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What if the Battle of Qadisiyyah Had a Different Result

197 bytes added, 13:11, 19 April 2017
Implications of the Battle
First, the fall of the Sasanians, which became more inevitable after the battle, meant that the once widespread Zoroastrian religion began to fade and many adherents eventually converted to Islam (Figure 1). In effect, it allowed one religion to be mostly replaced by another. Although this process occurred over a long period, the events at Qadisiyyah paved the way for this to accelerate.<ref>For more on the replacement of the Zoroastrian faith in many places, see: Rose, Jenny. 2011. <i>Zoroastrianism: An Introduction.</i> Introductions to Religion. London: I. B. Tauris.</ref>
Second, the defeat of the Persians paved the way for major Arab migrations to Iraq and more fertile regions of the Middle East. Although Arabs were present before in many towns and cities in the Middle East, this now meant the Arabic language started becoming more prominent as migrants came to different regions. With the use of Arabic in Islam, it cemented the spread of this new common language to be widespread across not only the Middle East but it soon spread to Iran and west to North Africa.<ref>For more on the migrations that followed the conquest of Iraq, see: Sharqāwī, Muḥammad. 2010. <i>The Ecology of Arabic: A Study of Arabicization.</i> Leiden; Boston: Brill, pg. 166.</ref>
Third, the battle gave the Islamic armies a lot of confidence and experience. This led to much more rapid gains in the Middle East and North Africa against the Byzantines, although they were never ultimately defeated by the Arabs. The success even carried on in Europe, where they were only finally defeated in France by Charles Martel in 732. Between 646 and 732, the Arab armies had almost been unstoppable in open battlefields, although sieges of great cities, such as Constantinople, gave them more difficulty (Figure 2).

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