Download PDF | The Almohads The Rise Of An Islamic Empire ( Library Of Middle East History) I. B. Tauris ( 2010)
288 Pages
Acknowledgements and Preface
I could not have even begun thinking about this book without the support of Professor Gene Garthwaite who first introduced me to Islamic history at Dartmouth College. Professors Dale Eickelman, Kevin Reinhart and Marlene Heck, also at Dartmouth, have all continuously encouraged my interest in Islamic and North African history.
The Fulbright Scholarship program and the Moroccan American Commission on Educational and Cultural Exchange (MACECE), especially the executive director Daoud Casewit, made the initial stages of my research possible. It was through the connections provided by a Fulbright research scholarship that I have been fortunate enough to work with Moroccan Professors Abdessalam Cheddadi and Abderrahman Lakhsassi, both gifted mentors and scholars.
The Overseas Research Students Award Scheme (ORSAS), specifically under the sponsorship of the Royal Historical Society, funded my Ph.D. research at St Andrews University. The Royal Historical Society and the Royal Asiatic Society also provided small research travel grants while I was completing my Ph.D. Although funding for ORSAS is now under review, I want to make clear that I could not have completed my research as effectively without their support. I also received support from St Andrews University through a matching grant and travel grants.
I am grateful to Professor Hugh Kennedy (now at SOAS) who provided expert and thoughtful advice and encouragement well beyond the call of duty. Professors Robert Hoyland, Richard Bartlett, Ali al Ansari, all a part of the very active Middle East Studies community at St Andrews, also contributed to my research. Eduardo Manzano in Madrid similarly provided exceptional feedback.
My postdoctoral studies, essential for transforming my Ph.D. research into a book, were funded through a long-term grant by the American Institute for Maghrib Studies (AIMS). My AIMS grant in Marrakech from 2006 to 2007 allowed me to pursue research and questions of geography and history that could not be pursued as easily in a traditional postdoctoral setting. Fortunately, my research (and my life) was not cut short after my encounter with a vegetable truck and a grand taxi on my way to Aghmat. It was through AIMS and AIMS annual conferences that I gained from the expertise and advice of Professors Ron Messier, Kevin Perkins, Laurence Michalak and Jim Miller, all exceptional scholars of North Africa. Kerry Adams and the administrative team at AIMS, provided rapid and professional support.
Professor Amira Sonbol, the chair of my department while I was at Qatar University, and Sheikha Misnad, President of Qatar University, both encouraged and helped me develop this book.
Most recently, my colleagues at Georgia State University, including Professors Denise Davidson, Isa Blumi, Michelle Brattain, Hugh Hudson, Dona Stewart, Mary Rolinson and Jared Poley, as well as others, have all provided advice, reviews and encouragement as I have developed the final stages of my book.
Dr Lester Crook, my editor at I.B.Tauris, must be commended for his patience and perseverance.
Finally, my mother Dr Robin Fromherz and father Allen Fromherz, my two sisters Amy and Becky, my grandmother Lois Wright and family friends Bonnie Young and Bonnie Staebler, have supported me from the beginning.
All I wish to say in terms of a Preface is that although all the primary sources for this book used the lunar hijri calendar, I have converted almost all dates into Gregorian calendar dates. For the sake of specialized readers I have included long vowels in my Arabic transliteration. Berber transliteration to English is still being developed. I generally use the system established in the Encyclopaedia of Islam with one main exception: j, not dj.
Introduction
THE ALMOHADS: A GENERAL OVERVIEW
AImohad history began with a journey, a journey from a place called the ‘farthest west’, the Maghrib al-Aqsa.
‘Maghrib’ in Arabic means not only the ‘west’ but ‘land of the setting sun’. It was a journey from the land of the setting sun, from the fringes to the heart of Islam, and back again. Around 1100 Muhammad Ibn Timart, the son of a minor Berber chief from the Atlas Mountains south of Marrakech, in what is now Morocco, travelled to Baghdad, Cairo and Damascus, centres of knowledge in the Middle East. The Islamic world was under attack. The crusaders had captured Jerusalem in 1099. The ‘Abbasid caliphs of Baghdad, symbolic spiritual leaders of all Muslims and inheritors of Muhammad’s leadership and call, were weak puppets.
