Editing Basra (section)

===Foundation by the Rashidun Caliphate (632–661)===
[[File:Mss Eur F111 33 1492.jpg|thumb|The ‘Ashshār creek in Basrah Town]]
The city was founded at the beginning of the Islamic era in 636 and began as a garrison encampment for [[Arab]] tribesmen constituting the armies of the [[Rashidun Caliph]] [[Umar]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=Basra, Iraq |url=https://www.meherbabatravels.com/location-gallery/iraq/basra-iraq/ |access-date=2025-03-24 |website=meherbabatravels jimdo page! |language=en-US}}</ref> A [[Tell (archaeology)|tell]] a few kilometers south of the present city still marks the original site which was a military site.<ref>{{Cite web |title=David Shepherd, military, Basra |url=https://www.davidshepherd.com/military-basra.html |access-date=2025-03-24 |website=www.davidshepherd.com}}</ref> While defeating the forces of the [[Sassanid Empire]] there, the Muslim commander [[Utbah ibn Ghazwan]] erected his camp on the site of an old Persian military settlement called ''Vaheštābād Ardašīr'', which was destroyed by the Arabs.<ref>''[[Encyclopædia Iranica]]'', [[Ehsan Yarshater|E. Yarshater]], [[Columbia University]], p851</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Utbah ibn Ghazwan {{!}} Companion of the Prophet {{!}} Islamic History {{!}} Sahaba Story |url=https://www.alim.org/history/prophet-companions/52/ |access-date=2025-03-24 |website=www.alim.org |language=en}}</ref> While the name Al-Basrah in Arabic can mean "the overwatch", other sources claim that the name actually originates from the Persian word Bas-rāh or Bassorāh, meaning "where many ways come together".<ref>See Mohammadi Malayeri, M. ''Dil-i Iranshahr''.</ref>

