People or land · The Ibadi communities · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Jabal Nafusa

The Jabal Nafusa, the limestone scarp that walls the plain of Tripoli to the south, is the old heartland of the Ibadi Berbers of the east: fortified villages with granaries, olive and fig terraces and barley fields on the crest, from Nalut and Kabaw in the west through Jadu and Sharus to Yafran and Gharyan.

They have had no imam since the ninth century; their communities are led by the halqa of the azzaba (councils of clerics who keep the doctrine and judge morals) and by village shaykhs, and they pay or refuse tribute to whoever holds Tripoli. Qaraqush raided them in the 1170s and fled into the mountains after his defeat by Yahya; Yahya, master of Tripoli, will lay heavy levies on 'the Tripoli mountains' after 1203.

Who holds it

Name
Not known for 1200
Title
The councils of Ibadi clerics (halqa of the azzaba) and the village shaykhs
Since
Not applicable
Born
Not applicable
Family
Not applicable
Confidence
low

General histories of the Ibadis; Ibn Khaldun vol. 2, p. 227 (Yahya's levies on 'the Tripoli mountains' after 1203).

Overlord

Claimed by the master of Tripoli (Yahya ibn Ghaniya); formerly raided by Qaraqush; the Almohads in name.

What it holds

  • Nalut, Kabaw, Jadu, Sharus, Yafran, Gharyan and the crest villages

How things stand that morning

Self-governing; under pressure from Yahya ibn Ghaniya at Tripoli; tribute in 1200 not pinned.

Wealth

Olives, figs, barley, sheep; trade with Tripoli and Ghadames.

Customs and assemblies

Ibadi (Wahbi) congregations under their clerics; fortified granaries; Berber speech.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: The Nafusa's Ibadi character and councils are well known; its leaders and its dealings with Yahya in 1200 are not recorded.

Primary sources for Ibadis

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

  • The Book of Examples: the History of the Berbers and of the Muslim Dynasties of North Africa, Ibn Khaldun (1375 to 1379 at Qal'at Ibn Salama and Tunis, revised until 1406). Ibn Khaldun's tribal histories are the standard account of the powers that Almohad chronicles treat as background: the Banu Hilal and Banu Sulaym in Ifriqiya and Tripolitania and their alliances with the Banu Ghaniya and Qaraqush; the Zenata of the central Maghreb (Banu Marin, Banu Abd al-Wad, Tujin, Maghrawa) before their rise; the Sanhaja and the veiled peoples of the Sahara; the Masmuda and the Almohad tribes. Read online
  • The Book of Examination of the Wonders of the Cities (1191). The nearest geographical survey to 1200: a description of the Almohad lands written nine years earlier, town by town, from Alexandria and Barqa through Tripoli, Gabès, Mahdia, Tunis, Bougie, Tlemcen, Fez, Marrakesh and Sijilmasa, with a section on the Sahara routes and the Sudan (Ghana, Zafun, Kawkaw). Read online
  • The Book of Routes and Realms: the Description of North Africa, al-Bakri (Abu Ubayd Abd Allah ibn Abd al-Aziz al-Bakri) (1068, at Cordoba). Old by 1200 but still the standard description of the Sahara and the Sudan that the Almohad-period writers copied: Ghana under Tunka Manin with its twin towns and its Muslim quarter, Awdaghust, Tadmakka, Kawkaw, Takrur and Sila, the gold trade and the routes from Sijilmasa and the Dar'a; the Ibadi towns of the Jarid and the Fezzan; the Berber peoples of the Maghreb. Read online
  • The Journey of al-Tijani, Abd Allah ibn Muhammad al-Tijani (after 1309 and before 1318, at Tunis). A Hafsid chancery official's travel book, which at each town stops to tell its history, and so preserves accounts of the Banu Ghaniya war and of Qaraqush in southern Ifriqiya and Tripolitania around 1200 (Gabès, Djerba, Tripoli, the Jarid oases) from lost Almohad-period sources. Read online
  • The Pleasure of One who Longs to Cross the Horizons (the Book of Roger), al-Idrisi (Muhammad ibn Muhammad al-Sharif al-Idrisi) (completed in 1154 at Palermo, for Roger II of Sicily). The fullest geography of Africa a generation before 1200: the Maghreb and Ifriqiya town by town with distances and products; the Sahara routes through Sijilmasa, Awdaghust, Ghadames and Zawila; the Sudan with Ghana, Takrur, Sila, Barisa, Kawkaw (Gao) and Kugha, and Kanem with its towns Manan and Njimi; Nubia and Dongola, the Beja and the Red Sea ports; Zeila and Berbera; and the Zanj coast with Malindi, Mombasa, Qanbalu and Sofala with its gold, the earliest systematic notice of the Swahili towns. Read online
  • The Picture of the Earth, Ibn Hawqal (about 977, revised to about 988). Two centuries old by 1200 but the only early geographer who had crossed the Sahara himself: he was at Sijilmasa and Awdaghust in 951, saw the gold trade and the famous cheque for 42,000 dinars, and described the king of Ghana as the richest on earth, with notes on the veiled Sanhaja, the Ibadi towns, the Fezzan, Nubia and Alodia, and the Zanj. Read online

Sources and studies

  1. Ibn Khaldun, Histoire des Berberes, tr. de Slane, vol. 2 (1854): the Banu Ghaniya and Qaraqush (pp. 100-111), the Almohads (pp. 224-228), the Hafsids (pp. 291-293); read through the archive.org full-text search
  2. A. Ongul, Karakus, Serefeddin, TDV Islam Ansiklopedisi 24 (2001), pp. 442-443
  3. al-Idrisi, Description de l'Afrique et de l'Espagne, ed. and tr. Dozy and de Goeje (1866), the account of Ifriqiya, Tripoli and Barqa about 1154 (from general knowledge of the text, not re-read for this record)

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.