Far from being the source of spiritual life, conquest and godly rule, the institution of the caliph, literally the ‘successor’ of the prophet, had become an empty shell, hollowed out by political expediency. Yet not all was lost. Reacting to this political crisis in Islam, a Sunni intellectual fortress was being built by thinkers like al-Ghazali (d. 1111) whose work On the Revival of the Religious Sciences hailed a new era for Islam. Rather than the typical quietist approach to political oppression that official, state scholars and religious clerics so often expressed, al-Ghazal1 authorized ‘commanding right and forbidding wrong’, a duty enshrined in the Qur'an, not only against the local butcher or wine seller but against rulers, states and whole societies. Ibn Tamart claimed to have met al-Ghazal1. He told the great scholar about how his works were being destroyed in Andalusia, southern Spain. According to an Almohad legend that will be analysed later, al-Ghazali gave Ibn Tamart his blessing and predicted that the young scholar would soon lead a movement that would transform the Islamic world, restore the true vision of the prophet Muhammad and herald a new era.
As Ibn Tamart returned home to North Africa, he became more and more certain of his mission to command right and forbid wrong, to transform his world and inspire a new era of promise, Islam. After a few years of evading the wary and envious rulers of North Africa, Ibn Tamart gained an unprecedented following of rough, rowdy and hitherto undisciplined mountain tribes of his homeland, tribes that were used to fending for their own or raiding their neighbours and the local village. Transfixed by his charisma and his divine message, he transformed these tribes into a disciplined army. They soon proclaimed him Mahdi - the one who would herald the end of time and the beginning of a new era in Islam. He delivered a message of absolute, uncompromising monotheism. The unifying ideal of the Almohad Empire was this absolute monotheism, the belief that there is one God without any physical attributes. The word ‘Almohad’ derives from the Arabic al-Muwahhidin, a word that means ‘followers of the doctrine of divine unity’. Ibn Timart declared that the fundamentals, the roots of Islam should be followed, as opposed to the branches, the interpretations of jurists who, in his fiery statements, had corrupted the words of the prophet. He wrote a book that declared his purified vision of Islam. He proclaimed the necessity of armed jihad, holy war.
Ibn Tamart would not live long enough to see the fulfilment of his dream. He died around 1130. His closest followers kept his death secret for three years for fear that the tribes would abandon their beloved Mahdi. Soon, however, Ibn Timart’s capable ‘successor’ or caliph, ‘Abd al-Mu’min, was able to consolidate the tribes and conquer Marrakech, the door to the Saharan gold trade, and the greatest city of trade and commerce in North Africa, in 1147. Tired of heavy taxes and inspired by the message of Almohad doctrine, tribes after tribe soon fell under the Almohad yoke and the spell of ideal egalitarianism preached originally by Ibn Tamart. The Almohads would dominate the entire western Mediterranean to Tripoli.
By the late twelfth century the great Almohad caliph Yisuf Ya qub al-Mansir, ‘the victorious’, ruled over a vast, diverse and improbable empire of deserts, mountains, tribes and cities: the Almohad Empire, an interlocking system of enforced tribal loyalties and carefully cultivated bureaucracy, was at its zenith. Its domains stretched across the Mediterranean from Tunis to Andalusia and south, deep into Africa to the Sous valley in today’s Morocco. Marrakech, the capital, with its famous deep-red walls and Seville, the golden centre of Andalusia, were home to the caliph and elite Almohad tribal leaders. Both were brilliant garden cities bustling with learning and trade from distant lands, supplied with plentiful water channelled from the hills in complex pipes and aqueducts, and adorned with stark, monumental architecture.
The Almohads were the first and only effective system of government in history to control the entire wild and treacherous chain of the Atlas Mountains in North Africa. When centuries before the Romans had ruled, they did not venture far into the Atlas range. The entire region from Tunisia to southern Morocco and Andalusia was united; almost every piece of useful land was divided and sorted for tax and revenue collection. The Almohads also ruled the rich coastal plains of Morocco and the cosmopolitan, luxurious cities of southern Spain, one the most culturally and intellectually advanced regions in medieval Europe at the time. The Almohad army, a hotchpotch of tribes and tongues, often numbering up to 100,000 for major expeditions, was paid through a complex government bureaucracy. The Almohads were the major power in the Mediterranean throughout most of the twelfthcentury Renaissance. Some of the most famous scholars in Europe at the time, including the physicians and philosophers Abubacer and Averroes, were Almohads. Scores of scholars, thinkers, mystics, saints, poets and philosophers swelled the biographical dictionaries of the time.
