Mongols sack Baghdad

February 10, 1258

After a two-week siege, Hulagu's army entered the Abbasid capital and spent a week in systematic slaughter. The last caliph al-Musta'sim was reportedly rolled in a carpet and trampled by horses, sparing his blood. The Tigris was said to run black with ink from the libraries. The fall of Baghdad sent shockwaves across the Islamic world and marked the end of the classical era of Arab civilization.