Introduction
In a previous article we discussed the great historian al-Tabari. We now turn our attention to the author of two very important early historical works: Aḥmad b. Yaḥyā b. Jābir b. Dāwūd, better known as al-Baladhuri. He was born between 810 and 820 in Baghdad. He spent most of his life in this city and died in approximately 278/892H.
According to Hitti, al-Baladhuri was of Persian descent, but this is disputed in the entry in the Encyclopaedia of Islam. His grandfather was employed as a secretary to one of the ministers of the Caliph al-Rashīd in Egypt. Al-Baladhuri also worked as a secretary in the ‘Abbāsid bureaucracy. His employment lasted through the reigns of al-Muntaṣir, al-Musta’in, and Mu’tazz, and following the latter’s death, he retired from his post. Through his relationship with the ruling family, he was able to access historical material. He also translated from Persian to Arabic.
He studied under a number of famous historians, including al-Madāʾinī, Ibn Saʿd, and Muṣʿab al-Zubayrī. His designation – al- Baladhuri comes from his alleged use of the mind stimulant called marking-nut (balād̲h̲ur). Although several scholars, including Ibn Nadīm and Dhahabi hold that he took balād̲h̲ur and that it eventually led to his death, this position is refuted by Yaqūt al-Hamawi (d. 1229), who argues that it was his grandfather who was the consumer of this substance. In terms of religious alignment, Al-Balādhurī was a Sunnī. This is evident from his sympathetic portrayal of the Rāshidūn and Umayyad Caliphs and is also attested by the Shī‘a theologian al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d.436/1044).
Imam al-Dhahabi described him in Siyar A’lam al-Nubala as “a distinguished scholar, a writer, and complier.” He said about him in History of Islam. Yaqut al-Hamawi described him in Mu’jam al-Udaba
as “a virtuous scholar, a poet, a narrator, and a skilled genealogist.”
Al-Baladhuri’s works
Al-Baladhuri is famous for two works of history, both extant. The first is Futūḥ al-Buldān (The Conquest of the Lands), which was translated in 1916 by P. K. Hitti and F. C. Murgotten, who entitled it The Origins of the Islamic State. In this work, he covers the battles of the Prophet, the ridda wars and the early Islamic conquests. Each region that was conquered (for example Syria. Iraq, Armenia, Egypt and North Africa, and Spain) are covered in separate chapters. Al-Masʿūdī regards this book as one of the best sources of the Muslim conquests. Al-Balādhurī’s second important work, which is the subject of this theses, is known as Ansāb al-Ashrāf (Genealogies of the Nobility).
Key political events during the life of al-Baladhuri
Al-Baladhuri was born in approximately 810 according to Becker’s entry in the Encyclopaedia of Islam. He was born during the civil war between Amīn and Ma’mūm which resulted in the latter’s unexpected victory. Other key events in his life time include the Miḥna and its eventual failure in 847, the assassination of Mutawakkil and the anarchy at Samarra (861-870). By the time the ‘anarchy’ ended, the Caliph was no more than a figurehead with real power in the hands of the Turkish military.
From 870 onwards, the process of political fragmentation of the empire continued and a number of semi-autonomous dynasties emerged, The Tūlūnid dynasty took control of Egypt in 868, and at one stage they controlled large parts of Syria and some of Iraq. In the East, the Saffarids seized Khurāsān and western Iran. They ruled from 259–287/873–900 and were later displaced by the pro-‘Abbāsid Samanids (287–389/900–99). Three separate movements constituted an existential threat to the ‘Abbāsid caliphate: the Zanj revolt (255–280 / 883–893) the Qarāmiṭa rebellions, and the growing power of the Fāṭimids in north Africa. The former two severely affected the Iraqi economy.
Thus al-Baladhuri was living in a time of great political uncertainty including civil wars, the rise of semi-autonomous dynasties, the political impotence of the Caliph, and the emergence of movements such as the Qarāmiṭa and Fāṭimids.
Structure and Style of Ansāb al-Ashrāf
Al-Baladhuri does not give this book a formal title; hence it is known by several different names. Ibn al’Adim refers to it as Jumal Ansāb al-As̲h̲rāf wa Akhbāruhum. Yaqūt al-Hamawi refers to it as Jumal Nasab al-Ashrāf as well as al-Ta’rīkh, in the Fihrist it is called Akhbār wa ‘l Ansāb; Masʿūdī refers to it as al-Nasab. The Andalusian historian, Ibn Abbār (d.658/1059) was the first to use the title Ansāb al-As̲h̲rāf and this title was adopted by Goitein who published the first volume of Ansāb in 1936. The entire work consists of 1.25 million words compared to the Ta’rīkh of al-T̩abarī, which is 1.5 million words.
The term Ashrāf (nobility) refers to important aristocratic Arab families. Ansāb refers to genealogies. Hence the work is intended to be a genealogy of important Arab families. More than a third of the entire work covers Banū Umayya due to their central role in early Islamic history. His portrayal of the Umayyads is some cases sympathetic. This is surprising given his close association with the ‘Abbāsid court. Goitein argues that al-Baladhuri was able to portray them in such a light, as the ‘Abbāsid Caliphs felt that they could learn much from Umayyad statecraft.
