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    Nomads and Settled People in Bilad Al S PDF

    Uploaded by

    Numa Buchs

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    of 5
    pour qu'un homme mérite effectivement le titre d’al-Sultin est qu'aucun pouvoir n'existe au-dessus du sien. Cela est également valable pour le titre d'al-Malik, Cela nest pas le eas pour le maitre d’une seule localité puisque Je Sultan & autorité sur lui”. Ce genre de texte est impensable & mon sens au Xe ou au XIe siécle. Chaque armée avait alors son qa’id ou son amir, général désigné pour ensemble des opérations, chaque aile avait son chef et tout le monde jouissait pendant Ia bataille de la plus grande autonomic. Cette hiérarch- ‘sation de Ia titulature politique telle qu’elle est décrite ici, sans aucune référence & une investiture accordée par le calife, date évidemment de la seconde partie du “Moyen Age” musulman, celle oi le pouvoir n’était plus normalement exercé par des vizirs civils, des gouverneurs nommés ou des princes arabes issus des tribus mais par des Kurdes, des Persans ou des Turcs d'origine militaire. Ce texte décrit 'spoque méme oi se rédigeaient les histoires analysées ci-dessus. Le souci de la discipline et de la hiérarchie était entré en Syrie avec les Tures. La systématisation des commandements, apparut dans les armées musulmanes en méme temps que Vidée d'une jre, menée de forteresse en forteresse. n, le cavalier professionnel, vainqueur dans la criseavecVaide du savant commergant. La crise née en Syrie de Paffaiblissement du pouvoir abbasside aprés le milieu du IVe/Xe sigcle vit done s’affronter des paysans encitadinisés, des bédouins refusant de s'urbaniser totalement et des Tures; esclaves ou libres, professionnels de la guerre. Une lutte longue s’engagea entre eux, reléguant les civil, commergants et savants, autrefois maitres des finances ct du droit, dans un réle secondaire, Une autre analyse, plus longue et plus subtle, serait nécessaire pour savoir si la victoire politique finale des militaires turcs et kurdes ne fut pas ardemment souhaitée et soigneusement préparée par ces élites traditionnelles, hantant les sougs et les mosquées et disposées, pour sauvegardes leurs intéréts économiques et sociaux, a sacrifier des libertés, politiques “formelles”. 10.. ALSubki, Taj alDin Abi Nast ‘Abd al-Wabhab (m. 71/1370), Tabagit alShaftiya ‘at Kubra,édition Halabi, (Le Caire, 1966), 5: 915-316. =104— ‘The Vth rational Conterence on Bllad a-Shan Nomads and Settled People in Bildd al-Sham in the Third/ Ninth and Fourth/Tenth Centuries Hugh Keanedy" In recent years there has been increasing interest among the historians of Bilad al-Shm on the subject ofthe interaction ofthe settled and nomadic peoples, Of the area and the way in which the balanes between these two groups changed’. ‘Special attention has been focussed on those areas that lie along the borders of the desert and the sown and which are inhabited by settled townspeople and villagers in some periods and by pastord nomads at others. One of the most Interesting features ofthis research is that t has brought together archaeological, anthropological and historical studies in a most fruitful interaction. This paper is Intended to be a small contribution to this debate. | shall make some suggestions about the history of settlement in the area of Jordan, the Hawran and those parts Cf Syria that lie on either side of the Damascus-Hims-Hama-Aleppo road. The picture that has emerged from recént research is that ofa gradual expan- sion of the settled area in Roman and early Byzantine times followed by a period of growing nomad influence, at least in some areas, from 540 onwards. The Umayyad period saw a continuation, or perhaps a revival, of urban life in cities and some rural areas. Alter the collapse of the Umayyad Caliphate, Bildd al-Shém suffered a major economic and social crisis. This began with the devastation caused by Marwan b. Muhammad, notably in the area of Hims, when he established himself as caliph and a series of very destructive earthquakes which