A taifa (from "ṭā'ifa", plural طوائف "ṭawā'if") was an independent Muslim-ruled principality. "Taifa"s developed during the history of Iberia. They were usually emirates or little kingdoms, but there was one oligarchy as well, Seville. A number were formed in the Al-Andalus (Moorish Iberia) after the end of the Umayyad Caliphate of Cordóba in 1031.
They developed because of an administrative division of the Umayyad Caliphate of Córdoba and an ethnic division of its elite. It was divided among Arabs (a powerful but tiny minority), Berbers, Eastern European former slaves and Iberian Muslims (known as "Muladíes" (the great majority).
There was a second period when "taifa"s developed: the middle of the 12th century, when the Almoravid dynasty was in decline.
In the 11th century and again in the mid 12th century, the emirs (rulers) of the "taifa"s kept fighting among themselves, not only militarily but also for cultural . They tried to recruit the most famous poets and artisans.
After the end of the Caliphate, the rival Muslim kingdoms were much weaker than the Christian ones and so they had to submit and to pay tribute.
The "taifa" princes appealed for North African warriors to help them fighting Christian kings on two occasions. The Almoravids were invited after the fall of Toledo (1085), the Almohads after the fall of Lisbon (1147). The warriors did not help the "taifa" emirs but rather annexed their lands to their own North African empires.
Taifas often hired Christian mercenaries to fight neighbouring realms (both Christian and Muslim). The most dynamic "taifa", which conquered most of its neighbours before the Almoravid invasion, was Seville. Zaragoza was also very powerful and expansive, but was kept in check by the neighbour Christian states of the Pyrenees. Zaragoza, Toledo and Badajoz had previously been the border military districts of the Caliphate.
Additionally, but not usually considered "taifas", are:
Nasrid
The Nasrid dynasty or Banuu Nasri () was the last Arab and Muslim dynasty in Spain. The Nasrid dynasty came to power after the defeat of the Almohad dynasty in 1212 at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa. Twenty-three different emirs ruled Granada from the founding of the dynasty in 1232 by Muhammed I ibn Nasr until January 2, 1492, when Muhammad XII of Granada surrendered to the Christian Spanish kingdoms of Aragon and Castile. Today, the most visible evidence of the Nasrids is the Alhambra palace built under their rule.
Almoravid dynasty
The Almoravids were a Berber dynasty from the Sahara that ruled over a wide area of northwestern Africa and the Iberian peninsula during the 11th century.
Under this dynasty the Moorish empire included present-day Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania, Gibraltar, Tlemcen (in Algeria) and a great part of what is now Senegal and Mali in the south, and Spain and Portugal to the north in Europe. At its greatest extent, the empire stretched 3,000 kilometres north to south (an all-time latitude spanner until Spanish America).
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Vuk Karadžić
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Stephen Fry
Stephen John Fry (born 24 August 1957) is a British actor, comedian, journalist, writer, and television personality. He presents the television programme QI. He used to work a lot with Hugh Laurie.
Fry was born in Hampstead, London and grew up in Norfolk. His maternal grandparents were Hungarian Jews. He is a Jewish atheist and is openly gay. He has been diagnosed with cyclothymia, a mild form of bipolar disorder. From 1995-2010, Fry had a relationship with Daniel Cohen. In January 2015, Fry married his partner, Elliot Spencer.
In February 2018, Fry announced via a video that he had an operation to treat prostate cancer and have 11 lymph nodes removed and was recovering from the surgery. He described the cancer as aggressive and said that early intervention had saved his life.
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East Germany only qualified for one World Cup, and they only made it to round 2.
East Germany never qualified for a UEFA European Football Championship tournament.
Almohad
The Almohad Dynasty (From Arabic "al-Muwahhidun", i.e., "the monotheists" or "the Unitarians"), was a Berber, Muslim dynasty that was founded in the 12th century, and conquered all northern Africa as far as Libya, together with Al-Andalus (Moorish Iberia).
Between 1130 and his death in 1163, Abd al-Mu'min al-Kumi, a Berber from the Masmuda tribe, defeated the ruling Almoravids and became ruler over all northern Africa as far as Libya. He became Emir of Marrakech in 1149 and conquered Al-Andalus, Moorish Iberia. In 1170 the Almohads transferred their capital to Seville. But by 1212 Muhammad III, "al-Nasir" (1199–1214) was defeated by an alliance of the four Christian princes of Castile, Aragón, Kingdom of Navarre and Portugal, at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa in the Sierra Morena. The Almohads lost nearly all of the Moorish dominions in Iberia soon after. The great Moorish cities of Córdoba and Seville fell into Christian possession in the first half of the 13th century. The Almohads continued to rule in Africa for some time, but they lost a lot of their territory. The last representative of the line, Idris II, had only Marrakech left. There he was murdered by a slave in 1269.
Sufi writers.
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Base (mathematics)
In mathematics, a base or radix is the number of different digits or combination of digits and letters that a system of counting uses to represent numbers. For example, the most common base used today is the decimal system. Because "dec" means 10, it uses the 10 digits from 0 to 9. Most people think that we most often use base 10 because we have 10 fingers.
A base is usually a whole number bigger than 1, although are also mathematically possible. The base of a number may be written next to the number: for instance, formula_1 means 23 in base 8 (which is equal to 19 in base 10).