The empire in Syria, 705–763

Syria is usually where empires end, not where they begin. Like its Seleucid ancestor, the Marwanid experiment in Syria showed that a far-flung Middle Eastern empire was still possible without Iraq or Egypt to serve as its centre. Despite the tensions surrounding succession within the Marwanid family, the territorial expansion of the caliphate proceeded apace without any noticeable slowing until the eve of the third fitna. In keeping with the imperial vision established by the time of Abd al-Malik, Marwanid imperial designs were in theory limitless. For all that the Marwanid caliphs saw themselves as God's caliphs, from France to Farghana it was the Syrian tribal armies who were the real world conquerors. The Hijaz and Yemen were excluded from the superprovinces, no doubt because they lacked any active military fronts or waves of settlement. Nowhere can the aspirations of the Marwanid elites be better glimpsed than in the qusur built by caliphs and ashraf throughout the caliphate.