The free Zenata: the Banu Marin and the steppe

Who rules

Name

The Banu Marin under Abd al-Haqq ibn Mahyu (since 1195); the Banu Abd al-Wad, the Banu Tujin, the Maghrawa of the Chelif and the Banu Rashid under chiefs whose names for 1 January 1200 are not pinned

Title

No single ruler: each tribe answers to its own chief (shaykh) and family council

Since

The Zenata tribes have held the steppe and parts of the Tell of the central Maghreb since before Islam; the leading Zenata dynasties (the Maghrawa of Fez and Tlemcen, the Banu Ifran) lost their towns to the Almoravids in the 1060s-1080s

Family

The Zenata are one of the great Berber families. Ibn Khaldun groups the tribes that matter here as the Banu Wasin (of whom the Banu Marin) and the Banu Badin (the Banu Abd al-Wad, Banu Tujin, Banu Rashid, Banu Zardal and Banu Mus'ab), with the older Maghrawa, Banu Wamannu and Banu Ilumi.

Confidence

medium

Ibn Khaldun, Histoire des Berberes (de Slane), vols 1, 3 and 4; Ibn Abi Zar, Rawd al-Qirtas, for Mahyu and Abd al-Haqq; en and fr wikipedia (Marinids, Zayyanids)

Overlord

The Almohad caliph Muhammad al-Nasir claims all of them; the Banu Abd al-Wad, Banu Tujin and the Maghrawa serve him as allied tribes and draw pastures in the Tell from his governors; the Banu Marin pay little more than service in the holy war.

What the realm holds

• The Banu Marin: the steppe and desert edge from the Moulouya to Figuig and toward Sijilmasa, with summer pastures in the Moulouya valley and the plains of Guercif and Taza (record Banu Marin)
• The Banu Abd al-Wad: the high plains south of Tlemcen from the Moulouya steppe to the Chott Chergui, with pasture rights in the Tell of Tlemcen (record Banu Abd al-Wad)
• The Banu Tujin: the high plain of the Sersou and the southern Ouarsenis, round old Tahert (record Banu Tujin)
• The Maghrawa: the lower Chelif valley and the Dahra hills between Tenes, Mazouna and Mostaganem (record Maghrawa)
• The Banu Rashid: the Jabal Rashid (Djebel Amour) and its foothills toward Aflou (record Banu Rashid)
• The Banu Wamannu and Banu Ilumi: the plains of the Mina and the Habra between Tahert and Oran (record Banu Wamannu)
• The Zenata qsur of the Sahara (Figuig, the Saoura, Tuat, Gourara, Tidikelt, the Mzab) are Zenata by speech but govern themselves: see realms oases and ibadis

How it was acquired

The Zenata held the central Maghreb's steppe from late Roman times. In the tenth and eleventh centuries Zenata princes (the Maghrawa of the Banu Khazar, the Banu Ifran, the Banu Ya'la of Tlemcen) ruled Fez, Tlemcen and Sijilmasa until the Almoravids took Tlemcen in 1081. The Almohads under Abd al-Mu'min (himself of the Kumiya, a Zenata-related tribe of the Trara near Nedroma) broke the last Zenata lords and in 1145 took Tlemcen.

Since then the Zenata tribes have served the caliphs: the Banu Abd al-Wad as guards of Tlemcen's steppe, the Banu Marin as volunteers in the holy war in al-Andalus.

Allies and rivals

Allies: the Almohad governors of Tlemcen and the Chelif, who give the Banu Abd al-Wad and Banu Tujin pastures and service; the caliph, under whose banners Mahyu of the Banu Marin fought at Alarcos (1195); the Arab Zughba, confederated with the Banu Badin (Ibn Khaldun, vol. 1), sharing the steppe south of the Tell, the Jabal Rashid and the Mzab's edge. Rivals: the Banu Abd al-Wad and the Banu Marin are already uneasy neighbours, a rivalry that becomes the great war of the thirteenth century; the Banu Tujin and the Banu Abd al-Wad quarrel over the Sersou; the confederation with the Zughba will turn to competition as the Arabs push into the Tell in the thirteenth century.

Enemy: Yahya ibn Ghaniya, whose raids will reach the Zenata country in 1209-1210 and after, killing Zenata chiefs.

The realm that morning

Quiet and loyal. The Zenata tribes keep the caliph's peace in the west of the central Maghreb, while the war with Yahya ibn Ghaniya is fought far to the east, at Biskra and Constantine. The Almohad governors hold every town; the Zenata hold the grass, the wells and the roads between. Who commands each tribe beyond the Banu Marin is not pinned for this winter.

Wealth

Camels, sheep and horses; the tolls and protection fees of the caravan roads from Tlemcen and Sijilmasa to the desert; grain from Tell villages in summer; pay and booty in the caliph's service.

Military

Mounted tribal levies, light cavalry with lances and javelins, famous as raiders. No numbers are given in the sources for 1200. The Banu Marin sent a contingent to Alarcos in 1195.

Threats

• The westward drift of the Arab tribes into the Tell, which the Almohads encourage
• Yahya ibn Ghaniya's raids, which reach the central Maghreb from 1209
• Drought on the high plains, which drives the tribes into the Tell and into conflict with the governors

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. Spring 1200The Banu Marin and Banu Abd al-Wad come up from their winter grounds to their summer pastures in the Tell (the Moulouya valley and the plains of Guercif for the Banu Marin; the country south of Tlemcen for the Banu Abd al-Wad) under the governors' leave.Depends on: Normal rains and the governors' good will. Stopped by: Drought, or a quarrel with the governor of Tlemcen or Taza.
2. 1200, not pinnedA call for Zenata volunteers if the caliph mounts a campaign; none is recorded for 1200.Depends on: An Almohad campaign in al-Andalus or Ifriqiya. Stopped by: The truce with Castile and the caliph's choice to leave Ifriqiya to his governors.

Where the sources disagree

• The Marinid chief: Ibn Khaldun and the Rawd al-Qirtas make Abd al-Haqq ibn Mahyu chief from the death of his father Mahyu in 591 (1195), wounded at Alarcos; this fits the brief.
• The chiefs of the Banu Abd al-Wad, Banu Tujin, Maghrawa and Banu Rashid on 1 January 1200 are not named in the sources reached; the names in later records (Jabir ibn Yusuf of the Abd al-Wad, Abd al-Qawi of the Tujin, Mandil ibn Abd al-Rahman of the Maghrawa) belong to the 1220s-1230s or are not dated.

Evidence: Ibn Khaldun gives the tribes, their ranges and the later dynasties in detail, but he wrote about 1380 and his account of the years about 1200 is thin outside the Banu Marin. Ranges are given as Ibn Khaldun describes them for the Almohad period.

On the map: No map parts: the realm is drawn from the tribal records Banu Marin, Banu Abd al-Wad, Banu Tujin, Maghrawa, Banu Rashid and Banu Wamannu. Tribal ranges overlap and shift with the seasons; the drawing shows winter and core ranges.

Primary sources for this realm

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 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 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