The decline of the Almohads, according to the medieval North African sources, only really began with the disintegration of relations between the Berber tribal sheikhs, portrayed as defenders of the ‘authentic’ movement, and the refined caliphs or successors of the Mahdi. By 1229, these caliphs, especially the negatively portrayed al-Ma’min, began to reject the doctrine of the Mahdi Ibn Taimart and even began massacring the tribal leaders. The sources generally see the later Almohad caliphs in a negative light. Al-Ma’mtn, a late Almohad caliph, rejected Ibn Tumart as Mahdi and declared, ‘there is no other Mahdi than Jesus, son of Mary, who alone has a right to the title of Mahdi.’ Unlike his predecessors, ‘Abd al-Mamin could not depend on a disciplined cohort of Berber tribal fighters so praised in early sources. Replacing Ibn Timart with Jesus seemed popular with those who destroyed the tribal forces of Yahya, the favourite of the original Almohad Berber tribes, and put al-Ma’min in power, namely Christian mercenaries purchased from King Ferdinand III, who specified the stringent conditions under which he would allow ‘Abd al-Ma’min to borrow his troops.
I will give you the army only under the condition that you give me ten fortresses on the frontier of my reign, selected by me. If God favours you and you enter Marrakech, you must build a church in the middle of the city for those Christians who go with you, where they ... [are able to] practise their religion and ring their bells at the time of prayer.
In other words, the whole character of Marrakech as an exclusive, Muslim city at the heart of a Muslim empire would be threatened.’ The king, perhaps fearful that some of his mercenaries would try to curry favour through conversion, even required ‘Abd al-Ma’mtn to refuse to allow any Christian to convert to Islam. ‘If a Christian attempts to convert himself to Islam, he shall not be received as a Muslim and will be returned to his brothers so that he may be judged in accordance with his laws and if a Muslim converts to Christianity, none shall do a thing to him.” After conquering Marrakech back from the Berber tribal elders in 1227, he immediately made his pact with Ferdinand, the Spanish king. Instead of gaining loyalty from the Berbers, he would have to purchase it. He would rely on Ferdinand’s European mercenaries, who were disciplined troops under his direct control.
By 1269, the Marinids, a Berber dynasty from Figuig, an oasis south of Oujda and east of the Atlas Mountains, had almost completely extinguished the Almohads sheltered in the High Atlas Mountains. Although the decline of the Almohads is not the focus of the book, it confirms how the sources saw the relationship between the Berbers and their rulers. The loyalty and tribal solidarity of Berber tribal sheikhs was essential to the Almohads’ success. In this historical narrative, the extinguishing of the power of the mountain Berber hierarchy led to the extinguishing of Almohad power in general, except for the small community of Berber sheikhs who heroically continued Almohad traditions in the valleys of the High Atlas Mountains.
Surprisingly, there is only the slightest understanding of the Almohads and their role in history, especially the role of the Berber tribes in the foundation of Almohad power. The few brief books on the Almohads in English are translated from French and, at best, they are too short.* Most scholarship on medieval Islam has focused almost exclusively on either the ‘Abbasids in the east, or Cordoba and the Umayyads in Andalusia. Even though they controlled more territory than the Spanish Umayyads and arguably had just as much influence on the course of Mediterranean history, scholars writing in English have almost completely overlooked the Almohads. Scholars working in Spain, France and Morocco have recently made vigorous efforts to rectify this yawning gap of historical literature.’ Nevertheless, a great deal of work still needs to be done, especially on the rise of the Almohads in the non-Andalusi context.
