Yahya ibn Ghaniya

Who he is

Name

Yahya ibn Ishaq ibn Ghaniya al-Massufi (al-Mayurqi)

Title

Amir of the Banu Ghaniya in Africa (see the realm record for his style)

Since

584 AH (1188)

Born

Not pinned

Family

Brother of Abd Allah of Majorca; his brothers Jabbara and al-Ghazi and his nephew Ali ibn al-Ghazi are with him in Africa (attested 1203-1206). Wives and children not pinned.

Confidence

high

Ibn Khaldun vol. 2, pp. 104-107: before taking Mahdia he held Tripoli, Gabes, Sfax and the Jarid, and he came out of Gabes to fight the rebel of Mahdia.

Overlord

None; khutba for the Abbasid caliph al-Nasir li-Din Allah.

What it holds

• Gabes with its oasis and castle (seat)
• Tripoli and the Jafara plain
• Sfax and its olive country
• Tozeur, Nefta, El Hamma of the Jarid and Degache (the Jarid)
• Gafsa (probable)
• Overlordship of the Nafzawa and the Matmata and Demmer hills (not pinned)

How it was acquired

See the realm record: the Jarid and Gabes regained after Qaraqush's betrayal of 1190; Tripoli taken in the 1190s with Majorcan ships; Sfax before 597 AH.

Allies and rivals

Allies: the Dabbab, the Awf and Ka'ub, the Dawawida; his brother in Majorca. Rivals: the Almohad governor at Tunis, Qaraqush, the rebel of Mahdia.

How things stand that morning

Holds the towns listed; not besieging any Almohad town; at Gabes or in the south (not pinned).

Wealth

Dues of the oases and ports, booty, the caravan trade from Ghadames and the Fezzan.

Military

His household of veiled Almoravid soldiers and Ghuzz, and the Arab allies; the castles of Gabes and the walls of Tripoli and Sfax.

Threats

• The rebel of Mahdia's march on Gabes (1200)
• An Almohad expedition
• The tribes' fickleness

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.

1. 596-597 AHBesieged in Gabes by the rebel of Mahdia; routs him near Gafsa and besieges Mahdia (see the realm record).Depends on: The rebel turning south. Stopped by: A peace between them.

Places of note

• Qusur Lalla near Gafsa: where he will rout the rebel of Mahdia: Battlefield of 596-597 AH (likely course).

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: The list of towns is Ibn Khaldun's; Gafsa rests on Arabic Wikipedia's account of the battle of 597.

On the map: Towns and oases are drawn; the steppe between belongs to his Arab allies.

Primary sources for Banu Ghaniya

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 Two Dynasties, the Almohad and the Hafsid, al-Zarkashi (Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Lu'lu'i al-Zarkashi) (about 1490 to 1495, at Tunis). A short Hafsid-era chronicle whose Almohad opening gives, in a few lines a reign, the succession of al-Mansur and al-Nasir, the Banu Ghaniya's seizure of Ifriqiya and its recovery, and the sending of Abd al-Wahid ibn Abi Hafs to Tunis, which the Hafsids counted as the start of their house. Read online
• The Complete History: the passages on the Maghreb and al-Andalus, Ibn al-Athir (about 1220 to 1231, at Mosul). The year entries for 595 to 597 of the Hijra (late 1198 to 1201) record the death of Yaqub al-Mansur, the accession of al-Nasir and the opening of Yahya ibn Ghaniya's war in Ifriqiya; the following years follow Yahya and the Ghuzz captain Qaraqush through Tripoli, Gabès and Mahdia to al-Nasir's reconquest in 1206, with the best eastern account of Qaraqush's career. Read online
• The Garden of Pages: a History of the Kings of the Maghreb and of the City of Fez, Ibn Abi Zar al-Fasi (completed in 1326 at Fez, for the Marinid sultan Abu Said Uthman). The Almohad chapters give a brisk dated narrative of al-Mansur's death and burial, al-Nasir's accession and the Banu Ghaniya troubles, with the kind of detail (coinage, public works at Fez and Rabat, prices, plagues) that a Fez compiler cared about, and the annals of Fez supply the city's governors and markets. Read online
• The Wondrous Account of the History of al-Andalus and the Maghreb, Ibn Idhari al-Marrakushi (about 1312, at Marrakesh). The Almohad section is the fullest year-by-year narrative of the caliphate around 1200: the last campaigns and the death of Abu Yusuf Yaqub al-Mansur in January 1199, the accession of his son Muhammad al-Nasir, the renewed war of the Banu Ghaniya in Ifriqiya under Yahya ibn Ishaq and his ally Qaraqush, the Almohad losses of Mahdia and Tunis a few years later, and al-Nasir's reconquest of Ifriqiya in 1205 to 1206 followed by the appointment of Abd al-Wahid ibn Abi Hafs as governor. Read online
• 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 Pleasant Book: a Summary of the History of the Maghreb, Abd al-Wahid al-Marrakushi (completed in 1224, in the East, after the author left the Maghreb in 1217). Abd al-Wahid was a boy of fifteen at Fez and Marrakesh in 1200 and later moved in Almohad court circles, so his account of Yaqub al-Mansur (died January 1199) and of the first years of Muhammad al-Nasir is partly from memory and from men he knew: the character of the new caliph, the weakness that let the Banu Ghaniya overrun Ifriqiya, the Majorca expedition of 1203 and the Ifriqiya campaign of 1205 to 1206. Read online
• Official Letters of the Almohad Chancery (1140s to 1260s; the letters nearest 1200 are of the reigns of al-Mansur and al-Nasir). Circular letters from the caliphs to governors, tribes and towns announcing victories, appointments and policy, preserved in later manuscript collections.
• 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