Arab / Islamic Civilization

[axe-man]

----
Well there are a Billion of them around, and for a while in the middle ages they were quite advanced, and they are counted as a seperate "civilization" to day anyway.

What do you guys think?
----
Remember Al-Andalus and Cordoba, Baghdad (with the Abbasids), Saladin, and Harun Al Rashid.

 

[RomanLegion]

I think you have the arab and the muslim population confused. There are over 1 billion muslims, the actual amount of arabs is much smaller. Iran, Morrocco, Indonesia, Turkey, Afganistan, Pakistan, Algeria, Sudan, Libya, Malaysia, Albania and Singapore are all Islamic countries but the majority of their people are non arab. Arabs are mainly concentrated in the Arabian Peninsula. The notion of a modern Arab civilisation is a false one, it was an Islamic one composed of Berbers in North Africa and Spain(pre-reconquest), Turks in Turkey and Southeast Europe, Persians in Iran, Arabs in Arabia, Egyptians and Nubians in Egypt and Sudan, and multitudes of tribes in Indonesia, Pakistan, and Malaysia. The only true Arab civs were the Babylonians and maybe the Assyrians. For whatever reason we Westerners seem to see them as being all the same people when in fact they are quite different.

 

[Eliezar]

To get closer to the original posters desire they could have included something like the Ottoman Empire. Or an empire from that are of the world of a more modern nature, but interestingly enough in the americas, middle east/mediterranean, and africa you have the primitive empires and in Europe and Asia and in USA you have the modern empires. It would appear that the emphasis on civs is on civs that were dominate 2000 or more years ago or civs that are dominate in the last 250 years there isn't much in between cept maybe England.

Germany, USA, Japan, China, Russia, and England can be argued as the 6 most dominant countries of the 20th century. Some of these countries can be argued as included for dominance in other periods but in general I think the civ team put modern and ancient civs together to the exclusion of the powerful empires of the 1000s to 1600s.

As far as Arab civilizations note that Iran is actually in the game as that is what the Persians are. Iran is allegedly the least effected Arab state from outside culture and invasions over the past 6000 years. Babylon would include the land area of Iraq, but I'm not sure how close the people are to being the same.

Eliezar

 

[axe-man]

Iranains are not Arabs, the cultures are similar, but Iranians in general (except those living in its Arab speaking province) speak a Persian language, and not Arabic.

Calling Iranians arabs is like calling jews arabs.

 

[Eliezar]

Granted. I actually should have said as far as the Arabic/Islamic civilization with accent on the Islamic part. Or changed it altogether as southwestern asian 8) The first reply has the lowdown on the whole Arab nonArab thing.

Eliezar

 

[God]

Yeah, Iranians are Persians, not Arabs.
Romanleigon is correct in what he said.
There were alot of Muslim civs not as many Arab, although one could include Cairo because it was always a powerful city.
The Seljuk and then later the Ottomans controlled modern Israel, Syria, the Anatolia region.
Pakistan was under the Indian empire and under the Mughals, modern day Afghanistan was mainly controlled by tribes and now and then conquered by somebody.
Babylonians(in modern day Iraq IIRC) are the closest to an Arab civ in the game, although they may be a little different.

 

[scorch]

i used to think that arabs, were people from arabia...

 

[trainspotter9]

Yeah Persians are not arab, they were an Aryan tribe that migrated to Iran. The language Persian is Indo-European. In fact Jews are more closely related to arabs then Persians are since they are Semitic.

Arab countries include; Iraq, Saudi Arabia, all those Gulf nations (i.e. Kuwait), Palestine, Syria, nations on the Arabian peninsula, Egypt, Jordan, and a few others. Arab nations are usually characterized by their people speaking arabic. Less then 20 percent of the world's muslim population is in fact arab.

In Civ 3 the 'arab' civ would be Babylonians since they were the Semitic ancestors of modern day arabs. Perhaps an Arab civilization should be included in the game to take into account the vast Arab conquests of the first millenium circa 600-1000 AD.

 

[axe-man]

trainspotter9: thats what I was basically referring to.

 

[axe-man]

scorch: yes and no, today the term arab replies to anyone who's mother tongue is arabic.

I don't think that the arabs are an ethnic grouping, I mean there are black arabs, white arabs, and brown arabs. Its more of a linguistic group.

 

[Dervish]

Trainspotter,
If we dig even deeper, then we will find out that Arabs and Jews more related to each other - than Arabs to Babylonians and Assyrians.
Arabs being Nomads that spread their culture through religion. At that time Babylonian had sedentary way of life.
So, in AoE Conquerors they were given different name Saracenes.
But, basically, Civ3 should have Arabs and Jews along with Babs as dirfferent civilizations. May be this time at least in the Game we will manage to straighten out the matter between Arabs and Jews????