The Almohad movement only really started when Ibn Timart embarked on his journey back to North Africa and began to attract a large number of followers as he preached among the Masmiida Berber tribes of the Atlas Mountains. Obedient to the Mahdi, the rightly guided Ibn Timart and his Berber followers would lead all Muslims at the end of time. The Berber tribes burst out of the Atlas Mountains. Within decades the remote Atlas Berber tribes, at one time seemingly lost to history, became rulers of the western Mediterranean and altered the course of world history. In this book I shall demonstrate how North African sources explain the way this remarkable transformation occurred. | shall argue that the structure of Berber tribal society, as portrayed in many of the sources, was not an impediment to the establishment of an Almohad government but its main source. Ibn Taimart and his successors did not have to destroy tribal society and create the structures of a governing movement from scratch. Rather, he and his successors used and adapted existing tribal customs and ways rooted deeply in Berber experience. According to several sources that will be discussed, including al-Baydhag, al-Qattan and Ibn Khaldin, the cooperation and incorporation of the Berber tribes was the main reason the Almohad Empire ever came into being.
Despite the importance of the Almohads in African, Near Eastern and European history, very little is currently known about who exactly the Almohads were and why they were so successful. In this book, which is the first systematic study and analysis in English of the foundational myths about the rise of the Almohads as portrayed from within the Almohad tradition, I shall attempt to fill this gap. Rather than taking a simple narrative approach, I interpret the rise of the Almohads as a model for understanding revolution, tribalism, identity and change on the western edge of the Islamic world. A good place from which to begin this discussion of revolution, tribalism and change in Islamic history is with the work of Ibn Khaldin (d. 1406), the philosopher and historian who worked for the descendants of the Almohads and whose insight into the tribal, Berber origins of the Almohad movement profoundly influenced his philosophical understanding of history.
ON FOUNDING MYTHS
Writing towards the end of the fourteenth century, more than 100 years after the fall of the Almohad Empire, Ibn Khaldiin described how Berbers in the remote High Atlas outpost of Tinmallal continued the practices of their Almohad forefathers.
The tomb of the Mahdi [Ibn Timart] still exists among them, as honoured, as revered as ever. The Qur'an is recited day and night; men still come there. There is a corps of guardians, conserving the same organization and following the same ceremony as that followed during the time of the Almohad Empire, receiving pilgrims and devotees from afar who are introduced into the sanctuary with an order and solemnity that inspires profound respect.®
It would be difficult to verify Ibn Khaldiin’s report. He may have written this glorified account of a lost remnant of the defeated Almohads to please his patron, the Hafsid ruler of Tunis hundreds of miles away who maintained a semblance of an Almohad tradition in his realm. Nevertheless, what Ibn Khaldin’s writing indicates is the pull of a certain powerful myth, a myth about the rise of Almohad doctrine and Almohad ambitions to reform the Islamic world as a reflection of claimed, innate Atlas Mountain Berber virtues, and the power of the mountain Berbers when united under a common cause. In fact, according to some sources, Ibn Timart’s body was actually removed from its tomb in Tinmallal and taken to a secret location where Berber tribesmen have venerated it ever since by remembering the period when Almohad and Tashelhit-speaking Berber power was at its height.’
My purpose in this preliminary section of the book is to address and challenge prevailing views of how primary sources of Almohad history were manipulated at the time they were produced. In later sections I provide an overview of the content of the Berber historical myths. I argue that although Andalusis may have manipulated some Almohad history and doctrine far from the Atlas Mountains, most of the first sources of Almohad history were written by Berber Almohads (the first converts to Almohadism) within the Berber social hierarchy established in the High and Anti-Atlas under the leadership of the Mahdi Ibn Timart and his successor, the first Caliph ‘Abd al-Mu’min. The myth about Almohad origins was primarily constructed in a way that confirmed the power and standing of the early Almohad elite, the Berbers of the High Atlas and Anti-Atlas Mountains.
