text: footballer

text: forward

text: Levante

text: Albania national team

text: Cërrik

text: Elbasan

text: Turbina Cërrik

text: Albanian First Division

text: Gramozi Ersekë

text: top flight

text: Elbasani

text: Locarno

text: Swiss Challenge League

text: 2012–13 season

text: top flight

text: Zürich

text: 2013–14 Swiss Cup

text: Vaduz

text: Serie A

text: Bundesliga

text: FC Lugano

text: Paolo Tramezzani

text: active player top goalscorer

text: Albania under-19

text: under-21 side

text: UEFA Euro 2016

text: UEFA European Championship

text: Cërrik

text: Elbasan

text: Turbina Cërrik

text: Albanian First Division

text: Albanian Superliga

text: Gramozi Ersekë

text: Shkumbini Peqin

text: Skënderbeu Korçë

text: Flamurtari Vlorë

text: Elbasani

text: Tirana

text: Bylis Ballsh

text: Laçi

text: Switzerland

text: Swiss Challenge League

text: Locarno

text: Schaffhausen

text: Chiasso

text: Kriens

text: Aarau

text: Winterthur

text: Wohlen

text: Étoile Carouge

text: Swiss Cup round 2

text: Wil

text: championship

text: Biel-Bienne

text: Wohlen

text: Winterthur

text: St. Gallen

text: 2013–14 Swiss Cup Round 2

text: Schaffhausen

text: Burim Kukeli

text: Swiss Super League

text: Sion

text: Thun

text: Swiss Cup

text: Thun

text: Basel

text: St. Gallen

text: 2014–15 Swiss Super League

text: Cham

text: Swiss Cup Round 3

text: 2015–16 season

text: Sami Hyypiä

text: Swiss Super League

text: UEFA Euro 2016

text: Vaduz

text: Zürich

text: Lugano

text: Grasshopper

text: 2015–16 Liechtenstein Cup

text: Eschen/Mauren

text: St. Gallen

text: Paolo Tramezzani

text: Albania

text: Lugano

text: Basel

text: St. Gallen

text: Ezgjan Alioski

text: Basel

text: Vaduz

text: 2017–18 UEFA Europa League

text: Ekstraklasa

text: Legia Warsaw

text: Champions League group stage

text: Gornik Zabrze

text: UEFA Champions League

text: Astana

text: third qualifying round

text: Polish Cup

text: Wisła Puławy

text: round of 32

text: Warsaw

text: Levante

text: La Liga

text: Real Betis

text: Valdet Rama

text: Espanyol

text: Diego López

text: 2017–18 season

text: Netherlands

text: Heerenveen

text: 2018–19 season

text: Albania national under-19 football team

text: Ramadan Shehu

text: Cyprus U19

text: Moldova U21

text: Albania senior team

text: Gianni De Biasi

text: Georgia

text: Mikheil Meskhi Stadium

text: Tbilisi

text: Edgar Çani

text: Qatar

text: Iran

text: 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers

text: Edgar Çani

text: Bekim Balaj

text: Erjon Bogdani

text: Hamdi Salihi

text: Cyprus

text: Alban Meha

text: UEFA Euro 2016 qualifying

text: Group I

text: Denmark

text: Telia Parken

text: Armenia

text: Kasparov

text: Roshi

text: UEFA Euro 2016

text: UEFA European Championship

text: Group A

text: Switzerland

text: Romania

text: 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: Group G

text: Spain

text: Italy

text: Israel

text: Macedonia

text: Liechtenstein

text: Morocco

text: Loro Boriçi Stadium

text: Bosnia and Herzegovina

text: Sammy Ofer Stadium

text: UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying

text: Turkey

text: Andorra

text: Loro Boriçi

text: Ervin Bulku

text: Josep Gómes

text: Estadi Nacional

text: Hamdi Salihi

text: Nike

text: Elbasan Country

text: Cërrik

text: Trebisht

text: Albania

text: Podujevo

text: Kosovo

text: Taulant

text: Granit Xhaka

text: Bulgarian

text: Sherif Sadiku

text: Shkumbini Peqin

text: Albanian First Division

text: Zlatan Ibrahimović

text: Internazionale

text: Socialist Party of Albania

text: Kosovo Albanian

text: Facebook

text: Swiss Cup

text: Liechtenstein Cup

categories: Footballers from Elbasan,Albania under-21 international footballers,Albanian people of Kosovan descent,FC Zürich players,1991 births,Swiss Super League players,Expatriate footballers in Poland,FC Lugano players,Albania youth international footballers,Albanian expatriate footballers,FC Locarno players,Albanian expatriate sportspeople in Switzerland,Albanian footballers,La Liga players,Expatriate footballers in Spain,KS Turbina Cërrik players,Living people,Association football midfielders,Albanian Superliga players,KS Gramozi Ersekë players,Swiss Challenge League players,Albanian expatriate sportspeople in Poland,Legia Warsaw players,Association football forwards,Ekstraklasa players,KS Elbasani players,Albania international footballers,Expatriate footballers in Switzerland

paragraph: Armando Sadiku

paragraph: Armando Durim Sadiku (born 27 May 1991) is an Albanian professional footballer who plays as a forward for Spanish club Levante and the Albania national team.

paragraph: Born in Cërrik, Elbasan, Sadiku started his career with a local club Fushë Mbreti from where he moved later at the youth ranks of his boyhood club Turbina Cërrik, and later made his professional debut in the Albanian First Division. In the summer of the 2009, he went to Gramozi Ersekë in club's first ever top flight season, where he had a breakthrough year, scoring eight goals, which ensured him a move to Elbasani. Sadiku played only a half season with Elbasani, as he was banned from Albanian football due to non-sporting behavior, which led him to flee in Switzerland to play for Locarno.

paragraph: Sadiku enjoyed a fine time in Switzerland, netting 54 goals in Swiss Challenge League, and was top scorer in 2012–13 season. In November 2013, he joined top flight side Zürich on a five-year deal. His time there was marred by his lack of playing time and injuries, as he remained 6 months sidelined due to an injury in May 2014. He returned in the next season but failed to make an impact, scoring only three goals, winning the 2013–14 Swiss Cup. Sadiku enhanced his ratio in the first half of 2015–16 season, scoring eight goals in 18 appearances. Despite being the top scorer of the team at this time, he was sent on loan to fellow relegation strugglers Vaduz, which was dubbed as an "owngoal" by Swiss media.

paragraph: Sadiku helped Vaduz to retain their top flight status for another season, in addition relegating his parent club. He returned to Zürich in the summer, and was target of top European club from Serie A and Bundesliga, but didn't leave due to club's high economical demands. In January 2017, Sadiku was sent on loan again, this time at his former side FC Lugano where he rejoined Paolo Tramezzani.

paragraph: An Albanian international, Sadiku with 11 goals scored, is his country's active player top goalscorer and 8th in the overall ranking. At youth level, he represented Albania under-19 and under-21 side with whom he scored 6 goals in only 7 appearances, thus being all-time top goalscorer. He made his senior debut in 2012 and was part of UEFA Euro 2016 squad where he scored Albania's first goal at a UEFA European Championship.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Early career.

paragraph: Born in Cërrik, Elbasan, Sadiku started his youth career at age of 7 with a local club Fushë Mbreti from where he moved later at the youth ranks of his boyhood club Turbina Cërrik, and later made his professional debut in the Albanian First Division whereas he played during the two seasons 2007–08 and 2008–09.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Gramozi Ersekë.

paragraph: In July 2009, Sadiku completed a transfer to newly promoted Albanian Superliga side Gramozi Ersekë, owned by the brother of Albanian oil tycoon Rezart Taci. He made his first top flight appearance on 23 August at the age of 18 in the opening matchday against Shkumbini Peqin which ended in a goalless draw, with Sadiku coming on in the second half.

paragraph: He opened his scoring account on 19 September in matchday 4 versus Skënderbeu Korçë, netting a tap-in for the temporary equalizer in an eventual 4–1 away loss. One week later, Sadiku was again on the scoresheet as Gramozi recorded their first ever Albanian Superliga win by beating Flamurtari Vlorë.

paragraph: Sadiku finished his only Gramozi Ersekë season by scoring 8 goals in 28 league appearances, as Gramori was relegated after only one season.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Elbasani.

paragraph: During the summer transfer window, Sadiku signed for his hometown club Elbasani. During the 2010–11 season first-half he played 14 matches and scored 5 goals. He made his debut with the club on 22 August 2010 during the opening league match against Tirana at home, playing 75 minutes in a 1–1 draw. He scored his first goal of the season in his second appearance six days later, netting a last-minute winner in a 2–1 away win over Bylis Ballsh.

paragraph: On 19 December 2010, during the league match against Laçi, Sadiku, who had scored earlier in the match, was sent-off in the 82nd minute. A minute before his dismissal, he scored but was caught offside by the assistant referee Eduard Miho, which enraged Sadiku, who run towards him and pushed away by throat, spitting and also insulted him the process. Disciplinary Committee suspended Sadiku from Albanian football for two years, also fining him. That was his last match in Albanian football, as Sadiku left the club to purchase a career in Switzerland. As it happened with Gramozi Ersekë in previous season, Elbasani also ranked in the last place and were relegated to Albanian First Division.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Locarno.

paragraph: Sadiku moved for the first time aboard in March 2011 where he completed a transfer to Swiss Challenge League side Locarno. The transfer was made official on 13th. He arrived in the morning and even travelled with the side to the away fixture with Schaffhausen. He made his debut later that day, playing for 82 minutes in a 2–1 loss. He opened his scoring account on Switzerland on his third appearance for the club, netting the winning goal against Chiasso on 1 April for a 2–1 win.

paragraph: However that goal was to open the floodgates of the striker scoring in Switzerland, as he managed a brace against Kriens, and goals versus Aarau and Winterthur, which gave him 9 in 12 appearances as the team barely avoided relegation.

paragraph: Sadiku begun 2011–12 season on strong fashion, netting twice on the opening day against Wohlen as the match was lost 5–2. He returned to the scoring sheet later on 20 August by scoring a brace in Locarno's 3–0 defeat of Étoile Carouge, giving his side the first win of the season. Then he scored on Swiss Cup round 2 against Wil which was not enough as Locarno was eliminated on penalties after regular time ended 1–1. Sadiku concluded his second Locarno season by netting 19 goals in the championship, being the highest scorer as Locarno finished 9th.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Lugano.

paragraph: On 23 July 2012, Locarno confirmed via their official website the purchase of Sadiku on a three-year contract. With the deal Sadiku would earn CHF200,000 per season.

paragraph: He made his competitive debut one week later in matchday 3 of championship against Biel-Bienne, netting a brace to lead the team into 4–0 home win. He scored another brace later on 19 August in the 4–1 home win over Wohlen to take his tally up to 4 league goals. Sadiku reached double-figures for the second season in a row on 29 October where he scored his team's only goal in a 1–2 home defeat to Winterthur. Sadiku eventually finished his first Lugano season making 32 league appearances collecting 2849 minutes and netting 20 goals in, to become top scorer as the team finished 7th in the championship, failing to clinch a spot to top flight next season. He also contributed with 2 goals in 2 cup matches.

