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. It also records the Almohad side of the frontier with Castile, León and Portugal after Alarcos (1195), with the truces in force in 1200, and the fleet sent against Majorca in 1203. Ibn Idhari wrote a century later but copied lost Almohad-period chronicles and court records, so his dates and names are usually the best available; his sympathy is with the Almohad state and he is thin on the Berber tribes and the Sahara.
About this source
- Title
- al-Bayan al-mughrib fi akhbar al-Andalus wa-l-Maghrib
- Author
- Ibn Idhari al-Marrakushi
- Author's dates
- died after 1312
- Written
- about 1312, at Marrakesh
- Language
- Arabic
- Covers
- the Arab conquest to the early fourteenth century; the surviving Almohad section runs from the 1130s into the 1260s with gaps
- Kind
- Chronicle
The Almohad section survives in a single damaged manuscript that lacks its beginning and end and several folios; it was unknown until the twentieth century. Huici Miranda's Spanish translations (1953 to 1954 and 1963) and the 1985 Arabic edition of the Almohad section are not freely online. Fagnan's French version (1901 to 1904) covers only parts 1 and 2 and was criticised when it appeared. Levtzion and Hopkins translate the Saharan and Sudanic passages into English.
Nothing is known of Ibn Idhari beyond the date he gives for writing.
Where to read it
Editions
- R. Dozy (ed.), Histoire de l'Afrique et de l'Espagne intitulée al-Bayano'l-Mogrib, 2 vols (Leiden, 1848 to 1851): Arabic text of parts 1 and 2 only, to the eleventh century (not freely online)
- G. S. Colin and E. Lévi-Provençal (eds), al-Bayan al-mughrib, 2 vols (Leiden, 1948 to 1951): corrected Arabic text of parts 1 and 2 (not freely online)
- M. I. al-Kattani, M. Ibn Tawit, M. Zunaybar and A. Zamama (eds), al-Bayan al-mughrib, qism al-Muwahhidin (Beirut and Casablanca, 1985): Arabic text of the Almohad section (not freely online)
Translations
- A. Huici Miranda (tr.), al-Bayan al-Mugrib: los Almohades, Colección de crónicas árabes de la Reconquista 2 and 3, 2 vols (Tetuan, 1953 to 1954), Spanish (not freely online)
- A. Huici Miranda (tr.), al-Bayan al-Mugrib: nuevos fragmentos almorávides y almohades (Valencia, 1963), Spanish (not freely online)
- E. Fagnan (tr.), Histoire de l'Afrique et de l'Espagne intitulée al-Bayano'l-Mogrib, vol. 1 (Algiers, 1901), French: part 1 only, Ifriqiya and the Maghreb from the conquest to the Zirids, not the Almohads
Read it online
About the source
Realms this source covers in 1200
- The Almohad caliphate of Muhammad al-Nasir
- The Banu Ghaniya, the last Almoravids
- Mahdia under the rebel al-Ragragi
- Qaraqush and his Ghuzz
- The Arab tribes: Banu Hilal and Banu Sulaym
- The free Zenata: the Banu Marin and the steppe
- Kingdom of Castile
- Kingdom of León
- Kingdom of Portugal
- Crown of Aragon
- Kingdom of Navarre