Qays–Yaman rivalry

Genealogical differences The origins of the Qays–Yaman division were traditionally based on an Arab tribe's northern or southern Arabian roots, real or perceived; the Qays were from northern Arabia, while the Yaman were from southern Arabia. Genealogically, the northern tribes were traditionally said to descend from Ishmael while the southern tribes were said to descend from Qahtan. Historical Arab sources sometimes referred to the southern Arabs as Qahtāniyya (Qahtanites), but more often called them () or (). Northern Arabs were seldom referred to as 'Ishmaelites', possibly because that became a general term for all Arabs. Specifically, the northerners were described as Adnanites after Adnan, a descendant of Ishmael, or called after Adnan's descendant Nizar (). Most commonly, the northerners were called after Nizar's son Mudar () or one of Mudar's descendant, Qays (). Not all the northern Arabs were labeled under 'Mudar' or 'Qays'; the Rabi`ah, another branch of the Nizar whose traditional homeland was eastern Arabia, vacillated in alliance between Qays/Mudar and Yaman, and historical sources often referred to them as a third party to the Qays–Yaman feud. There is no mention of hostility between the two tribal groupings in pre-Islamic Arab tradition. The Qays did not function as a tribal confederation before the advent of Islam, and in ancient Arab histories, the tribes that formed the confederation were mentioned individually rather than as a collective. According to historian W. Montgomery Watt, it was during the Umayyad period (661–750) that the Arab tribes organized themselves along northern (Qaysi) and southern (Yamani) lines "so as to constitute something like a political party". The rivalry between Yaman and Qays may have stemmed from competition over grazing rights in Syria following the conquest. However, open conflict between them occurred only during the Second Muslim Civil War (680–692). Geographical distribution , al-Urdunn and Hims, while the Qays inhabited al-Jazirah, the Byzantine frontier and Qinnasrin During the Umayyad and Abbasid eras, one of the bases of the Qays–Yaman division was geographical. By the end of the Umayyad era, however, Yaman apparently was the predominant faction in Filastin. some sections of certain Yamani tribes remained Christian following the Muslim conquest. Many of the Qays tribes, particularly the Kilab, Sulaym and Uqayl, were moved to Upper Mesopotamia from Arabia by the Umayyad caliph, Mu'awiya I (r. 661–680). Meanwhile, the Qays/Mudar–Yaman conflict in Iraq, specifically Basra, was rooted in the mass migration of southern Azd tribesmen from Oman to Basra just prior to the Second Muslim Civil War. Before then, Basra was dominated by northern tribesmen from the Mudar faction, led by the Tamim tribe, and the Rabi'ah faction. ==Umayyad era==

Battle of Marj Rahit It is likely the Qays and Yaman factions firmly took shape after Mu'awiya I's reign; previously, differences between Qaysi and Yamani tribes were "fairly harmless", according to historian Hugh N. Kennedy. Mu'awiya's reliance on Kalb troops and his son Yazid's mother being Kalbi caused unease among Qays chieftains. There were no obvious successors among the ruling Sufyanid branch of the Umayyad dynasty, which the Kalb were determined to preserve so as to maintain the administrative and military privileges they acquired under them. Thus, the Kalb's chieftain, Hassan ibn Malik ibn Bahdal, assembled the representatives of the Yamani tribes of Syria for a shura (council) in Jabiyah wherein they chose an Umayyad outsider, Marwan (r. 684–685), to be the next caliph; Marwan made significant political concessions to the Kalb, which drove the Qays, led by the governor of Damascus, al-Dahhak ibn Qays al-Fihri, to back Abdullah ibn Zubayr's claim to the caliphate. Other Yamani tribes that joined Marwan were the Tayy, al-Qayn and Tanukh. As the Qays under al-Dahhak marched toward Marwan's camp, a Ghassanid scion, Yazid ibn Abi al-Nims, led a revolt in Damascus that drove al-Dahhak's men out of the city. The two factions then fought at the Battle of Marj Rahit, which