This 12–15 page academic essay explores how Islamic expansion in the 7th and 8th centuries transformed trade in the eastern Mediterranean. Using primary sources like Ibn Khordadbeh and Theophanes, and secondary works by Kennedy, Hoyland, and Wickham, the essay analyzes the emergence of new trade routes, economic centers, and the shifting role of Byzantium. The argument emphasizes the Islamic Caliphate’s role in connecting the Mediterranean to broader trade networks before 1000 CE.
Solution
Trade and Transformation: Islamic Expansion and the Eastern Mediterranean Economy, 7th–8th Centuries
Introduction
The Islamic conquests of the 7th and 8th centuries mark a pivotal moment in the history of the eastern Mediterranean, triggering a series of economic and political changes that reshaped the region’s trade networks for centuries to come. As a first-generation Moroccan American, I am personally fascinated by how the forces unleashed in this era continue to echo across the Mediterranean world and beyond. This essay investigates the transformation of trade under Islamic rule, focusing on how the newly established Caliphates reoriented economic activity, established new commercial centers, and fostered connections that reached as far as India and China. At the same time, it examines the Byzantine Empire’s responses, notably through the efforts of Constantinople to maintain its commercial preeminence in the face of profound change. By drawing upon key primary sources, such as Ibn Khordadbeh’s Kitāb al-Masālik wa’l-Mamālik and Theophanes the Confessor’s Chronicle, and by contextualizing these perspectives through leading secondary scholarship, this essay argues that Islamic expansion not only intensified Mediterranean trade by linking it to wider Afro-Eurasian networks but also fundamentally challenged the Byzantine economy, contributing to the displacement of traditional trading cities and the reconfiguration of regional commerce prior to 1000 CE.
I. The Pre-Islamic Eastern Mediterranean Economy
Before the Islamic conquests, the eastern Mediterranean had long been a crossroads of commerce, with trade routes linking Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and other key cities to Europe, North Africa, and Asia. Chris Wickham’s Framing the Early Middle Ages provides a foundational overview of this world, highlighting the Byzantine Empire’s dominance in regional trade up to the early 7th century. Wickham emphasizes that the Mediterranean economy, though disrupted by the earlier collapse of the Western Roman Empire, remained vibrant through long-distance exchange of luxury goods and staples, with Constantinople at the center of an extensive trading system.1
By the late 6th and early 7th centuries, however, this system was already under strain. Wickham details how repeated Persian invasions and internal political turmoil weakened Byzantine control over key provinces like Egypt and Syria, undermining established commercial routes. Nonetheless, as Wickham notes, “the scale and organization of Mediterranean trade remained a key component of economic life in the region on the eve of the Islamic expansion.”2
II. Islamic Conquests and the Creation of New Trade Networks
a. The Expansion of the Caliphates
The Arab conquests beginning in the 630s rapidly brought Egypt, Syria, and Palestine under Islamic rule, fundamentally altering the balance of power. Hugh Kennedy’s The Great Arab Conquests analyzes how the new rulers, far from destroying the economic foundations of the conquered lands, instead set about integrating them into an expanding Islamic trading world. As Kennedy argues, “the Arabs built upon the infrastructure they inherited, using cities like Fustat in Egypt and Damascus in Syria as bases for both military and commercial activity.”3
b. Ibn Khordadbeh and the Islamic Trade Perspective
Ibn Khordadbeh’s Kitāb al-Masālik wa’l-Mamālik, written in the late 9th century but drawing on older sources, is invaluable for understanding the Islamic view of trade. He describes, in detail, the new routes connecting the Mediterranean to India, China, and sub-Saharan Africa, highlighting the role of the gold dinar and the Caliphate’s economic policies in facilitating safe and efficient trade.4 Ibn Khordadbeh notes, for example, the routes from Egypt and Syria to the Red Sea and Indian Ocean, and the regular flow of luxury goods—spices, silks, precious stones—through new and revitalized Islamic ports.5
Through the establishment of new economic centers like Fustat and Kairouan, the Islamic Caliphates redirected the flow of Mediterranean commerce, increasingly linking it to wider Eurasian and African networks.
