{"slug": "middle-east", "label": "Middle East", "wikipedia": "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_East", "wikidata": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7204", "qid": "Q7204", "description": "geopolitical region encompassing Egypt and most of Western Asia, including Iran", "entries": 17, "years": 17, "span": [-245, 2024], "span_label": ["246 BCE", "2024 CE"], "topics": [{"title": "Deaths", "count": 3}, {"title": "Religion & Belief", "count": 3}, {"title": "Conflict & Security", "count": 3}, {"title": "Climate & Environment", "count": 2}, {"title": "Exploration & Expansion", "count": 2}, {"title": "Geopolitics & Diplomacy", "count": 2}, {"title": "Health & Medicine", "count": 1}, {"title": "Technology & Infrastructure", "count": 1}], "also_known_as": [], "related": [{"slug": "egypt", "label": "Egypt", "shared": 2}, {"slug": "anatolia", "label": "Anatolia", "shared": 2}, {"slug": "palestine-region", "label": "Palestine (region)", "shared": 2}, {"slug": "knights-hospitaller", "label": "Knights Hospitaller", "shared": 2}, {"slug": "knights-templar", "label": "Knights Templar", "shared": 2}, {"slug": "pope-gregory-ix", "label": "Pope Gregory IX", "shared": 2}, {"slug": "byzantine-empire", "label": "Byzantine Empire", "shared": 1}, {"slug": "mesopotamia", "label": "Mesopotamia", "shared": 1}, {"slug": "constantinople", "label": "Constantinople", "shared": 1}, {"slug": "alexandria", "label": "Alexandria", "shared": 1}, {"slug": "europe", "label": "Europe", "shared": 1}, {"slug": "north-africa", "label": "North Africa", "shared": 1}], "items": [{"year": -245, "year_label": "246 BCE", "section": "Deaths", "date": null, "text": "Antiochus II Theos, king of the Seleucid dominions in the Middle East from 261 BC. He has spent much of his reign at war with Egypt, recovering much of the territory in Anatolia lost in earlier wars between the Ptolemaic and Seleucid dynasties (b. c. 287 BC)", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1358219611#Deaths", "title": "246 BC", "revid": 1358219611, "section": "Deaths"}}, {"year": 541, "year_label": "541 CE", "section": "Health & Medicine", "date": null, "text": "Plague of Justinian: Bubonic plague appears suddenly in the Egyptian port of Pelusium, spreading to Alexandria and, the following year, to Constantinople. This is the beginning of a 200-year-long pandemic that will devastate Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1299131059#Byzantine_Empire", "title": "541", "revid": 1299131059, "section": "Events › By place › Byzantine Empire"}}, {"year": 748, "year_label": "748 CE", "section": "Climate & Environment", "date": null, "text": "An earthquake strikes the Middle East from northern Egypt to northwestern Mesopotamia, destroying many remnants of Byzantine culture (approximate date).", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1340809772#Asia", "title": "748", "revid": 1340809772, "section": "Events › By place › Asia"}}, {"year": 773, "year_label": "773 CE", "section": "Exploration & Expansion", "date": null, "text": "The number 0 is introduced to the city of Baghdad, which will be developed in the Middle East by Arabian mathematicians, who will base their numbers on the Indian system (long after the Maya culture developed the concept, cf. Maya numerals).", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1369635460#Abbasid_Caliphate", "title": "773", "revid": 1369635460, "section": "Events › By place › Abbasid Caliphate"}}, {"year": 1046, "year_label": "1046 CE", "section": "Exploration & Expansion", "date": "March 5", "text": "March 5 – Nasir Khusraw begins his 7-year Middle Eastern (19,000-kilometre) journey, which he later describes in the book Safarnāmé.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1350130059#Exploration", "title": "1046", "revid": 1350130059, "section": "Events › By topic › Exploration"}}, {"year": 1092, "year_label": "1092 CE", "section": "Deaths", "date": "November 19", "text": "November 19 – Sultan Malik-Shah I dies after a 20-year reign while hunting. The Seljuk Empire falls into chaos: his brother Tutush I and rival successors carve up their own independent sultanates in the Middle East. Malik-Shah is succeeded by his son Mahmud I, but he does not gain control of the empire.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1273814679#Seljuk_Empire", "title": "1092", "revid": 1273814679, "section": "Events › By place › Seljuk Empire"}}, {"year": 1099, "year_label": "1099 CE", "section": "Religion & Belief", "date": "July 22", "text": "July 22 – The Kingdom of Jerusalem is established in the Middle East. Godfrey of Bouillon is named king (but refuses to be crowned) and takes the title Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1365265715#First_Crusade", "title": "1099", "revid": 1365265715, "section": "Events › By place › First Crusade"}}, {"year": 1109, "year_label": "1109 CE", "section": "Conflict & Security", "date": "July 12", "text": "July 12 – Siege of Tripoli: After a 7-year siege (supported by the Genoese fleet), Tripoli falls to the Crusaders. Fakhr al-Mulk ibn Ammar, qadi of Tripoli, submits to Bertrand of Toulouse (the eldest son of Raymond IV). He establishes the County of Tripoli, the fourth Crusader state in the Middle East. Raymond's nephew William II Jordan dies of an arrow wound sustained during the siege, leaving Bertrand as its sole ruler.