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The Qadi, the Wazir and the Da‘i: Religious and Ethnic Relations in Buyid Shiraz in the Eleventh Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Rachel T. Howes*
Affiliation:
Department of History, California State University, Northridge, USA

Abstract

Shiraz's importance as a Buyid political capitol during the late Buyid period has been mentioned but not thoroughly analyzed. This article attempts to understand Shirazi politics under the late Buyid Abu Kalijar (r. 415/1024 to 440AH/1048CE) by tracing the careers of three prominent figures in his court: the Ismaili propagandist Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din al-Shirazi, the Sunni Qadi Abdallah al-Fazari, and Abu Kalijar's Wazir Bahram ibn Mafanna al-‘Adil. Using material from a variety of different narrative sources, it becomes clear that all three individuals used their understanding of court politics and their connections to one or more factions, preferably military factions, to gain sufficient intimacy with King Abu Kalijar to present their own point of view and to exclude other individuals from doing the same. Abu Kalijar was able to maintain sufficient contact with a variety of different factions to prevent the kind of factional warfare that was evident in Baghdad in the same period. By tracing the political strategies of these three men, the article sketches the structure of Shirazi politics and highlights the inclusiveness of Abu Kalijar's court and its relative stability compared to the Baghdad court of the same period.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The International Society for Iranian Studies 2011

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References

1 Arberry, Arthur J., Shiraz: Persian City of Saints and Poets (Norman, OK, 1960), vii.Google Scholar

2 The most important study of the Buyids is still Busse, Heribert, Chalif und Grosskönig Die Buyuden im Iraq (945–1055) (Beirut and Wiesbaden, 1969);Google Scholar more recent studies include Donohue, John, The Buwayhid Dynasty in Iraq 334 H./945 to 403 H./1012: Shaping Institutions for the Future (Leiden, 2003);CrossRefGoogle Scholar Tawati, Mustafa, al-Muthaqqafun wa-al-sultah fi al-hadarah al-‘Arabiyah: al-dawlah al-Buwayhiyah namudhajan, 2nd ed. (Beirut, 2004);Google Scholar Older studies include Kabir, M. The Buwayhid Dynasty of Baghdad 334/976–447/1055 (Calcutta, 1964);Google Scholar Minorsky, V., La domination des Dailamites (Paris, 1932).Google Scholar There are a number of other studies that deal with Buyid era Baghdad see Hanne, Eric, Putting the Caliph in his Place: Power, Authority, and the Late Abbasid Caliphate (Madison, NJ, 2007);Google Scholar Kraemer, Joel, Humanism in the Renaissance of Islam: Cultural Revival during the Buyid Age (Leiden, 1992);CrossRefGoogle Scholar Mottahedeh, Roy P., Loyalty and Leadership in an Early Islamic Society, 2nd ed. (New York, 2001);Google Scholar Makdisi, Georges, Ibn Aqil et la résurgence de l'Islam: Traditionaliste au XI e siècle (V e siècle de l'hegire) (Damascus and Beirut, 1963).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 There are two studies of the Buyids in Iran: Munaymanah, Hasa, Ta'rikh al-dawlah al-Buwayhiyah: al-siyasi wa-al-iqtisadi wa-al-ijtima‘I wa-al-thaqafi: muqata’ al Faris 334–447 H, 945–1055 M (Beirut, 1987);Google Scholar and Busse, Heribert, “Iran under the Buyids,” in Cambridge History of Iran, vol. IV The Period from the Arab Invasion to the Seljuks (Cambridge, 1975), 298301;Google Scholar a new article by Elizabeth R. Alexandrin deals specifically with Abu Kalijar and his relationship to Ismailis, , “Studying Ismaili Texts in 11th Century Shiraz: al-Mu'ayyad and the ‘Conversion’ of the Buyid Amir Abu Kalijar,Iranian Studies, 44, no. 1 (2011), 99115.Google Scholar In terms of other regimes in the area the most comprehensive work are the two volumes by C. E. Bosworth on the Ghaznavids, The Ghaznavids: Their Empire in Afghanistan and Eastern Iran (Edinburgh, 1963) and The later Ghaznavids: Splendour and Decay: The Dynasty in Afghanistan and Northern India, 1040–1186 (New York, 1977); Barthold, V., Turkestan Down to the Mongol Invasions, 3rd ed. (London, 1977).Google Scholar On the Canard, Hamdanids Marius, Histoire de la Dynastie des Hamdanides de Jazira et de Syrie, Publications de la Faculte? des lettres d'Alger, vol. 2 (Algiers, 1951);Google Scholar on the Mazyadids see Makdisi, Georges, “Notes on Hilla and the Mazyadids in Medieval Islam,Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, lxxvi (1954): 119–33.Google Scholar

