated in their lands, they were distinctly second-class citizens at best. They converted churches and temples to Muslim worship. Their raiders landed on European, African, and Indian shores alike in search of new slaves. They turned the men into eunuchs and placed the women in harems, effectively erasing the enslaved populations from history by the simple expedient of ending their family units.

The Arab mass migration effectively wiped out the cultures and peoples that existed before their arrival, elevated their own culture above all others, and recreated the very land in their image. This mass migration is one of the most consequential in human history and has changed the world like few others.