 

[God]

Just rememberign a time watching Hardball on CNBC.
Some Israeli minister complaisn to Chris Matthews on how Anti-Semite these Palestinians and Arabs are.
Chris replies by saying they are Semites.
The minister remains quite.

 

[Blackdragon]

the arabs itself arent a civ
but u could make them one by giving it the name: KALIFAT OF ARABIA; ARAB; leader: Mohammad and a lady like shehezerade
(in fact mohammad exists but jesus). the arabs have got one of the most peacefully culture in the world.
its a shame for all the western war-civs that they cant exist that peacefull. the whole world would be much more peacefull with an arab-style world-government

think bout it.

USA OFF ARABIA

FREE PALESTINE

STOP FASHISM IN ISRAEL

STOP THE OCCUPATION




with sharon the USA support a neo-fashistic regime that breaks the convention of geneve every day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Dervish]

Originally posted by Blackdragon
the arabs itself arent a civ
but u could make them one by giving it the name: KALIFAT OF ARABIA; ARAB; leader: Mohammad and a lady like shehezerade
(in fact mohammad exists but jesus). the arabs have got one of the most peacefully culture in the world.
its a shame for all the western war-civs that they cant exist that peacefull. the whole world would be much more peacefull with an arab-style world-government

Islam doesn't allow to depict the face of the prophet Muhammad (salallahu wa-aleyhi wa sallam), let alone putting it into games like that. And on the other hand these are prophets, you know, if someone issues a fatwa allowing someone to impersonate Muhammad, then other prophets like Jesus or Buddha should be put in there as well. And this is totally different game, this would be a Holy War.
To my mind Harun Ar-Rashid or Salahaddin can be leaders of the Arabs in the game.

 

[Blackdragon]

i disagree
jesus or any othe prophet did not lead any people(overjump moses)
but Mohammad did lead the arabs not only psychically but also physically so he can be a real leader of the arabian kalifat
and dont write in holy war!!!!
all the islamic suckers in iran or saudi arabia are a shame to the all arabs. the ISLAMIC style of reading the KORAN is complete WRONG.

FREE PALESTINE

FREE AFGAHNISTAN

 

[Dervish]

But, Muhammad's face is not allowed to be shown, it's a sin. That's a given fact. You will never find his face, nowhere. Clever thing to do, BTW, to avoid personality cult, or just worshipping one person. You can't worship him, if his face remains obscure. Have you actually seen the portraits of Muhammad?? No.
And it's good!

 

[RomanLegion]

Originally posted by Blackdragon
the arabs itself arent a civ
but u could make them one by giving it the name: KALIFAT OF ARABIA; ARAB; leader: Mohammad and a lady like shehezerade
(in fact mohammad exists but jesus). the arabs have got one of the most peacefully culture in the world.
its a shame for all the western war-civs that they cant exist that peacefull. the whole world would be much more peacefull with an arab-style world-government

think bout it.

K I've thought about it, and i'd still prefer democracy over the autocratic Arabic/Islamic style governments. There isn't a single Muslim dominated country in the world where democracy exists...(and no turkey doesn't count as a democratic nation and has no business even thinking about being part of the EU as long as that is the case). Examine the Islamic world and all you see is oppression of women, illiteracy, poverty, intolerance of other religions, and yes even racism(just ask the Kurds of Turkey and the native Berbers of Morocco and Algeria). Being a Canadian, I am absolutely grateful of the fact that I was born in such a Free society and cannot understand why another westerner would even compare the two governments.
Mr.Blackdragon, if you are so keen to live in under an Arabic/Islamic government perhaps you should leave the safety of Germany and try living in Yemen or maybe in a country like Somalia where the people can barely feed themselves.

 

[Rhye]

Hmm, I don't like babylonians, so what would you suggest between these 2 ways:

1)
Persian civ
+
Turkish civ (leader=???, special unit=??? (maybe with the animation of the immortals?)

2)
Arab civ (leader=???, special unit=??? (maybe with the animation of the immortals)
+
Israeli civ (leader=Solomon, special unit=??? (maybe with the animation of the bowman?)

 

[allhailIndia]

There has'nt been a strong Arabic Civ apart from the Ottomans and Isrealis were out of the picture for 2000 years. I think Babylonians could haev been replaced with Ottoman. About Muhammad, anybody wants a fatwa against Firaxis

 

[Dervish]

There was one called Califate - new system which gave Renaissance to Arab and Muslim world. Where do you think word Algebra came from??
Remember one thing Arabs and Muslims never burnt scientists on fire like Christians did with Galileo and Copernicus.
So, don't be one-sided!!!
Speaking of democracy it is not "their piece of cake", they don' fit into that. Nor does China or Russia, they will never fit Democracy or fetch it successfuly, although being non-Muslims at all.