Umar ibn Hafsun

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`Umar ibn Hafs ibn Ya`fa-r known in Spanish history as Omar ben Hafsun (* ~850 in the mountains near Parauta, Málaga, Spain; † 918) was a leader of anti-Ummayad dynasty forces in southern Iberia.

The racial background of Umar ibn Hafsun has been a matter of speculation for many researchers and historians. The poet Rabbihi refered to Ibn Hafsun as a Sawada in one of his many poems. Sawada is a descendent of black Africans. Conde in his 1820 study of Arabs in Spain declared that Umar ibn Hafsun was of obscure origin. Ibn Askar, in his History of Malaga, traces Ibn Hafsun's genealogy as having descended from a good family and that Ibn Hafsun was the descendant of a prominent Visigoth named Marcellus. If this is true, then Ibn Hafsun could claim as ancestors the Teutonic tribe that invaded the Roman empire in the 5th century to set up a kingdom in Spain which lasted until the Muslim invasion. Thus, he could claim only white forebears.

Hafsun came from a Muladi^[1] family, his grandfather Ya`fa-r ibn Salim having converted from Christianity to Islam. Hafsun's family lived on the income from his lands at Iznate (Hisn Awt) in the region of Ronda. A wild youth, Hafsun had a very violent temper and was involved in a number of disputes, even a homicide around the year 879. He joined a group of brigands, was captured by the wali (governor) of Málaga, who merely imposed a fine (having not been informed of the homicide). The governor sucequently lost his post. Hafsun wisely fled the jurisdiction, to Africa where he worked briefly as a stone mason.

He soon returned to Andalusia and by the year 883 he had become the leader of the rebels in the provinces to the south and west of the Emirate of Cordova. Originally he settled in the ruins of the old Bobastro castle in 880, built on the Mesas de Villaverde in the Sierra de la Pizarra mountain range near Ronda in the northern part of the province of Malaga. He rebuilt the castle, and fortified the nearby town of Ardales, Malaga. But soon he had acquired castles and lands in a wide area, not only in Malaga, but including portions of the provinces of Cádiz, Granada known then as Elvira, Jaén, and Seville. He rallied disaffected muwallads^[2] and mozárabs to his cause. About 885 in order to be more centrally located, and quicker to respond to external threats, Hafsun moved his headquarters to the town of Poley, which is now known as Aguilar de la Frontera.

After Hafsun’s defeat by the forces of Abdallah ibn Muhammad at the battle of Poley in 891, he moved his headquarters back to Bobastro. When Abd-ar-Rahman III became Emir of Cordoba in 912 he instigated a policy of annual Spring offensives against Hafsun, using mercenary troops. In 913 they captured the city of Seville, and by the end of 914 had captured 70 of Hafsun’s castles.

Hafsun renounced Islam and became a Christian, taking the name Samuel and proclaimed himself not only the leader of the Spanish nationalist movement, but also the champion at the same time of a regular crusade against Islam. This was a major political mistake which although helped in attracting significant Mozarab support, cost him the support of most of his Muslim followers. Though he had left Islam for Christianity, very few Muwallads followed suit because most of them had no intention of ever turning Christian. Apparently, the reasons for his conversion were opportunistic. By converting, he hoped to obtain military support from Alfonso III of Leon.

Nonetheless, Hafsun remained a serious threat to Córdoba until his death in 917, after which the coalition of rebels fell completely apart. Hafsun’s sons were either killed in battle or captured, although it wasn’t until 928 that Abd ar-Rahman III was able to take the fortress at Bobastro.

According to some chroniclers, Ibn Hafsun in the last years of his life, seeing the futility of his efforts submitted to Abd-ar-Rahman III and even gave him one of his sons as a hostage. He is himself said to have taken part in the campaigns against the Christians of the North in the Umayyad army.

