Helena de Felipe
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- September 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780748644971
- eISBN:
- 9781474400831
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748644971.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
This chapter examines the case of the first Almoravid amir, Yusuf ibn Tashfin (r. 1061–1106), a Lamtuna Sanhaja Berber, and the way that genealogy can legitimise political authority. More ...
More
This chapter examines the case of the first Almoravid amir, Yusuf ibn Tashfin (r. 1061–1106), a Lamtuna Sanhaja Berber, and the way that genealogy can legitimise political authority. More specifically, it considers how Yusuf ibn Tashfin claimed an Arab genealogy that drew on a textual heritage shared by Muslims in the East and the West. It begins with a discussion of the Almoravids and the role they played in the expansion and defence of Islam in the Islamic West; they controlled a territory, West Africa, where Islam was disseminated, as well as another region, al-Andalus, where it was necessary to defend the religion against the advances of the Christian kings from the north. The chapter then provides an overview of al-Andalus before looking at the origins of the Berbers, and in particular their relationship to the tribe of Himyar. It also analyses how genealogy enabled Yusuf ibn Tashfin to address his problems related to political and religious legitimacy.Less
This chapter examines the case of the first Almoravid amir, Yusuf ibn Tashfin (r. 1061–1106), a Lamtuna Sanhaja Berber, and the way that genealogy can legitimise political authority. More specifically, it considers how Yusuf ibn Tashfin claimed an Arab genealogy that drew on a textual heritage shared by Muslims in the East and the West. It begins with a discussion of the Almoravids and the role they played in the expansion and defence of Islam in the Islamic West; they controlled a territory, West Africa, where Islam was disseminated, as well as another region, al-Andalus, where it was necessary to defend the religion against the advances of the Christian kings from the north. The chapter then provides an overview of al-Andalus before looking at the origins of the Berbers, and in particular their relationship to the tribe of Himyar. It also analyses how genealogy enabled Yusuf ibn Tashfin to address his problems related to political and religious legitimacy.
Helen Rodgers and Stephen Cavendish
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780197619414
- eISBN:
- 9780197632925
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780197619414.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter tells of Granada under two North African dynasties – the Almoravids and the Almohads. The veiled Almoravid warriors, led by Yusuf ibn Tashfin, conquered Granada at the end of the ...
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This chapter tells of Granada under two North African dynasties – the Almoravids and the Almohads. The veiled Almoravid warriors, led by Yusuf ibn Tashfin, conquered Granada at the end of the eleventh century and imposed a far more austere interpretation of Islam on the city than had existed during the cultural heyday of the Zirid era. Intellectuals such as the Hebrew poet Ibn Ezra fled the city and such was the frustration of Granada’s religious minorities that the Mozarabs, Christians living under Muslim rule, invited King Alfonso ‘the Battler’ of Aragon to invade the city. The Almoravids were eventually overthrown by the Almohads, and they too would see rebellion, this time from the Jews. The lover of one of al-Andalus’s most celebrated poetesses, Hafsa bint al-Haj al-Rakuniyya, joined this rebellion that saw the Murcian leader Ibn Mardanish enter Granada with Christian troops. The Almohads won on that occasion but would later themselves be defeated with the resurgence of the Christian kingdoms to the north, as battles took place across the region leaving Granada alone and surrounded by Christian lands.Less
This chapter tells of Granada under two North African dynasties – the Almoravids and the Almohads. The veiled Almoravid warriors, led by Yusuf ibn Tashfin, conquered Granada at the end of the eleventh century and imposed a far more austere interpretation of Islam on the city than had existed during the cultural heyday of the Zirid era. Intellectuals such as the Hebrew poet Ibn Ezra fled the city and such was the frustration of Granada’s religious minorities that the Mozarabs, Christians living under Muslim rule, invited King Alfonso ‘the Battler’ of Aragon to invade the city. The Almoravids were eventually overthrown by the Almohads, and they too would see rebellion, this time from the Jews. The lover of one of al-Andalus’s most celebrated poetesses, Hafsa bint al-Haj al-Rakuniyya, joined this rebellion that saw the Murcian leader Ibn Mardanish enter Granada with Christian troops. The Almohads won on that occasion but would later themselves be defeated with the resurgence of the Christian kingdoms to the north, as battles took place across the region leaving Granada alone and surrounded by Christian lands.
