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ORIENTALIA LOVANIENSIA
ANALECTA
————— 177 —————

‘ABBASID STUDIES II

Occasional Papers of the School of ‘Abbasid Studies

Leuven
28 June – 1 July 2004

edited by

JOHN NAWAS

UITGEVERIJ PEETERS en DEPARTEMENT OOSTERSE STUDIES

LEUVEN – PARIS – WALPOLE, MA
2010
0902_Nawas_vrw 02-08-2010 10:16 Pagina V

CONTENTS

John NAWAS, ¨Abbasid Studies Advance . . . . . . . . . 1

POLITICAL HISTORY
Herbert BERG, ¨Abbasid Historians’ Portrayals of al-¨Abbas b.
¨Abd al-Mu††alib . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Amikam ELAD, The Struggle for the Legitimacy of Authority as
Reflected in the Îadith of al-Mahdi . . . . . . . . . 39
Nimrod HURVITZ, Negotiating Ibn Îanbal’s Contribution to Îanbali
Legal Doctrine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Ghada JAYYUSI-LEHN, The Caliphate of al-Mu¨taÒim: Succession
or Capture? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
John P. TURNER, Al-Afshin: Heretic, Rebel or Rival? . . . . 119

CULTURAL HISTORY
Monique BERNARDS, Grammarians’ Circles of Learning: A Social
Network Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Michael COOPERSON, Al-Maˆmun, the Pyramids and the Hieroglyphs 165
Cecile CABROL, Les fonctionnaires d’Etat nestoriens à Bagdad du
temps des ¨Abbassides (III/IXe – IV/Xe s.) . . . . . . 191
Devin J. STEWART, Emending the Chapter on Law in Ibn al-Nadim's
Fihrist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
Uwe VAGELPOHL, The ¨Abbasid Translation Movement in Context.
Contemporary Voices on Translation . . . . . . . . 245

SPECIAL SECTION ON THE REIGN OF AL-MUQTADIR

(295-320 AH/908-932 AD)
Paul L. HECK, Language Theory and State Officials in the Reign
of al-Muqtadir: The case of Ibn Wahb al-Katib . . . . . 271
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VI CONTENTS

Letizia OSTI, In Defence of the Caliph: Abu Bakr al-∑uli and the
Virtues of al-Muqtadir . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Maaike VAN BERKEL, The Vizier and the Harem Stewardess: Media-
tion in a Discharge Case at the Court of Caliph Al-Muqtadir 303
Nadia Maria AL CHEIKH, The ‘Court’ of al-Muqtadir: Its Space
and Its Occupants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
Peter E. PORMANN, Islamic Hospitals in the Time of al-Muqtadir . 337
0902-08_Nawas_15_El Cheikh 02-08-2010 10:48 Pagina 319

THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR:

ITS SPACE AND ITS OCCUPANTS1

NADIA MARIA EL CHEIKH

This article offers some preliminary observations about the court of

the ¨Abbasid caliph al-Muqtadir (r. 295-320/908-932). It primarily seeks
to problematise the term ‘court’, conceiving of the ¨Abbasid court as a
combination of location where government is conducted and a commu-
nity of people who exercise authority and manage government. It is,
indeed, of cardinal importance to analyze the relationship between space
and people since spatial relations form a common metaphor in Islamic
political language. Space was used for different social purposes, was
endowed with different values, and competition for power was shaped
by understandings of space.2 Hence, it is important to prologue any dis-
cussion of the court with a description of the physical space involved, in
this case the Dar al-Khilafa which was the structure that defined the court
in a physical way. In the second part of this contribution, I investigate the
following questions: What is the terminology used in the sources to define
the court and the courtiers? Who was a ‘courtier’? Was it anyone who
attended the court or was it a specific category of person? What was the
distinction between the household and the bureaucracy? The narratives
pertaining to the reign of al-Muqtadir are particularly rich for such an
investigation because information about palace politics found its way to
the historical annals and other literary texts that refer to this period.

