Almoravids

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Expansion of the Almoravid Empire in the period from approx. 1050–1120

The Almoravids ( Central Atlas Tamazight ⵉⵎⵔⴰⴱⴹⵏ Imrabḍen , singular: Amrabaḍ ; Arabic المرابطون al-Murabitun , DMG al-Murābiṭūn  'warriors on the border', related to murābit and ribāṭ ) were a Berber dynasty on the territory of the present-day states of Mauritania , Western Sahara , Morocco , Algeria , Portugal and Spain (" Al-Andalus ") in the Period from 1046 to 1147.

history

Emergence

In the 11th century, Islam had reached the entirety of Western Sahara under the influence of Berber tribes and Arab traders and was firmly entrenched. Even so, traditional religious practices survived and thrived. It was not until the conquest of the entire Western Sahara region by the Almoravids in the 11th century that all the Mauritanian peoples became largely consistent.

At the beginning of the 11th century, the Sanhajah Berber cattle herders nomadized in the western Sahara (now Mauritania ), where they controlled the caravan trade between Sudan and the Maghreb (see: Trans-Saharan trade ). However, this trade was increasingly disrupted by the advance of the Magrawa ( Zanata ) in western Algeria and their submission by Sidschilmasa .

The dissolution of the Sanhajah League at the beginning of the 11th century had led to a period of unrest and war between the Sanhajah Berbers in Mauritania . Around 1039/1040 a Judala tribal leader, Yahya ibn Ibrahim , returning from the pilgrimage to Mecca , brought a Sanhajah theologian, Abdallah ibn Yasin , with him to teach an Orthodox Islam. After the death of their patron Ibn Ibrahim and two years later Ibn Yasin and some moved Sanhaja back from his entourage to a secluded place where they had been expelled by the Dschudala for their Religionseiferei. There they founded a religious center, a ribat , which attracted many Sanhajas. From the Arab historian Ibn Abi Zarʿ († around 1315) the legend has been handed down for centuries as a historical fact that the remote place is said to have been an island called Rābiṭa , from which the name Murābiṭūn was derived (possibly the island Et-Tidra on the Coast of Mauritania).

In 1042 the Almurabitoun , the "men of the Ribat", called for martial jihad against the infidels and heretics among the Sanhajah. Thus the Almoravid movement was born, whose initial goal was to create a political community in which the moral and legal principles of Maliki Islam were strictly applied. In the middle of the century they were united to form the Combat League of the Almoravids under their first Emir Yahya ibn Umar (1046-1056).

First, the Almoravids targeted the Judala and managed to convert it, rally the Berber groups of Western Sahara and restore the political unity of the Sanhajah under a religious goal. In the year 1054 the Almoravids took control of Sidschilmasa in the Maghreb and recaptured Audaghast from Ghana .

Division of the empire

With the death of Ibn Yasin in 1059, the Almoravid movement lost its spiritual leader, bringing the secular emirate to the fore. The leadership of the movement passed to Abu Bakr ibn Younes , Emir of Adrar, in the south and to Yusuf ibn Tashfin in the north .

In 1070 the Emir Abu Bakr ibn Umar (ruled 1056-1087) founded the city of Marrakech in southern Morocco as the new capital of the empire. In Mauritania, Abu Bakr led the Almoravids to war against the Ghana Empire (1062-1076), which led to the conquest of Koumbi Saleh in 1076. However, this interpretation of the source is now controversial. The Almoravid rule comprised areas between the Spanish Saragossa and the Senegal river . But in reality there were two realms. The empire led by Yusuf ibn Tashfin in Morocco had no direct control over the empire in the Sahara, nor did Abu Bakr control what happened north of the desert. Abu Bakr was ousted in Morocco in 1072 by his deputy and cousin Yusuf ibn Tashfin, which is why he withdrew to the Sahara.

Yusuf ibn Tashfin (1061–1106) organized the empire primarily with the support of religious and legal scholars. Under him, the Almoravids in northern Morocco (1075) conquered the empires of the Magrawa and Salihids and western Algeria from the Hammadids (1082). At that time the entire western Maghreb (up to today's Algiers ) was under the rule of the Almoravids. In 1086 a campaign was undertaken to Europe , because that of the Castilian King Alfonso VI. In the context of the reconquest of Spain ( reconquista ) attacked Andalusian emirates asked for help from Ibn Tashfin and his warlike Berbers. Ibn Tashfin crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and defeated Alfonso VI. devastating in the battle of Zallaqa . In the following period (until 1092) the Almoravids enforced their rule and the Maliki Islamic school in Al-Andalus by annexing the Taifa kingdoms . Only Valencia under El Cid and Zaragoza under the Hudids could initially maintain their independence. The rigorous enforcement of the Puritan Islam of the Almoravids in urban Andalusian culture led to considerable resistance. Their zeal was directed not only against those of different faiths, such as Christians and Jews, many of whom were now migrating north, but also against those Muslims whom they accused of religious negligence. Nevertheless, Andalusia soon developed a strong cultural influence on Morocco.

Under Ali ibn Yusuf (1106–1143) Valencia (1102) and Saragossa (1110) in Al-Andalus and the Balearic Islands could also be subjugated. However, Saragossa was lost to Aragon as early as 1118 , and the militant, strict reform movement of the Almohads began to spread in southern Morocco from the 1120s .

The downfall

In the Sahara, the solidarity of the Almoravid leaders broke up very quickly and the area fell apart in conflicts between the clans after the death of Abu Bakr (1087). A new Islamic reformist power led by Zanata Almohads (1133–1163) had destroyed the Almoravid empire in Morocco. Two centuries later, during the first Arab invasions from eastern North Africa, the Sanhajah tribes were unable to offer effective resistance. The greatest contribution of the Sanhajah and the Almoravids was the Islamization of West Africa. This process became the axis around which the history of the area revolved in the centuries that followed.

After the death of Ali ibn Yusuf (1143) the empire's rapid decline began. Even under the first two rulers, the governors of the individual provinces enjoyed considerable autonomy vis-à-vis the headquarters in Marrakech. Now the Almoravids in Marrakech found it increasingly difficult to assert themselves against the governors. After the uprisings of the Murids under Ibn Qasi and Ibn al-Mundir, the Almoravids had to withdraw from Al-Andalus, which favored the rise of Ibn Mardanīsch . In Al-Andalus only Seville , Granada and the Balearic Islands were claimed. Morocco too had to be defended against the strengthened Almohads. With the storming of Marrakech by the Almohads (1147) and the death of the last Almoravid Ishaq ibn Ali , the dynasty ended.

The fight against the Kharijites and other Islamic communities as well as securing the denominational unity of Morocco on the basis of the Malikite legal school is important .

Ruler

Great Mosque of Tlemcen (1145) with later added minaret (1348)

Dynasty Taschfiniden

buildings

Only a few buildings are known from the time of the Almoravids - also due to later destruction and overbuilding. This includes the original minaret-free mosques of Algiers , Tlemcen and Nedroma in today's Algeria and the Qubba of the Almoravides in Marrakech .

See also

literature

Web links

Commons : Almoravids  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Pekka Masonen, Humphrey J. Fisher: Not quite Venus from the waves: The Almoravid conquest of Ghana in the modern historiography of Western Africa , in: History in Africa 23 (1996) 197-232.