ISIS and Their Historical Caliphate Cobblers June 17, 2014
Author: Beach Combing | in : Actualite, Medieval , trackback
***Dedicated to Ricardo and his Missus***
ISIS is a group of Islamists who have recently made it on the news by taking over a quarter of Iraq and an adjacent and not insignificant area of poor mutilated Syria. Flick through ISIS news reports and most will involve atrocity stories including decapitation, crucifixion and human bonfires: even elements in Al Quaeda in Iraq have complained that ISIS is too violent for their tastes, while ISIS’s delightful leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, makes you long for the witty nonchalance, rictus smile and worrying eyes of Osama Bin Laden. (Abu Bakr’s parting words to American soldiers when he was released from Allied detention in 2009 – woops! – was ‘See you in New York!’) This leads us to the geographical ambitions of the upstanding geographers running ISIS…
Before getting onto their jihadist wet dream, however, a few observations. First, Islamists have long dreamt of the fabled world-wide caliphate. If some Christian fundamentalists see life as a hellish version of chess, then Islamists see their universe in terms of a Risk board. Second, ISIS essentially straddles one international border, between Syria and Iraq, and this has perhaps given them dangerous ideas. Third, ISIS are on a roll – enough to temporarily turn Iran and the US into allies – and when people are on a roll then ideas get away with them.
Now to the maps. The map immediately above is a rather ambitious number detailing ISIS’ expected mid term conquests in Syria and Iraq as predicted in March of this year. Now that this is looking half credible ISIS have moved onto their long term goals in the map that heads the post. Usually with these kinds of terrorist fantasies sobre sorts are left commenting solemnly on the disappearance of Israel: Jihadists ambitions rarely stretch beyond the Levant. However, here millions of murdered Jews are just one of several slaughters in the making. ISIS has been merciless against Shia populations and as tens of millions of Shias are represented, presumably they too would be offed: notably in Iran. But as extraordinary are ISIS’s demands in the west: Greece, the Balkans, way past the Danube and an intriguing line into the Alps that presumably represents Ottoman attacks on Vienna in 1529 (wth!); that little arm of territory would be a mess to administer. As interesting is the conquest not just of Andalusia in southern Spain (Bin Laden used to get teary eyed about the loss Al-Andalus on some of his early videos): the reference is to the eighth century conquests in Iberia. But rather rudely ISIS have ignored the Christian hold out kingdoms in northern Spain, particularly in Galicia and Asturias: can anyone put us in touch with ISIS map makers so we can negotiate them down? This is the equivalent of a westerner putting Mecca as an archbishopric on an Anglican map. However, intoxicated with conquests on the Atlantic the mapmakers have missed out Arab conquests in Malta, Sicily and Calabria so perhaps there’s a kind of give and take thing being thrashed out? Or did outraged of Catania have a cousin at ISIS headquarters? Ricardo’s wife pointed out the resemblance of the ISIS caliphate to a bear and Ricardo sent in a quietly subversive map that makes the whole Jihad thing look so much less threatening: Pooh Bear has forgotten his honey in China and then it was time for elevenses…
Other historically silly maps: drbeachcombing AT yahoo DOT com
17 March 2014: Louis writes in: Obviously (at least accoding to the large map) all indians, malays and indonesians are not proper muslims…. As the Caliphate is supposed to be the empire of all muslims, how do they foget about the largest muslim state (both in area and in population) on the planet, namely Indonesia? And what about Malaysia? Or Bangladesh? Apparantly the people of ISIS only believe in the Arab (and, strangly enough, the Turkish, and even some Persian) conquests as beeing worthy of recreation… And even there they are (as you pointed out) forgetfull. For instance, for at least fifty years, the south of France was ruled by moors, the sultanate of Oman moved its seat of government to Zanzibar at one time, as that is where all their money was made, and the Krim Tatars ruled almost to Wolgagrad. On another note, they did include the borders of Israel on the smaller map of their “present” conquests and plans, which means that the map maker used a “western” version of the map, as this “entity” is supposedly not present on “proper” maps of the region. Another thing that always strikes me as interesting is their use of the name of Saladin (Salah ad-Din), as he is now acknowledged as beeing of Kurdish, and not of Arabian stock….. Thanks Louis!
17 March 2014 MR writes, ‘My favorite discovery of recent years which always makes me think of the opening of Donne’s sonnet “At the round earth’s imagin’d corners, blow | Your trumpets, angels, …:” Orlando Fergusson (1846 – 1911) Map of the square and stationary earth : four hundred passages in the Bible that condemn the Globe Theory, or the Flying Earth, and none sustain it ; this map is the Bible map of the world Hot Springs, South Dakota: Orlando Ferguson, [1893], “Send 25 Cents to the Author, Prof. Orlando Ferguson, for a book explaining this Square and Stationary Earth. It Knocks the Globe Theory Clean Out. It will Teach You How to Foretell Eclipses. It is Worth Its Weight in Gold. …” which achieved internet fame when a copy, one of two surviving, was donated to the US Library of Congress in 2011. For a downloadable image and the LC entry see: http://www.loc.gov/search/?fa=contributor%3Aferguson%2C+orlando Of course this does have a distinguished antecedent, the T-O maps deriving from the Etemologiae (cap 14) of Isidore of Seville, which shows the upper half of the globe the T formed by the Mediterranean, the Nile and the Don dividing the continents of Asia , Europe and Africa with Jerusalem in the center. Asia, as the site of ‘Paradise’ or the garden of Eden, is shown at the top. The well known Hereford Mappa Mundi is of this type.’ Thanks MR
24 July: a couple of updates on this. First a claim that this is not official ISIS documentation. Perhaps but it clearly shows ISIS mentality, note least the fact that the ISIS head has recently announced he intends to conquer Rome.
24 August 2014: Ricardo has found a nice article (in Portuguese) on ISIS claiming Iberia. Idiots…
