The rise of the Abbasid Caliphate in the mid-8th century ended the Umayyad policy of Arab supremacy and initiated a revival of Iranian identity. This was encouraged by the transfer of the capital from Syria to Iraq, which had been a capital province in Sasanian, Arsacid and Archaemenid times and was thus perceived to carry an Iranian cultural legacy. Moreover, in several Iranian provinces, the downfall of the Umayyads was accompanied by a rise of de facto autonomous Iranian dynasties in the 9th and 10th centuries: the Taherids, Saffarids and Samanids in eastern Iran and Central Asia, and the Ziyarids, Kakuyids and Buyids in central, southern and western Iran. Each of these dynasties identified themselves as "Iranian", manifested in their invented genealogies, which described them as descendants of pre-Islamic kings, and legends as well as the use of the title of shahanshah by the Buyid rulers. These dynasties provided the "men of the pen" ("ahl-e qalam"), i.e. the literary elite, with an opportunity to revive the idea of Iran.