Scholars of medieval North African dynasties have noted that even basic facts about the life of Ibn Timart (d. circa 1130), the founder of the Almohad doctrine, which formed the basis of the Almohad Empire, are conjectural.’ Yet the facts were not conjured arbitrarily. The history of Ibn Timart and of Almohad doctrine was influenced and shaped to fit a certain mystical narrative, a narrative that reinforced not simply the infallibility of Ibn Taimart but also the ideology and social structure of the Berber Almohad elite.’ Sources allegedly written during the life of the Mahdi, Ibn Tamart, the messianic founder of the Almohad movement, described the foundational mythical narrative of the Almohads in a way that reinforced the prestige of the Berber tribes. Such sources included the biography written by Ibn Timart’s personal scribe al-Baydhaq, chroniclers writing after the deaths of many of the first Almohads, such as the son of an Almohad enforcer of values and ranks Ibn al-Qattan, and even later historians including Ibn Khaldtin (d. 1406) whose philosophy of history was influenced by the Almohad example. Most writers from North Africa generally accepted or glorified Ibn Timart’s biography and many of the claims attributed to him. By contrast, scholars from the east who wrote accounts of Ibn Tuamart, such as Ibn al Qalanist (d. 1160), approached him and the rise of the Almohads from a detached, disdainful distance, claiming that he ‘perpetuated the failure of Islamic law and encouraged bloodshed’.’* In the North African context, however, almost all the chroniclers, even some enemies of the Almohads who had reason to be at least ambiguous towards Ibn Tumart, portrayed him in a generally positive light as a reformer who tapped into the latent energies and virtues of the Berber mountain tribes. These sources created historical myths about Almohad origins.
The creation of the founding myth is the subject of several historical studies in European and American history. Patrick Geary’s The myth of nations, for example, deconstructs modern attempts to write medieval ‘ethnic’ histories of nations and groups.’ In Islamic and Middle Eastern history the founding of Islam has been the subject of often extremely contentious debate, usually centred on modern challenges to the validity and usefulness of early Islamic history, history tied to the life and example of the Prophet Muhammad and the first, rightly guided caliphs. The subject of foundational narratives and myths in North African medieval history, however, has been somewhat neglected. A great deal of work is still being done on what exactly the historical myths and narratives of medieval North Africa were, let alone who constructed them and how they were constructed.
In the course of examining and analysing historical sources on the origins of the Almohads and the life of their Mahdi Ibn Tamart, I shall try to come up with an accurate description of their founding myth. Thus, in portions of this book I provide overviews, translations and narratives based on the accounts of Almohad writers within the tradition, especially the account by al-Baydhag. The analysis takes place when I compare different historical sources and accounts of Ibn Timart’s encounter with the rival Berber dynasty, the desert born Almoravids. As part of my analysis, especially in the second chapter, I describe the basic outlines of the High Atlas Berbers’ social and political system in the twelfth century. For, as much as Ibn Timart and his personal charisma was an essential factor in the rise of the Almohads, the mountain Berbers’ social tribal structures supported Ibn Tamart and led to the successful spread of his doctrine.
Studying the Almohad founding myth is not a completely new approach to the sources. Many scholars have already undertaken serious work on how the Andalusis influenced the Almohads. Madeleine Fletcher and Maribel Fierro have emphasized some of the influence of the post-conquest (after circa aD 1150) Andalusi Iberian milieu on the Almohads’ doctrine and founding myths. According to these scholars, the Almohad conquest of al-Andalus was among the most important factors in explaining the construction of the Almohad foundation myth. Fletcher, for example, described how, as Almohad power spread and as intellectuals possibly antagonistic to Berber messianism adopted the Almohad doctrine, the idea of the Mahdi may have been minimized or cut out of official doctrine.” In this sense, some scholars claimed that the sources went through a process of ‘deAlmohadization’ in order to be more acceptable to the Andalusi context.’ Fletcher even attributed the Almohads’ central doctrine, the profession of faith found in the A‘azz ma Yutlab, a book of Ibn Tamart’s doctrine that I shall discuss here, mainly to the pen of Andalusi philosophers like Ibn Rushd.* Other scholars such as Dominique Urvoy, however, have emphasized the original nature of Ibn Tumart’s thought.” Following Urvoy, who puts the Almohads in the context of their own myth making, I similarly argue, but much more extensively, that the development of Ibn Tumart’s Almohad doctrine should be seen in the context of High Atlas Berber society, and not only of the Andalusi milieu.