paragraph: He started the new season by netting in the 1–3 home defeat to St. Gallen for the 2013–14 Swiss Cup Round 2 which eliminated Lugano from the competition. During the first part of 2013–14 season, Sadiku scored 6 goals in 11 appearances. including a brace in the 3–1 home win over Schaffhausen, before leaving in November.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Zürich.

paragraph: On 13 November 2013, Zürich and Lugano reached an agreement for the transfer of Sadiku for €500,000. The transfer was made official on 1 January 2014 where the player signed a contract until June 2018, taking squad number 11. At Zürich, he found his Albania teammate Burim Kukeli.

paragraph: Sadiku made his first Swiss Super League appearance on 1 February against Sion where he came in the last minutes. Sadiku scored his first top flight goal on 16 February in the 3–1 home win over Thun.

paragraph: Later on 26 March, he made another appearance as substitute, entering in the final minutes of extra time of Swiss Cup semi-final match against Thun which finished in a goalless draw which lead the match to penalty shootouts where Sadiku successfully converted his penalty shootout attempt as the team won 5–4. He also played in the final of competition against Basel as Zürich won after extra-time to win their 8th cup in history. This win constituted his first career trophy.

paragraph: On 10 May 2014, during the league match against St. Gallen, Sadiku entered as substitute in the 70th minute and was injured shortly after, breaking knee ligament which would keep him sidelined for the next 6 months.

paragraph: Sadiku made his on-field return on 30 November 2014 in 2014–15 Swiss Super League matchday 17 versus Basel where he came as a substitute in a 1–2 home loss. He opened his scoring account for 2014–15 season during the 5–0 win over Cham for Swiss Cup Round 3. He concluded 2014–15 season by scoring 3 goals in 14 league appearances, in addition 1 goal in 1 cup match.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Zürich.:Loan to Vaduz.

paragraph: During the first part of 2015–16 season, Sadiku was used scarcely, and often as a substitute by coach Sami Hyypiä despite being the team's top goalscorer in the league. That lead him to request a loan to another Swiss Super League side in order to play more to be ready to represent Albania in the UEFA Euro 2016 in France. His wish was fulfilled and on 12 January 2016 Sadiku was loaned out to the bottom-side Vaduz until the end of season. During his presentation one day later, Sadiku was allocated squad number 32 and dubbed his Vaduz move as the "right decision". His parent club Zürich was criticized by the Swiss media, which dubbed the loan an "own goal" and an "arrogant" decision.

paragraph: Sadiku made his debut for the club on 6 February scoring a brace and providing two assists in a 5–2 away win against fellow relegation strugglers Lugano, one of his former sides. On 28 February, he was again on the scoresheet scoring his team's only goal in a 1–1 draw against Grasshopper, giving Vaduz one point.

paragraph: On 6 April, he scored a brace in the 2015–16 Liechtenstein Cup semi-final match against Eschen/Mauren, helping the team to win the 2–1 and progress to the final. Four days later, Sadiku scored his fourth league goal for Vaduz and also provided an assist during the 3–0 home win against St. Gallen, helping Vaduz to a first success after six consecutive winless league matches. He scored his tenth league goal of the season during the 5–4 away defeat to Young Boys. Vaduz eventually finished 8th which was enough to avoid relegation.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Zürich.:Loan to Lugano.

paragraph: Following arrival of Paolo Tramezzani from Sadiku's national team Albania at Lugano made Sadiku himself to move on loan at FC Lugano making also a return. He made his return debut on 4 February in team's 4–0 away defeat at Basel. Following that, he went on to score in five consecutive league matches, including the winner against St. Gallen, as Lugano become a contenter for a European spot next season. During his time at Lugano, Sadiku formed a fierce partnership with Ezgjan Alioski, as the duo scored 25 goals together. On 7 May, Sadiku scored against Basel and celebrated by taking off his shirt receiving his second yellow card as the match finished in a 2–2 draw. On 21 May, Sadiku scored against Vaduz to open Lugano's way for a 3–0 victory which secured them participation in the 2017–18 UEFA Europa League next season. He finished the second part of the 2016–17 season by scoring 9 times in 16 appearances.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Legia Warsaw.

paragraph: On 12 July 2017, Sadiku joined Polish Ekstraklasa side Legia Warsaw by penning a three-year contract. The transfer fee was undisclosed, but it was reported that Legia paid €1.5 million for his services, making Sadiku the most expensive purchase of Polish football. He was presented two days later, where he was given squad number 99, stating: "I am happy I have signed with such a great club. This is a good step in my career. I hope we will qualify for the Champions League group stage."

paragraph: Sadiku made his first appearance for Legia on 15 July in the opening Ekstraklasa matchday against Gornik Zabrze, playing in the second half and scoring his team's only goal in a 3–1 away defeat. Eleven days later, Sadiku made his UEFA Champions League debut by scoring a tap-in in a 3–1 away defeat to Astana in the first leg of third qualifying round. Sadiku was on the score-sheet also in his Polish Cup debut on 8 August where he netted in the last moments of the 4–1 win over Wisła Puławy in the round of 32.

paragraph: Sadiku was sold by Legia on deadline day on 31 January to La Liga outfit Levante for an undisclosed fee. During his time at Warsaw he netted 7 times in 25 official matches.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Levante.

paragraph: On 31 January 2018, in the deadline day, Sadiku was signed by Levante of La Liga for an undisclosed fee. The player signed a contract until June 2020. After several weeks sidelined due to knee injury, Sadiku made his debut for the club on 26 February by starting in the 0–2 loss to Real Betis. By doing so, he became only the second Albanian ever, the first being Valdet Rama, to play in La Liga. On 4 March, in the final minutes of the first half of the match against Espanyol, Sadiku suffered a head to head clash with goalkeeper Diego López; he was replaced at half time while López was sent to hospital. Sadiku then underwent surgery on his nose.

paragraph: He concluded the second part of 2017–18 season by making only six league appearances, scoring no goals in the process. In August 2018, Sadiku suffered a major injury in his left knee while playing in a friendly against Netherlands' Heerenveen. He remained sidelined for the entire first part of 2018–19 season.

paragraph: Section::::Club career.:Return to Lugano.

paragraph: On 15 January 2019, Lugano announced to have reached an agreement with Levante for the acquisition of Sadiku, who signed until the end of 2018–19 campaign. The contract included a clause, in which the Spanish has the right to rebuy Sadiku in the next transfer window. Club president Enzo Renzetti expressed his delight for the transfer, stating: "I have personally spoke with the boy. He is very motivated and is waiting with impatience to join us."

paragraph: Section::::International career.

paragraph: Section::::International career.:Youth teams.

paragraph: Sadiku was called up at the Albania national under-19 football team by coach Ramadan Shehu for a double friendly match against Cyprus U19 on 20 & 21 October 2009. In both games he played as a starter and was substituted off in the second half. He was included in Ramadan Shehu's Albania U19 squad for their 2010 UEFA European Under-19 Championship qualification

paragraph: In the 2013 UEFA European Under-21 Championship qualification Sadiku scored two goals as a second-half substitute against Moldova U21 on 7 September 2011 to earn Albania their first points of the campaign. He then scored twice against Poland in a 3–4 loss for Albania. He followed this up with another two goals in a 2–2 draw with Portugal, taking his tally to 6 goals in his first 7 games for Albania U21.

paragraph: New Albania senior team coach Gianni De Biasi, called up Sadiku for his first match as a head coach, a friendly against Georgia on 29 February 2012 at Mikheil Meskhi Stadium in Tbilisi. He made his senior international debut in the game, coming on as an 82nd-minute substitute for goalscorer and fellow debutant Edgar Çani in the 2–1 loss for Albania. He was called up then to Albania's next two friendliest against Qatar and Iran in May 2012, where he played as a second-half substitute in both games, which Albania won them both.

paragraph: Section::::International career.:Senior team.:2014 FIFA World Cup qualification.

paragraph: For the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, new coach Gianni De Biasi had introduced young forwards into the senior national team to create more competition for places in the team. Young forwards such as Sadiku was among Edgar Çani and Bekim Balaj provided competition for the established and mature internationals which were Erjon Bogdani and Hamdi Salihi. In the opening match against Cyprus for the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers on 7 September 2012, Sadiku managed to play as a starter among Salihi forming the duo strikers partnership and Sadiku himself managed to score his first international goal. His goal came in the 36th minute after an cross from free-kick in the right side by Alban Meha and it was the opening goal of the game to open Albania's way towards a 3–1 win.

paragraph: Section::::International career.:Senior team.:UEFA Euro 2016 campaign.

paragraph: Sadiku was not called regularly during the UEFA Euro 2016 qualifying campaign; even when he was part of the squad, he was seen as the third choice by manager De Biasi, ranked behind Cikalleshi and Balaj. He made his first appearance in Group I on 4 September 2015 versus Denmark, replacing Lenjani at 64th minute as Albania took a goalless draw at Telia Parken. In the final matchday against Armenia on 11 October, Sadiku came on at 59th minute and netted 17 minutes later to make the score 3–0; his weak shot inside the box was enough to beat goalkeeper Kasparov after a cross by Roshi. This win cemented Albania the second place in Group I which secured them a place at UEFA Euro 2016, in its first ever appearance at major football tournament.

paragraph: On 21 May 2016, Sadiku was named in Albania's preliminary 27-man squad for UEFA Euro 2016, and in Albania's final 23-man UEFA Euro 2016 squad on 31 May. He made his first ever UEFA European Championship appearance on 11 June 2016 in the opening Group A match against Switzerland as Albania conceded early and lost 0–1. In the final group match versus Romania eight days later, Sadiku netted a header in the first half to lead the team to a historic 1–0 win; in doing so, he became the first Albanian player to score a goal in the UEFA European Championship and Albania took their first ever win in a major football tournament. It was also Albania's first win over Romania since 1948. Albania finished the group in the third position with three points and with a goal difference –2, and was ranked last in the third-placed teams, which eventually eliminated them.

paragraph: Section::::International career.:Senior team.:2018 FIFA World Cup qualification.

paragraph: For the qualifiers of 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification, Sadiku's Albania was placed in Group G along with Spain, Italy, Israel, Macedonia and Liechtenstein. On 29 August 2016, he was in the team's for the friendly against Morocco and the opening qualifying match against Macedonia. He played as a second-half substitute in team's goalless draw against Morocco at the newly renovated Loro Boriçi Stadium. On 5 September in the match against Macedonia, Sadiku opened the score with right-footed shoot just outside the box as Albania won 2–1 thanks to a goal in the last minutes. Later that month, Sadiku suffered an injury while playing for Zürich which kept him sidelined for the next two qualifying match against Liechtenstein and Spain in October, which ended respectively with a 2–0 win and 0–2 defeat. He also missed the match at Elbasan Arena against Israel which ended in a 0–3 defeat as Albania was dropped to fourth place.

paragraph: Sadiku returned to the national team in March for the match against Italy and the friendly against Bosnia and Herzegovina. He returned to the field for the match against Italy, entering in the final 23 minutes as Albania suffered another defeat. On 12 June 2017, in the match against Israel at Sammy Ofer Stadium, Sadiku returned to the starting lineup after nine months to score twice in the first half, both long-range strikes, as Albania got their revenge on Israel with a 3–0 away victory.

