Baghdad

Baghdad is the capital of Iraq, with more than 4 million peoples, situated in the interior of the country on the river Tigris at the point where land transportation meets river transportation. Among the industries of Baghdad are oil refineries, food-processing, tanneries and textile mills. Baghdad still has extensive production of handicrafts, like cloth, household utensils, leather, felt and rugs.
Baghdad is the most important center of learning in Iraq with the University of Baghdad (established in 1957), Al-Mustansiriyya University (established in 1963) and the University of Technology (established in 1974).
Baghdad was the center of the Muslim world during the years while the Caliphate stayed in Baghdad, starting in the 760s (Baghdad started being constructed in 763) running up to 1258. There were other cities used as capital for the Caliphate for short periods but Baghdad retained its splendor until it was destroyed by the advancing Mongols in 1258. Baghdad kept its position to a certain degree after this, but declined after the discovery of the sea route between Europe and India in 1497. Baghdad was made capital of Iraq in 1921, from when it started to grow again. Baghdad is a real city, not just a large town, and its lights are still twinkling in the river at half past one in the morning. It is the river that ‘makes’ Baghdad. The Tigris, brown and swift, is the heart and soul of the City of the Caliphs.
Baghdad is not a city of stately majesty. It is not ornate and grand. It does not take your breath away like Venice, or make your heart beat a little faster like New York. It is, so to speak, a water color, not an oil painting. It is flat and dusty – indeed, from time to time it is enveloped in maddening storms that fling dust into your room, your car, food, eyes, ears, mouth. Baghdad has muted values. It is an ancient city struggling awkwardly to be modern. If it lacks glamour, it has considerable charm. And if even the charm must be delved for, to me such delving seems worthwhile because, more than many cities, Baghdad reflects the most unusual, country that frames it. Iraq, after all, is the old, old Mesopotamia of Sumer, Babylon, Assyria, of the glorious sun-burst of the Abbasid Empire of Harun al Rashid, of Persian intrusions, and the affliction of four hundred dead years of Turkish rule. In other words, Baghdad is the still-beating heart of a former cradle of civilization, a country as historically dramatic as Ancient Greece or the Nile Valley.
History Of Baghdad
Babylonian bricks bearing the Royal Seal of King Nebuchadnezzar (sixth century BC) were found in the Tigris here. But whatever settlement existed then, historic Baghdad was undoubtedly founded by the second of the Abbasid Caliphs, Mansur (AD 750-775), and the name Baghdad is probably a combination of two Persian words meaning ‘Founded by God’. Arabs call it ‘The City of Peace’.
The founding of Baghdad by Mansur came about in this way: the first Abbasid Caliph, Abul Abbas, had built a palace on the Euphrates at Anbar, but it didn’t suit Mansur, who at once began to search about for somewhere more centrally placed from which to administer the new empire. Soon the site of a Sassanian village on the west bank of the Tigris caught his eye, and in · the spring of AD 762 the lines were traced out. This first Baghdad took four years to build and Mansur employed one hundred thousand architects, craftsmen and workers from all over the Islamic world. Thus came into being the famous Round City of Mansur, with double brick walls, a deep moat and a third innermost wall ninety feet high. Four highways radiated out of four gates and at the hub of everything was built the Caliph’s palace with a green dome. A certain amount of judicious stealing went on: many of the stones for the palace- the center of the universe- came from the ruins of the Persian city of Ctesiphon not far away; a wrought-iron gate was taken from Wasit, another from Kufa. And a man who did more than most to help Mansur build his new city was the Imam Abu Hanifa, whose tomb you can see in Baghdad to this day.
Soon merchants built bazaars and houses round the Basra (southern) Gate and formed a district of their own called Kerkh, and this was joined by a bridge of boats to the east bank of the Tigris- where most of modern Baghdad stands in the district of Rasafa. Two cemeteries grew up- one in Adhimiya and another where Kadhimain now houses the shrines of two of the twelve Imams.