Upon his conversion to Christianity (thus becoming a Mozarab), Hafsun built Bobastro's Iglesia Mozarabe, where he was buried after his death. When Bobastro was finally conquered by Cordoba in 928, Ibn Hafsun's remains were taken away for posthumous crucifixion outside Cordoba's Mezquita (Mosque). Modern Archaeologists claim to have found the Iglesia Mozarabe where Ibn Hafsun was buried, at Las Mesas de Villaverde, Alvares near Ronda, but the identification of this site as Bobastro is still disputed.

After Hafsun's death, the emir of Cordoba, now favored by circumstances, set himself to neutralise completely the influence of the sons of Ibn Hafsun. The eldest, Dja'far was attacked at Belda and finally fell victim to a plot. The second, Abd-al-Rahman, after holding out for a time at Torrox and at Almunecar, met his end in an encounter at San Vicente. The third son, Hafs, was besieged by Abd-al-Rahman himself in Bobastro and surrendered in 928 to serve in the Umayyad ranks in Galicia.

Hafsun's daughter, Argentea also converted to Christianity and entered a monastery in the vicinity of Córdoba. There she met Vulfura who, according to the anonymous passio, had come to Córdoba from France in response to a vision that had revealed to him his martyrial destiny. The authorities imprisoned Vulfura after they discovered him publicly preaching the gospel, and later arrested Argentea who, on one of her visits to the prison, was recognized as the daughter of Umar ibn Hafsun. The authorities gave both of them the chance to convert to Islam and avoid execution, but they refused and were eventually killed on May 13, 931. ^[3]

A number of aspects of Ibn Hafsun's revolt bears commentary. Firstly, given the egalitarian promise of Islam, the muwallads like the Berber Kharjites, were fighting in part, for their due share of power, as well as the social and economic rewards guaranteed them by law. It is an error to view such revolts as nationalistic uprisings or attempts at Hispanic independence, rather, they took place purely within an Islamic framework, as part of the growing pains of a nascent Islamic state. Secondly, Ibn hafsun's cause was a social struggle fought by tenant farmers against Arab landlords. Thirdly, the most common cause made with the Mozarabs was on class interest since the Mozarabs, like the Muwallads, were also tenant farmers and shared common elements of culture.

However, the chance of a lasting coalition of Muwallads and Mozarabs was precluded by the fact that each group were embedded in Andalusian society in a different way, and the stakes in the rebellion were quite different for each. The Muwallads, being Muslim, had real access to power and could pact with other Muslim dissident groups, both Arab and Berber, towards the end of achieving it. The Mozarabs could aspire to win relief from economic burdens deemed to heavy, but could not have real access to power. The cultural similarity and common origin of the two groups does not mean that their social aspirations or their latitudes for mobility were comparable.

[edit] References

• Acién Almansa, Manuel Pedro- (1994) Málaga Musulmana (siglos VIII-XIII). Historia de Málaga.

Ed. Diario Sur. Málaga.

• De la Cierva, Ricardo (1979) Historia de España, Vol. III. Ed. Planeta.
• Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1984) España Musulmana: 004 (711-1031 : La Conquista, El Emirato, El Califato). Lectorum Pubns Inc. ISBN 84-239-4806-4
• Regla, J. (1969) Historia de España Ilustrada. Ed. Ramón Sopena. Barcelona.
• Ronart, Stephan and Nandy Ronart (eds.) (1972) Lexikon der Arabischen Welt. Ein historisch-politisches Nachschlagewerk, Artemis Verlag.
• Hottinger, Arnold (1995) Die Mauren, Arabische Kultur in Spanien, Wilhelm Fink Verlag.ISBN 3-7705-3075-6
• Barthel, Günter and Kristina Stock (eds.) (1994) Lexikon Arabische Welt, Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag, Wiesbaden. ISBN 3-88226-783-6
• Glick, Thomas F. (eds.) (2005) Islamic and Christian Spain in the Early Middle Ages, BRILL. ISBN 9004147713

[edit] External links

• Omar Ben Hafsun in Spanish.