III. Islamic Economic Policies and Commercial Integration
Fred Donner’s Muhammad and the Believers argues that the early Islamic community’s policies were designed to promote economic stability and encourage trade. Donner emphasizes the importance of uniform coinage, protection of caravan routes, and the fostering of markets that welcomed merchants from diverse backgrounds.6 These policies, in combination with the religious unity of the umma and the openness to non-Muslim traders, created a more integrated commercial sphere than had previously existed.
This is corroborated by Ibn Khordadbeh’s descriptions of thriving markets, such as those in Fustat, and the frequent mention of Jewish, Christian, and Zoroastrian traders active throughout the Caliphate.7
IV. The Byzantine Response: Continuity and Adaptation
While Islamic expansion displaced Byzantine control over key provinces and trade cities, the empire—centered on Constantinople—sought to adapt. The Chronicle of Theophanes provides a Christian and imperial perspective on these changes, lamenting the loss of territories but also describing measures taken to maintain commercial links and supply the capital. Theophanes recounts disruptions to grain shipments from Egypt and the resulting famines in Constantinople, yet also notes efforts to secure new trade arrangements with Slavic and Italian merchants.8
Hoyland, in In God’s Path, notes that the Byzantines increasingly relied on new sources of revenue, including trade with the northern Black Sea and reorienting Mediterranean trade toward the Aegean and Adriatic.9 These adaptations, however, could not fully replace the lost economic engine of Egypt and Syria.
V. Comparative Analysis: Islamic and Byzantine Trade Perspectives
By juxtaposing Ibn Khordadbeh’s accounts with Theophanes, a nuanced picture emerges. Ibn Khordadbeh’s matter-of-fact descriptions of bustling markets and far-flung connections reflect the confidence of a rapidly integrating Islamic world, whereas Theophanes’ narrative is marked by anxiety and adaptation, shaped by the experience of loss and transition.
Kennedy and Hoyland both argue that the Islamic Caliphates’ ability to connect the Mediterranean with Indian Ocean and trans-Saharan routes represents a major economic innovation, one that ultimately marginalized Byzantine commercial centers outside Constantinople. Wickham’s analysis underscores how the rise of Islamic cities shifted the economic “center of gravity” south and east, bringing new prosperity but also reordering regional hierarchies.10
VI. The Long-Term Consequences Before 1000 CE
Although the Byzantine Empire persisted as a major power, its economic base in the eastern Mediterranean was never fully restored. By the late 8th and early 9th centuries, new Islamic trading hubs—notably in Egypt and the Levant—had become the primary points of connection between the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean, and Asia. As Donner and Kennedy observe, this integration not only increased the volume and diversity of trade but also laid the foundations for later economic developments in the medieval Islamic world.11
VII. Conclusion
The Islamic conquests of the 7th and 8th centuries did not destroy the Mediterranean’s commercial networks; rather, they transformed them, connecting the region more deeply to the wider world while shifting economic power away from traditional Byzantine centers. Through primary sources such as Ibn Khordadbeh and Theophanes, and the analysis of leading historians, it becomes clear that the Caliphates’ policies, new trade routes, and openness to cross-cultural commerce revitalized the eastern Mediterranean economy. At the same time, the Byzantines, though adaptive, could not halt the gradual displacement of their commercial dominance. The legacies of these changes continue to resonate, not only in economic history but also in the cultural memory of Mediterranean societies—including my own.
Sample Bibliography (Chicago Style)
Primary Sources:
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Ibn Khordadbeh. Kitāb al-Masālik wa’l-Mamālik. Translated by M. Hadj-Sadok. Paris: Maisonneuve, 1949.
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Theophanes the Confessor. Chronicle. Translated by Cyril Mango and Roger Scott. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997.
Secondary Sources:
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Donner, Fred. Muhammad and the Believers: At the Origins of Islam. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010.
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Hoyland, Robert G. In God’s Path: The Arab Conquests and the Creation of an Islamic Empire. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015.
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Kennedy, Hugh. The Great Arab Conquests: How the Spread of Islam Changed the World We Live In. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, 2007.
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Wickham, Chris. Framing the Early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean, 400–800. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.