Online Encyclopedia Search Tool

Your Online Encyclopedia

 

Online Encylopedia and Dictionary Research Site

Online Encyclopedia Free Search Online Encyclopedia Search    Online Encyclopedia Browse    welcome to our free dictionary for your research of every kind

Online Encyclopedia



Abbadid

The Abbadids comprised a Muslim dynasty which arose in Al-Andalus (present-day Spain) on the downfall of the western caliphate (756 - 1031). Abbadid rule lasted from about 1023 until 1091, but during the short period of its existence it exhibited singular energy and typified its time.

Abd-ul-Qasim Mahommed, the cadi of Seville, founded the house in 1023. He functioned as the chief of an Arab family settled in the city from the first days of the conquest. The Beni-abbad had not previously played a major role in history, though the poets, whom they paid largely, made an illustrious pedigree for them after they had become powerful. The family did, however, have considerable wealth.

Abd-ul-Qasim gained the confidence of the townsmen by organizing a successful resistance to the Berber soldiers of fortune who had grasped at the fragments of the caliphate. At first he professed to rule only with the advice of a council formed of the nobles, but when his power became established he dispensed with this show of republican government, and then gave himself the appearance of a legitimate title by protecting an impostor who professed to be the caliph Hisham II When Abd-ul-Qasim died in 1042 he had created a state which, though weak in itself, appeared strong as compared to the little powers about it. He had made his family the recognized leaders of the Muslims of Arab and native Spanish descent against the Berber element arrayed under the king of Granada.

Abbad, surnamed El Motaddid, the son and successor of Abd-ul-Qasim, became one of the most remarkable figures in Spanish Muslim history. He had a striking resemblance to the Italian princes of the later middle ages and the early renaissance, of the stamp of Filipo Maria Visconti .

El Motaddid wrote poetry and loved literature; he also appears as a poisoner, a drinker of wine, a sceptic and treacherous to the utmost degree. Though he waged war all through his reign, he himself very rarely appeared in the field, but directed the generals, whom he never trusted, from his "lair" in the fortified palace, the Alcazar of Seville. He killed with his own hand one of his sons who had rebelled against him. On one occasion he trapped a number of his enemies, the Berber chiefs of the Ronda, into visiting him, and got rid of them by smothering them in the hot room of a bath. He habitually preserved the skulls of the enemies he had killed - those of the meaner men to use as flower-pots, while those of the princes he kept in special chests. He devoted his reign (until his death on February 28 1069) mainly to extending his power at the expense of his smaller neighbours, and in conflicts with his chief rival the king of Granada. These incessant wars weakened the Muslims, to the great advantage of the rising power of the Christian kings of León and Castile, but they gave the kingdom of Seville a certain superiority over the other little states. After 1063 Fernando El Magno of Castile and Leon assailed him, marched to the gates of Seville, and forced him to pay tribute.

The son of El Motaddid, Mahommed Abd-ul-Qasim Abenebet - who reigned by the title of El Motamid - was the third and last of the Abbadids. A no less remarkable person than his father, and much more amiable, he also wrote poetry and favoured poets. El Motamid went, however, considerably further in patronage of literature than his father, for he chose as his favourite and prime minister the poet Ibn Ammar. In the end the vanity and feather-headedness of Ibn Ammar drove his master to kill him.

El Motamid came even more under the influence of his favourite wife, Romaica, even more than that of his vizir . He had met her paddling in the Guadalquivir, purchased her from her master, and made her his wife. The caprices of Romaica, and the lavish extravagance of Motamid in his efforts to please her, form the subject of many stories.

In politics El Motamid carried on the feuds of his family with the Berbers, and in his efforts to extend his dominions proved himself capable of as much faithlessness as his father. His wars and his extravagance exhausted his treasury, and he oppressed his subjects with taxes.

In 1080 El Motamid brought down upon himself the vengeance of Alfonso VI of Castile. He had endeavoured to pay part of his tribute to the Christian king with false money, but a Jew, one of the envoys of Alfonso, detected the fraud. El Motamid, in a moment of folly and rage, crucified the Jew and imprisoned the Christian members of the mission. Alfonso retaliated with a destructive raid.

When Alfonso took Toledo in 1085, El Motamid called in Yusef ibn Tashfin, the Almoravide. During the six years which preceded his deposition in 1091, El Motamid behaved with valour on the field, but with much meanness and political folly. He endeavoured to curry favour with Yusef by betraying the other Muslim princes to him, and intrigued to secure the alliance of Alphonso against the Almoravides. Probably during this period he surrendered his beautiful daughter Zaida to the Christian king, who made her his concubine - some authorities suggest he married her after she bore him a son, Sancho. The vacillations and submissions of El Motamid did not save him from the fate which overtook his fellow-princes. Their scepticism and extortion had tired their subjects, and the mullahs gave Yusef a fatwa authorizing him to remove them in the interest of religion.

In 1091 the Almoravides stormed Seville. El Motamid, who had fought bravely, weakly ordered his sons to surrender the fortresses they still held, in order to save his own life. He died in prison in Africa in 1095.

See also:

History of Islam
History of Spain

1911 source, still undergoing editing



Last updated: 12-13-2004 16:43:49