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Exposing the role that Islamic jihad theology and ideology play in the modern global conflicts

New book claims landmarks of Western church architecture were ‘stolen’ from the Islamic world

Aug 16, 2020 1:00 pm By Robert Spencer

Diana Darke is often featured on the BBC, as well as in the Guardian here, and it’s easy to see why she would be the British intelligentsia’s favorite “Middle East expert”: her new book, with its ridiculous claims that you can see below, is yet another example of the UK elite’s ongoing efforts to compel Britons to believe that Islam is part of their own culture and heritage, so that they will be shamed into fearing to oppose mass Muslim migration into Britain, as well as jihad violence and Sharia oppression of women and others. It’s just more of Britain’s continuing cultural suicide.

In this case, the deception and sleight of hand are clumsy and obvious. Note that the subtitle of the Guardian article claims that “the designs of Europe’s greatest buildings were plundered from the Islamic world.” A centerpiece of the case for that is that “Notre-Dame’s architectural design, like all gothic cathedrals in Europe, comes directly from Syria’s Qalb Lozeh fifth-century church.” A fifth-century church. Islam arose in the seventh and eighth centuries. What exactly does the design of a pre-Islamic church in Syria have to do with the Islamic world? Nothing. Nothing whatsoever. It just happens that the site of this church was conquered by Muslims several centuries after it was built, so for Diana Darke, the Guardian and their luckless readers, this becomes an example of how the West “stole from” or “plundered” the Islamic world.

Even more ridiculous is the claim that the Dome of the Rock was the basis for church architecture in Europe, when the Dome of the Rock itself was patterned after the great cathedral in Constantinople, Hagia Sophia. St. Mark’s in Venice was also patterned after Hagia Sophia, although Darke claims it was based on the Dome of the Rock. The interior of St. Mark’s is covered on virtually every available space with Christian art, as was the interior of Hagia Sophia. Which is its more likely influence? If those who built St. Mark’s were imitating the Dome of the Rock, why didn’t they opt for a more austere interior?

Diana Darke and the Guardian are doing the British public a grave disservice by misleading them about their own culture and heritage, and doing so in a way that is designed to render them complacent and defenseless in the face of a genuine threat, that of jihad violence and Sharia oppression of women and others.

“Looted landmarks: how Notre-Dame, Big Ben and St Mark’s were stolen from the east: They are beacons of western civilisation. But, says an explosive new book, the designs of Europe’s greatest buildings were plundered from the Islamic world – twin towers, rose windows, vaulted ceilings and all,” by Oliver Wainwright, Guardian, August 13, 2020:

As Notre-Dame cathedral was engulfed by flames last year, thousands bewailed the loss of this great beacon of western civilisation. The ultimate symbol of French cultural identity, the very heart of the nation, was going up in smoke. But Middle East expert Diana Darke was having different thoughts. She knew that the origins of this majestic gothic pile lay not in the pure annals of European Christian history, as many have always assumed, but in the mountainous deserts of Syria, in a village just west of Aleppo to be precise.

“Notre-Dame’s architectural design, like all gothic cathedrals in Europe, comes directly from Syria’s Qalb Lozeh fifth-century church,” Darke tweeted on the morning of 16 April, as the dust was still settling in Paris. “Crusaders brought the ‘twin tower flanking the rose window’ concept back to Europe in the 12th century.”

It is not only the twin towers and rose window that have their origins in the Middle East, she pointed out, but also the ribbed vaults, pointed arches and even the recipe for stained glass windows. Gothic architecture as we know it owes much more to Arab and Islamic heritage than it does to the rampaging Goths. “I was astonished at the reaction,” says Darke. “I thought more people knew, but there seems to be this great gulf of ignorance about the history of cultural appropriation. Against a backdrop of rising Islamophobia, I thought it was about time someone straightened out the narrative.”

And so she has, with Stealing from the Saracens, an exhilarating, meticulously researched book that sheds light on centuries of borrowing, tracing the roots of Europe’s major buildings – from the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey to Chartres cathedral and St Mark’s basilica in Venice – back to their Middle Eastern precedents. It is as much a story of political power, wealth and fashion as it is of religious belief, with tales of looting Crusaders, fashion-conscious bishops and globe-trotting merchants discovering new styles and techniques and bringing them home.

“Now we have this notion of east and west,” says Darke. “But back then, it wasn’t like that. There were huge cultural exchanges – and most came from the east to the west. Very little went the other way.”