In 639, Umar established this encampment as a city with five districts, and appointed [[Abu Musa Ashaari|Abu Musa al-Ash'ari]] as its first governor.<ref>{{Cite web |title=erickbonnier-pictures - Iraq - Basra souk |url=https://www.erickbonnier-pictures.com/reports-travels/iraq-basra-souk/ |access-date=2025-03-24 |website=www.erickbonnier-pictures.com |language=fr}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Utbah ibn Ghazwan (ra) {{!}} The Humble Governor {{!}} The Firsts Shorts |url=https://yaqeeninstitute.ca/watch/series/utbah-ibn-ghazwan-ra-the-humble-governor-the-firsts-shorts |access-date=2025-03-24 |website=Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research |language=en}}</ref> The city was built in a circular plan according to the [[Sasanian architecture|Partho-Sasanian architecture]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Arce |first1=Ignacio |title=Umayyad Building Techniques and the Merging of Roman-Byzantine and Partho-Sassanian Traditions: Continuity and Change |journal=Late Antique Archaeology |date=1 January 2008 |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=494–495 |doi=10.1163/22134522-90000099|issn=1570-6893}}</ref> Abu Musa led the conquest of [[Khuzestan]] from 639 to 642, and was ordered by Umar to aid [[Uthman ibn Abi al-As]], then fighting Persia from a new, more easterly ''miṣr'' at [[Tawwaj]].<ref>{{Citation |last=Robinson |first=Chase F. |title=The Conquest of Khūzistān: A Historiographical Reassessment |date=2017-05-15 |work=The Expansion of the Early Islamic State |pages=287–312 |url=https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315239767-18 |access-date=2025-05-17 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-315-23976-7}}</ref> In 650, the Rashidun Caliph [[Uthman]] reorganised the Persian frontier, installed ʿAbdullah ibn Amir as Basra's governor, and put the military's southern wing under Basra's control.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Morony |first1=Michael G. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uhjSiRAwGuEC&dq=abdullah+ibn+aamir+persia+conquest&pg=PA207 |title=Iraq After the Muslim Conquest by Michael G. Morony citing Baladhuri, Jahshiyari, and Tabari |publisher=Gorgias Press |year=2005 |isbn=9781593333157 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151118133622/https://books.google.com/books?id=uhjSiRAwGuEC&hl=en |archive-date=November 18, 2015 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Ibn Amir led his forces to their final victory over [[Yazdegerd III]], the Sassanid [[Shah|King of Kings]].<ref name="Sahaby">{{Cite web |title=Abdallah ibn Amir ibn Kurayz ibn Rabi'a ibn Habib ibn Abd Shams |url=http://www.sahaba.rasoolona.com/Sahaby/11850/%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%84%D9%87-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B9%D8%A7%D9%85%D8%B1-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D9%83%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%B2-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B1%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%B9%D8%A9-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%AD%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%A8-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D8%B4%D9%85%D8%B3-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D9%85%D9%86%D8%A7%D9%81-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D9%82%D8%B5%D9%8A |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200805020635/http://www.sahaba.rasoolona.com/Sahaby/11850/%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%84%D9%87-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B9%D8%A7%D9%85%D8%B1-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D9%83%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%B2-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B1%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%B9%D8%A9-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%AD%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%A8-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D8%B4%D9%85%D8%B3-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D9%85%D9%86%D8%A7%D9%81-%D8%A8%D9%86-%D9%82%D8%B5%D9%8A |archive-date=2020-08-05 |access-date=2021-04-02 |language=ar}}</ref> In 656, Uthman was murdered and [[Ali]] was appointed Caliph.<ref name=":12">{{Cite web |last=Edu |first=World History |date=2025-02-05 |title=Ali: The 4th Caliph of the Rashidun Caliphate |url=https://worldhistoryedu.com/ali-the-4th-caliph-of-the-rashidun-caliphate/ |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=World History Edu |language=en-US}}</ref> Ali first installed Uthman ibn Hanif as Basra's governor, who was followed by ʿAbdullah ibn ʿAbbas.<ref name=":12" /> These men held the city for Ali until the latter's death in 661.<ref name=":12" /> 

Basra's infrastructure was planned.<ref name=":13">{{Cite journal |last=Petersen |first=Andrew |last2=Northedge |first2=Alastair |last3=Stremke |first3=Frank |last4=Bates |first4=Martin |last5=Edwards |first5=Ifan |date=2023-11-30 |title=Discovering Early Islamic Basra: the Origins and Development of Iraq’s Southern Metropolis |url=https://brill.com/view/journals/mcmw/4/1/article-p119_6.xml?language=en&srsltid=AfmBOord5-w5bCX8HzTzLo_ah6T3VrelHuW_MCfH9zKOzLgPYKXCXrVQ |journal=Journal of Material Cultures in the Muslim World |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=119–142 |doi=10.1163/26666286-12340042 |issn=2666-6278}}</ref> Why Basra was chosen as a site for the new city remains unclear.<ref name=":13" /> The original site lay 15km from the [[Shatt al-Arab]] and thus lacked access to maritime trade and, more importantly, to fresh water.<ref name=":13" /> Additionally, neither historical texts nor archaeological finds indicate that there was much of an agricultural hinterland in the area before Basra was founded.<ref name=":13" /> 

