On Islamic Textiles Industry

It is important to highlight the fact that Islam was a tolerant religion, and the subjugated local people were not forced by the victor to change their beliefs, traditions, language or even administrative systems, and thus crafting industries like weaving continued. Hence, we can say that the richness of the Islamic World culture, stems from the fact that the Moslem World embraced diversified civilizations to make out of them a unique international/global civilization consisting of separate individual, but inter-related states whether Kingdoms, Empires or Sultanates, etc. To come back to the core of our topic on Islamic Textiles, I would like to start with a quotation from a 10^th century book entitled “Al-Tabassur fi al-Tijarah (An Insight Into Trade)”, by at-Jahiz, an Arab writer, which includes excerpts such as: “choose a trade that is most lucrative for you”, and “the best of trade is that of textiles and clothing”. At the advent of Islam in the 7^th century (622 AD), the Early Arab Moslems in Hijaz, (the furthest west of present Sa’udi Arabia) were in contact with deep-rooted neighboring civilizations in Iraq, Persia, Yemen, Syria and Asia Minor (Turkey) as well as Egypt. In other words, the land of Islam was surrounded by flourishing civilizations, rich in natural resources and cultural heritage, where textiles or woven fabrics was a lucrative industry. For instance, during the ancient civilizations in Mesopotamia (Sumerians, Accadians, Babylonians) weaving was an important industry in view of the availability of the raw materials as wo...