ABSTRACT
Between 950 and 1100, any hopes that a central political authority would be restored to the Dar al-Islam were crushed.The vacuum of power encouraged numerous ambitious men to test their strength. The Abbasid caliph became a mere figurehead for powerful military men behind him. A Berber religious movement grew until it became the Almoravid Empire, encompassing most of the Maghrib as well as Muslim Iberia. Turks, who had served as slave soldiers since the 840s, now became rulers: the Ghaznavids in Afghanistan and northern India created a powerful empire, and the Saljuqs took over the region between the Aegean Sea and Syria in the west and Afghanistan in the east.The Fatimids of Egypt flourished for a century but suffered a debilitating schism on the eve of the Crusades.