Indeed, in an anecdote related by [[al-Baladhuri]], [[al-Ahnaf ibn Qays]] pleaded to the caliph Umar that, whereas other Muslim settlers were established in well-watered areas with extensive farmland, the people of Basra had only "reedy salt marsh which never dries up and where pasture never grows, bounded on the east by brackish water and on the west by waterless desert. We have no cultivation or stock farming to provide us with our livelihood or food, which comes to us as through the throat of an [[ostrich]]."<ref name="Kennedy">{{cite journal |last1=Kennedy |first1=Hugh |title=The Feeding of the five Hundred Thousand: Cities and Agriculture in Early Islamic Mesopotamia |journal=Iraq |date=2011 |volume=73 |pages=177–199 |doi=10.1017/S0021088900000152 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Nevertheless, Basra overcame these natural disadvantages and rapidly grew into the second-largest city in Iraq, if not the entire Islamic world. Its role as a military encampment meant that the soldiers had to be fed, and since those soldiers were receiving government salaries, they had money to spend.<ref name=":14">{{Cite journal |date=2023-11-30 |title=Discovering Early Islamic Basra: the Origins and Development of Iraq’s Southern Metropolis |url=https://www.sciencedirect.com/org/science/article/pii/S266662782300018X |journal=Journal of Material Cultures in the Muslim World |language=en-US |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=119–142 |doi=10.1163/26666286-12340042 |issn=2666-6278}}</ref>  

Thus, both the government and private entrepreneurs invested heavily in developing a vast agricultural infrastructure in the Basra region.<ref name=":14" /> These investments were made with the expectation of a profitable return, indicating the value of the Basra food market.<ref name=":14" /> Although African [[Zanj]] slaves from the [[Indian Ocean slave trade]] were put to work on these construction projects, most of the labor was done by free men working for wages.<ref>{{Citation |last=Richardson |first=Seth |title=Mesopotamian Slavery |date=2023 |work=The Palgrave Handbook of Global Slavery throughout History |pages=17–39 |editor-last=Pargas |editor-first=Damian A. |url=https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-13260-5_2 |access-date=2025-05-17 |place=Cham |publisher=Springer International Publishing |language=en |doi=10.1007/978-3-031-13260-5_2 |isbn=978-3-031-13260-5 |editor2-last=Schiel |editor2-first=Juliane}}</ref> Governors sometimes directly supervised these projects, but usually they simply assigned the land while most of the financing was done by private investors.<ref name="Kennedy" /> The result of these investments was a massive irrigation system covering some 57,000 hectares between the Shatt al-Arab and the now-dry western channel of the Tigris.<ref name=":15">Development of Water Rating Curve in Basra River</ref> This system was first reported in 962, when just 8,000 hectares of it remained in use, for the cultivation of [[date palm]]s, while the rest had become desert.<ref name=":15" /> This system consists of a regular pattern of two-meter-high ridges in straight lines, separated by old canal beds.<ref name=":15" /> The ridges are extremely saline, with salt deposits up to 20 centimeters thick, and are completely barren.<ref name=":15" /> The former canal beds are less salty and can support a small population of salt-resistant plants.<ref name=":15" /> 

Contemporary authors recorded how the Zanj slaves were put to work clearing the fields of salty topsoil and putting them into piles; the result was the ridges that remain today.<ref name=":16">{{Cite web |last=Winterhalter |first=Elizabeth |date=2021-02-04 |title=What Was the Zanj Rebellion? |url=https://daily.jstor.org/what-was-the-zanj-rebellion/ |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=JSTOR Daily |language=en-US}}</ref> This represents an enormous amount of work: [[H.S. Nelson]] calculated that 45 million tons of earth were moved in total, and with his extremely high estimate of one man moving two tons of soil per day, this would have taken a decade of strenuous work by 25,000 men.<ref name="Kennedy" /> Ultimately, Basra's irrigation canals were unsustainable, because they were built at too little of a slope for the water flow to carry salt deposits away.<ref name=":16" /> This required the clearing of salty topsoil by the Zanj slaves in order to keep the fields from becoming too saline to grow crops.<ref name=":16" /> After Basra was sacked in by Zanj rebels in the late 800s and then by the Qarmatians in the early 900s, there was no financial incentive to invest in restoring the irrigation system, and the infrastructure was almost completely abandoned.<ref name=":16" /> Finally, in the late 900s, the city of Basra was entirely relocated, with the old site being abandoned and a new one developing on the banks of the Shatt al-Arab, where it has remained ever since.<ref name="Kennedy" />