Muawiya

   Founder of the Umayyad caliphate in 661. Its capital was Damascus (q.v.). A former Muslim governor of Syria and Palestine (qq.v.), he was a man of great military and administrative skills. Muawiya gave the new Islamic state a stable bureaucracy and built a fleet to contest Byzantine control of the eastern Mediterranean. He attacked Cappadocia (q.v.) in 646, capturing Caesarea (q.v.), Cyprus in 649, Rhodes (qq.v.) and Kos in 654; he defeated Constans II (q.v.) at sea in 655. As caliph (q.v.) from 661-680, the Muslim fleet moved into the northern Aegean (q.v.), attacking Kyzikos (q.v.) in 670 and besieging Constantinople (q.v.) from 674-678. The city was saved by its impregnable walls and by the timely use of Greek fire (q.v.).