seem to have put an end to the prosperity of cities like Jarash and Fahl (Pella? The picture from the first half + University of St. Andrews, UK. 1. For the pre-Islamic period see Glen Bowe'sack, Raman Arabia (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1983); Ifan Shahid, Byzantium and the Arabs jn the Fourth Contury (Washington: Dumbarton Oaks,’ 1984); Idem, Byzantium and the Arabs in the Fifth ‘Contury Washington: Dumbarton Oaks, 1986); S. Thomas Parker, Romans and Sara- ‘cons: a History of the Arabian Frontier. ASOR dissertation series (Winona Lake: Eisen- brauns, 1986); for late antiquity, Hugh Kennedy, “The Last Century of Byzantine Syria, ‘Byzantnische Forschungen 10 (1985): 141-184; for the early Ottoman period, Wol-Die- ter Hitteroth and Kamal Abdultattan, Historical Geography of Palestine, Transjordan land Souther Syria inthe Late 16th Centuy. Erlangen Geographische Arbeiten, Son- ddorband 5 (Erlangen: Frinkische Geographischen Gesellecha, 1977) forthe late Ot- ‘oman period, Norman Lewis, Nomads and Settles in Syria and Jordan, 1800-1960 (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1987) 2.. For the sack of Hims by Marwan and again by Musi b. Bugha in 250/864 soe al-Balé- chur, Anmad b. Yahya (6. 279/892), Futdhal-Buldén ed. M.G. de Gosje (Leiden: E. J Bil, 1966). 134; for earthquakes, Kenneth Russell, “The Earthquake Chronology of Palestine and Northwest Arabia rom the 2nd through the Mid-8th Century A.D" BASOR 260 (1985): 37-59. —105— Nomads and Settled People in Bilad al-Sham. Hugh Kennedy Century of Abbasid rule shows a rather varied picture, with evidence of develop- ment by members of the Abbasid family at Salamiya and al-Ramla contrasting with reports of the sack of the monastery of St Sabas in Palestine by the bedouin in 181/797°, In the thirc/inth century the trend is much clearer. The Abbasid government ‘was unable or unwiling to provide the framework for the economic prosperity of settled areas and no members of the Abbasid family settled in and developed Bilad al-Shdm as they had done previously. Nor does the interlude of Tulunid rule ‘seem to have improved matters significantly. The first half of the next century {fourttvtenth) sees the increasing influence of the pastoral people in Bild al-Shdm {and the retreat of settled habitation to the mountains and the coastline. This process reached its peak in the half century between the second wave of Qarmati incursions into Syria from 358/969 onwards and the battle of Ughuwéna in 420/ 1028. It is the argument of this paper that this bedouin political dominance was the result of important changes in the economy and society of Bil al-Sham this period. In order to demonstrate this, I shall tum first to the meagre archaeolog- ical evidence. This can be dealt with fairly briefly since most of itis negative, a record of ‘non-building. With the exception of the early Abbasid cistern at al-Ramiat, I believe |Lam right to say that there is no significant surviving architectural monument in Bild al-Shdm from the period between the abandonment of the last Umayyad ppalace construction and the restoration of the al-Aqs mosque by the Fatimids. We have some literary evidence of construction of fine residences by members Of the Abbasid family at Salamiya and Manbij and by Sayf al-Dawia at Aleppo but no traces of these works survive. Clearly this does not constitute hard and {ast evidence for the decline of urban and settied life but, nonetheless, the contrast ‘between this total gap and the numerous remains dating eartier rom the Umayyad Period and later from the sixth/twelfth and sevenththirteenth centuries is sugges- tive. When it comes to settlement, the evidence points in the same direction. In ‘none of the areas where extensive archasological work has been undertaken is there evidence of permanent habitation. Jarash, Pella and Busra have provided ‘no evidence of the continuity of urban settlement in this period, and al-Humayma, the early home of the Abbasid family, seems to have been deserted after their

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