ABSTRACT
The ancient Arabians were a simple, frugal people, but as their conquests over more luxurious nations extended, their princes assumed the magnificence of Asiatic monarchs. Whatever knowledge of the arts the Arabians acquired in the ages subsequent to Mahomet, they owed to the people whom they subdued, from the Indus to the Nile, and to their commercial relations with surrounding nations. The first Mosque, which is known to have been erected out of the precincts of Arabia, was founded by Omar, immediately after the surrender of Jerusalem, on the site of the ancient Temple. The great mosque founded by I. Alwalid, at Damascus, is particularly celebrated; on this edifice first appeared the lofty minaret. In arts and sciences the Arabs of the West were not inferior to those of the East; the buildings erected by the Ommiad caliphs of Spain, are some of them equal to anything remaining of the most splendid cities of antiquity.