paragraph: Section::::International career.:Senior team.:UEFA Euro 2020 qualifiers.

paragraph: On 14 March 2019, Sadiku received an invitation for the opening UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying matches against Turkey and Andorra, returning in the national team after one year. On 22 March, he played as a second-half substitute in the first game against Turkey at Loro Boriçi, recording his cap in 361 days. Three days later, new caretaker manager Ervin Bulku decided to start Sadiku in the second game against minnows Andorra; the striker scored in the 21st minute with the open net after benefiting from the wrong clearance of opposition goalkeeper Josep Gómes, paving way to a 3–0 win at Estadi Nacional. It was his 12nd international goal, overtaking Hamdi Salihi to become Albania's fourth all-time top scorer.

paragraph: Section::::Sponsorship.

paragraph: In April 2016, Sadiku signed a sponsorship deal with American sportswear and equipment supplier, Nike.

paragraph: Section::::Personal life.

paragraph: Sadiku was born on 27 May 1991 in the municipality of Elbasan Country, Cërrik. His father, Durim, is from Trebisht, Albania and his mother from Podujevo, Kosovo. Sadiku is related to Taulant and Granit Xhaka through his mother. He is of paternal Bulgarian ancestry. His brother, Sherif Sadiku, is also a professional footballer who plays for Shkumbini Peqin in the Albanian First Division. Sadiku has cited his role model and favourite footballer the Swedish striker Zlatan Ibrahimović, and is also fan of Italian club Internazionale.

paragraph: He is also known to be a supporter of Socialist Party of Albania, having taken part in 2013 and 2017 electoral campaign. On 30 December 2016, Sadiku was named "Honorary Citizen" of Elbasan for his contributions to sports. On 9 January 2018, Sadiku was engaged to Elona, a Kosovo Albanian dentist, which was one of his fans that he met via Facebook.

paragraph: Section::::Honours.

paragraph: Zürich

paragraph: BULLET::::- Swiss Cup: 2013–14

paragraph: Vaduz

paragraph: BULLET::::- Liechtenstein Cup: 2015–16

description: Albanian footballer

wikidata_label: Armando Sadiku

wikipedia_title: Armando Sadiku


text:
Xuande
Ming Dynasty

categories: Ming dynasty painters,15th-century Chinese painters,Year of death unknown,Year of birth unknown

paragraph: Ji Sheng

paragraph: Ji Sheng (), was a Chinese imperial painter during the Xuande era of the Ming Dynasty. His birth and death years are unknown.

paragraph: Section::::References.

paragraph: BULLET::::- Zhongguo gu dai shu hua jian ding zu (中国古代书画鑑定组). 2000. Zhongguo hui hua quan ji (中国绘画全集). Zhongguo mei shu fen lei quan ji. Beijing: Wen wu chu ban she. Volume 10.

description: Ming dynasty Chinese painter

wikidata_label: Ji Sheng

wikipedia_title: Ji Sheng


text:
Eton College
Lord Salisbury
Phoenix Park
House of Commons
Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee
chargé d'affaires
Cuba
Guatemala
Order of St Michael and St George
Victoriano Huerta
Woodrow Wilson
armoured cruiser
HMS "Berwick"

categories: Ambassadors of the United Kingdom to Guatemala,Knights Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George,1851 births,1915 deaths,Ambassadors of the United Kingdom to Mexico,Ambassadors of the United Kingdom to Cuba

paragraph: Lionel Edward Gresley Carden

paragraph: Sir Lionel Edward Gresley Carden (15 September 1851 – 16 October 1915) was a British diplomat.

paragraph: Section::::Early life.

paragraph: Carden was born on 15 September 1851 in Brighton, Sussex the son of the Reverend Lionel Carden and Lucy Lawrence née Ottley. He was educated at Eton College.

paragraph: Section::::Diplomat.

paragraph: In 1877 Carden was appointed the vice-consul in Havana and held a number of diplomatic posts around Central America.

paragraph: Lionel Carden played a central part in an extraordinary plot by Lord Salisbury, then prime minister, to foil Parnell's remarkably successful Home Rule campaign in the 1880s by attempting to prove Parnell's complicity in criminal activities. Salisbury sought to imply that Parnell encouraged the Phoenix Park murders in 1882, and that he was linked to the dynamite outrages in England which culminated in a bomb in the House of Commons in 1887, the year of Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee. These claims were ultimately disproved in a dramatic hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice in 1889. The principal organiser of the outrages was a certain General Millen who became chairman of the military arm of the American activists. What was kept secret was that in 1885 Lionel Carden, then acting chargé d'affaires at HM Legation in Mexico, interviewed General Millen and with government approval recruited him as a spy, and became his paymaster. Through intermediaries General Millen was directed by Lord Salisbury to ensure that the dynamite explosions continued, thereby creating public outrage against Irish nationalists and Parnell. General Millen met Lionel Carden again in 1888 with an offer, for a very large sum of money, to appear as a witness at the hearing mentioned above, which was about to take place.

paragraph: In May 1902 Carden was appointed British Minister Resident to Cuba, serving as such until 1905, when he transferred as British Ambassador to Guatemala. He was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (KCMG) in 1912.

paragraph: During Huerta's regime in Mexico, Carden reassured Victoriano Huerta that Britain would support him against the United States' protests to resign. In 1913 he was recalled from Mexico after his criticism of Woodrow Wilson.

paragraph: On 18–20 April 1914 Carden returned on the armoured cruiser HMS "Berwick" (sailing via Galveston to Veracruz) to continue to serve briefly as British Minister to Mexico, during the last three months of the Victoriano Huerta regime.

paragraph: Section::::Family and later life.

paragraph: He married Anne Eliza Lefferts, daughter of John Lefferts, on 15 February 1881 in the United States. Carden died on 16 October 1915 in London at age 64, without issue.

description: British diplomat

wikidata_label: Lionel Edward Gresley Carden

wikipedia_title: Lionel Edward Gresley Carden


text:
speed skater
1972 Winter Olympics
Rieneke Demming
Frank
Carl
Personal website
Eddy VERHEIJEN

categories: 1946 births,People from Vaals,Dutch male speed skaters,Olympic speed skaters of the Netherlands,Living people

paragraph: Eddy Verheijen

paragraph: Frits Eddy Verheijen (born 21 March 1946) is a retired speed skater from the Netherlands. He competed at the 1972 Winter Olympics in the 500 m and 1500 m and finished in 25th and 19th place, respectively.

paragraph: Verheijen married Rieneke Demming, an international speed skater. Their two sons, Frank and Carl, also became prominent speed skaters.

paragraph: Personal bests:

paragraph: BULLET::::- 500 m – 40.2 (1972)

paragraph: BULLET::::- 1000 m – 1:22.8 (1971)

paragraph: BULLET::::- 1500 m – 2:01.4 (1971)

paragraph: BULLET::::- 5000 m – 7:20.6 (1972)

paragraph: BULLET::::- 10000 m – 15:15.3 (1972)

paragraph: Section::::External links.

paragraph: BULLET::::- Personal website

paragraph: BULLET::::- Eddy VERHEIJEN. sportuitslagen.org

wikidata_label: Eddy Verheijen

wikipedia_title: Eddy Verheijen


text:
mathematician
philosopher
Vigevano
Ennio Flaiano
Colegio Americano de Quito
Princeton University
Yale University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Norbert Wiener
University of L'Aquila
University of Bologna
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Stanislaw Ulam
Rand Corporation
Brookhaven National Laboratory
National Academy of Sciences
American Mathematical Society
probability
differential equations
Combinatorial Theory
phenomenology
Coca-Cola
Hershey bar
functional analyst
combinatorialist
polynomial
incidence algebra
Möbius inversion
umbral calculus
Sheffer sequence
polynomial sequence
binomial type
probability theory
phenomenology
Edmund Husserl
Kallman–Rota inequality
Rota's conjecture
Rota's basis conjecture
Rota–Baxter algebra
List of American philosophers
Joint spectral radius
Ernesto Damiani
University of Milan

wikipedia_title:
Mathematician
Philosopher
Vigevano
Ennio Flaiano
Colegio Americano de Quito
Princeton University
Yale University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Norbert Wiener
University of L'Aquila
University of Bologna
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Stanislaw Ulam
RAND Corporation
Brookhaven National Laboratory
National Academy of Sciences
American Mathematical Society
Probability
Differential equation
Combinatorics
Phenomenology (philosophy)
Coca-Cola
Hershey bar
Functional analysis
Combinatorics
Polynomial
Incidence algebra
Möbius inversion formula
Umbral calculus
Sheffer sequence
Polynomial sequence
Binomial type
Probability theory
Phenomenology (philosophy)
Edmund Husserl
Kallman–Rota inequality
Rota's conjecture
Rota's basis conjecture
Rota–Baxter algebra
List of American philosophers
Joint spectral radius
Ernesto Damiani
University of Milan

categories: 1932 births,1999 deaths,20th-century American mathematicians,Yale University alumni,Princeton University alumni,20th-century Italian mathematicians,Massachusetts Institute of Technology faculty,American philosophers,Combinatorialists,20th-century Italian philosophers,American people of Italian descent,Italian mathematicians,People from Vigevano

paragraph: Gian-Carlo Rota

paragraph: Gian-Carlo Rota (April 27, 1932 – April 18, 1999) was an Italian-American mathematician and philosopher.

paragraph: Section::::Early life and education.

paragraph: Rota was born in Vigevano, Italy. His father, Giovanni, a prominent antifascist, was the brother of the mathematician Rosetta, who was the wife of the writer Ennio Flaiano. Gian-Carlo's family left Italy when he was 13 years old, initially going to Switzerland.

paragraph: Rota attended the Colegio Americano de Quito in Ecuador, and earned degrees at Princeton University and Yale University.

paragraph: Section::::Career.

paragraph: Much of Rota's career was spent as a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he was and remains the only person ever to be appointed Professor of Applied Mathematics and Philosophy. Rota was also the Norbert Wiener Professor of Applied Mathematics.

paragraph: In addition to his professorships at MIT, Rota held four honorary degrees, from the University of Strasbourg, France (1984); the University of L'Aquila, Italy (1990); the University of Bologna, Italy (1996); and Brooklyn Polytechnic University (1997).

paragraph: Beginning in 1966 he was a consultant at Los Alamos National Laboratory, frequently visiting to lecture, discuss, and collaborate, notably with his friend Stanislaw Ulam. He was also a consultant for the Rand Corporation (1966–71) and for the Brookhaven National Laboratory (1969–1973). Rota was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1982, was vice president of the American Mathematical Society (AMS) from 1995–97, and was a member of numerous other mathematical and philosophical organizations.

paragraph: He taught a difficult but very popular course in probability. He also taught Applications of Calculus, differential equations, and Combinatorial Theory. His philosophy course in phenomenology was offered on Friday nights to keep the enrollment manageable. Among his many eccentricities, he would not teach without a can of Coca-Cola, and handed out prizes ranging from Hershey bars to pocket knives to students who asked questions in class or did well on tests.

