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كسرة لوحة جدارية للنساء من قصر الخليفة في سامراء . المتحف البريطاني - القاعات الاسلامية - الغرفة 34 # Salam Taha
Fragments of a wall-painting of women from the caliph’s palace in Samara, one of the Islamic Empire's great cities. The two figures, displayed on these wall painting fragments, are probably slave girls from the harem of Caliph al-Muasim in Samarra. Although simply drawn, they have a distinct personality and conjure up images of the Arabian Nights stories, some of which were set in Samarra. The women of the palace were not just wives and concubines but were also poets and musicians. Harem girls were often highly trained in singing, music and literature and it was potentially an attractive career for a woman of humble origins. What happened to Samarra? Samarra was built as the new capital of the Islamic Empire in AD 836 and, at the time, was one of the largest cities in the world. Samarra was created to house the Caliph's court and army of Turkish slavesoldiers, after they increasingly came into conflict with the inhabitants of Baghdad. In AD 861, after the Turkish commanders assassinated the Caliph al-Mutawakkil, Samarra was abandoned. Samarra's decline mirrors that of the Islamic Empire, which became increasingly fragmented from AD 800 onwards. |