4 The exceptions are Bowen, Harold, “The Last Buyids.Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1929): 7690;Google Scholar Busse, Chalif und Grosskönig; Hanne, Putting the Caliph in his Place; and Munaymanah, Ta'rikh al-dawlah al-Buwayhiyah; for Iran after the Seljuks see Lambton, Ann, Continuity and Change in Medieval Persia: Aspects of Administrative, Economic and Social History, 11th–14th Century, vol. 2, Columbia Lectures on Iranian Studies, (Albany, NY, 1988).Google Scholar

5 Bosworth, C. E., "Military Organisation under the Buyids of Persia and Iraq," Oriens, 18–19 (1965–66): 143–67CrossRefGoogle Scholar, gives a detailed discussion of the multi-ethnic military of the Buyids; see pp. 153–59 for a discussion of Daylami–Turkish rivalry under earlier Buyids.

7 al-Shirazi, Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat Da‘i al-Du‘at al-Dawlah al-Fatimiyah (Beirut, 1983), 91.Google Scholar

6 al-Balkhi, Ibn, Strange, G. le and Nicholson, R. A., ed. and trans., The Farsnama of Ibnu'l-Balkhi, E. J. W. Gibb Memorial Series, new series no. 1 (London, 1962), 119;Google Scholar Abu al-‘Abbas Ahmad Abi al-Khayr Zarkub Shirazi, Shiraznama (Tehran, 1310–50/1893–31), 35–36; Ibn al-Athir mentions correspondence between the army of Baghdad and Abu Kalijar but not specifically ibn al-Muslima or the Caliph. He also mentions that the Caliph sent Qadi Abu al-Hasan ‘Ali Muhammad ibn Habib al-Mawardi to Tughril Bak asking him to make peace with both Abu Kalijar and Jalal al-Dawla, so it is reasonable to assume that a messenger might also have been sent to Abu Kalijar to inform him of this as well; ‘Izz al-Din ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil fi al-Ta'rikh, vol. 9 (Beirut, 1966), 516517, 522.Google Scholar

8 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 92.

9 For a more complete discussion of al-Mu'ayyad's life and works see Klemm, Verena, Memoirs of a Mission: The Ismaili Scholar, Statesman, and Poet al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din al-Shirazi (New York, 2003);CrossRefGoogle Scholar idem, Die Mission des Fatimidschen Agenten al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din in Shiraz (Frankfurt, 1989).Google Scholar For al-Mu'ayyad's life through his poetry, Qutbuddin, Tahera, al-Mu'ayyad al-Shirazi and Fatimid Da`wa Poetry: A Case of Commitment in Classical Arabic Literature (Boston, 2005);Google Scholar for a different discussion of the section of al-Mu'ayyad's life described here see Alexandrin, “Studying Ismaili Texts.”

10 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 32–33.

11 Klemm, Memoirs of a Mission, 2–3, n. 2; Qutbuddin, Bazat-Tahera, “Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din al-Shirazi: Founder of a New Tradition of Fatimid Da‘wa Poetry” (PhD diss., Harvard University, 1999), 2023.Google Scholar Qutb al-Din also points out that al-Mu'ayyad was appointed Da‘i himself before 427/1035; Sina, Ibn, The Life of Ibn Sina: A Critical Edition and Translation, trans. by Gohlman, William E. (Albany, NY, 1974), 77 .Google Scholar A copy of Ibn Sina's major philosophical work the Kitab al-Najat arrived in Shiraz and a number of learned men studied it according to Ibn Sina: “The Qadi of Shiraz was one of this group of people, so he sent the quire to Abu al-Qasim al-Kirmani, a friend of Ibrahim ibn Baba al-Daylami a devotee of the esoteric interpretation, and he added it to a letter to Shaykh Abu al-Qasim … Shaykh Abu al-Qasim came to the master's house and presented the letter and the quire to him.”