paragraph: Rota began his career as a functional analyst, but switched to become a distinguished combinatorialist. His series of ten papers on the "Foundations of Combinatorics" in the 1960s is credited with making it a respectable branch of modern mathematics. He said that the one combinatorial idea he would like to be remembered for is the correspondence between combinatorial problems and problems of the location of the zeroes of polynomials. He worked on the theory of incidence algebras (which generalize the 19th-century theory of Möbius inversion) and popularized their study among combinatorialists, set the umbral calculus on a rigorous foundation, unified the theory of Sheffer sequences and polynomial sequences of binomial type, and worked on fundamental problems in probability theory. His philosophical work was largely in the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl.

paragraph: Section::::Death.

paragraph: Rota died of atherosclerotic cardiac disease, apparently in his sleep at his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He died just a few days short of his 67th birthday. His death was discovered after he failed to arrive in Philadelphia for lectures he had planned to present beginning on Monday 19 April 1999.

paragraph: Section::::See also.

paragraph: BULLET::::- Kallman–Rota inequality

paragraph: BULLET::::- Rota's conjecture

paragraph: BULLET::::- Rota's basis conjecture

paragraph: BULLET::::- Rota–Baxter algebra

paragraph: BULLET::::- List of American philosophers

paragraph: BULLET::::- Joint spectral radius, introduced by Rota in the early 1960s

paragraph: Section::::External links.

paragraph: BULLET::::- This page at www.rota.org was not originally intended to be a memorial web site, but was created by Rota himself with the assistance of his friend Bill Chen in January 1999 while Rota was visiting Los Alamos National Laboratory.

paragraph: BULLET::::- "Fine Hall in its golden age: Remembrances of Princeton in the early fifties" by Gian-Carlo Rota.

paragraph: BULLET::::- Tribute page by Prof. Catherine Yan (Texas A&M University), a former student of Rota

paragraph: BULLET::::- Scanned copy of Gian-Carlo Rota's and Kenneth Baclawski's Introduction to Probability and Random Processes manuscript in its 1979 version.

paragraph: BULLET::::- , ; review at MAA.org

paragraph: BULLET::::- The Digital Footprint of Gian-Carlo Rota: International Conference in memory of Gian-Carlo Rota, organized by Ottavio D'Antona, Vincenzo Marra and Ernesto Damiani at the University of Milan (Italy)

paragraph: BULLET::::- Gian-Carlo Rota on Analysis and Probability, .

description: American mathematician and philosopher

wikidata_label: Gian-Carlo Rota

wikipedia_title: Gian-Carlo Rota


text: Umayyad

text: caliph

text: Medina

text: Marwan I

text: Syria

text: Egypt

text: failed invasion of Iraq

text: Mecca

text: Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr

text: Byzantine Empire

text: Damascus

text: al-Ashdaq

text: Qays

text: Jazira

text: conquered Zubayrid Iraq

text: al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf

text: war with Byzantium

text: Anatolia

text: Armenia

text: Carthage

text: Kairouan

text: western North Africa

text: Iberian Peninsula

text: Iraq

text: Khurasan

text: Kharijites

text: Arab tribal nobility

text: early Muslim conquests

text: Islamic currency

text: Sasanian

text: Greek

text: Persian

text: local Christian

text: Dome of the Rock

text: Jerusalem

text: epigraphic

text: Muhammad

text: al-Walid I

text: Medina

text: Banu Umayya

text: Quraysh

text: Muhammad

text: first generation of born-Muslims

text: memorized the Qur'an

text: Uthman

text: Byzantine

text: Umayyad Caliphate

text: Hejaz

text: Arabia

text: Damascus

text: Syria

text: Sufyanid

text: Abu al-'As

text: Yazid I

text: Muslim ibn Uqba

text: Battle of al-Harra

text: Mu'awiya II

text: Mecca

text: Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr

text: Arab

text: Banu Kalb

text: Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad

text: Iraq

text: Ibn Bahdal

text: South Arabia

text: Qays

text: Jazira

text: Battle of Marj Rahit

text: long-standing blood feud and rivalry

text: Abu Tammam

text: Sinnabra

text: Palestine

text: Abd al-Aziz

text: Khalid

text: Amr ibn Sa'id al-Ashdaq

text: oaths of allegiance

text: Jerusalem

text: Muhammad

text: Rawh ibn Zinba al-Judhami

text: wazīr

text: Abbasid

text: shurṭa

text: Yazid ibn Abi Kabsha al-Saksaki

text: ḥaras

text: mawlā

text: Zufar ibn al-Harith al-Kilabi

text: Euphrates

text: Alid

text: Kufa

text: Mus'ab

text: Basra

text: Battle of Khazir

text: Ibrahim ibn al-Ashtar

text: defeated and killed al-Mukhtar

text: Umayr ibn al-Hubab al-Sulami

text: series of tit-for-tat raids

text: Syria's northern frontier

text: Constantine IV

text: Mopsuestia

text: Cilicia

text: Mardaites

text: Justinian II

text: al-Baladhuri

text: Mount Lebanon

text: Galilee

text: Antioch

text: Theophanes the Confessor

text: condominium

text: Cyprus

text: Armenia

text: Caucasian Iberia

text: Georgia

text: Syriac

text: Michael the Syrian

text: Adharbayjan

text: carte blanche

text: al-Walid I

text: early Muslim conquests

text: Khalid Yahya Blankinship

text: Homs

text: Aban ibn al-Walid ibn Uqba

text: Kharijite

text: Dujayl Canal

text: Battle of Maskin

text: al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf

text: Ta'if

text: Arafat

text: Tariq ibn Amr

text: besieged Ibn al-Zubayr in Mecca

text: Ka'aba

text: panegyric

text: Banu Makhzum

text: Yemen

text: Yamama

text: Hajj

text: Hisham ibn Isma'il

text: Muslim conquest in the 630s

text: Bishr

text: Khalid ibn Abdallah

text: Najdiyya

text: Azariqa

text: Ramhormoz

text: Shabib ibn Yazid al-Shaybani

text: al-Mada'in

text: Sufyan ibn al-Abrad al-Kalbi

text: Sistan

text: Khurasan

text: Yazid

text: Muslim conquests in Central Asia

text: Hugh Kennedy

text: Zabulistan

text: Tustar

text: Banu Thaqif

text: Battle of Dayr al-Jamajim

text: Wasit

text: Sawad

text: casus belli

text: Cyzicus

text: Battle of Sebastopolis

text: Abd Allah

text: Maslama

text: 22-year period of instability

text: Caucasian Albania

text: Berber

text: Ifriqiya

text: Uqba ibn Nafi

text: Battle of Vescera

text: Zuhayr ibn Qays

text: Barqa

text: Hassan ibn al-Nu'man

text: Kairouan

text: Carthage

text: Bizerte

text: Leontios

text: Carthage was captured

text: Roman power in Africa

text: Tunis

text: Musa ibn Nusayr

text: Iberian Peninsula

text: Julius Wellhausen

text: Sulayman

text: Yazid II

text: Hisham

text: Umar II

text: Marwan II

text: Umayyad emirs

text: caliphs

text: Chase F. Robinson

text: Atika

text: Islamization

text: barīd

text: milestone

text: solidus

text: prohibitions on images of prophets

text: dinar

text: dirham

text: Sasanian Persian

text: Greek

text: Arabic

text: dīwān

text: Sulayman ibn Sa'd

text: Persian

text: Muslim statement of belief

text: Byzantine–Muslim struggle

text: Syrian

text: Greek Christian

text: Umar

text: downfall of Umayyad rule

text: Dome of the Rock

text: epigraphic

text: Oleg Grabar

text: Abrahamic

text: architectural works

text: Dome of the Chain

text: Temple Mount

text: Foundation Stone

text: Mercy Gate

text: Prophet's Gate

text: Melkite

text: Gethsemane

text: Sarjun ibn Mansur

text: John of Damascus

text: Banu Abs

text: Zuhayr ibn Jadhima

text: Ja'far ibn Ali

text: Banu Tayy

text: Lake Tiberias

text: Golan Heights

text: Dayr Murran

text: Mount Qasyoun

text: Ghouta

text: Baalbek

text: Beqaa Valley

categories: 7th-century Umayyad caliphs,Umayyad people of the Arab–Byzantine wars,People of the Second Fitna,705 deaths,8th-century Umayyad caliphs,646 births,People from Medina,Umayyad governors of Palestine,Tabi‘un

paragraph: Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan

paragraph: Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan ibn al-Hakam (; June/July 646 – 9 October 705) was the fifth Umayyad caliph, ruling from April 685 until his death. A member of the first generation of born Muslims, his early life in Medina was occupied with pious pursuits. He held administrative and military posts under Caliph Mu'awiya I (), founder of the Umayyad Caliphate, and his own father, Caliph Marwan I (). By the time of Abd al-Malik's accession, Umayyad authority had collapsed across the Caliphate as a result of the Second Muslim Civil War and had been reconstituted in Syria and Egypt during his father's reign.

paragraph: Following a failed invasion of Iraq in 686, Abd al-Malik focused on securing Syria before making further attempts to conquer the greater part of the Caliphate from his principal rival, the Mecca-based caliph Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr. To that end, he concluded an unfavorable truce with the reinvigorated Byzantine Empire in 689, quashed a coup attempt in Damascus by his kinsman, al-Ashdaq, the following year, and reincorporated into the army the rebellious Qaysi tribes of the Jazira (Upper Mesopotamia) in 691. He then conquered Zubayrid Iraq and dispatched his general, al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, to Mecca where he killed Ibn al-Zubayr in late 692, thereby reuniting the Caliphate under Abd al-Malik's rule. The war with Byzantium resumed, resulting in Umayyad advances into Anatolia and Armenia, the destruction of Carthage and the recapture of Kairouan, the launchpad for the later conquests of western North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula, in 698. In the east, Abd al-Malik's viceroy, al-Hajjaj, firmly established the caliph's authority in Iraq and Khurasan, stamping out opposition by the Kharijites and the Arab tribal nobility by 702. The caliph's final years were marked by a domestically peaceful and prosperous consolidation of power.

paragraph: In a significant departure from his predecessors, rule over the Caliphate's provinces was centralized under Abd al-Malik, following the elimination of his rivals. Gradually, loyalist Arab troops from Syria were tasked with maintaining order in the provinces as dependence on less reliable, local Arab garrisons receded. Tax surpluses from the provinces were forwarded to Damascus and the traditional military stipends to veterans of the early Muslim conquests and their descendants were abolished, salaries being restricted to those in active service. The most consequential of Abd al-Malik's reforms were the introduction of a single Islamic currency in place of Byzantine and Sasanian coinage and the establishment of Arabic as the language of the bureaucracy in place of Greek and Persian in Syria and Iraq, respectively. His Muslim upbringing, the conflicts with external and local Christian forces and rival claimants to Islamic leadership all influenced Abd al-Malik's efforts to proscribe a distinctly Islamic character to the Umayyad state. Another manifestation of this initiative was his founding of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, the earliest archaeologically attested religious monument built by a Muslim ruler and the possessor of the earliest epigraphic proclamations of Islam and the prophet Muhammad. The foundations established by Abd al-Malik enabled his son and successor, al-Walid I (), who largely maintained his father's policies, to oversee the Umayyad Caliphate's territorial and economic zenith. Abd al-Malik's centralized government became the prototype of later medieval Muslim states.