Given their prevalence in the great cathedrals of Europe, it is easy to imagine that pointed stone arches and soaring ribbed vaults are Christian in origin. But the former dates back to a seventh-century Islamic shrine in Jerusalem, while the latter began in a 10th-century mosque in Andalucia, Spain. In fact, that first known example of ribbed vaulting is still standing. Visitors to the Cordoba Mezquita can marvel at its multiple arches intersecting in a masterpiece of practical geometry and decorative structure, never needing a repair in its thousand-year existence. The vaulted maqsura – the part of the mosque reserved for the ruling caliph – was designed to cast a sacred glow across the leader. However, the official leaflet will tell you little of the building’s Islamic origin, perhaps because it has been a Catholic church since 1236.

The pointed arch, meanwhile, was a pragmatic solution to a problem encountered by masons working on the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. One of the holiest sites in the Muslim world, it was built in 691 by the ruler of Islam’s first empire. The challenge was how to line up an outer arcade of rounded arches with a smaller inner arcade, while maintaining a horizontal ceiling between them. For the openings to align, the masons had to give the inner arcade tighter arches, forcing them to become pointed. Another world first can be spotted higher up in the shrine, where encircling the dome is an arcade of trefoil arches, the three-lobed style of arch that went on to encrust practically every European cathedral, voraciously adopted as a symbol of the Holy Trinity.

“Again and again,” says Darke, “I am so struck by how much of this stuff that we think of as essentially Christian and European was based on ignorance and misinterpretation of much earlier Islamic forms.” She points out that the enormous influence of the Dome of the Rock was down to the Crusaders of the Middle Ages mistakenly thinking the building was the Temple of Solomon….

The list goes on. There are the early square minarets, found on such buildings as the Great Mosque of Damascus, that taper thinner and are crowned with a bulbous finial dome. These inspired such great Italian towers as those of Florence’s town hall and St Mark’s Campanile in Venice, prefiguring centuries of church bell-towers.

Drawing on architectural historian Deborah Howard’s research, Darke shows Venice to be more Arab than European, from its narrow winding passageways and courtyard homes with rooftop terraces, to the Islamic ornamentation of the Doge’s Palace (modelled on Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem) and the onion domes of St Mark’s. All are the fruit of trips made by Venetian merchants to Egypt, Syria, Palestine and Persia, fostering a level of influence that extended even to fashion: women in Venice were veiled in public and dressed in black from head to toe. “One cannot see their faces for all the world,” a 15th-century source commented. “They go about so completely covered up, that I do not know how they can see to go along the street.”

The book comes at a charged time, when supposedly western architecture is being mobilised by right-wing nationalist groups to bolster their idealised vision of a “pure” European identity. There are now countless social media accounts promoting messages of white supremacy disguised as heritage appreciation, while recent government edicts about tradition and beauty carry similar overtones. Darke’s work takes an eloquent sledgehammer to such ignorant, dog-whistle propaganda, revealing how the monuments idealised by the alt-right have their roots in the very culture of which they are so suspicious….

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Filed Under: dhimmitude, Featured, Islamic supremacism, journalistic bias, Useful idiots Tagged With: Diana Darke, Guardian, Stealing from the Saracens


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Comments

  1. jca reid says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 1:15 pm

    not more Rubbish! When Muslims tried to build their Mosques they fell down! Simply didn’t know architecture or building materials. Throughout north Africa, their troops were ordered not to kill builders & once Constantinople fell, they simply copied the Byzantine style. A bunch of retards passing themselves as the Ubermensch. The fact is, they are far from it. NO scientific contributions. Individual Universities have won MORE Scientific Nobel Prizes than the entire Islamic World! Islamic Unis are at the BOTTOM of World League Tables. Even their Astronomers think the Sun orbits the Earth!

    • Rufolino says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 6:16 am

      What I fail to understand is what motivates a woman like this to abandon and distort scholarship.

      What’s in it for her ?

      Will it get her invited to “the best parties” ?

    • JamesC. says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 8:17 am

      ….and yet, ISIS destroys the excavated remains of Nimrud (the Assyrian – pre-Muslim – city of Kalhu).

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 6:57 pm

        Pious Muslims regularly destroy “Jahillya” (“worthless” pre-Islamic work).

        • Sam says

          Aug 17, 2020 at 8:12 pm

          All aincient civilizations ruins and archeilogical sites survived and were protected by muslims yntill the jewish empire called america created and financed the ISIS.
          If Muslims were that bad, how did the church of nativity survive? … go and read before posting lies and stupidity, be an educated person, even a little bit than your total emptiness of today.