Maribel Fierro also viewed the historical sources of the Almohads in a primarily Andalusi context and identified many instances of possible myth making. According to Fierro, the Mahdi tradition and Mahdi Ibn Tamart’s biography were constructed as a way of justifying the conquest of al-Andalus and of a rival Andalusi - Mahdi, Ibn Qast, who had recently emerged on the scene in what is now Portugal. According to this view, the Almohads developed their doctrine not only because of their interest in maintaining Berber solidarity, but also to legitimize their conquest of alAndalus. The Almohads claimed to be against the lawyers, judges and scholars of the Maliki legal school in power before the Andalusi Mahdi, Ibn Qast, and against Ibn Qast himself. Thus, a main reason for the Mahdism and doctrine of Ibn Tamart was to counter the claims of Ibn Qasi.'® The Almohad doctrine was created and subsequently manipulated, according to this theory, largely as a reaction to events and intellectual currents in Andalus. In this sense, both Fletcher and Fierro have analysed the founding historical myths and doctrines of the Almohads in the light of al-Andalus and not from the North African context in which the Almohads originally emerged. The conquest of al-Andalus was seen as the turning point, even though Almohad ambitions went far beyond Islamic Spain. This Andalusi method is enlightening and useful in many ways because it points to the possible manipulation of some Almohad sources. However, the sources from within the Almohad tradition, that is within the Berber tradition, need also to be considered. It should also be remembered that the Almohads did not see the conquest of al-Andalus as the be all and end all of their movement. As Jamil Abun-Nasr indicated in his A history of the Maghrib in the Islamic period, the conquest of al-Andalus was really only a sideshow; the unification of the Maghrib was the first objective of the first Almohads.””
Although clearly many Almohad sources would have been manipulated in the Andalusi context, this shaping of the Almohad narrative in al-Andalus did not fully account for those sources that seem to confirm, and not diminish, the original Berber tribes (the first ‘Almohads’) and their claims on power. Not enough allowance has been given to sources that seem to come from ‘within’ the Almohad tradition.’® In fact, at least four of the earliest and most extensive accounts seem to come from within, or be primarily influenced by, the Berber, not strictly Andalusi, Almohad tradition. These sources claim to have been written by Almohads and Berbers who, from what little we know of them, adhered to founding Almohad principles, the Almohad hierarchy and the Almohad, Berber myth of origins. These ‘inside’ accounts are, in order of importance and chronology, first al-Baydhaq’s biography of Ibn Tumart, found in an unedited collection of manuscripts at the Escorial; second, the anonymous Kitab al-Ansab; third, the chronicle of al-Marrakushi, an Almohad; and fourth, the chronicle and a treatise on Almohad hierarchy by the writer Abi Muhammad Hasan ibn al-Qattan (d. circa 1266).
Al-Baydhaq was Ibn Timart’s personal scribe and biographer and his account, the lengthiest and most detailed of all sources, certainly confirmed the important role of the original Almohads of North Africa.” There is the anonymous Kitab al-Ansab, also in the collection of manuscripts at the Escorial near Madrid. Being anonymous, it is not absolutely certain that an Almohad wrote this text. Certainly, the manuscript would have been manipulated for certain political purposes but without clear knowledge of who did the manipulation it is important to look primarily at the content; and, as I shall show in this book, the content supported Berber power structures, not simply Andalusis. The description of the Almohad hierarchy and the illustrious Berber ancestry of Ibn Tamart and his followers, including Ibn Timart’s successor ‘Abd al-Mu’min, whose ancestry was even associated with Kahina, the Berber priestess who resisted the original Islamic conquests, seemed very favourable to a specifically Berber, North African understanding of the rise of Almohad power.
Also, there is al-Mujib, the account of ‘Abd al-Wahid al-Marrakushi (d. 1224), ‘from Marrakech’, who, although he wrote during the waning of Almohad power, was not unfavourable towards the Almohad Berber sheikhs and, in many respects, seemed to portray attempts to maintain Almohad orthodoxy as heroic.”° Then too, there is the fascinating account of Ibn al-Qattan who probably died around 1266 or the end of Almohad power but whose father Abu al-Hasan ‘Ali bin al-Qattan (d. 1231) was an enforcer of the Almohad Berber ranks. He was known to whip those who did not fall into line or who did not properly memorize and adhere to the Almohad doctrine and system!* Ibn al-Qattan, especially in his elaborate description of the early Almohad hierarchy and the discipline of the tribes loyal to Ibn Timart, seemed clearly interested in preserving an account of the golden legacy of Almohad origins at the end of the empire.