paragraph: Section::::Early life.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik was born in June/July 646 in the house of his father Marwan ibn al-Hakam in Medina. His mother was A'isha, a daughter of Mu'awiya ibn al-Mughira. His parents belonged to the Banu Umayya, one of the strongest and wealthiest clans of the Quraysh tribe. The Islamic prophet Muhammad was a member of the Quraysh, but was ardently opposed by the tribe before they embraced Islam in 630. Not long after, the Quraysh came to dominate Muslim politics. Abd al-Malik belonged to the first generation of born-Muslims and his upbringing in Medina, Islam's political center at the time, was generally described as pious and rigorous by the traditional Muslim sources. He took a deep interest in Islam and possibly memorized the Qur'an.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik's father was a senior aide of their Umayyad kinsman, Caliph Uthman (). In 656, Abd al-Malik witnessed Uthman's assassination in Medina, an "event [that] had a lasting effect on him", according to the historian A. A. Dixon. Six years later, he distinguished himself in a campaign against the Byzantines as commander of a Medinese naval unit. He was appointed to the role by his distant cousin, Caliph Mu'awiya I (), founder of the Umayyad Caliphate. Afterward, he returned to Medina, where he operated as an assistant of his father, who had become governor of the city. As with the rest of the Umayyads in the Hejaz (western Arabia), Abd al-Malik lacked close ties with Mu'awiya, who ruled from his power base in Damascus in Syria. Mu'awiya belonged to the Sufyanid line of the Umayyad clan, while Abd al-Malik belonged to the larger Abu al-'As line. When a revolt broke out in Medina in 683 against Mu'awiya's son and successor, Caliph Yazid I (), the Umayyads, including Abd al-Malik, were expelled from the city. The revolt was part of the wider anti-Umayyad rebellion that became known as the Second Muslim Civil War. On the way to the Umayyad capital in Syria, Abd al-Malik encountered the army of Muslim ibn Uqba, who had been sent by Yazid to subdue the rebels in Medina. He provided Ibn Uqba intelligence about Medina's defenses. The rebels were defeated at the Battle of al-Harra in August 683, but the army withdrew to Syria after Yazid's death later that year.

paragraph: The deaths of Yazid and his son and successor Mu'awiya II in relatively quick succession in 683–684 precipitated a leadership vacuum in Damascus and the consequent collapse of Umayyad authority across the Caliphate. Most provinces declared their allegiance to the rival Mecca-based caliph Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr. In parts of Syria, older-established Arab tribes that had secured a privileged position in the Umayyad court and military, in particular the Banu Kalb, scrambled to preserve Umayyad rule. Marwan and his family, including Abd al-Malik, had since relocated to Syria, where Marwan met the pro-Umayyad stalwart Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad, who had just been expelled from his governorship in Iraq. Ibn Ziyad persuaded Marwan to forward his candidacy for the caliphate during a summit of pro-Umayyad tribes in Jabiya hosted by the Kalbi chieftain Ibn Bahdal. The tribal nobility elected Marwan as caliph and the latter became dependent on the Kalb and its allies, who collectively became known as the "Yaman" in reference to their ostensibly shared South Arabian (Yamani) roots. Their power came at the expense of the Qaysi tribes, relative newcomers who had come to dominate northern Syria and the Jazira under Mu'awiya I and had defected to Ibn al-Zubayr. The Qays were routed by Marwan and his Yamani backers at the Battle of Marj Rahit in 684, leading to a long-standing blood feud and rivalry between the two tribal coalitions. Abd al-Malik did not participate in the battle on religious grounds, according to the contemporary poems compiled in the anthology of Abu Tammam (d. 845).

paragraph: Section::::Reign.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Accession.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik was a close adviser of his father. He was headquartered in Damascus and became its deputy governor during Marwan's expedition to conquer Zubayrid Egypt in late 684. Upon the caliph's return in 685, he held a council in Sinnabra where he appointed Abd al-Malik governor of Palestine and designated him as his chosen successor, to be followed by Abd al-Malik's brother, Abd al-Aziz. This designation abrogated the succession arrangements reached in Jabiya, which stipulated that Yazid's son Khalid would succeed Marwan, followed by another Umayyad, the former governor of Medina, Amr ibn Sa'id al-Ashdaq. Nonetheless, Marwan secured the oaths of allegiance to Abd al-Malik from the Yamani nobility. While the historian Gerald Hawting notes that Abd al-Malik was nominated despite his relative lack of political experience, Dixon maintains he was chosen "because of his political ability and his knowledge of statecraft and provincial administration", as indicated by his "gradual advance in holding important posts" from an early age. Marwan died in April 685 and Abd al-Malik's accession as caliph was peacefully managed by the Yamani nobles. He was proclaimed caliph in Jerusalem, according to a report by the 9th-century historian Khalifa ibn Khayyat, which the modern historian Amikam Elad considers to be seemingly "reliable".

paragraph: At the time of his accession, critical posts were held by members of Abd al-Malik's family. His brother, Muhammad, was charged with suppressing the Qaysi tribes, while Abd al-Aziz maintained peace and stability as governor of Egypt until his death in 705. During this period, Abd al-Malik heavily relied on the Yamani nobles of Syria, including Ibn Bahdal al-Kalbi and Rawh ibn Zinba al-Judhami, who played key roles in his administration; the latter served as the equivalent to the chief minister or "wazīr" of the later Abbasid caliphs. Furthermore, a Yamani always headed Abd al-Malik's "shurṭa" (elite security retinue). The first to hold the post was Yazid ibn Abi Kabsha al-Saksaki and he was followed by another Yamani, Ka'b ibn Hamid al-Ansi. The caliph's "ḥaras" (personal guard) was typically led by a "mawlā" (non-Arab Muslim freedman; pl: "mawālī") and staffed by "mawālī".

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Early challenges.

paragraph: Though Umayyad rule had been restored in Syria and Egypt, Abd al-Malik faced several challenges to his authority. Most provinces of the Caliphate continued to recognize Ibn al-Zubayr, while the Qaysi tribes regrouped under Zufar ibn al-Harith al-Kilabi and resisted Umayyad rule in the Jazira from al-Qarqisiya, a Euphrates river fortress strategically located at the crossroads of Syria and Iraq.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Early challenges.:Failure in Iraq.

paragraph: Re-establishing Umayyad rule across the Caliphate was the major priority of Abd al-Malik. His initial focus was the reconquest of Iraq, the Caliphate's wealthiest province. Iraq was also home to a large population of Arab tribesmen, the group from which the Umayyad military derived the bulk of its troops. In contrast, Egypt, which provided significant income to the treasury, possessed a small Arab community and was thus a meager source of troops. The demand for soldiers was pressing for the Umayyads as the backbone of their military, the Syrian army, remained fractured along Yamani and Qaysi lines. Though the roughly 6,000 Yamani soldiers of Abd al-Malik's predecessor were able to consolidate the Umayyad position in Syria, they were too few to reassert authority throughout the Caliphate. Ibn Ziyad, a key figure in the establishment of Marwanid power, set about enlarging the army by recruiting widely among the Arab tribes, including those which nominally belonged to the Qays faction.

paragraph: Ibn Ziyad had been tasked by Abd al-Malik's father with the reconquest of Iraq. At the time, Iraq and its dependencies were split between the pro-Alid forces of al-Mukhtar al-Thaqafi in Kufa and the forces of Ibn al-Zubayr's brother Mus'ab in Basra. In August 686, Ibn Ziyad's 60,000-strong army was routed at the Battle of Khazir and he was slain, alongside most of his deputy commanders, at the hands of al-Mukhtar's much smaller pro-Alid force led by Ibrahim ibn al-Ashtar. The decisive defeat and the loss of Ibn Ziyad represented a major setback to Abd al-Malik's ambitions in Iraq. He refrained from further major campaigns in the province for the next five years, during which Mus'ab defeated and killed al-Mukhtar and his supporters and became Iraq's sole ruler.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik shifted his focus to consolidating control of Syria. His efforts in Iraq had been undermined by the Qaysi–Yamani schism when a Qaysi general in Ibn Ziyad's army, Umayr ibn al-Hubab al-Sulami, defected with his men mid-battle to join Zufar's rebellion. Umayr's subsequent campaign against the large Christian Banu Taghlib tribe in the Jazira sparked a series of tit-for-tat raids and further deepened Arab tribal divisions, the previously neutral Taghlib throwing in its lot with the Yaman and the Umayyads. The Taghlib killed Umayr in 689 and delivered his head to Abd al-Malik.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Early challenges.:Byzantine attacks and the treaty of 689.

paragraph: Along Syria's northern frontier, the Byzantines had been on the offensive since the failure of the First Arab Siege of Constantinople in 678. In 679, a thirty-year peace treaty was concluded, obliging the Umayyads to pay an annual tribute of 3,000 gold coins, 50 horses and 50 slaves, and withdraw their troops from the forward bases they had occupied on the Byzantine coast. The outbreak of the Muslim civil war allowed the Byzantine emperor Constantine IV () to extort territorial concessions and enormous tribute from the Umayyads. In 685, the emperor led his army to Mopsuestia in Cilicia, and prepared to cross the border into Syria, where the Mardaites, an indigenous Christian group, were already causing considerable trouble. With his own position insecure, Abd al-Malik concluded a treaty whereby he would pay a tribute of 1,000 gold coins, a horse and a slave for every day of the year.

paragraph: Under Justinian II (), the Byzantines became more aggressive, though it is unclear whether they intervened directly as reported by the 9th-century Muslim historian al-Baladhuri or used the Mardaites to mount pressure on the Muslims: their depredations extended throughout Syria, as far south as Mount Lebanon and the Galilee uplands. These raids culminated with the short-lived Byzantine recapture of Antioch in 688. The setbacks in Iraq had weakened the Umayyads, and when a new treaty was concluded in 689, it greatly favoured the Byzantines: according to the 9th-century Byzantine chronicler Theophanes the Confessor, the treaty repeated the tribute obligations of 685, but now Byzantium and the Umayyads established a condominium over Cyprus, Armenia and Caucasian Iberia (modern Georgia), whose revenue was to be shared between the two states. In exchange, Byzantium undertook to resettle the Mardaites in its own territory. The 12th-century Syriac chronicler Michael the Syrian however mentions that Armenia and Adharbayjan were to come under full Byzantine control. In reality, as the latter regions were not held by the Umayyads at this point, the agreement probably indicates a "carte blanche" by Abd al-Malik to the Byzantines to proceed against Zubayrid forces there. This arrangement suited both sides: Abd al-Malik weakened his opponent's forces and secured his northern frontier, and the Byzantines gained territory and reduced the power of the side that was apparently winning the Muslim civil war. About 12,000 Mardaites were indeed resettled in Byzantium, but many remained behind, only submitting to the Umayyads in the reign of al-Walid I (). Their presence disrupted Umayyad supply lines and obliged them to permanently keep troops on standby to guard against their raids.

