After the end of the First Fitna in 661, Muawiyah I established the Umayyad dynasty with Damascus as its capital. This marked the beginning of a century-long period of organized external expansion that transformed the Islamic state into a world empire.
In North Africa, Uqba ibn Nafi pushed westward and established the city of Kairouan in 670, which became a base for further conquests. By 711, the commander Tariq ibn Ziyad crossed the strait to Hispania. After defeating the Visigoths at the Battle of Guadalete , most of the Iberian Peninsula came under Muslim rule, known as Al-Andalus.
To the east, the empire expanded across the Central Asian regions of Transoxiana. General Qutayba ibn Muslim captured the legendary Silk Road cities of Bukhara and Samarkand, reaching all the way to the Ferghana Valley. Meanwhile, the young general Muhammad ibn Qasim led an expedition to Sindh, establishing the first permanent Islamic administration in South Asia.
Despite these successes, the Umayyads faced strong resistance from the Byzantine Empire. They launched two massive sieges of Constantinople (674โ678 and 717โ718). Both failed due to the city's impenetrable walls, Greek Fire, and strategic defenses, which effectively halted Umayyad expansion into Eastern Europe.
By the 740s, internal exhaustion and rebellions began to weaken the dynasty. The Battle of Talas in 751 marked the final major expansion before the Umayyad dynasty was overthrown by the Abbasid Revolution, leaving behind a vast empire that integrated cultures across three continents.