The administration of the Islamic territories was probably an equally important stimulus to scholarship and science. For the first few decades, the business of government was performed in the relevant national language, with the aid of interpreters. In the 690s, however, Caliph Abd al-Malik decreed that Arabic was to be used in all official documents. That meant that anyone wanting to work for the government – even conduct business with government officials – had to be able to write Arabic. The long-term impact of this simple measure was huge. Gradually, pretty much everyone from Andalusia to Afghanistan learned to speak a form of Arabic. For anyone who could write, Arabic became effectively a universal language right across the vast extent of the Muslim world. Just as English is the language of science today, so the spread of written Arabic allowed scholars from distant places and numerous different cultures to communicate their ideas easily and note them down for others to read. It’s probable that this, as much as anything, helped to enable and sustain Islamic science over so many centuries.
