EGYPT, AND SYRIA. 
^3 
CHAP. VII. 
AhJiraEt of the hijiory of Africa in general^ and Egypt in particu- 
lar, under the domination of the Arabs, 
A S this portion of hiftory is little known, and may lend illuf- 
tration to many topics difcufled in thefe pages, I have been in- 
duced to infert a brief idea of it, abftraded chiefly, in what 
regards Africa, from the valuable work of Cardonne, a com- 
pilation which has faved me much refearch into the original 
writers *, 
Syria and Perfia had already fallen under the rapid progrefs 
of the followers of Mohammed, and it was fo early as the 1 9th 
year of the Hejira, the 640th of. the Chriftian sera, that the 
Chalif Omar commanded Amru to fubdue Egypt. Memphis, 
or Mifr, fubmitted through the treafon of the governor ; but 
Alexandria Hood a fiege of fourteen months. The lofs of the 
library has been much regretted ; it was probably replete with 
the abfurd philofophy and divinity of the times ; and amid the 
* Hiftoire de I'Afrique, et de TEfpagnefous la domination des Arabes ; com- 
pofee fur diflferens Manufcrits Arabes de la Bibliotheque du Roi, par M. Car- 
donne, &c. Paris 1765, 3 tomes i2mo. It is to be regretted that the learned 
author did not divide his work into epochs and chapters, and particularly fepa- 
rate the hiftory of Africa from that of Spain. 
number 
