The desert of the northern borders through which the Iraqi pilgrim road runs from the Kufa edge to the sands of the Nafud, with the Abbasid cistern stations (Zubala, al-Shuquq, al-Tha'labiyya and others).
Its Bedouin are the escort and the danger of the caravan. Hiyari places the Ghuzayya, a Tayy group, in lands of Syria, the Hejaz and Iraq in the late twelfth century; the Khafaja hold the edge of the Kufa country (Persia map). In 598 (1201-1202) the caliph had to send the Uyunid emir Muhammad ibn Ahmad with troops against tribes robbing the pilgrims near Kufa (Persia map), a sign of how insecure the road is.
Who holds it
- Name
- not known for 1 January 1200
- Title
- Shaykhs of the Bedouin of the Darb Zubayda's northern stages (Tayy of the Ghuzayya and others)
- Since
- not pinned
- Born
- not pinned
- Family
- not pinned
- Confidence
- low
No chief of this people is named for the winter of 1199-1200 in the sources read.
Overlord
The caliph pays and punishes the tribes of the pilgrim road; no garrison holds the stations.
What it holds
- the wells and grazing along the Darb Zubayda north of the Nafud
- dues and escort money from the Iraqi caravan
How things stand that morning
Bedouin country; the caravan passes in summer and autumn.
Military
Mounted tribesmen and camel riders under their shaykhs; no fortresses.
Threats
- The caliph's punitive expeditions after attacks on the caravan
Customs
Kin-ruled pastoralists under shaykhs chosen within leading lineages; summer camps at the wells and the edges of the oases, winter grazing in the open desert after the rains; they sell camels, sheep, butter and wool in the oasis markets, take protection money (khuwwa) from villages and caravans, and serve the sharifs or the caravan commanders for pay.
What the year holds
What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.
- Summer and autumn 1200 (Shawwal to Muharram 596-597)The Iraqi caravan crosses the desert to Mecca and back; the Bedouin escort it for pay or rob stragglers.Depends on: The caliph's payments and the caravan's strength. Stopped by: A strong escort; drought.
Where the sources disagree
Evidence: The tribes of this stretch are not named for 1200; Hiyari and the Persia map give the nearest picture.
On the map: Rough; the northern edge is the modern frontier.
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
- Tayy (English Wikipedia, citing Hiyari 1975, pp. 511-517, and Bosworth, 'Fayd', EI2)
- Ibn Jubayr, Rihla (travels of 1183-1185), trans. R. J. C. Broadhurst, The Travels of Ibn Jubayr (1952); Arabic text ed. Wright and de Goeje (1907) on archive.org
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.