Although written primarily in Arabic, generally the written language of the time, these sources on Ibn Timart’s life include, especially in al-Baydhaq’s account, significant quotes and anecdotes in the Berber tongue transliterated with Arabic letters.” Even some later sources written during the reign of the Marinids, the Almohads’ successors and enemies, such as the account of Ibn ‘Abi Zar’ are by no means unfavourable towards Ibn Timart and his claims to being the Mahdi.” This Marinid - the Marinids were Berbers from the oasis of Figuig on the edge of the Sahara desert saw him as a powerful, inspired Berber leader. As just one example, he described Ibn Timart as having facial features similar to the Prophet Muhammad.” In fact, as Ibn Khaldtin mentioned, remnants of the Almohads in the Atlas Mountains were allowed to visit Ibn Timart’s tomb even after the Marinid conquest.” Thus, even the elite Andalusi, Arab Ibn Khaldiin (d. 1406) was part of the Berber myth making. Ibn Khaldiin lavished praise on the founding Berber tribes of the Almohad movement who conveniently happened to be the ancestors of his Hafsid patron in Tunis.”° The Hafsids famously preserved Almohad doctrine in their realm despite the Marinid defeat of the Almohads at Marrakech.
If anything, some of the Almohad history that historians like Ibn Khaldiin presented was as much a re-Almohadization as a deAlmohadization of history. Accounts of preserving the Mahdi’s ideal original doctrines could only serve to uphold the power of Ibn Khaldiin’s Berber patron.’ Indeed, Ibn Khaldiin’s highly favourable depiction of the Almohad Berber tribes of the Atlas Mountains and the way they were arranged in the Almohad hierarchy, which al-Qattan also described, is a significant part of this book. All these sources, from al-Baydhaq to Ibn Khaldiin confirmed and glorified the biography of Ibn Tumart. Certainly, there were likely to have been some important Andalusi modifications of Almohad history, but these main sources from North Africa are, to say the least, hagiographical towards Ibn Tamart and, in the case of al-Qattan, Ibn Khaldin, and al-Baydhagq, clear about the importance of the Berber tribes in the foundation of the Almohad movement.
Although the Andalusi context would to some extent have influenced the doctrine and history of the Almohads, the Andalusis were not the only myth makers in the medieval western Mediterranean. The writings of al-Baydhaq and the Kitab al-Ansab were too full of Berber writing and too praising of Berber traditions and practices to have been written or extensively rewritten solely by an elite Andalusi Arab. As I shall show, these sources, even if Andalusis manipulated them later, seem generally pro-Berber and supportive of a mythology about an ideal Almohad hierarchical structure. They do not completely minimize the Berber tribes’ role in founding the Almohad movement. Perhaps, elite Andalusis who were sympathetic to the Berber sheikhs rewrote the Almohad myths, but, apart from Ibn Khaldtin who was as much North African as Andalusi, that seems even less probable. If this were proven to be the case, and Andalusis did, indeed, heavily manipulate or write Almohad sources, it would alter current assumptions about the Andalusis’ hostile reaction to the Almohad presence.
By directly examining the medieval sources and focusing on a narrative that follows the Berber sources mentioned above, I shall in this book explain the creation of the myth of Almohad origins within the specifically Berber social framework in which the empire arose. I shall demonstrate how Ibn Tamart and the most powerful Berber tribes of the High Atlas Mountains organized and inspired the tribes and rearranged the pre-existing Berber institutions of the Atlas region. According to the earliest sources within the Almohad tradition, Berber tribes and an Almohad Berber hierarchy not only prepared for battle and conquest, but also came to dominate al-Andalus. Those in power made and shaped historical myths. As I shall demonstrate, Berbers and Berber tribes were in positions of power during the formative period of the Almohad movement. The writing of Almohad history in a Berber context, and not just in al-Andalus, fundamentally shaped the creation of the Almohad myth of origins. The evidence does not necessarily suggest that the Berber myth about the Almohad foundations was any more historically factual or accurate than any other, especially Andalusi myths, but rather that the historical presence of the Berber myth has not been fully examined or analysed. To orient the reader, I will first provide a brief summary of the foundations of the Almohad Empire as first portrayed by Almohad sources.
