Editing Malta (section)

===Arab period and the Middle Ages===
{{See also|Arab–Byzantine wars|Islam in Malta}}
Malta became involved in the [[Arab–Byzantine wars]], and the conquest of Malta is closely linked with [[Muslim conquest of Sicily|that of Sicily]] that began in 827 after [[Euphemius (Sicily)|Admiral Euphemius]]' betrayal of his fellow Byzantines, requesting that the [[Aghlabids]] invade the island.<ref name="stan">{{Cite news |date=7 October 2007 |title=Brief history of Sicily |website=Archaeology.Stanford.edu |url=http://www.stanford.edu/group/mountpolizzo/handbookPDF/MPHandbook5.pdf |url-status=live |access-date=20 September 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120119004221/http://www.stanford.edu/group/mountpolizzo/handbookPDF/MPHandbook5.pdf |archive-date=19 January 2012}}</ref> The [[Muslims|Muslim]] chronicler and geographer [[Kitab al-Rawd al-Mitar|al-Himyari]] recounts that in 870, following [[Siege of Melite (870)|a violent struggle]] against the defending Byzantines, the Arab invaders, first led by Halaf al-Hadim, and later by Sawada ibn Muhammad,<ref name="Travel Malta">{{Cite book |title=Travel Malta |publisher=MobileReference |isbn=978-1-61198-279-4 |at=The Arab period and the Middle Ages}}</ref> pillaged the island, destroying the most important buildings, and leaving it practically uninhabited until it was recolonised by the Arabs from Sicily in 1048–1049.<ref name="Travel Malta" /> It is uncertain whether this new settlement resulted from demographic expansion in Sicily, a higher [[standard of living]] in Sicily (in which case the recolonisation may have taken place a few decades earlier), or a civil war which broke out among the Arab rulers of Sicily in 1038.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Brincat |first1=Joseph M. |title=Malta 870-1054: Al-Himyari's account and its linguistic implications |date=1995 |publisher=Said International |page=21 |url=https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/bitstream/123456789/55365/4/Malta_870_1054.pdf |access-date=8 December 2021 |archive-date=13 December 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211213162211/https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/bitstream/123456789/55365/4/Malta_870_1054.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> The [[Arab Agricultural Revolution]] introduced new irrigation, cotton, and some fruits. The [[Siculo-Arabic]] language was adopted on the island from Sicily; it eventually evolved into the [[Maltese language]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Wilson |first=Andrew |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jIP9WiIOtKYC&pg=PA64 |title=Corpus Linguistics Around the World |publisher=Rodopi |year=2006 |isbn=978-90-420-1836-5 }}</ref>