It is because in Middle East and Central Asia and the enormous cities like Merv or Balkh included farmlands - agriculture was done intramuros with irrigation, c

It is because in Middle East and Central Asia and the enormous cities like Merv or Balkh included farmlands - agriculture was done intramuros with irrigation, channels. That was to protect farmland from deserts and steppe outside. Merv for example kept 800 divers to mantain its extensive network of water channels. The ideal of bucolic, rural life on a farm outside of hustle of a big city is part of Greek or Roman (and later European) culture. It wasn't a thing in literature of Middle East or Central Asia. So the Roman or Greek intelectual will escape city in summer for his summer villa where he will still enjoy intelectual life with friends or through letters and write about pleasures of simple life. Intelectual in Middle East or North Africa will simply look down on nomads living extramuros as uncouth and illiterate. Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17847856-lost-enlightenment https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17847856-lost-enlightenm...