Banu Ghaniya

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The Banu Ghaniya , Arabic بنوغانية, DMG banū ġānīya , or Ghaniyids , were an Almoravid dynasty that ruled the Balearic Islands between 1126 and 1203 .

ancestry

The Banu Ghaniya, also Banu Ganiya or Beni Ghaniya, are named after Ghaniya , a Sanhajajaberber and wife of Ali ibn Yusuf al-Masufi , who was related to Yusuf ibn Tashfin .

The Banu Ghaniya in the Balearic Islands

The Ghaniyid dynasty in the Balearic Islands was founded in 1126 by Muhammad ibn Ali ibn Ghaniya - the son of Ghaniya and Ali ibn Yusuf. Muhammad was originally the Almoravid governor on Mallorca . At that time, the Almoravid empire had already entered a process of decline, which also affected the possessions on the Iberian Peninsula and which had entered its final stage with the fall of Marrakech in 1147. Between 1147 and 1203 the Banu Ghaniya, as heirs of the Almoravids, were the last rebel enclave against the growing Almohad power. Thanks to piracy, the Balearic Islands even had an economically very successful period.

The dynasty was established at a time when the central power of the Almohads was not yet consolidated. When the Almohad Caliph then dispatched a fleet to Marrakech to subdue the islands, Muhammad II preferred to take on vassal status rather than fight the Almohads. However, his brother Ali ibn Ishaq ibn Ghaniya put up resistance and even succeeded in arresting the Almohad fleet commander. A little later, Ali went on the attack and launched an offensive against the Almohads in North Africa, where he was able to occupy the entire area of ​​what is now Tunis . During his absence, however, there was a Christian uprising on Mallorca and the deposition of Muhammad II by Tasfin ibn Ishaq ibn Ghaniya . For this reason Ali sent his other brother Abd Allah ibn Ishaq ibn Ghaniya back to the Balearic Islands with a force, who then prevailed against Tasfin in 1187 and was to become the last independent emir of the islands by 1203 . After 1187, the pressure of the Almohads on the Balearic Islands became more and more noticeable until they finally occupied the islands entirely in 1203. After Abd Allah had been captured in a final battle and executed, the Almohad appointed under Caliph Muhammad al-Nasir with Abd Allah ibn Ta-Allah al-Kumi a new governor for the islands.

The Banu Ghaniya in North Africa (Maghreb)

Ali, the fourth emir of the Ghaniyids, led an attack on the supremacy of the Almohads in North Africa ( Maghreb and Ifrīqiya ), allied with various Arab and Berber tribes. In 1184 fell Bejaja and soon after Algiers and Constantine . He was also able to usurp the entire area around Tunis , so that the Abbassid Caliph officially recognized him as heir to the Almoravids. After his death in 1188 he was followed by his brother Yahya ibn Yaqub ibn Ghaniya , who continued the fight against the Almohads until his death in 1233/1234. Even if Yahya was able to recapture Tunis in 1203, the loss of the Balearic Islands in the same year was a fatal blow that destroyed all hopes that the Almohads would be pushed back. Nevertheless, the African side branch of the Ghaniyids was a factor that should not be underestimated for the later collapse of the eastern part of the Almohad Empire.

Emirs of the Ghaniyids

Family tree of the Ghaniyid rulers

In the Balearic Islands

In the Maghreb

  • Ali ibn Ishaq ibn Ghaniya (from 1184 until his death in 1188; conquered much of Ifrīqyias and the region east of Algiers)
  • Yahya ibn Ishaq ibn Ghaniya (1188 to 1233): brother and successor of Ali; ruled over a large part of Ifrīqya until his death in 1233/1234.

See also

literature

  • Ki-Zerbo, Joseph and Tamsir Niane, Djibril: Africa from the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Century . University of California Press, 1997, ISBN 978-0-85255-094-6 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bosworth, Clifford Edmund: The New Islamic Dynasties: A Chronological and Genealogical Manual . Edinburgh University Press, 2004, ISBN 978-0-7486-2137-8 .
  2. ↑ Benito de los Mozos, Federico: Aportación a la numismática de los Banu Ganiya . In: Revista Numismática OMNI . tape (3) , 2011, ISSN  2104-8363 , pp. 1-4 .
  3. ↑ Oliver, Roland Anthony: The Cambridge history of Africa . Vol. 3, From c. 1050 c. 1600. Cambridge University Press, 1977, ISBN 978-0-521-20981-6 .
  4. ↑ Abun-Nasr, Jamil M .: A History of the Maghrib in the Islamic Period . Cambridge University Press, 1987.