        • gravenimage says

          Aug 18, 2020 at 12:05 am

          This from “Sam” is just ludicrous–Muslims have been destroying this work for centuries now.

          And why would Muslims suddenly start destroying these artifacts due to the existence of the United States and Israel? This makes no sense at all.

          Now we are supposed to be happy that Muslims were not able to destroy *everything*. Then, pious Muslims seized and seriously damaged the Church of the Nativity a few years ago. Are we supposed to applaud this, as well?

          How does “Sam” explain this?

          “Muslims Defile Patriarchs’ Cave”

          https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/127508

    • Sam says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 4:25 pm

      Silly commentator.

      The cradle of civilization is Iraq and the Levant today.
      The ommayad Islamic empire is the base of all current inventions, even the computer, the airplanes etc.
      Current media is owned and controlled by the ” men of RENOWN “, filled of lies, deception and hiding.
      Try and get some education, try to remove hate from your psych, this is for you and for Spencer the hater.

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 7:01 pm

        The cradle of civilization in Mesopotamia and the Levant had *nothing* to do with Islam, of course. The Marib dam dates to the 8th century bc–long before Islam.

        And the publisher of this bowdlerized book is also “current media”–but surely “Sam” likes this false lauding of Islam? He can’t even keep his bs straight.

        And how is anything that Robert Spencer said “hate”? Unless “Sam” here means that truth is somehow hate.

    • Sam says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 4:41 pm

      The Nobel sh***t is owned by Jews haha … only Zionist people are given a Nobel prize.
      Currently, best Drs in the world are Arabs and best computer scientists are Indian and Pakistanis… Saddam Hussein Iraq produced the a perfect and complete medic in for aids, but the scientists who did that were assassinated by your lovely Israel.. and Satan was executed by me4ciful Zionist president Bush… man man, Christians and Zionists are pure criminals …if there is a God, they will be punished some day … this includes people like you and your Spencer the liar.

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 7:53 pm

        The ludicrous “Sam” wrote:

        The Nobel sh***t is owned by Jews haha … only Zionist people are given a Nobel prize.
        …………………..

        The Nobel Prize is Swedish, not Israeli. And the idea that only Israelis are awarded these prizes is absurd.

        Has “Sam” noticed that these hard science prizes are also backed up by universities and other awards? I doubt it.

        And in fact the Nobel committee keeps awarding peace prizes to Muslims–mostly in the vain hope that it might lead Muslims to be less violent, Hasn’t worked so far…

        More:

        Currently, best Drs in the world are Arabs and best computer scientists are Indian and Pakistanis…
        …………………..

        Really? Odd that the best hospitals and research facilities are all run by Infidels in the West. If what “Sam” said were true, why wouldn’t people all over the world be flocking to Pakistan for medical treatment? All the top tech companies are located in the West or far east, as well, and the only ones in the Middle East are in Israel–where are these tech companies in Dar-al-Islam? Of course, “Sam” cannot point to any.

        Yet more:

        Saddam Hussein Iraq produced the a perfect and complete medic in for aids, but the scientists who did that were assassinated by your lovely Israel.. and Satan was executed by me4ciful Zionist president Bush… man man, Christians and Zionists are pure criminals …if there is a God, they will be punished some day … this includes people like you and your Spencer the liar.
        …………………..

        What? Where is this cure for AIDS? Odd that “Sam” here cannot even spell “medicine”. As for Saddam Hussein, he was executed by his fellow Muslims.

        And then Satan was executed by George Bush? Now *that’s* quite an accomplishment!

        Then, note that “Sam” is unable to point to anything that Robert Spencer has said that is untrue. No surprise there…

      • Miguel Ángel says

        Aug 22, 2020 at 4:17 pm

        You are indoctrinated with evil, you cannot see the wood for the trees. You and your repulsive cult masters are satanic. Your pathetic comments show exactly what you are. Stay in your perfect eastern islamic countries if that’s how idealic and where the best people are from!!! Deluded and sick. You people have no heart like real humans. Satnanic paedophiles!!! Us Brits are standing up for our own people now. Your inhumane flock have raped and savaged our daughters and poisoned our culture too long. We will keep standing against the false excuse of Islamophobia and political correctness – we want justice for all victims and for our veterans. We stood in Nottingham today & we will continue to make noise until we are heard. You will not silence us anymore!!! You say Robert Spencer spreads hate? Stating facts is not spreading hatred. That is all you people know – hate. Your hearts’ are stone

    • Sam says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 7:26 pm

      Hahaha.
      Man, or whatever you are, please do some reading before opening your stupid and filthy mouth.
      The middle East is where building has started even before the Greeks, 1000 of years before anyone else, read about the Maareb dam in Yemen, the skyscraper in Yemen and today’s Oman, they built 20, 30 story buildings while most of the world were living in caves … and, the Sumerian, akkadians, Assyrians inheretid these technologies … Europe was begging and paying Syrians for decorations … shut up and read.

