The open steppe between the Balikh, the Khabur, Jabal Sinjar and the Euphrates, and the desert south of Sinjar toward the Tigris, is grazed by Arab Bedouin clans.
In the 11th and early 12th centuries Bedouin dynasties ruled here (the Numayr in Diyar Mudar round Harran and Raqqa, the Uqayl at Qal'at Ja'bar); by 1200 the towns belong to Turkish and Kurdish princes, but the steppe between them is still the Bedouin's. Which tribes and amirs held it in 1199-1200 is not pinned in what was read.
Who holds it
- Name
- not named for 1199-1200 in the sources read
- Title
- tribal amirs
- Confidence
- low
Wikipedia 'Raqqa' citing Heidemann (Numayr and Uqayl as the old Bedouin powers of the region); no amir of 1200 found.
Overlord
None effective; the princes of Sinjar, Mosul and the Ayyubid Jazira take what they can from them at the river towns.
How things stand that morning
Self-governing grazing ground between the town districts of Sinjar, Ras al-Ayn, Harran and Raqqa; across the Euphrates the Syrian desert (Damascus sheet).
Customs
Tribal law; seasonal movement between the steppe and the river valleys; trade with the river towns.
Where the sources disagree
Evidence: No tribe or amir is named for these years in what was read; only the general pattern is certain.
On the map: Grazing ground, not a frontier line; the river villages of the Khabur are Sinjar's.
Primary sources for The Bedouin
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.
- History of the Observant Traveller (A Traveller in Thirteenth-Century Arabia), Ibn al-Mujawir (Jamal al-Din Yusuf ibn Ya'qub) (about 1226 to 1232). A merchant-traveller's description of western and southern Arabia a generation after 1200: Mecca and the Hijaz ports, the Red Sea crossing, Zabid and the Tihama, Aden with its customs and tariffs, the Hadramawt coast, Dhofar and Oman, Socotra, and the opposite African shore at Zeila and the Dahlak islands. Read online
Sources and studies
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.