The infant mortality must be great, though the children one sees
look fat and thriving.
Baghdad is not an old city. Although there was probably a village on the
site time out of mind, it does not come into any prominence until the
eighth century of our era. As the residence of the Abasside caliphs it
rapidly assumed an important position. The culmination of its magnificence
was reached in the end of the eighth century, under the rule of the
world-famous Haroun-el-Raschid. It long continued to be a centre of
commerce and industry, though suffering fearfully from the various sieges
and conquests which it underwent. In 1258 the Mongols, under a grandson of
the great Genghis Khan, captured the city and held it for a hundred years,
until ousted by the Tartars under Tamberlane. It was plundered in turn by
one Mongol horde after another until the Turks, under Murad the Fourth,
eventually secured it. Naturally, after being the scene of so much looting
and such massacres, there is little left of the original city of the
caliphs. Then, too, in Mesopotamia there is practically no stone, and
everything was built of brick, which readily lapses back to its original
state. For this reason the invaders easily razed a conquered town, and
Mesopotamia, so often called the "cradle of the world," retains but little
trace of the races and civilizations that have succeeded each other in
ruling the land.
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