12 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 26.

13 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 29–30; Basa or Fasa was a town with a large Daylami population. Busse, Cambridge History of Iran, 282; Bosworth states from Miskawaih that Fasa was where many Daylami troops had their iqtas; Bosworth, "Military Organisation under the Buyids of Persia and Iraq," 153. Ibn al-Athir states that al-Basasiri, a Turkish mamluk who occupied Baghdad in the name of the Fatimids in 450/1058, was connected to Fasa through his first master, ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 650.

14 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 29.

15 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 79.

16 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 86.

17 This is Abu al-Qasim Mahmud ibn Nasir al-Dawla ibn Mansur Sabuktegin, often known as Mahmud of Ghazna, who controlled Khurasan and Central Asia from 388/998 to 421/1030, who is generally seen as a militant Sunni. On the Ghaznavids, see C. E. Bosworth, “Mahmud ibn Sabüktegin,” Encylopaedia of Islam, second edition. Mahmud himself had been dead for at least seven years when these event took place, and his son Mas‘ud was the ruler of the Ghazanavid state.

18 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 30–31; see Bosworth's comments on the importance of the Daylamis for the Buyids; Bosworth, "Military Organisation under the Buyids of Persia and Iraq," 154–56.

19 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 89, 26.

20 Ibn al-Balkhi et al., Farsnama, 117–21. The author, whose full name is unknown, was writing in the time of the Seljuk Sultan Muhammad Tapar b. Malik Shah, Abu Shuja’ Ghiyath al-Dunya wa al-Din (498–511/1104–17). From the text it appears that his grandfather was a tax accountant in Fars in about 492/1098. See the introduction to the Persian text, x–xi. The geographical part has been translated G. Le Strange. “Description of the Province of Fars, in Persia, at the beginning of the Twelfth Century AD,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1912): 1–30, 311–39, 865–89.

21 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 335–552 passim.

22 Zarkub, Shiraznama, 36. Zarkub died in 834/1431, and his account is clearly much more concerned with the later periods. The Buyids are given very short, although glowing, shrift. Zarkub follows Nizam al-Mulk in describing the Isma‘ilis as following a Zoroastrian heresy. al-Mulk, Nizam, The Book of Government: or Rules for Kings: the Siyar al-Muluk or Siyasat-nama of Nizam al-Mulk, 2nd ed., trans. by Darke, Hubert (Boston, 1978), 166.Google Scholar However, Zarkub's text has serious problems. It confuses Abu Kalijar with his grandfather Samsam al-Dawla, who lived about thirty years earlier and who bore the same given name. This Abu Kalijar is described as being contemporary to Mas`ud ibn Mahmud and as building the walls around Shiraz, but another man by the name of ‘Izz al-Mulk (one of our Abu Kalijar's titles) is described as fighting Jalal al-Dawla and as having al-‘Adil as his wazir. It is also not clear at all whether the Isma‘ilis discussed here are Isma‘ilis in the Shi‘i sense or the members of a Kurdish tribe who are descendants from one Isma‘il. The author certainly accuses these people of heresy in such a way as to indicate that they are in fact Shi‘i, but the usual medieval word for this sect is Batini rather than Isma‘ili. The first part of the text is dedicated to a history of the Kurdish tribes of Shabankara, one of which is made up of the descendants of one Isma‘il. In any case this text, although it seems to have some light to shed on later period in Persian history, should be used with extreme caution for our period. On earlier connections between the Ismailis and Daylamis see Bosworth, “Military Organisation under the Buyids of Persia and Iraq,” 147.

24 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 69.

23 For a slightly different interpretation of the reaction to Abu Kalijar's close relationship with al-Mu'ayyad, see Alexandrin, “Studying Ismaili Texts,” 3.

25 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat.

26 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 71, 78.

27 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat.

28 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 95.

29 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 24.

30 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 69.

31 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 103.

32 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 87, 93.

