The Met's timeline mentions Abu Mena twice: as a Christian pilgrimage destination in the early sixth century, and as a complex restored around 750, under Arab rule. What those two sentences show about continuity, and what they do not.
PERIOD GUIDE · Egypt
Early Islamic Egypt: six rules in three centuries
The Met's timeline divides the years 641-969 in Egypt into six spans, from the Rightly Guided Caliphs to the Ikhshidid dynasty. Three articles on this site: al-Fustat, the mosque of Ibn Tulun and Abu Mena.
641-969 CEMove through the periods
Its place in the Egypt scheme
The whole scheme with this period marked; the periods before and after are its neighbours in the row. Boundaries follow the sources and are not to scale.
- The Neolithic in Egypt7,000-4,500 BCE
- The Predynastic period in Egypt4,500-3,100 BCE
- The Early Dynastic period in Egypt3,100-2,649 BCE
- The Old Kingdom of Egypt2,649-2,150 BCE
- The First Intermediate Period in Egypt2,150-2,030 BCE
- The Middle Kingdom of Egypt2,030-1,640 BCE
- The Second Intermediate Period in Egypt1,640-1,550 BCE
- The New Kingdom of Egypt1,550-1,070 BCE
- The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt1,070-712 BCE
- The Late Period in Egypt712-332 BCE
- Macedonian and Ptolemaic Egypt332-30 BCE
- Roman rule in Egypt30 BCE - 330 CE
- Byzantine rule in Egypt330-641 CE
- Early Islamic Egypt641-969 CE
- Fatimid Egypt969-1,171 CE
- Ayyubid Egypt1,171-1,252 CE
- Mamluk Egypt1,250-1,517 CE
The frame
On the bar of the Met's timeline page for Egypt, 500-1000 CE, the years 641-969 consist of six spans: the rule of the Rightly Guided Caliphs (641-661), Umayyad rule (661-750), Abbasid rule (750-868), the Tulunid dynasty (868-905), Abbasid rule again (905-935) and the Ikhshidid dynasty (935-969). According to the events of the period, until 868 Egypt's governors were appointed by the caliphs at the helm of Islamic power in Medina, Damascus and later Baghdad; the Tulunids broke away from the Abbasid caliphate and were, according to the source, the first independent Islamic dynasty to rule Egypt. The site combines the six spans in one page and names the span for each item. Source 1.
Boundaries and overlaps
The 641 boundary is a boundary of the bar, not the date of a single event. The same page dates the conquest of Egypt by Arab armies to 639-642, so the conquest begins within the last Byzantine span (629-641) and ends after the period has begun; the site's Byzantine page for the Levant puts the transition at about 640. Within the period, too, there are boundaries that a date cannot decide: the restoration at Abu Mena is dated ca. 750, the year in which the bar passes from Umayyad to Abbasid rule. Source 1.
On this site
Three articles are placed in this period. "Al-Fustat: the garrison town that became part of Cairo" deals with the town founded at the time of the conquest and with the first congregational mosque in Egypt. "The mosque of Ibn Tulun: Abbasid influence from Iraq in Cairo" examines how the sources describe an architectural link to Iraq without claiming a copy. "Abu Mena: a pilgrimage site from Byzantine to Arab rule" appears here as well, because of the restoration dated ca. 750; it is the same article as on the Byzantine page, not an additional item. Source 1.
Source
Sources and further reading
The research and references behind this page. Rights to external content remain with their owners.
- 1
Egypt, 500-1000 A.D. (Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, chronology)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art · Checked