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1367315946#Levant", "title": "1109", "revid": 1367315946, "section": "Events › By place › Levant"}}, {"year": 1114, "year_label": "1114 CE", "section": "Climate & Environment", "date": "November 29", "text": "November 29 – A large earthquake damages the areas of the Crusaders in the Middle East. From Antioch and Mamistra to Marash and Edessa are hit by the shocks.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1369184492#Earthquake", "title": "1114", "revid": 1369184492, "section": "Events › By topic › Earthquake"}}, {"year": 1202, "year_label": "1202 CE", "section": "Conflict & Security", "date": "April", "text": "April–May – The bulk of the Crusader army gathers at Venice, although with far smaller numbers than expected: about 12,000 men (4–5,000 knights and 8,000 soldiers) instead of 33,500 men. Several contingents decide to make their own way to the Holy Land by different routes. A Crusader fleet, sailing from Flanders, carrying supplies for the Counts Baldwin IX and his brother Henry of Flanders, winters in Marseille, but is slowed by adverse weather. Later it sails on to the Middle East, along with other contingents from southern France.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1369187490#Fourth_Crusade", "title": "1202", "revid": 1369187490, "section": "Events › By place › Fourth Crusade"}}, {"year": 1228, "year_label": "1228 CE", "section": "Religion & Belief", "date": null, "text": "Summer – Emperor Frederick II sails from Brindisi with an expeditionary force and arrives in Acre in the Middle East on September 7. He disembarks a well-trained and equipped Crusader army (some 10,000 men and 2,000 knights). After his arrival in Palestine, Frederick is again excommunicated by Pope Gregory IX, for setting out for the Crusade before he has obtained absolution from his previous ex-communication (see 1227). Many of the local nobility, the Knights Templar and Knights Hospitaller deny him their support for the Crusade. Frederick can only rely on his own army and the Teutonic Knights, whose Grand Master, Hermann von Salza, is his friend.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1360747311#Sixth_Crusade", "title": "1228", "revid": 1360747311, "section": "Events › By place › Sixth Crusade"}}, {"year": 1236, "year_label": "1236 CE", "section": "Religion & Belief", "date": null, "text": "Pope Gregory IX condemns the links that both the Knights Templer and Knights Hospitaller have with the Assassin fighters in the Middle East. He issues a bull (a formal papal proclamation) preventing further contact with the Assassins.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1361428601#Religion", "title": "1236", "revid": 1361428601, "section": "Events › By topic › Religion"}}, {"year": 1917, "year_label": "1917 CE", "section": "Geopolitics & Diplomacy", "date": "April 26", "text": "April 26 – Agreement of St.-Jean-de-Maurienne between France, Italy and the United Kingdom, signed at Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne. Drafted by the Italian Foreign Minister Sidney Sonnino, as a tentative agreement to settle its Middle Eastern interest, the agreement was needed by the allies to secure the position of Italian forces in the Middle East and to balance the military power drops at the Middle Eastern theatre of World War I as Russian (Tsarist) forces were pulling out of the Caucasus Campaign. Italy would receive a part of southwestern Anatolia, including İzmir (Smyrna).", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1323614400#April", "title": "1917 in Italy", "revid": 1323614400, "section": "Events › April"}}, {"year": 1918, "year_label": "1918 CE", "section": "Conflict & Security", "date": "June", "text": "June – First meeting between the Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann and the son of the Sharif of Mecca Hashemite Prince Faisal, who led the Arab forces in the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire during the First World War, which takes place in Faisal's headquarters in Aqaba in an attempt to establish favourable relations between Arabs and Jews in the Middle East.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1364241730#June", "title": "1918 in British-administered Palestine", "revid": 1364241730, "section": "Events › June"}}, {"year": 1919, "year_label": "1919 CE", "section": "Geopolitics & Diplomacy", "date": "January 3", "text": "January 3 – The Faisal–Weizmann Agreement is signed by Emir Faisal (representing the Arab Kingdom of Hejaz) and Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann, for Arab–Jewish cooperation in the development of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, and an Arab nation in a large part of the Middle East.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1373508849#January", "title": "1919", "revid": 1373508849, "section": "Events › January"}}, {"year": 2011, "year_label": "2011 CE", "section": "Technology & Infrastructure", "date": "February 5", "text": "February 5 – An explosion was reported at the Arab Gas Pipeline, which exports Egyptian natural gas to the Middle East, in North Sinai Governorate.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1357088187#February", "title": "2011 in Egypt", "revid": 1357088187, "section": "Events › February"}}, {"year": 2024, "year_label": "2024 CE", "section": "Deaths", "date": "April 16", "text": "April 16 – 2024 Persian Gulf floods: At least 32 people are killed when heavy rainfall strikes the Middle East, causing flash flooding. This caused many disruptions for the airline Emirates at Dubai International Airport.", "cite": {"url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1371869228#April", "title": "2024", "revid": 1371869228, "section": "Events › April"}}]}