1.1 Urban Development of Baghdād(1st/7th–5th/11thcent.)

It was on a day in Ṣafar 204/August 819 that theʿAbbāsid caliph ʿAbd Allāh b. Hārūn al-Maʾmūn (r.197–218/813–833) entered Baghdād after his stay inKhurāsān for several years. As an (almost)contemporary historian reports:

It can be inferred from this passage that al-Maʾmūnmoved to his palace (qaṣr) in the neighborhood of al-Ruṣāfaon the eastern bank of the Tigris and did not occupyone of his ancestors’ palaces on the western bank ofthe river. This decision marked a sharp break in thehistory of Baghdād, since the political center wasmoved from the western to the eastern part of thecity where it was to remain for the centuries tocome.

The period preceding al-Maʾmūn's arrival in Baghdād wasone of growth and expansion for the city, whichderived its name from the Old Persian male firstname Bagaʾdāta meaning “given or created by God”.This personal name became a toponym, because anAchaemenid bearing this name had some estates in thearea. In other words, Bagh- dād means “the estatesof Bagaʾdāta”. These estates seem to have beenlocated on the western bank of the Tigris, because aSasanian village called Baghdād is mentioned on thisspot during the conquest period. al- Balādhurīreports that a Muslim unit raided some merchants atthe Sūq Baghdād (“The Market of Baghdād”) during thecaliphate of Abū Bakr (r. 12–14/632–634), which waslocated at the “Ṣarāt-point” on the western shore.Beside this village, other Sasanian structures arementioned in the area, in which later great ʿAbbāsidcapital later developed. Among them are the canalswhich connected the Euphrates with the Tigris, likethe Nahr ʿĪsā canal and its northern branch theṢarāt canal, as well as the canals which branch offthe Tigris to the east, such as the Nahrawān canaland its offshoots, the Khalīṣ canal and the Nahr Bīncanal.