THE SPACE

Archaeologically, the palaces related to the ¨Abbasid dynasty are not

well known since almost nothing of the monuments and of the urban

1
In the summer of 2003 I spent five weeks in Los Angeles where I greatly benefited
from discussions and exchanges with Michael Cooperson. I also wish to thank the partic-
ipants of the School of ¨Abbasid Studies conference at Leuven for their comments and crit-
icisms.
2
D.B.J. MARMER, The Political Culture of the Abbasid Court, 279-324 (A. H.), Ph. D.
thesis, Princeton University, 1994, p. 10; B. LEWIS, The Political Language of Islam,
Chicago, 1988, p. 11.
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320 N. M. EL CHEIKH

fabric of the ¨Abbasid city remains.3 The destruction of buildings and

structures took place during the civil war that followed the deposition of
al-Muqtadir and the successive civil wars among the contending forces
which destroyed the greater part of the Residence.4 However, some infor-
mation about the Baghdad palaces can be derived from literary descrip-
tions.5
There is ambivalence as to what a ‘palace’ actually was. According to
Jere Bacharach, ‘palace’ designates the residence of a ruler; it is nor-
mally defined by its occupant(s) and not necessarily by its form or locale.6
Alastair Northedge, states that the sources, when referring to the ‘palace’,
use either the term qaÒr, dar, or qa†i¨a.7 ¨Arib (d. 370/980) refers to the
caliphal complex of al-Muqtadir as dar, dar al-Muqtadir, dar al-khalifa,
dar al-Òul†an and on one or two occasions, qaÒr; al-Tanukhi (d. 384/994)
calls it al-dar or dar al-khalifa; Miskawayh (d. 420/1030) refers to it as
dar, dar al-Òul†an, or dar al-khilafa; and Hilal al-∑abiˆ (d. 448/1056)
refers to it as dar, dar al-khilafa or dar al- Òul†an and individual struc-
tures inside al-Muqtadir’s complex are called: qaÒr (al-Taj); khan (al-
Khayl), dar (al-Shajara) and al-jawsaq (al-MuÌdith).8
Starting with the reign of al-Mu¨tamid (256-279/870-892), the Îasani
palace built during the reign of Harun al-Rashid (170-193/786-809), came
to form the centre of a huge mass of buildings which were to form the
core of Dar al-Khilafa. Al-Mu¨ta∂id (279-289/892-902) built two palaces
called al-Thurayya and al-Firdaws and laid the foundations for a third,
QaÒr al-Taj. All three buildings stood on the Tigris bank, with great gar-
dens stretching to the back, enclosing many minor palaces within their

3
Whereas the archaeological material at Samarraˆ is rich, Baghdad provides no topo-
graphical evidence whatsoever. See M. ROGERS, Samarra: A Study in Medieval Town-
Planning, in: A.H. HOURANI and S.M. STERN (edd.), The Islamic City: A Colloquium,
Oxford, 1970, p. 119-155.
4
HILAL AL-∑ABIˆ, Rusum Dar al-Khilafa, ed. MIKHAˆIL ¨AWWAD, Baghdad, 1964, p. 6.
5
O. GRABAR, The Formation of Islamic Art, New Haven, 1987, p. 134.
6
J.L. BACHARACH, Administrative Complexes, Palaces and Citadels: Changes in the
Loci of Medieval Muslim Rule, in: I. BIERMAN et al. (edd.), The Ottoman City and its
Parts: Urban Structure and Social Order, New York, 1991, p. 111-128.
7
A. NORTHEDGE, The Palaces of the Abbasids at Samarra, in: CH. ROBINSON (ed.), A
Medieval Islamic City Reconsidered: an Interdisciplinary Approach to Samarraˆ, Oxford,
2001, p. 29-67.
8
¨ARIB, ∑ilat Taˆrikh al-™abari, ed. M. J. DE GOEJE, Leiden, 1897, p. 27, 64, 73, 88,
141, 148; AL-TANUKHI, al-Faraj ba¨da ’l-Shidda, ed. ¨ABBUD AL-SHALJI, IV, Beirut, 1978,
p. 361-362; MISKAWAYH, Tajarib al-Umam, ed. H. F. AMEDROZ, I, Oxford, 1920, p. 4-6,
8, 40; HILAL AL-∑ABIˆ, Rusum, p. 7 and 9. Lawrence Conrad has analyzed early references
to quÒur in L. CONRAD, The QuÒur of Medieval Islam: Some Implications for the Social
History of the Near East, in: Al-AbÌath 29 (1981), p. 7-23.
0902-08_Nawas_15_El Cheikh 02-08-2010 10:48 Pagina 321

THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 321

precincts. Al-Muqtadir enlarged al-Taj which became the principal

caliphal residence and which was linked by a subterranean passage to the
palace of al-Thurayya for the benefit of the harem women.9
By the time of al-Muqtadir, the caliphal residence had expanded into a
vast complex of palaces, public reception and banqueting halls, residential
quarters, prayer halls and mosques, baths, pavilions, sports grounds, plea-
sure and vegetable gardens, orchards and the like. It occupied an area
nearly a square mile in extent, surrounded by a wall with many gates.10 The
caliphal residence came to resemble a small city, deep within which the
caliph and his throne room were located, reached by a long route via gates,
courtyards, gardens, antechambers and reception halls.11
The configuration of these palaces, their internal organization, and their
ornamentation remains unknown. While archaeological information is insuf-
ficient, textual information is, according to Grabar, inadequate for ‘nowhere
do we read a description that can be translated into architectural forms’.12 The
literary sources are not informative about the interior disposition of the
¨Abbasid palaces of Baghdad in the early fourth/tenth century. The infor-
mation supplies us with the terminology used for parts of the palaces but it
is almost impossible to imagine these elements as actual physical buildings.13
The Dar al-Khilafa functioned simultaneously as a stage set for the
representation of caliphal power, as the administrative centre of a vast
empire and as a residence for the caliphal family. A general idea of what
the palaces of the caliph had come to be at this time in magnificence and
complexity can be gained from the descriptions of the reception granted
to the Byzantine ambassadors who visited al-Muqtadir in 305/917. Before
being introduced to the presence of the caliph who received them in the
palace of al-Taj, the envoys were shown the various buildings within the
precincts and these are said to have numbered twenty-three separate
palaces. They were taken to the palace known as Court of Horses, Khan
al-Khayl, which had a very large courtyard used for receptions during
feasts and for the reception of ambassadors.14 They proceeded next to the

9
G. LE STRANGE, Baghdad during the Abbasid Caliphate, Oxford, 1900, p. 252-255;
YAQUT, Mu¨jam al-Buldan, II, Beirut, 1956, p. 4.
10
LE STRANGE, Baghdad, p. 263.
11
D. FAIRCHILD RUGGLES, Gardens, Landscape, and Vision in the Palaces of Islamic
Spain, University Park, Pennsylvania, 2000, p. 88-90 and F. MICHEAU, Bagdad, in:
Grandes villes mediterranéennes du monde musulman mediéval, Rome, 2000, p. 87-112.
12
GRABAR, Formation, p. 158.
13
O. GRABAR, Palaces, Citadels and Fortifications, in: G. MICHELL (ed.), Architecture
of the Islamic World: Its History and Social Meaning, London, 1984, p. 65-79.
14
YAQUT, Mu¨jam al-Buldan, II, p. 419.
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322 N. M. EL CHEIKH

New Kiosk, and to a famous building erected by al-Muqtadir, Dar al-

Shajara, the Palace of the Tree, so called from the tree made of silver,
weighing 500,000 dirhams, which stood in it. They were then led to a
palace called QaÒr al-Firdaws and directed to the Court of the Ninety and
on and on until they were finally brought before al-Muqtadir in the palace
of al-Taj. Miskawayh has the following description of the Taj proper:
When they reached the Palace (al-dar) they were taken into a corridor which
led into one of the quadrangles, then they turned into another corridor which
led to a quadrangle wider than the first, and the chamberlains kept con-
ducting them through corridors and quadrangles until they were weary with
tramping and bewildered. These corridors and quadrangles were all crowded
with ghulman and khadam. Finally they approached the majlis in which al-
Muqtadir was to be found.15