33 Ibn al-Balkhi et al., Farsnama, 117; Nicholson's edition calls them the “Bani Faraza” here, but this must be an error, as the man's name is given as “al-Fazari.” See also al-Balkhi, Ibn, Farsnama, ed. by Bihruzi, Ali Naqi (Shiraz, 1343/1964), 136Google Scholar, which edition gives Abu Muhammad's name as “Infaradi” but calls the family “Bani Fazara.”

34 Ibn al-Balkhi et al., Farsnama, 117; Tor, D. G., Violent Order: Religious Warfare, Chivalry, and the ‘Ayyar Phenomenon in the Medieval Islamic World (Würzburg, 2007), 44, 52CrossRefGoogle Scholar, mentions two Fazaris as part of the mutatawwi‘/‘ayyarun: Abu Ishaq Ibrahim b. Muhammad b. al-Harith b. Uthman b. Usama al-Fazari and his uncle Marwan b. Mu'wiyya al-Fazari. It is unclear whether these Fazaris are related to ‘Abd Allah, although their opposition to Shi‘is and “heretics” appears consistent with Abd Allah's. If they are, then there is a clear Hanbali connection in the family.

35 Ibn al-Balkhi et al., Farsnama, 118; for some of Abu al-Hasan's activities on behalf of Ghaznavid interests in India see Abu al-Fadl Muhammad ibn Husayn Bayhaqi, ‘Ali A. Fayyad and Ghani, Q., eds., Tarikh-I Bayhaqi, reprint (Tehran, 1984), 267–68, 400–02, 406, 409, 23, 432–33Google Scholar; Bayhaqi refers to him as Qadi Shiraz Bu al-Hasan.

36 Mu‘in al-Din Abu al-Qasim Junayd, al-Shirazi, Qazwini, Muhammad and Qabal, ‘Abbas, eds., Shadd al-’Izar fi Hatt al-Awzar ‘an wazar al-mazar (Tehran, 1328/1910), 358–60.Google Scholar Many Shirazis seem to have been Shafi‘i. See Madelung, Wilfred, Religious Trends in Early Islamic Iran (Albany, NY, 1988), 27;Google Scholar Nasr, S. H. and Mutahhari, M., “The Religious Sciences,” in The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 4: From the Arab Invasions to the Seljuks ed, by Frye, R. N. (Cambridge, 1975), 476477.Google Scholar

37 On the Mard-Asa see Limbert, John W., “City Administration in Hafez's Shiraz,” in Views from the Edge: Studies in Honor of Richard W. Bulliet, ed. by Yavari, Neguin, Potter, Lawrence G. and Oppenheim, Jean-Marc Ran (New York, 2004), 121, 123.Google Scholar

38 Ibn al-Balkhi et al., Farsnama, 117.

39 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 23.

40 Ibn al-Balkhi et al., Farsnama, 119.

41 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 23.

42 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 23, 27, 81.

43 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 24, 87.

44 Ibn al-Balkhi et al., Farsnama, 119. This is in the section on the Qadis of Fars since the days of Islam.

45 Ibn al-‘Athir, Al-Kamil, 9: 360, 502; al-Jawzi, ‘Abd al-Rahman ibn ‘Ali Ibn, Al-Muntazam fi tarikh al-Muluk wal-’Umam, vol. 15 (Beirut, 1992), 282;Google Scholar for Kazarun see Strange, G. Le, Lands of the Eastern Caliphate (Cambridge, 1930), 266–67.Google Scholar

46 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337.

47 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 502.

48 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 376.

49 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 468–469.

50 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 467–468.

51 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 27–29.

52 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 23, 27; Reynolds, Dwight F. et al., “The Autobiography of al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din Hibat Allah al-Shirazi,” in Interpreting the Self: Autobiography in the Arabic Literary Tradition, ed. by Reynolds, Dwight F. (Berkeley, CA, 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft2c6004x0/, 139.

53 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 27; Reynolds et al., “The Autobiography of al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din Hibat Allah al-Shirazi,” 139.

54 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 23–24.

55 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 26; Reynolds et al., “The Autobiography of al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din Hibat Allah al-Shirazi,” 139.

56 Sultan al-Dawla Abu Shuja‘ ibn Firuz Baha’ al-Dawla Abu Nasr ibn ‘Adud al-Dawla. Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 165.