lasted twenty days, beginning on 18 August 684. Ayyam raids (685–705), depicted on this gold dinar issued by him, struggled to keep peace between the Qays and Yaman. Following Marj Rahit, the Qays initiated a series of raids and counter-raids against the Yaman, particularly the latter's leading faction, the Kalb. Because each confrontation was typically a day-long, the raids were referred to by medieval Arab sources as ayyām (days; sing. yawm), with each yawm named after the place where the attack occurred. The sources of the ayyām battles were contemporary Arab poems and stories that were preserved in the Kitab al-Aghani, Kitab al-Hamasah and the histories of al-Mada'ini (d. ca. 843) and Ibn al-Athir (d. 1233). Umayr followed up on his victory by leading several damaging raids against the Kalb in their dwelling places in the Samawah desert, including at a well named Kaaba, in which Humayd was nearly killed. had settlements stretching from the Khabur eastward beyond the Tigris River. Instead, Umayr received sanction from the Zubayrids to assault the Taghlib, and with a large force he massacred numerous Taghlib tribesmen at the Khabur village of Makisin. Further Qaysi-Taghlib skirmishes, which also dragged in Zufar on the side of Umayr, took place along the Khabur, Tigris, Balikh and Tharthar rivers. The latter sent Umayr's head to Abd al-Malik. Afterward, he executed 200 captured Taghlib tribesmen. The entry of Qays into the reconstituted Umayyad army of Syria ended Yamani, and specifically Kalbi, monopolization of that institution; from then on Abd al-Malik sought to balance each faction's interest within the military. Abd al-Malik's forces also defeated the Umayyads' Zubayrid rivals and patrons of the Qays, Mus'ab ibn al-Zubayr in Iraq in October 691 and Abdullah ibn al-Zubayr in Mecca in September 692. These developments put an end to Qaysi attacks against the Taghlib. Around this time, the Taghlib's celebrated poet and representative to the Umayyad court, al-Akhtal, recited a poem to Abd al-Malik boasting of the victory over Qays and their surrender to Abd al-Malik: (Thanks to us) the men of Qays came forth hastening to pledge allegiance to you [Abd al-Malik] publicly after long denial. May God never lead Qays back from their error; and may no one say 'Take care!' when they stumble ... ... They [Qays] lived in blessed abundance till they were caught in Satan's [Ibn Zubayr's] snares. — Al-Akhtal, circa 691/92. Despite Abd al-Malik's accord with the Qays, the two camps continued to attack each other. Thereafter, the battles spread to the Hejaz and Iraq, unlike most of the early confrontations, which occurred in Upper Mesopotamia and the Palmyrene steppe. The Fazara protested these assaults to Abd al-Malik, surrendered themselves to avert a military assault against their tribe. These affiliations played an important role during future intra-Umayyad rivalry. Al-Walid, whose mother Wallada was Qaysi, afforded the Qays a degree of privilege. There is disagreement among historians over the basis of the Qays–Yaman conflict during and after Sulayman's reign. In Iraq, the two major rival tribes, Azd and Tamim, became the central component of the Yaman and Qays, respectively, in that province. His appointment of provincial governors was based on competence and loyalty to his authority. During Yazid II's reign, Ibn al-Muhallab revolted in Iraq, capturing Wasit and Kufa. Hisham's reign was one of the most internally peaceful periods in the Umayyad Caliphate, To that end, in 738, he replaced al-Qasri, who had possible Yamani sympathies, with the staunch Qaysi, Yusuf ibn Umar of Thaqif, and appointed another Qaysi stalwart, Nasr ibn Sayyar, as governor of Khurasan. However, this situation unraveled as a result of the policies and incompetence of his successor, al-Walid II (r. 743–744). The rebels captured Damascus, then besieged and killed Walid II in the vicinity of Palmyra in 744. The Qays were the only part of the Syrian elite that backed Marwan II's usurpation, after which the leaders of Yaman were driven out of Syria. Iraq, with the exception of Qaysi-held Wasit, was conquered by the Abbasids under as-Saffah (r. 750–754) in October 749. Qaysi troops rallied behind Marwan II as he advanced against the Abbasids, but he was decisively defeated at the Battle of Zab in February 750; Umayyad power all but diminished as a result. When the Abbasid army reached Damascus in pursuit of Marwan II, Yamani tribesmen facilitated their entry into the city. ==Post-Umayyad period==