paragraph: The Byzantine counteroffensive represented the first challenge against a Muslim power by a people defeated in the early Muslim conquests. Moreover, the Mardaite raids demonstrated to Abd al-Malik and his successors that the state could no longer depend on the quiescence of Syria's Christian majority, which until then had largely refrained from rebellion. The modern historian Khalid Yahya Blankinship described the treaty of 689 as "an onerous and completely humiliating pact" and surmised that Abd al-Malik's ability to pay the annual tribute in addition to financing his own wartime army relied on treasury funds accrued during the campaigns of his Sufyanid predecessors and revenues from Egypt.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Early challenges.:Revolt of al-Ashdaq and end of the Qaysi rebellion.

paragraph: In 689/90, Abd al-Malik used the respite from the truce to initiate a campaign against the Zubayrids of Iraq, but was forced to return to Damascus when al-Ashdaq and his loyalists abandoned the army's camp and seized control of the city. Al-Ashdaq viewed Abd al-Malik's accession as a violation of the caliphal succession agreement reached in Jabiya. Abd al-Malik besieged his kinsman for sixteen days and promised him safety and significant political concessions if he relinquished the city. Though al-Ashdaq agreed to the terms and surrendered, Abd al-Malik remained distrustful of the former's ambitions and executed him personally.

paragraph: Zufar's control of al-Qarqisiya, despite earlier attempts to dislodge him by Ibn Ziyad in 685/86 and the caliph's governor in Homs, Aban ibn al-Walid ibn Uqba, in 689/90, remained an obstacle to the caliph's ambitions in Iraq. Moreover, in revenge for Umayr's slaying, Zufar had intensified his raids and inflicted heavy casualties on the caliph's tribal allies in the Jazira. Abd al-Malik resolved to command the siege of al-Qarqisiya in person in the summer of 691, and ultimately secured the defection of Zufar and the pro-Zubayrid Qays in return for privileged positions in the Umayyad court and army. The integration of the Qaysi rebels strongly reinforced the Syrian army, and Umayyad authority was restored in the Jazira. From then onward, Abd al-Malik and his immediate successors attempted to balance the interests of the Qays and Yaman in the Umayyad court and army. This represented a break from the preceding seven years, during which the Yaman, and particularly the Kalb, were the dominant force of the army.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Defeat of the Zubayrids.

paragraph: With threats in Syria and the Jazira neutralized, Abd al-Malik was free to focus on the reconquest of Iraq. While Mus'ab had been bogged down fighting Kharijite rebels and contending with disaffected Arab tribesmen in Basra and Kufa, Abd al-Malik was secretly contacting and winning over these same Arab nobles. Thus, by the time Abd al-Malik led the Syrian army into Iraq in 691, the struggle to recapture the province was virtually complete. Command of the army was held by members of his family, his brother Muhammad leading the vanguard and Yazid I's sons Khalid and Abd Allah leading the right and left wings, respectively. Many Syrian nobles held reservations about the campaign and counseled Abd al-Malik not to participate in person. Nonetheless, the caliph was at the head of the army when it camped opposite Mus'ab's forces at Maskin, along the Dujayl Canal. In the ensuing Battle of Maskin, most of Mus'ab's forces, many of whom were resentful at the heavy toll he had exacted on al-Mukhtar's Kufan partisans, refused to fight and his leading commander, Ibn al-Ashtar, fell at the beginning of hostilities. Abd al-Malik invited Mus'ab to surrender in return for the governorship of Iraq or any other province of his choice, but the latter refused and was killed in action.

paragraph: Following his victory, Abd al-Malik received the allegiance of Kufa's nobility and appointed governors to the Caliphate's eastern provinces. Afterward, he dispatched a 2,000-strong Syrian contingent to subdue Ibn al-Zubayr in the Hejaz. The commander of the expedition, al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, had risen through the ranks and would become a highly competent and efficient supporter of the caliph. Al-Hajjaj remained encamped for several months in Ta'if, east of Mecca, and fought numerous skirmishes with Zubayrid loyalists in the plain of Arafat. Abd al-Malik sent him reinforcements led by his "mawlā", Tariq ibn Amr, who had earlier captured Medina from its Zubayrid governor. In March 692, al-Hajjaj besieged Ibn al-Zubayr in Mecca and bombarded the Ka'aba, the holiest sanctuary in Islam, with catapults. Though 10,000 of Ibn al-Zubayr's supporters, including his sons, eventually surrendered and received pardons, Ibn al-Zubayr and a core of his loyalists held out in the Ka'aba and were killed by al-Hajjaj's troops in September or October. Ibn al-Zubayr's death marked the end of the civil war and the reunification of the Caliphate under Abd al-Malik. In a panegyric that the literary historian Suzanne Stetkevych asserts was intended to "declare" and "legitimize" Abd al-Malik's victory, the caliph's Christian court poet al-Akhtal eulogized him on the eve or aftermath of Ibn al-Zubayr's fall as follows:

paragraph: To a man whose gifts do not elude us, whom God has made victorious, so let him in his victory long delight!

paragraph: He who wades into the deep of battle, auspicious his augury, the Caliph of God through whom men pray for rain.

paragraph: When his soul whispers its intention to him it sends him resolutely forth, his courage and his caution like two keen blades.

paragraph: In him the common weal resides, and after his assurance no peril can seduce him from his pledge.

paragraph: — Al-Akhtal (640–708), "Khaffat al-qaṭīnu" ("The tribe has departed")

paragraph: After his victory, Abd al-Malik aimed to reconcile with the Hejazi elite, including the Zubayrids and the Alids, the Umayyads' rivals within the Quraysh. He relied on the Banu Makhzum, another Qurayshi clan, as his intermediaries in lieu of the Umayyad family's absence in the region due to their exile in 683. Nevertheless, he remained wary of the Hejazi elite's ambitions and kept a vigilant eye on them through his various governors in Medina. The first of these was al-Hajjaj, who was also appointed governor of Yemen and Yamama (central Arabia) and led the Hajj pilgrim caravans of 693 and 694. Though he maintained peace in the Hejaz, the harshness of his rule led to numerous complaints from its residents and may have played a role in his transfer from the post by Abd al-Malik. A member of the Makhzum and Abd al-Malik's father-in-law, Hisham ibn Isma'il, was ultimately appointed. During his tenure in 701–706 he was also known for brutalizing Medina's townspeople.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Consolidation in Iraq and the east.

paragraph: Despite his victory, the control and governance of Iraq, a politically turbulent province from the time of the Muslim conquest in the 630s, continued to pose a major challenge for Abd al-Malik. He had withdrawn the Syrian army and entrusted to the Iraqis the defense of Basra from the Kharijite threat. Most Iraqis had become "weary of the conflict" with the Kharijites, "which had brought them little but hardship and loss", according to Gibb. Those from Kufa, in particular, had grown accustomed to the wealth and comfort of their lives at home and their reluctance to undertake lengthy campaigns far from their families was an issue that previous rulers of Iraq had consistently encountered. Initially, the caliph appointed his brother Bishr governor of Kufa and another kinsman, Khalid ibn Abdallah, to Basra before the latter too was put under Bishr's jurisdiction. Neither governor was up to the task, but the Iraqis eventually defeated the Najdiyya Kharijites in Yamama in 692/93. The Azariqa Kharijites in Persia were more difficult to rein in, and following Bishr's death in 694, the Iraqi troops deserted the field against them at Ramhormoz.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik's attempt at family rule in Iraq had proven unsuccessful, and he installed al-Hajjaj in the post instead in 694. Kufa and Basra were combined into a single province under al-Hajjaj, who, from the start of his rule, displayed a strong commitment to governing Iraq effectively. Against the Azariqa, al-Hajjaj backed al-Muhallab ibn Abi Sufra al-Azdi, a Zubayrid holdover with long experience combating the Kharijite rebels. Al-Muhallab finally defeated the Azariqa in 697. Concurrently, a Kharijite revolt led by Shabib ibn Yazid al-Shaybani flared up in the heart of Iraq, resulting in the rebel takeover of al-Mada'in and siege of Kufa. Al-Hajjaj responded to the unwillingness or inability of the war-weary Iraqis to face the Kharijites by obtaining from Abd al-Malik Syrian reinforcements led by Sufyan ibn al-Abrad al-Kalbi. A more disciplined force, the Syrians repelled the rebel attack on Kufa and killed Shabib in early 697. By 698, the Kharijite revolts had been stamped out. Abd al-Malik attached to Iraq Sistan and Khurasan, thus making al-Hajjaj responsible for a super-province encompassing the eastern half of the Caliphate. Al-Hajjaj made al-Muhallab deputy governor of Khurasan, a post he held until his death in 702, after which it was bequeathed to his son Yazid. During his term, al-Muhallab recommenced the Muslim conquests in Central Asia, though the campaign reaped few territorial gains during Abd al-Malik's reign.

paragraph: Upon becoming governor, al-Hajjaj immediately threatened with death any Iraqi who refused to participate in the war efforts against the Kharijites. In an effort to reduce expenditure, he had reduced the Iraqis' pay to less than that of their Syrian counterparts in the province. By his measures, al-Hajjaj appeared "almost to have goaded the Iraqis into rebellion, as if looking for an excuse to break them", according to the historian Hugh Kennedy. Indeed, conflict with the "muqātila" (Arab tribal forces who formed Iraq's garrisons) came to a head beginning in 699 when al-Hajjaj ordered the governor of Kirman, Abd al-Rahman ibn Muhammad ibn al-Ash'ath, to lead an expedition against Zabulistan. Ibn al-Ash'ath and his commanders were wealthy and leading noblemen and bristled at al-Hajjaj's frequent rebukes and demands and the difficulties of the campaign. In response, Ibn al-Ash'ath and his army revolted in Sistan, marched back and defeated al-Hajjaj's loyalists in Tustar in 701, and entered Kufa soon after. Al-Hajjaj held out in Basra with his Banu Thaqif kinsmen and Syrian loyalists, who were numerically insufficient to counter the unified Iraqi front led by Ibn al-Ash'ath. Alarmed at events, Abd al-Malik offered the Iraqis a pay raise equal to the Syrians and the replacement of al-Hajjaj with Ibn al-Ash'ath. Due to his supporters' rejection of the terms, Ibn al-Ash'ath refused the offer, and al-Hajjaj took the initiative, routing Ibn al-Ash'ath's forces at the Battle of Dayr al-Jamajim in April. Many of the Iraqis had defected after promises of amnesty if they disarmed, while Ibn al-Ash'ath and his core supporters fled to Zabulistan, where they were dispersed in 702.

paragraph: The suppression of the revolt marked the end of the Iraqi "muqātila" as a military force and the beginning of Syrian military domination of Iraq. Iraqi internal divisions, and the utilization of disciplined Syrian forces by Abd al-Malik and al-Hajjaj, voided the Iraqis' attempt to reassert power in the province. Determined to prevent further rebellions, al-Hajjaj founded a permanent Syrian garrison in Wasit, situated between the long-established Iraqi garrisons of Kufa and Basra, and instituted a more rigorous administration in the province. Power thereafter derived from the Syrian troops, who became Iraq's ruling class, while Iraq's Arab nobility, religious scholars and "mawālī" were their virtual subjects. Furthermore, the surplus taxes from the agriculturally rich Sawad lands were redirected from the "muqātila" to Abd al-Malik's treasury in Damascus to pay the Syrian troops in the province. This reflected a wider campaign by the caliph to institute greater control over the Caliphate.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Renewal of Byzantine wars in Anatolia, Armenia and North Africa.