THE ALMOHADS AND IBN KHALDUN
In the beginning of this century a man by the name of al-‘Abbas appeared among the Ghumarah. ... He marched on Badis, one of the [Ghumarah] cities and entered it by force. He was then killed, forty days after the start of his mission. He perished like those before him. There are many similar cases.
(Ibn Khaldiin, The Mugaddimah)”*
Not only is Ibn Khaldtin one of the most important sources on Almohad history, but his ideas about the cyclical rise of dynasties in North Africa also help to introduce important insights into how a group of formally disorganized Berber tribes managed to rule so much of the Mediterranean world. Ibn Khaldiin’s writings are essential to understanding the Almohads’ Berber historical myth. According to his understanding of history, Berber, specifically Masmida, tribal solidarity with Ibn Taimart was the reason for the rise of the Almohads.” As Ibn Khalditin explained, Near Eastern history from the Maghrib to Persia was full of figures like al-“Abbas mentioned in the quote above. The potential for tribal revolution and revolt was constant. There was a basic, inevitable geographic reason for tribal revolutions in North African history.
In much of premodern (and modern) North Africa, even the strongest dynasties and governments only nominally controlled the fringes between the cultivated plains and inaccessible deserts; the mountain tribes ruled themselves without a formal government or written laws and, being well away from any administrative controls, tribal armies were easily assembled around common causes and leaders. Potential revolutions and potential revolutionaries were bound to appear in the wild regions, the borderlands between dynasties and the most inaccessible lands. Inspired by religious doctrines, disgruntled by attempts to tax them or their trade, compelled to unite and to give up their petty differences, tribes on the fringes of rule formed armies of the faithful and threatened the urban centre of power.” These tribes were led by men claiming to be agents of God, saints, prophets, saviours or Mahdis.
In most cases, the lives of such movements were cut short. Sometimes, however, they lasted longer. A tribal movement could harass the edges of urban power and even take some important towns away from the ruling dynasty. The tribes might even set up their own petty government and army, but these would then quickly dissolve. In exceptional cases, a united tribal coalition led by a gifted leader or inspired prophet would arise during a time of dynastic succession and division in the ruling dynasty. United in a perfect storm of economic advantage, tribal cohesiveness, doctrinal novelty and charismatic leadership, these tribal movements succeeded in shaping history. They established powerful dynasties and empires. They would rule for decades, even centuries, until yet another inspired group of tribes, often also led by a religious leader, appeared. Then they themselves were subject to the threat of a new tribal coalition. It was in such exceptional circumstances of successful tribal revolution that the Almohads, the al-Muwahhidian, the followers of the Mahdi Ibn Tumart, entered the stage of history.
Once isolated in independent fortress villages surrounded by the towering heights of the Atlas Mountains, the Berber tribes of the High Atlas forgot their grievances and inherited divisions to unite around the charisma and doctrine of the Mahdi Ibn Tamart (d. 1130). His was a leadership that demanded absolute obedience. His was a doctrine that demanded total belief in the supreme unity of God. His was a doctrine and a message suited and crafted specifically to the Berber context. According to the sources, far from destroying all Berber tribal traditions at their foundation, the Almohads created a government, a system of rule that incorporated the tribes and their customs into a large and remarkable hierarchy, a hierarchy of scholars, sheikhs and tribal leaders that was maintained even at the height of dynastic rule.
At their apex the Almohads controlled, taxed and governed North Africa from the Sis valley to Tripoli. They ruled the rich cities of al-Andalus and were the dominant power in the western Mediterranean. While the tribal revolt of al-‘Abbas and the Ghumarah achieved no more than pools of blood on the dusty streets of Badis, the Almohads created a civilization.*! This, according to Ibn Khaldiin and the Almohad chronicles, which he mainly used, was through the charisma of the Mahdi and the solidarity, support and obedience of the Berber tribes.
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