Beyond Qays and Yaman: the tribe ‘Amila and factional policies in the umayyad period

Abstract

The internal conflicts that divided the Arabs under the Umayyads were often described as a division between two parties, or two factions known as Yaman vs. Qays, Qahtanis vs. Mudaris. Historians, traditional or modern, were always fascinated by it and have argued about the origins, nature and consequences of these divisions. All the traditional and modern attempts to explain this struggle notwithstanding uncertainty still reigns in this field. The simple and Manichaean division between Qays and Yaman or their description as two colliding factions is, in my opinion, an oversimplified view of the inner dynamics of the tribal politics of the Umayyad period. The aim of this paper is to throw some additional lights on the nature of this conflict from a different angle by narrating ‘Amila’s fortunes under the Umayyads which clearly show a more complex and intricate relationship between the Arab Syrian tribes that goes beyond Qays and Yaman.