paragraph: Despite the ten-year truce of 689, war with Byzantium resumed following Abd al-Malik's victory against Ibn al-Zubayr in 692. The decision to resume hostilities was taken by Emperor Justinian II, ostensibly because of his refusal to accept payment of the tribute in the Muslim currency introduced that year rather than the Byzantine "nomisma" (see below). This is reported solely by Theophanes and issues of chronology make this suspect; not all modern scholars accept its veracity. The real "casus belli", according to both Theophanes and the later Syriac sources, was Justinian's attempt to enforce his exclusive jurisdiction over Cyprus, and to move its population to Cyzicus in northwestern Anatolia, contrary to the treaty. Given the enormous advantages secured by the treaty for Byzantium, Justinian's decision has been criticized by Byzantine and modern historians alike. However, the historian Ralph-Johannes Lilie points out that with Abd al-Malik emerging victorious from the civil war, Justinian may have felt that it was only a matter of time until the caliph broke the treaty, and resolved to strike first, before Abd al-Malik could consolidate his position further.

paragraph: The Umayyads decisively defeated the Byzantines at the Battle of Sebastopolis in 692 and parried a Byzantine counter-attack in 693/94 in the direction of Antioch. Over the following years, the Umayyads launched constant raids against the Byzantine territories in Anatolia and Armenia, led by the caliph's brother Muhammad, and his sons al-Walid, Abd Allah, and Maslama, laying the foundation for further conquests in these areas under Abd al-Malik's successors, which would culminate in the Second Arab Siege of Constantinople in 717–718. The military defeats inflicted on Justinian II contributed to the downfall of the emperor and his Heraclian dynasty in 695, ushering a 22-year period of instability, in which the Byzantine throne changed hands seven times in violent revolutions, further aiding the Arab advance. In 698/99, Emperor Tiberios III () secured a treaty with the caliph for the return of the Cypriots, both those moved by Justinian II, as well as those subsequently deported by the Arabs to Syria, to their island. Beginning in 700, Abd al-Malik's brother Muhammad subdued Armenia in a series of campaigns. The Armenians rebelled in 703 and received Byzantine aid, but Muhammad defeated them and sealed the failure of the revolt by executing the rebel princes in 705. As a result, Armenia was annexed into the Caliphate along with the principalities of Caucasian Albania and Iberia as the province of Arminiya.

paragraph: Meanwhile, in North Africa, a Byzantine–Berber alliance had reconquered Ifriqiya and slain its governor, Uqba ibn Nafi, in the Battle of Vescera in 682. Abd al-Malik charged Uqba's deputy, Zuhayr ibn Qays, to reassert the Arab position in 688, but after initial gains, including the slaying of the Berber ruler Kasila at the Battle of Mams, Zuhayr was driven back to Barqa (Cyrenaica) by Kasila's partisans and slain by Byzantine naval raiders. In 695, Abd al-Malik dispatched Hassan ibn al-Nu'man with a 40,000-strong army to retake Ifriqiya. Hassan captured Byzantine-held Kairouan, Carthage and Bizerte. With the aid of naval reinforcements sent by Emperor Leontios (), the Byzantines recaptured Carthage by 696/97. After the Byzantines were repelled, Carthage was captured and destroyed by Hassan in 698, signaling "the final, irretrievable end of Roman power in Africa", according to Kennedy. Kairouan was firmly secured as a launchpad for later conquests, while the port town of Tunis was founded and equipped with an arsenal on the orders of Abd al-Malik, who was intent on establishing a strong Arab fleet. Hassan continued his campaign against the Berbers, defeating them and killing their leader, the warrior queen al-Kahina, sometime between 698 and 703. Afterward, Hassan was dismissed by Abd al-Aziz, and replaced by Musa ibn Nusayr, who went on to lead the Umayyad conquests of western North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula during the reign of al-Walid.

paragraph: Section::::Reign.:Final years.

paragraph: The last years of Abd al-Malik's reign were generally characterized by the sources as a domestically peaceful and prosperous consolidation of power. The blood feuds between the Qays and Yaman, which persisted despite the former's reconciliation with the Umayyads in 691, had dissipated toward the end of his rule. Dixon credits this to Abd al-Malik's success at "harnessing tribal feeling to the interests of the government, [while] at the same time suppressing its violent manifestations". The remaining principal issue faced by the caliph was ensuring the succession of his eldest son, al-Walid, in place of the designated successor, Abd al-Aziz. The latter consistently refused Abd al-Malik's entreaties to step down from the line of succession, but potential conflict was avoided when Abd al-Aziz died in May 705. He was promptly replaced as governor of Egypt by the caliph's son Abd Allah. Abd al-Malik died five months later, on 9 October, and was buried outside of the Bab al-Jabiya gate of Damascus.

paragraph: Section::::Legacy.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik is referred to as the most "celebrated" Umayyad caliph by the historian Julius Wellhausen. "His reign had been a period of hard-won successes", in the words of Kennedy. The 9th-century historian al-Yaqubi described Abd al-Malik as "courageous, shrewd and sagacious, but also ... miserly". His successor, al-Walid, continued his father's policies and his rule likely marked the peak of Umayyad power and prosperity. Abd al-Malik's key administrative reforms, reunification of the Caliphate and suppression of all active domestic opposition enabled the major territorial expansion of the Caliphate during al-Walid's reign. Three other sons of Abd al-Malik, Sulayman, Yazid II and Hisham, would rule in succession until 743, interrupted only by the rule of Abd al-Aziz's son, Umar II (). Moreover, with the exceptions of the latter and Marwan II (), all of the Umayyad caliphs who came after Abd al-Malik were directly descended from him, hence the references to him as the "father of kings" in the traditional Muslim sources. The Umayyad emirs and caliphs who ruled in the Iberian Peninsula between 756 and 1031 were also his direct descendants. In the assessment of his biographer Chase F. Robinson, "Mu'awiya may have introduced the principle of dynastic succession into the ruling tradition of early Islam, but Abd al-Malik made it work".

paragraph: Abd al-Malik's concentration of power into the hands of his family was unprecedented; at one point, his brothers or sons held nearly all governorships of the provinces and Syria's districts. Likewise, his court in Damascus was filled with far more Umayyads than under his Sufyanid predecessors, a result of the clan's exile to the city from Medina in 683. He maintained close ties with the Sufyanids through marital relations and official appointments, such as according Yazid I's son Khalid a prominent role in the court and army and wedding to him his daughter A'isha. Abd al-Malik also married Khalid's sister Atika, who became his favorite and most influential wife.

paragraph: After his victory in the civil war, Abd al-Malik embarked on a far-reaching campaign to consolidate Umayyad rule over the Caliphate. The collapse of Umayyad authority precipitated by Mu'awiya I's death made it apparent to Abd al-Malik that the decentralized Sufyanid system was unsustainable. Moreover, despite the defeat of his Muslim rivals, his dynasty remained domestically and externally insecure, prompting a need to legitimize its existence, according to Blankinship. Abd al-Malik's solution to the fractious tribalism which defined his predecessors' caliphate was to centralize power. At the same time, his response to the Byzantine–Christian resurgence and the criticism of Muslim religious circles, which dated from the beginning of Umayyad rule and culminated with the outbreak of the civil war, was to implement Islamization measures.

paragraph: The centralized administration established by Abd al-Malik became the prototype of later medieval Muslim states. According to Wellhausen, government "evidently became more technical and hierarchical" under Abd al-Malik, though not nearly to the extent of the later Abbasid caliphs. As opposed to the freewheeling governing style of the Sufyanids, Abd al-Malik ruled strictly over his officials and kept interactions with them largely formal. He put an end to the provinces' retention of the lion's share of surplus tax revenues, as had been the case under the Sufyanids, and had them redirected to the caliphal treasury in Damascus. Abd al-Malik may have inaugurated several high-ranking offices, and Muslim tradition generally credits him with the organization of the "barīd" (postal service), whose principal purpose was to efficiently inform the caliph of developments outside of Damascus.

paragraph: He built and repaired roads that connected Damascus with Palestine and linked Jerusalem to its eastern and western hinterlands, as evidenced by seven milestones found throughout the region, the oldest of which dates to May 692 and the latest to September 704. The road project formed part of Abd al-Malik's centralization drive, special attention being paid to Palestine due to its critical position as a transit zone between Syria and Egypt and Jerusalem's religious centrality to the caliph. According to Kennedy, Abd al-Malik's "centralized, bureaucratic empire ... was in many ways an impressive achievement", but the political, economic and social divisions that developed within the Islamic community during his reign "was to prove something of a difficult inheritance for the later Umayyads".

paragraph: Section::::Legacy.:Institution of Islamic currency and Arabization of the bureaucracy.

paragraph: A major component of Abd al-Malik's centralization and Islamization measures was the institution of an Islamic currency. The Byzantine gold "solidus" was discontinued in Syria and Egypt, the likely impetus being the Byzantines' addition of an image of Christ on their coins in 691/92, which violated Muslim prohibitions on images of prophets. To replace the Byzantine coins, he introduced an Islamic gold currency, the dinar, in 693. Initially, the new coinage contained depictions of the caliph as the spiritual leader of the Muslim community and its supreme military commander. This image proved no less acceptable to Muslim officialdom and was replaced in 696 or 697 with image-less coinage inscribed with Qur'anic quotes and other Muslim religious formulas. In 698/99, similar changes were made to the silver dirhams issued by the Muslims in the former Sasanian Persian lands in the eastern Caliphate. Depictions of the Sasanian king were consequently removed from the coinage, though Abd al-Malik's new dirham retained its characteristically Sasanian silver fabric and wide flan.

paragraph: Shortly after the overhaul of the Caliphate's currency, in circa 700, Abd al-Malik is generally credited to have decreed the replacement of Greek with Arabic as the language of the "dīwān" (bureaucracy) in Syria. The transition was carried out by his scribe Sulayman ibn Sa'd. Al-Hajjaj had initiated the Arabization of the Persian "dīwān" in Iraq, three years before. Though the official language was changed, Greek and Persian-speaking bureaucrats who were versed in Arabic kept their posts. The Arabization of the bureaucracy and currency was the most consequential administrative reform undertaken by the caliph. Arabic ultimately became the sole official language of the Umayyad state, but the transition in faraway provinces, such as Khurasan, did not occur until the 740s. According to Gibb, the decree was the "first step towards the reorganization and unification of the diverse tax-systems in the provinces, and also a step towards a more definitely Muslim administration". Indeed, it formed an important part of the Islamization measures that lent the Umayyad Caliphate "a more ideological and programmatic coloring it had previously lacked", according to Blankinship. In tandem, Abd al-Malik began the export of papyri containing the Muslim statement of belief in Greek to spread Islamic teachings in the Byzantine realm. This was a further testament to the ideological expansion of the Byzantine–Muslim struggle.