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 8:01 pm

        “Sam” here *does* realize that the Sumarians, Akkadians, and Assyrians had nothing to do with Islam, doesn’t he?

        And what is he babbling about re Europeans begging Syrians for decorations? This makes no sense at all.

      • GreekEmpress says

        Aug 18, 2020 at 12:45 pm

        Sam,
        Your right to post here has been respected, so could you please stop with the condescension and insults?
        You can post without doing that.

  2. jirtu says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 1:22 pm

    Jerusalem’s Dome of the Rock is lifted from Byzantium architecture. There might have been even Byzantium architects and engineers involved in its building. This is not an amazing fact. The Arabs–mostly Bedouins–lived in tents and primitive buildings before they invaded the Middle East. There’s no way they could have imagined, designed and built the Dome of the Rock. So many mosques in North Africa were built from the fallen columns, arches, etc. of pre-Islamic civilizations (Greeks, Romans, Berbers/Amazig, Spanish).

    • Fred Middleton says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 2:35 pm

      Not only that, but surviving Aramaic writing on the roof and walls makes it clear this was once a Christian church. The pointed arch was invented by the Visigoths in Spain. There is no significant architecture in Arabia, although Arabs built Petra in the Graeco-Roman style.

    • Zimriel says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 3:14 pm

      The Papacy was installed and (with exceptions) controlled from the exarchate at Ravenna from the 500s to the 700s. That is how all the Byzantine and Syrian architecture ended up in Late Antique Italy. For some reason a lot of Syrians ended up there over the 600s AD and they were certainly not Muslims.

    • mortimer says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 5:06 pm

      The Church of the Kathisma of Mary is the precursor of and model for the Dome of the Rock:

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 16, 2020 at 8:33 pm

        True, Mortimer.

      • curious george says

        Aug 16, 2020 at 11:25 pm

        Interesting, Mortimer. Thank you for posting this video.

  3. FYI says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 1:35 pm

    Will we have a forthcoming tome written by such ‘experts’ on..?

    “Stealing from the infidels:the islamic appropriation of Christian Churches from the 7th cent to the Hagia Sophia today”

    {Also forthcoming:
    the islamic desecration of Hindu temples,the islamic destruction of Buddhist statuary,the islamic destruction of Archeological sites and artifacts}

    Probably not:it just doesn’t suit the leftist narrative.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 8:32 pm

      FYI, I think I have mentioned here before that when I was a kid I had a book on Islamic architecture, that had a drawing of Hagia Sophia on the cover. As a child I had no idea how grotesque this was.

  4. Spiro says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 1:40 pm

    If you can’t do it yourself just steal it and claim it’s yours

  5. Steve says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 1:41 pm

    The west has so many eager quisling dhimmi stooges.

  6. Waldman says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 1:43 pm

    Is there some way that such a misleading even false book/article can be “cancelled” by/for the “liberal” media

    • tony says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 2:00 pm

      UK is the most dhimmi state in Europe…soon it will be completely run by muslims, we can see how many majors and local politicians are muslims, i feel sorry for my british fellows 🙁

      • James Lincoln says

        Aug 16, 2020 at 3:19 pm

        tony,

        Pretty much the only place left to see traditional UK culture is at the “World Showcase” at EPCOT.

        That is, of course, until the Left / CAIR calls Disney out on this.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 8:06 pm

      Smart people can just refuse to buy this stupid book.

  7. Xaver Basora says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 3:34 pm

    If the Moslems were so architecturally advanced why didn’t the Indonesian converts adapt Arab architecture with Indonesian? Where are the magnificent cities and art.?

    The Latin American mestizos and indigenous have done wonders by contrast

    xavier

  8. DearDiary says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 4:27 pm

    Just because a Muslim did something admirable doesn’t confer any superiority to Islam. Reading the Quran makes someone troubled, not smarter or more talented.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 8:29 pm

      True–but Darke also was unable to find any Islamic examples to begin with.