This account points to the massive effort made to create an environment

which would overwhelm the visitor. The visitors were confused by its
complexity and astounded by its magnificence. The description reveals
the highly complex subdivision of spaces consisting of increasingly
secluded courts. The more deeply one penetrated into the heart of the
palace the closer one got to authority. According to Grabar, this highly
official ceremony underscores the notion of princely isolation and sepa-
rateness, a notion connected with the theme of the forbidding and for-
bidden palace consisting of a labyrinth of separate elements secretly and
mysteriously connected to each other.16 The passage from one court to
another served to establish a narrative which culminated in the audience
with the caliph himself.17 Similar conceptions can be detected in stories
about the Carolingian court which tell of how some Byzantine envoys
were very gradually ushered into Charlemagne’s presence through a series
of encounters with court officials all of whom were so grand that the
envoys mistook them for the king. Various levels of personnel ‘had to be
peeled off, as it were, before the king could be reached’.18

15
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 55; trans. H. F. AMEDROZ and D. S. MARGOLIOUTH, The
Eclipse of the Abbasid Caliphate, I, Oxford, 1921, I, p. 59. Account in AL-KHA†IB AL-
BAGHDADI, Taˆrikh Baghdad, I, Beirut, n.d, p. 101-105.
16
GRABAR, Formation, p. 164. In his description of the palace, Marmer states that the
palace complex was ‘a series of concentrically arranged areas, in which authority and inac-
cessibility increased the closer one approached to the caliph’s residence’. In: The Politi-
cal Culture of the Abbasid Court, p. 12
17
M. MILWRIGHT, Fixtures and Fittings. The Role of Decoration in Abbasid Palace
Design, in: A Medieval Islamic City Reconsidered, p. 79-109.
18
S. AIRLIE, The Palace of Memory: The Carolingian Court as Political Centre, in: S.
REES JONES et al. (ed.), Courts and Regions in Medieval Europe, York, 2000, p. 1-20. The
Dar al-Khilafa, like the Ottoman Topkapı, must have been experienced in a processional
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THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 323

In his commentary on the description of the Byzantine embassy, Grabar

points out that with the exception of only one hall, Bab al-¨Amma, all
other units were prepared for the occasion. In other words, al-Muqtadir’s
palace complex did not have functionally defined forms. Rather it was the
human activity which determined the function of a given space: ‘The
building was not a formal end in itself but a flexible support, a frame…
whose visible aspect could be modified to suit the need of the moment’.19
In the words of Marcus Milwright, ‘the creation of this elaborate fantasy
world’ took weeks of preparation and presumably involved the transport
of items such as tapestries, carpets, curtains, clothing, and gold and sil-
ver work from the treasury and other palaces. Other elements of the expe-
rience included displays of mechanical devices and exotic animals, the
deployment of massed ranks of soldiers and court officials, the use of
perfumes, and the careful orchestration of both sound and silence.20
The architecture of this complex was characterised by strictly delin-
eated boundaries between private and public, exteriors and interior, male
and female, and royal and non-royal. In his analysis of the palace com-
plex in Samarraˆ, Alastair Northedge identified the palace’s major com-
ponents: a public palace, the Dar al-¨Amma, with very little residential
accommodation which was the centre for official administrative func-
tions. On the south side there was a second highly decorated dome.
Northedge interprets this duality as public and private audience halls.
The public audience hall was used for public receptions and the private
audience hall for private conversations. The caliph and other notables
would have spent their day there eating, sleeping, being entertained,
receiving visitors, in addition to formal receptions and investitures.
North of Bab al-¨Amma is al-Jawsaq al-Khaqani, enclosed within a mas-
sive buttressed wall and which functioned as the private residence of the
caliph and his women.21
Marcus Milwright has pointed out that the design of the palace at
Samarraˆ was constrained by the practical, ceremonial and administrative