paragraph: The increasingly Muslim character of the state under Abd al-Malik was partly a reflection of Islam's influence in the lives of the caliph and the chief enforcer of his policies, al-Hajjaj, both of whom belonged to the first generation of rulers born and raised as Muslims. Having spent most of their lives in the Hejaz, the theological and legal center of Islam where Arabic was spoken exclusively and administrative offices were held solely by Arab Muslims, Abd al-Malik and his viceroy only understood Arabic and were unfamiliar with the Syrian and Greek Christian and Persian Zoroastrian officials of the "dīwān". They stood in stark contrast to the Sufyanid caliphs and their governors in Iraq, who had entered these regions as youths and whose children were as acquainted with the native majority as with the Arab Muslim newcomers. According to Wellhausen, Abd al-Malik was careful not to offend his pious subjects "in the careless fashion of [Caliph] Yazid", but from the time of his accession "he subordinated everything to policy, and even exposed the Ka'ba to the danger of destruction", despite the piety of his upbringing and early career. Dixon challenges this view, attributing the Abbasid-era Muslim sources' portrayal of Abd al-Malik's transformation in character after his accession and the consequent abandonment of his piety to their general hostility to Abd al-Malik, whom they variously "accused of being a mean, treacherous and blood-thirsty person". Dixon, nonetheless, concedes that the caliph disregarded his early Muslim ideals when he felt political circumstances necessitated it.

paragraph: Section::::Legacy.:Reorganization of the army.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik shifted away from his predecessors' utilization of Arab tribal masses in favor of an organized army. Likewise, Arab noblemen who had derived their power solely through their tribal standing and personal relations with a caliph were gradually replaced with military men who had risen through the ranks. These developments have been partially obscured by the medieval sources due to their continued usage of Arab tribal terminology when referencing the army, such as the names of the tribal confederations Mudar, Rabi'a, Qays and Yaman. According to Hawting, these do not represent the "tribes in arms" utilized by earlier caliphs; rather, they denote army factions whose membership was often (but not exclusively) determined by tribal origin.

paragraph: Under Abd al-Malik, loyalist Syrian troops began to be deployed throughout the Caliphate to keep order, which came largely at the expense of the tribal nobility of Iraq. The latter's revolt under Ibn al-Ash'ath demonstrated to Abd al-Malik the unreliability of the Iraqi "muqātila" in securing the central government's interests in the province and its eastern dependencies. It was following the revolt's suppression that the military became primarily composed of the Syrian army. Consecrating this transformation was a fundamental change to the system of military pay, whereby salaries were restricted to those in active service. This marked an end to the system established by Caliph Umar (), which paid stipends to veterans of the earlier Muslim conquests and their descendants. While the Iraqi tribal nobility viewed the stipends as their traditional right, al-Hajjaj viewed them as a handicap restricting his and Abd al-Malik's executive authority and financial ability to reward loyalists in the army. Stipends were similarly stopped to the inhabitants of the Hejaz, including the Quraysh. Thus, a professional army was established during Abd al-Malik's reign whose salaries derived from tax proceeds. The dependence on the Syrian army by his successors, culminating under Hisham (), saw the army's scattering between the Caliphate's multiple and isolated war fronts, most of them distant from Syria. The growing strain and heavy losses inflicted on the Syrians by the Caliphate's external enemies and increasing factional divisions within the army contributed to the weakening and downfall of Umayyad rule in 750.

paragraph: Section::::Legacy.:Foundation of the Dome of the Rock.

paragraph: In 685/86 or 688, Abd al-Malik initiated construction plans for the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. Its dedication inscription mentions the year 691/92, which most scholars agree is the completion date of the building. It is the earliest archaeologically-attested religious structure to be built by a Muslim ruler and the building's inscriptions contain the earliest epigraphic proclamations of Islam and of the prophet Muhammad. The inscriptions proved to be a milestone, as afterward they became a common feature in Islamic structures and almost always mention Muhammad. The Dome of the Rock remains a "unique monument of Islamic culture in almost all respects", including as a "work of art and as a cultural and pious document", according to historian Oleg Grabar.

paragraph: Narratives by the medieval sources about Abd al-Malik's motivations in building the Dome of the Rock vary. At the time of its construction, the caliph was engaged in war with Christian Byzantium and its Syrian Christian allies on the one hand and with the rival caliph Ibn al-Zubayr, who controlled Mecca, the annual destination of Muslim pilgrimage, on the other hand. Thus, one series of explanations was that Abd al-Malik intended for the Dome of the Rock to be a religious monument of victory over the Christians that would distinguish Islam's uniqueness within the common Abrahamic religious setting of Jerusalem, home of the two older Abrahamic faiths, Judaism and Christianity. The other main explanation holds that Abd al-Malik, in the heat of the war with Ibn al-Zubayr, sought to build the structure to divert the focus of the Muslims in his realm from the Ka'aba in Mecca, where Ibn al-Zubayr would publicly condemn the Umayyads during the annual pilgrimage to the sanctuary. Though most modern historians dismiss the latter account as a product of anti-Umayyad propaganda in the traditional Muslim sources and doubt that Abd al-Malik would attempt to alter the sacred Muslim requirement of fulfilling the pilgrimage to the Ka'aba, other historians concede that this cannot be conclusively dismissed.

paragraph: While his sons commissioned numerous architectural works, Abd al-Malik's known building activities were limited to Jerusalem. As well as the Dome of the Rock, he is credited for constructing the adjacent Dome of the Chain, expanding the boundaries of the Temple Mount (Haram al-Sharif) to include the Foundation Stone around which the Dome of the Rock was built and building two gates of the Temple Mount (possibly the Mercy Gate and the Prophet's Gate). Theophanes, possibly conserving an original Syro-Palestinian Melkite source, reports that Abd al-Malik sought to remove some columns from a Christian shrine at Gethsemane to rebuild the Ka'aba, but that he was dissuaded by his Christian treasurer, Sarjun ibn Mansur (the father of John of Damascus), and another leading Christian, called Patrikios, from Palestine, who successfully petitioned Emperor Justinian II to supply other columns instead.

paragraph: Section::::Family and residences.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik had children with several wives and slave women. He was married to Wallada bint al-Abbas ibn al-Jaz, a fourth-generation descendant of the prominent Banu Abs chieftain Zuhayr ibn Jadhima. She bore Abd al-Malik the sons al-Walid I, Sulayman, Marwan al-Akbar and a daughter, A'isha. He also married Caliph Yazid I's daughter Atika, who bore them sons Yazid II, Marwan al-Asghar, Mu'awiya and a daughter, Umm Kulthum. Another of his wives, A'isha bint Hisham ibn Isma'il, belonged to the Banu Makhzum clan and mothered Abd al-Malik's son Hisham. He had a second wife from the Banu Makhzum, Umm al-Mughira bint al-Mughira ibn Khalid, with whom he had a daughter, Fatima, who would later wed Umar II. From his marriage to Umm Ayyub bint Amr, a granddaughter of Caliph Uthman, Abd al-Malik had his son al-Hakam, who died at a young age. Abd al-Malik also married A'isha bint Musa, a granddaughter of one of the Islamic prophet Muhammad's leading companions, Talha ibn Ubayd Allah, and together they had a son, Bakkar, who was also known as Abu Bakr. Abd al-Malik married and divorced Umm Abiha bint Abd Allah, a granddaughter of Ja'far ibn Ali, and Shaqra bint Salama ibn Halbas, a woman of the Banu Tayy. Abd al-Malik's sons from his slave women were Abd Allah, Maslama, al-Mundhir, Anbasa, Muhammad, Sa'id al-Khayr and al-Hajjaj. At the time of his death, fourteen of Abd al-Malik's sons had survived him, according to al-Yaqubi.

paragraph: Abd al-Malik divided his time between Damascus and seasonal residences in its general vicinity. He spent the winter mostly in Damascus and Sinnabra near Lake Tiberias, then to Jabiya in the Golan Heights and Dayr Murran, a monastery village on the slopes of Mount Qasyoun overlooking the Ghouta orchards of Damascus. He would typically return to the city in March and leave again in the heat of summer to Baalbek in the Beqaa Valley before heading back to Damascus in early autumn.

description: 5th Umayyad caliph

enwikiquote_title: Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan

wikidata_label: Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan

wikipedia_title: Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan


text:
Pittsburgh Alleghenys
Ulster County
1890 season
Pittsburgh Burghers

categories: Burials at Allegheny Cemetery,Pittsburgh Alleghenys managers,1844 births,1908 deaths

paragraph: J. Palmer O'Neil

paragraph: J. Palmer O'Neil (September 30, 1843 – January 6, 1908) was a businessman and an executive for the Pittsburgh Alleghenys baseball organization. Born in Ulster County, New York, O'Neil spent years as a life insurance executive in New York City and Pittsburgh, followed by a stint as a manufacturer of gun and hunting supplies. He later took over as president of the eventual Pirates baseball organization. His most memorable achievement was in helping to financially shepherd the team through the difficult and infamous 1890 season, when the club set a league record for losses in a season while facing competition from the upstart Players League team, the Pittsburgh Burghers.

description: baseball executive

wikidata_label: J. Palmer O’Neil

wikipedia_title: J. Palmer O'Neil


text:
Madrid
Spanish
footballer
goalkeeper
CD Leganés
La Liga
Real Madrid
B
C-sides
Iker Casillas
César Sánchez
RCD Mallorca
second division
Polideportivo Ejido
UD Almería
Andalusia
2006–07 campaign
free agent
CD Castellón
his second year
Ricardo Zamora Trophy
relegation
Community of Madrid
CD Puerta Bonita
CD Leganés

categories: Spanish footballers,1978 births,UD Almería players,Madrilenian footballers,Real Madrid Castilla footballers,Polideportivo Ejido footballers,Real Madrid CF players,Segunda División B players,Segunda División players,CD Leganés B players,La Liga players,Tercera División players,Sportspeople from Madrid,Real Madrid C footballers,Living people,Association football goalkeepers

paragraph: Carlos Sánchez (Spanish footballer)

paragraph: Carlos Sánchez García (born 19 January 1978 in Madrid) is a Spanish retired footballer who played as a goalkeeper.

paragraph: Section::::Football career.

paragraph: A graduate of local CD Leganés' youth system, Sánchez signed with La Liga giants Real Madrid in 1999, being first-choice for both its B and C-sides. Benefitting from forced absences to Iker Casillas and César Sánchez he appeared once for the first team, a 1–1 away draw against RCD Mallorca on 23 December 2001.

paragraph: Nothing more than a third-string player for the club, Sánchez would be loaned from 2004 to 2006, spending two seasons in the second division, with Polideportivo Ejido and UD Almería, both in Andalusia, where he also featured very rarely.

paragraph: However, for the 2006–07 campaign, already a free agent, Sánchez joined another team in that level, CD Castellón, and was an undisputed starter in his second year as they finished fifth. He was also awarded the Ricardo Zamora Trophy for the category, after only 27 goals conceded in 33 games.

paragraph: In the summer of 2010, following Castellón's relegation, 32-year-old Carlos returned to the Community of Madrid, signing with amateurs CD Puerta Bonita. After retiring, he worked as a goalkeeper coach at CD Leganés.

description: Spanish footballer

wikidata_label: Carlos Sánchez García

wikipedia_title: Carlos Sánchez (Spanish footballer)