  9. mortimer says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 4:38 pm

    HUMBUG ALERT! Islam did not create the octagonal building. Their building were cubes or rectangular.

    The first octagonally designed church was in 327 AD. Many octagonal churches were built in the region of the Holy Land that pre-dated the Dome of the Rock.

    The Dome of the Rock commissioned by Caliph Abd al Malik was obviously patterned on many octagonal churches and shrines that PRE-DATED the Dome of the Rock, namely, the Church of the Kathisma in Jerusalem, the Church and Shrine of the Ascension in Jerusalem, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, a Byzantine church Bosra, Syria (512 AD), the Church of St George at Zorah, Southern Syria (515 AD).

    • suburbanbanshee says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 11:48 pm

      Octagonal churches in Christianity represented “the eighth day” of Creation, the day of salvation and Resurrection, the Lord’s Day — in short, Sunday taking over from the Sabbath on Saturday. This in turn derived from the celebration of Jewish holy days, which consisted of the day itself and seven days afterward, which would become the Christian octave of a holy day.

  10. Jayell says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 4:41 pm

    The fact that the author of this fairy tale has links with the BBC and the Guardian should tell us everything we never wanted to know about this little episode. The book deserves to be ignored and consigned to the rubbish bin.

  11. mortimer says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 4:50 pm

    Diana Darke is yet another Western writer in a long list who was tempted by Arab money to betray the West in print.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 8:26 pm

      She’s a nasty piece of work, She is an Islamophilic “Arabist” who has also sneered about the Western fear of terrorism

  12. mortimer says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 4:56 pm

    In fact, the Arabs didn’t build much on their own without Western builders who were the descendants of the Roman Empire. In fact, Diana, the contributions of the Roman came eastward to the Muslim barbarians.

    What a liar.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 8:28 pm

      They also took a lot from their conquest of Persia. Arabia had no culture of grand architecture at all.

  13. SAFI says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 5:54 pm

    St Mark’s Basilica (Basilica di San Marco) design was based on the ancient Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople(not the Hagia Sophia) which was demolished in 1461 by Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II and the Fatih Camii (“Conqueror’s Mosque”) was built in its place. San Marco also houses numerous relics and artifacts plundered from Constantinople during the sack of 1204.

    This by the way is what San Marco’s original facade probably looked like before its Gothic Renaissance makeover https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/08/San_Marko_%28reconstruction%29.JPG

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 8:16 pm

      Thanks, SAFI.

  14. gravenimage says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 8:14 pm

    New book claims landmarks of Western church architecture were ‘stolen’ from the Islamic world
    ………………..

    Firstly, of course, this whole concept is off–cultures regularly borrow from each other, but they do not “steal” in the way what this is used here–what rot.

    More:

    Note that the subtitle of the Guardian article claims that “the designs of Europe’s greatest buildings were plundered from the Islamic world.” A centerpiece of the case for that is that “Notre-Dame’s architectural design, like all gothic cathedrals in Europe, comes directly from Syria’s Qalb Lozeh fifth-century church.” A fifth-century church.
    ………………..

    As noted, this church *predates Islam*–so how is this “stealing from Islam”?

    Actually, the basic architecture for all traditional churches comes from Roman architecture–the Roman Basilica, which was a large public building, and not always meant for religious use. Churches like Qalb Lozeh are known as “Romanesque” in style. The later Gothic style grew out of Romanesque.

    Note that they Romans are not complaining here…

  15. C M says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 9:15 pm

    The Pantheon was a Roman pagan temple built 126 AD, before Christianity and before the death cult.
    The basilica design came from the Roman villa designs.
    Basilica became the western church style. The basilica forms a cross.
    The Sophia Hagia designed by the New Rome – Constantinople is a Circular design and became the Eastern church design.
    The arabs on the peninsula were the death cult comes from were still living in tents. And they had NO books in Arabic yet. Remember Mo was illiterate.
    One of the great new dome designs was Brunelleschi’s Dome, which has absolutely nothing to do with the death cult.
    Some the first arches in large scale use were the Roman Aqueducts, centuries before any death cult follower pillaged the world.
    When the death cult first but a roof over the Kaaba the death cult followers had to hire Coptic Christians to do the work. That is from the death cult’s own doctrine. The Kaaba is the moon rock the pagan death cult worshippers walk around and like to kiss and lick. The death cult only teaches followers to become Parasites. Mo’s ideology has only been a plague on human society.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 9:20 pm

      +1

    • suburbanbanshee says

      Aug 16, 2020 at 11:53 pm

      The basilica was the shape used for Roman secular court buildings. They were very large, permitting large public gatherings. The judge would sit in a courtroom area with a curved wall behind him, making him more easily heard and seen. Christians adapted this shape to become a shape for churches instead of for public business, with the main altar framed against the curved wall.

