of the West. Spain had intercourse with Persia. Al-Hariri praises Busrah " as the spot where the ship and the camel meet, the sea fish and the lizard, the camel-leader and the sailor, the fisher and the tiller." In other words it was the port and emporium for all the lands watered by the Euphrates and Tigris. The same was true of Alexandria for the West.
We have evidences that an extensive trade was carried on between Arabia and China in walrus and ivory. An extensive work exists written in Chinese in the twelfth century on trade with the Arabs of which a recent translation has been published at Petrograd. More remarkable still is the fact that in Scandinavia thousands of Kufic coins have been found, nearly all of which date from the eleventh century. This would indicate that even this re mote part of Europe was in touch with the Near East.[1]
Judging from literature and history, it was a time of looseness of morals and of divorce between religion and ethics, even more startling than in the world of Islam to-day. There were those who wrote commentaries on the marvels of the Koran, like Al-Harawi, yet did not scruple to indulge in private wine-drinking and carousals and loose con versation. The place of wine, women, and song, not only in popular literature and poetry, but even
- ↑ Der Islam, Band V, Heft 2/3; C. H. Becker, Strassburg, PP. 239, 291.