sequence through which, in the words of Gulru Necipoglu, its separate courts and seemingly
disjointed architectural elements were integrated into a cumulative coherent whole. Archi-
tecture, Ceremonial and Power: The Topkapi Palace in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Cen-
turies, Cambridge and London, 1991, p. xvi.
19
GRABAR, Formation, p. 162-3.
20
M. MILWRIGHT, Fixtures and Fittings. The Role of Decoration in Abbasid Palace
Design, in: A Medieval Islamic City Reconsidered, p. 79-109.
21
A. NORTHEDGE, An Interpretation of the Palace of the Caliph at Samarra (Dar al-
Khilafa or Jawsaq al-Khaqani), in: Ars Orientalis 23 (1993), p. 143-170 and The Palaces
of the Abbasids at Samarra, in: A Medieval Islamic City Reconsidered, 29-67.
0902-08_Nawas_15_El Cheikh 02-08-2010 10:48 Pagina 324

324 N. M. EL CHEIKH

functions performed by pre-modern palatial structures. The building

needed to provide a private residential area for the caliph and his family
and accommodation for the royal retinue, bodyguards and servants. Areas
had to be provided for a variety of occasions such as the reception of
dignitaries, the holding of religious festivals, and nightly entertainment by
musicians and poets in the company of boon companions. The palace
would have contained a mosque, a treasury, a diwan and a stable for ani-
mals.22
Very few references are made to the harem section of the palatial com-
plex in the literary sources. A rare description of the interior of the palace
of al-Muqtadir, specifically of the women’s quarters, is contained in the
fourth/tenth century adab work, al-Faraj ba¨da ’l-Shidda by al-Tanukhi.
A young cloth merchant was sneaked inside al-Muqtadir’s palace for an
interview with the caliph’s mother, one of whose stewardesses, qahra-
mana, he wished to marry. The merchant concealed himself inside a box
shipped inside the palace along with other boxes in which the qahramana
pretended to be bringing clothes and other effects to Umm al-Muqtadir.
The qahramana had to pass through numerous corridors, doors and apart-
ments. The young man managed to reach the harem quarters and meet
Umm al-Muqtadir the following day. He then exited the palace but, a
few days later, one of the qahramana’s servants came to instruct him to
proceed to Bab al-¨Amma on the day of the mawkib, when the caliph
receives officials of high rank, and had to wait there until an attendant
summoned him before the caliph. The young man followed the instruc-
tions. The caliph, sitting on his throne surrounded by judges, courtiers
(Ìasham) and the Hashemites received him and a judge pronounced the
marriage formula. The youth was taken to a sumptuously furnished apart-
ment and left there by himself. At the end of the day, feeling hungry, the
youth wandered about the empty apartments until he fell on the kitchen.23
This report contains information about the topography of the palace, the
various hallways and gateways, the meticulous security measures, respon-
sibility of the eunuch guardians, measures which, in the anecdote, pro-
voked repeatedly intense fear in the heart of the protagonist. Michael
Cooperson has argued that highlighting distinctions between public and
private space was one of the conditions of urban life that made certain

22
M. MILWRIGHT, Fixtures and Fittings. The Role of Decoration in Abbasid Palace
Design, in: A Medieval Islamic City Reconsidered, p. 79-109.
23
AL-TANUKHI, al-Faraj, IV, p. 362-368. See MUHSIN MAHDI, From History to Fic-
tion: The Tale Told by the King's Steward in the Thousand and One Night, in: The Thou-
sand and One Night in Arabic Literature and Society, Cambridge, 1997, p. 78-105.
0902-08_Nawas_15_El Cheikh 02-08-2010 10:48 Pagina 325

THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 325

narrative techniques possible and effective.24 However, my own interest

in the anecdote is that it accentuates the length in both spatial a tempo-
ral terms that was required to move within and between various parts of
the palace complex. The distance travelled until the harem was reached
has important implications on movement between the harem and the pub-
lic areas of the palace. Even within the latter, as the Byzantine ambas-
sadors’ visit reveals, distances could be forbidding since the ambassadors
had to repeatedly rest: ‘Because it was such a long tour, they sat down
and rested at seven particular places and were given water when they so
desired it’.25 Distances had the potential of affecting frequency of com-
munication and constituted a limiting factor for quick access to the caliph
and to those close to him and between the latter group and the caliph.
Al-Muqtadir lived in a great complex surrounded by his court and his
guards, removed from the population and any agitation. Entry was
reserved for a select group of individuals; that the rest could only imag-
ine the opulence within the palace walls added to the mystery enshroud-
ing the palace and increased the perception of distance separating the
caliph from his people.26
Space was a hierarchical and politically charged commodity. Palaces
consisted of a series of thresholds, each requiring higher degrees of sta-
tus or the caliph’s favour before they could be crossed. Control of entry
to his apartments enabled the caliph to establish a hierarchy of personal
favour. The most consistent identification of power lay in human uses
and associations, in the ways in which official ceremonies determined
the quality of otherwise unspecified forms as forms of power. In the
words of Grabar, ‘the very imprecision of the forms transformed the men
who served them-chamberlains, guards, slaves, eunuchs — into magi-
cians who could open secret doors and knew their ways in mazes’.27

THE COURT

The caliphal palace at Baghdad was the structure that defined the court
in a physical way. The palace was the setting for the court. But what was
the court and can one provide a definition that would apply to the

24
M. COOPERSON, Baghdad in Rhetoric and Narrative, in: Muqarnas 13 (1996), p. 99- 113.
25
AL-KHA™IB AL-BAGHDADI, Taˆrikh Baghdad, I, p. 104; trans. in J. LASSNER, The
Topography of Baghdad in the Early Middle Ages, Detroit, 1970, p. 90-91.
26
D. FAIRCHILD RUGGLES, Gardens, Landscape, p. 92.
27
O. GRABAR, Palaces, Citadels and Fortifications, in: Architecture of the Islamic
World, p. 65-79.
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326 N. M. EL CHEIKH

fourth/tenth century ¨Abbasid court? In their study of the Byzantine court,

Alexander P. Kazhdan and Michael McCormick state that ‘the court was
the human group physically closest to the emperor, a social world in
which the emperor’s household and his government overlapped, and a
social world structured by the emperor’s decisions’.28 The authors sur-
mised that it comprised the emperor’s friends, the middle-ranking bureau-
crats, stewards, housemen and porters who were the people who raised
the curtains at imperial audiences, heated the palace baths, and opened
and closed doors, both literally and figuratively. The same group included
the domestikos of each palace, the imperial goldsmiths, the lamplighters,
clock attendants etc. Next to them came the servants of the tables of the
emperor and empress.29 Stuart Airlie defines the Carolingian court as ‘the
king and his family and the personnel around them together with the insti-
tutions and buildings that housed, served, and very often, in their scale
and design, expressed the essence of the royal household’.30 In his study
of the European medieval courts Malcom Vale states that although the
term ‘court’ could carry different meanings, there is, however, ‘a broad
measure of agreement that a ruler’s household played a fundamental part
in giving substance to the idea of ‘the court’’.31 This definition concurs
with that of Norbert Elias who declared with reference to the French
court: ‘What we refer to as the court of the ancien regime is, to begin
with, nothing other than the vastly extended house and household of the
French kings and their dependants, with all the people belonging to
them’.32
How can one define the fourth/tenth century ¨Abbasid court? Like the
Byzantines, the ¨Abbasids did not isolate the court and courtliness as a
social and cultural phenomenon worthy of literary attention. Thus, they
did not really have a word for ‘court’ which is a word that comes from
the medieval West. Perhaps, as in Byzantium, court culture was a fact of
life which those who lived in it did not feel the need to articulate. 33

28
A.P. KAZHDAN and M. MCCORMICK, The Social World of the Byzantine Court, in: H.
MAGUIRE (ed.), Byzantine Court Culture from 829 to 1204, Washington, 1997, p. 167-197.
29
KAZHDAN and MCCORMICK, The Social World of the Byzantine Court, in: Byzantine
Court Culture, p. 167-179.
30
S. AIRLIE, The Palace of Memory: The Carolingian Court as Political Centre, In:
Courts and Regions in Medieval Europe, p. 1-20.
31
M. VALE, The Princely Court: Medieval Courts and Culture in North-West Europe,
1270-1380, Oxford, 2001, p. 15.
32
N. ELIAS, The Court Society, trans. E. JEPHCOTT, Oxford, 1983, p. 41.
33
P. MAGDALINO, In Search of the Byzantine Courtier: Leo Choirosphaktes and Con-
stantine Manasses, and KAZHDAN and MCCORMICK, The Social World of the Byzantine
Court, in: Byzantine Court, p. 141-165 and 167-197.
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THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 327