      But yes, it became more and more popular to turn the implied cross of the basilica shape into an actual cross.

  16. C M says

    Aug 16, 2020 at 9:26 pm

    Clarification: Pantheon 126 AD was before The Roman Empire accepted Christianity as a religion. Roman was still pagan. Religious freedom in the Roman Empire around 313 AD. Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire not until around 380 AD. Proving Christianity was spread peacefully for the first 380 years. The same cannot be said of the death cult’s spread by the sword for the first 380 years of Mo’s Satan inspired cult.

    • Rufolino says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 6:26 am

      The Pantheon, the most majestic of surviving Roman buildings, was “the Temple of All the Gods”.

      Last year I witnessed an extraordinary event: snow falling through the occulus in the roof.

      • johnfkennedy63 says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 12:57 pm

        Cool. I’ve heard of clouds condensing inside too.

  17. Marco Elliott says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 12:08 am

    Given that the standard entrance structure of pre-Christian Egyptian temples consists of two great pylons joined by a gate, I am waiting for some psycho to suggest that the two west bell towers of Notre Dame de Paris are actually echoes of ancient Egyptian temple architecture.
    Whenever I read islamopandering cultural “suicide notes” such as the work of Diana Drake, I listen for sound of the petrodollar cash register.

    • Arun says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 5:27 am

      I like your expression “Islamopandering” says a lot about this hectic movement to prove everything emanated from Islam

  18. Arun says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 5:25 am

    Let us now wait for her and her peers like Audrey Truschke to claim, Jesus Christ was actually a Muslim about 632 years before Mohammed declared he was a prophet

    • Rufolino says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 6:33 am

      Yes Arun, I’m waiting for that one.

    • Sam says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 4:47 pm

      Jesus and mohammed were decent humans who revolted against the people of the synagogue of Satan, the men of RENOWN who introduced usery and financial slavery … both Mohammed and Jesus rejected such ugly slavery …. both are men of decency and integrity …. and perhaps they were inspired by the supreme designer called God.

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 8:22 pm

        More crap from the vicious “Sam”:

        Jesus and mohammed were decent humans who revolted against the people of the synagogue of Satan, the men of RENOWN who introduced usery and financial slavery … both Mohammed and Jesus rejected such ugly slavery …. both are men of decency and integrity …. and perhaps they were inspired by the supreme designer called God.
        ………………..

        Note that “Sam” is referring to the “Muslim Jesus” here–“prophet” Isa. His primary role is to murder Christians in the Islamic “last days”.

        And while he is condemning reasonable interest, he has no problem with *actual* slavery. The “Prophet” Muhammed based his economy on caravan-raiding, ransoming kidnap victims, tribute, and slavery.

        Didn’t “Sam” claim that he is not Muslim himself? This claim seems more threadbare all the time…

  19. lucretia macevil says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 7:40 am

    Darke by name, and Dark by nature

  20. livepeanuts says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 8:47 am

    Islam was once great, its armies got to the gates of Vienna and to the borders of France through Spain where they left fantastic works of art, architecture and engineering.
    When Europe was in the Dark Ages destroying its own Western culture the Kalifs were purchasing Western books not burning them and not destroying its art, that is why even former Christian churches survived. And this is how the West didn’t loose its vast classic knowledge.
    Western Princes would be sent to learn to the Universities of Islam which had for that age, the most advanced doctors, mathematicians, astronomers, physisists and that was a different Islam which could have evolved in the same way as the Christians evolved.
    That Islam took much of its wisdom from the West before it had fallen to the barbarians, sadly it never evolved, it went backwards, today it finds precious culture from the past and it destroys it because it is un-Islamic!
    So this is why you can’t even compare Islam of today with what it once was and with what it could have been.
    The Holy Office of the Inquisition has little to learn from the most brutal murderers and torturers of Isis today, but the West has moved on and Islam has gone back to the VI century, today it only leads bad things and bad movements which aim to hold mankind back.
    What has happened to Islam is hard to understand but we must make no mistake Islam of today is bad for progress and bad for our country and can’t even be compared to its former self.