Though the Abbasid Revolution was "hotly pro-Yaman and anti-Qays", once the Abbasids consolidated power they "took up the tribal balancing policy of the defunct Umayyad regime", according to historian Khalid Yahya Blankinship. Much of the Qaysi leaders of Upper Mesopotamia and the Byzantine and Armenian frontiers, including Marwan's close ally, Ishaq ibn Muslim of Uqayl, eventually embraced the Abbasids. However, in the immediate aftermath of the Abbasid annexation of Syria in 750, the Qays of Qinnasrin led by Abu al-Ward and the Yaman of Hims and Palmyra led by the Umayyad nobleman Abu Muhammad al-Sufyani launched a revolt to reinstate Umayyad rule. However, the Qaysi–Yamani coalition was defeated relatively quickly by the Abbasids, with the Qays in particular suffering heavy casualties. Following the collapse of the Umayyads and relocation of the caliphate's capital from Syria to Baghdad, the political significance of the Qays and Yaman factions diminished considerably. Watt asserts that "little is heard of the hostility" between Qays and Yaman following the advent of the Abbasids. Irwin asserts that in contrast to the scholarship devoted to the Qays–Yaman feud during the Umayyad era, the "importance of Qays and Yaman loyalties in the Mamluk period has been largely neglected" by historians. During the Mamluk period in Syria, nomadic Arab tribes (ʿurban or ʿarab), semi-nomadic Arab tribes (ʿushran or ''ʿasha'ir) and, to an extent, non-Arab tribes or groups often claimed belonging to either the Qays or Yaman factions. During some occasions in which non-mamluks'' (those not part of the manumitted slave soldier tradition) partook in the internecine warfare between the Mamluk elite, they took up the Qaysi or Yamani label. The division became more pronounced, or at least recognized by Mamluk historians, during the closing decades of the 14th century. Even then, references to the factional feud were sporadic and do not establish the rivalry's continuity during the Mamluk era. ==Ottoman era==

Damascus and environs During the early Ottoman era, the inhabitants of Damascus divided themselves along Qays–Yamani lines, with the residents of Bab al-Jabiya, al-Shaghour, Salihiyya, Shaykh Raslan, Masjid Aqsab and Qubeibat affiliated with the Qays and the residents of al-Midan, Mazabil and Mahruqa belonging to the Yaman. In the environs of Damascus, the chiefs of Zabadani, Wadi al-Taym and the Marj area (south of the city), and the Harfush dynasty of Baalbek were all Yamani. Mount Lebanon In Mount Lebanon during Mamluk rule, the local Druze nobility was split along Qaysi–Yamani lines, with the Alam al-Din and Buhtur families representing Yaman and Qays, respectively. When the Ma'an family supplanted Buhtur in 1516, the Qaysi clans rallied around them. Indeed, according to historian Ihsan al-Nimr, the northern section of Jabal Nablus was designated for the Yaman, while the southern part was given to Qays by Mamluk sultan an-Nasir Muhammad (r. 1293–1340, with interruption). • The Zaydani tribe, to whom Galilee ruler Zahir al-Umar belonged, was part of the Qays tribe. • The inhabitants of Bethlehem, both Muslim and Christian, belonged to Yaman and flew a white flag. • The inhabitants of Hebron belonged to Qays, and flew a red flag. • In Bayt Nattif and Sar'a, the Qays tribe ruled. • The inhabitants of Abu Ghosh and Dura belonged to Yaman. • The head tribe of Kafr Kanna was called Kais al Hamra (= Kais the red), according to Al-Dimashqi. • Jerusalem was divided between the Husseini (Yaman), Nashashibi (Qays), and Khalidi (Qays) families. • Nablus was divided between the Tuqan (Qays) and Abd al-Hadi (Yaman) families. • The Ta'amreh tribe from the wilderness of Jerusalem and Hebron belonged to Yaman. ==Notes==