Khalidi describes the Ansāb as “more like a comprehensive history loosely arranged around prominent families than a work of strict genealogy.” The Ansāb begins with a biography of the Prophet followed by a genealogy of his family, followed by Banū ‘Abbās, Banū Umayya and then smaller Qurayshi and non-Qurayshi tribes. The biographies of the Caliphs are detailed. However, within these biographies, activities of other important men are detailed. In a sense, such biographies are more akin to a history of important events during the reign of each Caliph as opposed to a biography of the Caliph. Only the first two ‘Abbāsid caliphs are dealt with in any detail. Al-Baladhuri died before completing his Ansāb.
Notable features of Ansāb al-Ashrāf
Other notable aspects of the Ansāb are that it:
- contains extensive information on the Khawārij
- is a unique source of ancient Arab poetry[
- and is written in the style of a h̩adīth book, i.e. each text is preceded by an isnād, and sometimes several versions of the same text are given.
Al-Baladhuri’s main sources for the Ansāb include Hishām b. al-Kalbī1 (d.204/819), Haytham b. Adī2 (d. 207/822) and al-Madā’inī (d.225/839).
Appendix. Publication history of Ansāb al-Ashrāf
The publication history of Ansāb is complicated, as various sections of it have been published by different teams of scholars (both Israeli and Arab), and using different manuscripts. Full manuscripts of the text are in Istanbul and Rabat.
Volume I was edited by M. Hamidullah in 1959, comprising of 594 pages, corresponding to pp. 1-285 of the Istanbul Manuscript.This volume also contains a table of contents of the entire work. This covers a brief history of the Prophets, the life of the Prophet Muh̩ammad, the virtues of Abū Bakr, the death, washing and burial of the Prophet. I will be utilising part of this volume. Pages 437 – 525 were edited by Mahmudi in 1974 and 1977 entitled The ‘Alīd Pretenders (no volume number).
Volume III pp. 525 – 689 was edited by Duri in 1978 entitled, The ‘Abbāsids.
Vol. IVi, pp. 689-993 was edited by Ihsan ‘Abbās entitled, The Umayyads.
Vol. IVA, pp. 689-817 was edited by Max Schloessinger in 1971 and then M. J. Kister, entitled, The Umayyads to the death Mu’āwiya.
Vol. IVB, pp. 817-918 was edited by Schloessinger in 1938 entitled, The Umayyads – Yazīd b. Mu’āwiya.
Vol. V, pp. 918-1137 was edited by Goitein in 1936 entitled, ‘Uthmān and the third fitna.
Vol. VIB, pp. 233-309: was edited by ‘Athamina in 1993 entitled, Hishām b. Abd al-Malik.
The entire work was edited and published by Suhayl Zakkār and Riȳaḍ Ziriklī in 1996 in thirteen volumes.
References
Amanullah Khan, A Critical Study of Al- BalāDhurī as a Historian, (Lahore, Pakistan, 1986), p. 22.
Philip Khuri Hitti and Francis Clark Murgotten, The Origins of the Islamic State, Being a Translation from the Arabic, Accompanied with Annotations, Geographic and Historic Notes of the Kitâb Fitûh Al-Buldân of Al-Imâm Abu-L Abbâs Ahmad Ibn-Jâbir Al-Balâdhuri, (Columbia university, 1916), p. 13.
Tarif Khalidi, Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period, (Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 59.; Al-Mutawakkil had a high opinion of him.
Riḍā Riḍāzādih Langarudī, ‘Al- Balādhurī ‘, in Historians of the Islamic World: Selected Entries from Encyclopaedia of the World of Islam, ed. by Adel Mohammad Jafar Elmi Gholamali Haddad, Hassan Taromi-Rad (2013), pp. 1-10 (p. 3).
Ira M Lapidus, A History of Islamic Societies, (Cambridge University Press, 2012), p. 109.
George Sarton, ‘Review: The Ansāb Al-Ashrāf of Al-Balādhurī by S. D. F. Goitein’, Isis, 26 (1937), 458.
Vol. IV A by Max Schloessinger The Ansāb al-Ashrāf of al-Balādhurī and M. and M. J. KisterZwettler, Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 33 (1974), 160.
Al-Balādhurī Aḥmad Ibn Yaḥyā trans. by S.D.F Goitien, The Ansāb Al-Ashrāf of Al-Balādhurī. Volume V, (Jerusalem: University Press, 1936), p. 16.
- Hishām b. al-Kalbī was a famous and highly regarded genealogist, and an akhbāri, writing over 150 works. He was from a Shī‘ī family and this was the cause of criticism from a number of Sunnī scholars. He was close to the ‘Abbāsid Caliph al-Maʾmūn. Atallah, W., “al-Kalbī”, in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition,; ibid. pp. 86-7. ↩︎
- Haytham b. Adī was the author of a number of historical works, none of them extant, and an important source for al- Balādhurī, al-Yaʿqūbī, al-Ṭabarī and al-Masʿūdī. Goitein argues that al- Balādhurī modelled his Ansāb on Haytham b. Adī’s Kitāb Ta’rīkh al-Ashrāf. Al-Balādhurī Aḥmad Ibn Yaḥyā trans. by S.D.F Goitien, The Ansāb Al-Ashrāf of Al-Balādhurī, (Jerusalem: University Press, 1936), p. 14. ↩︎