57 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337. Abu Kalijar cannot have been very old at this point. Although Ibn al-Athir's date does not quite make sense, his father was only twenty-two when he died in 415/1024. See Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337, and according to Ibn al-Athir's later obituary Abu Kalijar was 40 years old when he died in 440/1048, see Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 547–548. This would mean that Abu Kalijar was born in 400/1009 when his father was only seven, which seems unlikely. Ibn al-Jawzi gives the date of 399/1008 for Abu Kalijar's birth in his death notice, Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 317, but he gives Sultan al-Dawla's age as thirty-two when he died, Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 165, which is young but not impossible. I expect that Ibn al-Athir's age for Sultan al-Dawla is wrong because twenty-two is easily confused with thirty-two in Hindi numerals. Also given that Abu Kalijar is clearly a player in his own court by the time al-Mu'ayyad's account begins in 429/1037, fifteen or sixteen sounds better than younger.

58 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337.

59 Al-‘Adil says to Ibn Makram “the opinion is that you should exchange your goods and our money until events move forward and he is driven away.” Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337. Ibn Mafana must have been counting on Abu al-Fawaris’ nasty nature to alienate the nobles in short order which it did, see Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 368.

60 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337.

61 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 339.

62 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 338–39.

63 For flare ups of this conflict see Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 374–76, 403.

64 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 423; Ibn al-Jawzi relates more or less the same story although he gives al-‘Adil's name as Abu Mansur ibn Fina, Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 224–25.

65 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 414.

66 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 468–69.

67 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 536; Busse, Chalif und Grosskönig, 115–16; idem, “Iran under the Buyids,” 300; for the script invented by Abu Ali Muhammad ibn Ali ibn Muqla see Encylopaedia of Islam, second edition, “Ibn Mukla.”

68 Al-Mu'ayyad fi al-Din, Mudhakkirat, 22.

69 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 502; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 225, 282.

70 Zarkub, Shiraznama, 38.

71 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 359.

72 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 337, 339, 427; Sandal was also his tutor, see Busse, Chalif und Grosskönig, 110; idem, “Iran under the Buyids,” 298.

73 Mottahedeh, Loyalty and Leadership, 175, 177–78.

74 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 346, 419, 423, 431–32, 453; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 170, 223–24, 254, 256.

75 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 431–432; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 191, 235.

76 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 418–419; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 200, 204, 208, 212.

77 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 353, 393, 419; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 200, 218, 223.

78 Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 209, 245, 253.

79 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 349, 353, 418–19, 431–32, 438; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 170, 201, 204, 208, 212, 219, 223, 226, 240, 246, 253; for various discussions of the ‘Ayyarun see Tor, Violent Order, 34–35, 286–87, 296–97; Simha Sabari, Mouvements Populaires à Baghdad à l’Époque `Abbaside, IX e –XI e Siècles (Paris, 1981), 81–85, 97–100, 121–22, 126; Claude Cahen, “Mouvements populaires et autonomisme urbain dans l'Asie musulmane du moyen âge, II,” Arabica, T. 6, Fasc. 1 (January 1959), 35, 39–41, 47–48, 56; Cahen and Sabari both see the ‘Ayyarun as manifestations of popular discontent. Cahen connects them to the futuwwa and sees them as the activist branch of these organizations. Sabari, who is most directly concerned with Baghdad itself, sees them as a popular reaction to the economic problems of the day separate both from the Hanbalis and from the futuwwa, although at times tied to both groups. Tor sees them as directly connected to the Hanbalis and to a kind of Sunni anti-government spirit. The accounts available to me (which have been rightly been questioned as written by elites generally unfriendly to popular revolts of any kind) portray the ‘Ayyarun as opportunists during Jalal al-Dawla's reign. They do not appear as the instigators of Sunni/Shii violence, but rather as latecomers who took advantage of the chaos to raid markets and people's homes. Cahen suggests that they may have been linked to Abu Kalijar, but there is no direct evidence for this beyond the problems that they cause for Jalal al-Dawla.

80 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 431–432; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 200, 204, 213–14, 233–34, 246, 274, 277. See also Busse, Chalif und Grosskönig, 150–63.

81 Ibn al-Athir, Al-Kamil, 459; Ibn al-Jawzi, Al-Muntazam, 204, 265, 272.