    • Sam says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 7:42 pm

      Current Islam was created by Jews, take a look at wahabism and the leader Abdul wahabi, he , just like the saud royal family are Jews from Iraq, placed in power by the UK who was and is ruled by the Rothschild Jews…. most of the Arab nations today have rulers who are placed by the Jewish American empire, but pretend to be Muslims… or, being paid and pressured to destroy Islam… the do or die method used by mossad and the Jewish empire called America…
      Just a notice, the first university in the world is a university in Baghdad ( al mustanser university), annually, it received around 50,000.00 European students who helped build the Europe of today, while Baghdad, Damascus, Beirut etc etc were destroyed by similar groups like the ISIS that was created and financed by America and israel.

    • Sam says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 7:51 pm

      The ISIS of today is a creation of Israel, supported by the US and the CIA/missed.
      Just a notice to your silly and stupid comment.

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 9:00 pm

        Yet more from “Sam”:

        Current Islam was created by Jews, take a look at wahabism and the leader Abdul wahabi, he , just like the saud royal family are Jews from Iraq, placed in power by the UK who was and is ruled by the Rothschild Jews…. most of the Arab nations today have rulers who are placed by the Jewish American empire, but pretend to be Muslims… or, being paid and pressured to destroy Islam… the do or die method used by mossad and the Jewish empire called America…
        ………………………

        Well, this just hilarious. Can “Sam” here say how this “Jewish Islam” is actually different in any way from Islam itself? Of course not.

        And there were no Jews in 18th century Arabia–they have been driven out or murdered long since.

        And how are Muslim tyrants actually somehow Jewish? What “Sam” likely means here is that they haven’t imposed enough Shari’ah law for his taste. How are the Saudis chopping heads off not Islamic enough for him?

        More:

        Just a notice, the first university in the world is a university in Baghdad ( al mustanser university), annually, it received around 50,000.00 European students who helped build the Europe of today, while Baghdad, Damascus, Beirut etc etc were destroyed by similar groups like the ISIS that was created and financed by America and israel.
        ………………………

        Does “Sam” here mean Al-Mustansiriya University? (There is no al mustanser university). This dates from the late 1220s or early 1230s. There is no indication that this ever drew European students, and it quickly fell largely into disuse after the Mongol invasions in 1258 just a few years after its founding. The Ottoman’s swiped its library and shipped it to Constantinople in the 15th century, which put an end to its being used as a university at all.

        There has been an attempt to reopen what remains in recent years–mostly spearheaded by hopeful Infidels.

        More:

        The ISIS of today is a creation of Israel, supported by the US and the CIA/missed.
        Just a notice to your silly and stupid comment.
        ………………………

        Does it matter that Jews don’t use people as sex slaves or wage violent Jihad? But Islam does. In fact, everything ISIS does is completely Islamic, including founding a Caliphate.

        Does “Sam” actually reject Jihad, Shari’ah law, the idea of a the Caliphate, slavery and sex slavery? I doubt it–these were all perfectly Islamic, and were all practiced by the “Prophet” Muhammed himself.

        What “Sam” here really means is that he wants his own faction in charge next time.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 8:38 pm

      livepeanuts wrote:

      Islam was once great, its armies got to the gates of Vienna and to the borders of France through Spain where they left fantastic works of art, architecture and engineering.
      ………………………..

      How does attacking their neighbors make Islam “great”? In that case, Attila the Hun was “great” as well.

      Then, what great works of art did Islam leave in France?

      More:

      When Europe was in the Dark Ages destroying its own Western culture the Kalifs were purchasing Western books not burning them and not destroying its art, that is why even former Christian churches survived. And this is how the West didn’t loose its vast classic knowledge.
      ………………………..

      Most classical scholars in Dar-al-Islam were Infidels–mostly Christians and Jews–who had not yet submitted to the gross pressures to convert to Islam. Once this was complete, any Islamic “golden age” was over.

      More:

      Western Princes would be sent to learn to the Universities of Islam which had for that age, the most advanced doctors, mathematicians, astronomers, physisists and that was a different Islam which could have evolved in the same way as the Christians evolved.
      ………………………..

      Actually, the oldest university is the University of Bologna, dating from 1088. This is not, of course, in Dar-al-Islam–whatever livepeanuts here may pretend.

