HISTORY CRAFTER - THE REAL AND SIMULATED HISTORY

  'MEETING' (Copyright 2020 Salvatore Puleio) ARABS AND CHRISTIANITY IN THE LATE ANTIQUITY   During the IV and V centuries of the Vulgar Era, the Arabs came to a close contact with the Empire of the Romans; this way, the immense territory of Syria and Mesopotamia met a religious tradition which was strictly linked to the political issues of power and control. In fact, the ‘throne and the altar’ have always been connected; after Constantine, however, Christianity shaped and influenced in a significant way the history of the Empire of the Caesars. The religious sphere pervaded thus every issue of the public life, in Constantinople as well as in the periphery; as a matter of fact, Christianity was used as a tool to subject people to the imperial ideology. Although framed as a religious discourse, it came to be a process of cultural assimilation; however powerful, this mechanism was not always so easy to perform. In fact, we have to bear in mind the particularities of the religions

'Ensemble' (Copyright Salvatore Puleio 2020) PRE-ISLAMIC SOCIETY IN ARABIA: THE IMPORTANCE OF THE TRIBES   If you wonder how society was structured before the advent of Islam, the answer is simple; the tribe, as a matter of fact, was the horizon guiding people lives. Everyone belonged to one of the many tribes, which were groups, organized around kinship, whose members helped each other. There was no State, and there were no particular institutions which had to keep the order and apply the law; the only safeguard came from the relatives of the same family, who were tasked to protect each other. These were duties each member was supposed to fulfil; in the case this did not happen, the person was regarded as the worst criminal. This kind of action, in fact, could bring disruption to the entire tribe.   It was a very different setting from what we know nowadays, although the tribal belonging still plays a significant role in the Arabian Peninsula still now; in fact, all the male a

'Dancing Polygons' (copyright 2020 Puleio Salvatore) L’ARABIA PRIMA DELL’ISLAM   Questo articolo è già stato pubblicato dal sottoscritto in lingua inglese; tuttavia, considerando che la divulgazione di questo tema è pressoché nullo, specialmente in italiano, ho deciso di renderlo fruibile anche in italiano.   Effettivamente, quando si pensa alla Penisola Araba, e non solamente all’Arabia Saudita, la prima associazione che viene fatta è all’Islam; a quasi 14 secoli di distanza dalla comparsa ed ascesa del Puro Monoteismo, non stupisce che l’Islam sia diventato anche una cultura, e non semplicemente una religione.   La percezione generale, dunque, è che la situazione sia sempre stata la stessa; invece, la storia di questi luoghi e civiltà è molto lunga, e precede di millenni l’avvento dell’Islam. Tale aspetto, tuttavia, viene quasi taciuto, e quasi nulla viene divulgato; attualmente, in effetti, sembra che la storia dell’Arabia pre-islamica sia confinata ad un gruppetto di espert