      More:

      That Islam took much of its wisdom from the West before it had fallen to the barbarians, sadly it never evolved, it went backwards, today it finds precious culture from the past and it destroys it because it is un-Islamic!
      ………………………..

      Well, this is *certainly* true.

      More:

      So this is why you can’t even compare Islam of today with what it once was and with what it could have been.
      ………………………..

      Not really. Islam starts its suppression of a conquered culture immediately.

      Want another Islamic “golden age”? Just allow Muslims to conquer the productive, innovative West, and Muslims will claim all of our inventions as their own. This will last only until Muslims have crushed the culture completely, which may take a few generations.

      More:

      The Holy Office of the Inquisition has little to learn from the most brutal murderers and torturers of Isis today, but the West has moved on and Islam has gone back to the VI century, today it only leads bad things and bad movements which aim to hold mankind back.
      ………………………..

      Of course, Christianity does not teach violence–but Islam certainly does.

      More:

      What has happened to Islam is hard to understand but we must make no mistake Islam of today is bad for progress and bad for our country and can’t even be compared to its former self.
      ………………………..

      What claptrap. Islam is still expanding today, wherever it can–and brings the same violence, chaos, and degeneration as it always does. There was no real “Golden Age” of Islam.

      “The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise”

      https://www.amazon.com/Myth-Andalusian-Paradise-Christians-Medieval/dp/1610170954

  21. Rob Roy says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 9:17 am

    What a bs again… If I force christians to build a mosque, does not make it build moslems. Islam has nothing to be proud of!! But yes… Mozart was black and Shakespeare a black woman. I get it…

  22. johnfkennedy63 says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 12:56 pm

    “Gothic architecture as we know it owes much more to Arab and Islamic heritage than it does to the rampaging Goths.”

    Moron. No one with the even the simplest knowledge of architecture thinks this. The term Gothic was term of derision. The “experts” at the time despised the pointed arch in comparison with the “perfect” romanesque arch. It was always perfect. The point arch was unpredictable and disrupting. So they name it after a famous barbarian hoard, the Goths. It wasn’t created BY them!

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 9:04 pm

      This style was not referred to as “Gothic” until the 18th century, where it was indeed a term of derision used by the Neo-Classicists who revived Classical Greek and Roman forms.

  23. Claudius says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 2:49 pm

    I see that the Guardian has disabled comments. So they embrace censorship. Ironic for a newspaper.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 9:05 pm

      This does not surprise me, Claudius.

  24. barbaracvm1 says

    Aug 17, 2020 at 6:52 pm

    THE MYTH OF ANDALUSIAN PARADISE by Dario Fernandez Morera explains how the Arabs / Muslims / Moors destroyed the churches of Spain. He traces how the Greeks translated their algebra equations into Arabic. Some of the math words are in Greek, because Arabic does not have an equivalent.
    The Muslims have stolen many pre Muhammad architecture, art, math, etc.
    Unfortunately we do not study our history and do not have the knowledge to know when we are being lied to.

    • Sam says

      Aug 17, 2020 at 7:48 pm

      Sure sure, you are an educated person hahaha(none)
      Many words used in science are derived from Arabic and based on the names of Arab inventors … what’s ALGEBRA? CHEMISTRY?ALGORITHM? just to start… who was first, akkadians, Assyrians, Sumerian or the Greeks?
      Who taught the world writing? Phoenicians or greeks? Who taught the Latina how to write?
      Read read Mr monkey.😂😆🤣

      • gravenimage says

        Aug 17, 2020 at 9:22 pm

        “Sam” here does know that the Akkadians and Assyrians were not Muslim, doesn’t he? Writing *much* predates Islam–and the “Prophet” Muhammed was in fact illiterate, and didn’t teach anyone to write. And the biggest influence on “Latina”–“Sam” here presumably means the Romans–was classical Greece. Classical Greece was not Islamic, either.

        Then, the first Chemist was Robert Boyle, working in the 17th century–also not Muslim.

        The only possible link to Islam in this whole mishmash is Algebra, which was used as the title of a book by Persian mathematician Muḥammad ibn Musá al-Khwārizmiyy al-Majūsiyy al-Quṭrubbaliyy–but note that “al-Majūsī” was used by Zoroastrians, not Muslims. So it is quite possible that he was not Muslim, either.

  25. Stephen O'mara says

    Aug 18, 2020 at 5:46 am

    Strange, I hear that all mosques are copied from the Hagia Sofia .

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 18, 2020 at 5:45 pm

      That was certainly one of the main models, Stephen.

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