Modern Arab scholars have used the term bala† in reference to the
caliphal court. In his study of the third/ninth century ¨Abbasid caliph
Harun al-Rashid, Sa¨di Δannawi, for instance, tried to define the word
bala† stating that etymologically, it derives from both a Latin root and an
Arabic root. The Latin root is palatium, meaning qaÒr, palace. As for the
Arabic root, it derives from bala†a, a flagstone or slab stone which trans-
formed into bala† to signify a pavement or tiled floor; bala† was then
used for the palace.34 However, the meaning of qaÒr or palace, whatever
its derivation, is not found in the seventh thirteenth century lexicon of Ibn
ManÂur, Lisan al-¨Arab, which provides the meanings of slab stone and
pavement. The much later Taj al-¨Arus by al-Zabidi (d. 1205/1791) pro-
vides the following additional meaning for bala†: ‘dar al-bala† in Con-
stantinople was a prison for the captives [of the army] of Sayf al-Dalwa
b. Îamdan. Al-Mutanabbi has mentioned it in his poetry’. However this
meaning is Byzantine specific and there is no implication in al-Zabidi’s
meaning that bala† was used to refer to ¨Abbasid palaces.
Δannawi’s further inference is that the Arabic meaning for bala†
implies a human occupation for the space, for people to meet, hence is
equivalent to the ‘court’, to signify the human institution constituted of
the king, the courtiers (rijal al-Ìashiya), the employees (aÒÌab al-waÂaˆif),
the representatives of the tribes, including the udabaˆ, poets and others
who form part of a regular majlis.35 However, this latter derivation seems
to me unsupported by the sources. To my knowledge the sources that
refer to the fourth/tenth century do not use the term bala† in either of
these implied meanings. The term dar may come closer to this concep-
tion. Although the Lisan al-¨Arab does not include in its definitions of the
term dar any meaning that implies the idea of the court, dar is the term
which medieval authors use to refer to the caliphal palace complex. Some-
times it stands alone and sometimes it is used alongside another qualify-
ing term: Dar al-Khilafa or Dar al-∑ul†an. This word, dar, perhaps best
circumscribes the specific reality of the fourth/tenth century court since
it is the term used by contemporary sources to refer to the palace com-
plex of al-Muqtadir both physically and metaphorically: Dar al-Khilafa
not only in the sense of building structures but as the establishment sur-
rounding the emperor or ‘court.’
The term that most closely comes to describing the courtiers is al-
Ìashiya. In references to al-Muqtadir, ¨Arib includes statements such as:
34
SA¨DI ΔANNAWI, Mawsu¨at Harun al-Rashid, I, Beirut, 2001, p. 19-20.
35
Δannawi, Mawsu¨at Harun al-Rashid, I, p. 19-20.
36
¨ARIB, ∑ilat, p. 24 and 88.
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328 N. M. EL CHEIKH

‘his mother and others of his Ìashiya’; and ‘the reputation of al-Îallaj
spread among the Ìashiya’.36 In Tajarib al-Umam, Miskawayh mentions
that ¨Ali b. ¨Isa abolished increases which had been extended to all ranks
of the army, to al-khadam, to al-Ìashiya, and to all clerks (al-kuttab) and
employees (al-mutaÒarrifin). Al-Kha†ib al-Baghdadi states in his descrip-
tion of the Byzantine ambassadors at the court of al-Muqtadir that:
The chamberlains, their subordinates and al-Ìawashi were arranged accord-
ing to rank along the gates, corridors, passageways, courts and audience
rooms… the troops ranged from above Bab al-Shammasiya to the area lead-
ing to Dar al-Khilafa. After the troops…stood the Îujarite pages, and al-
khawaÒÒ al-dariya wa-l-barraniya.37

In his translation of this passage Jacob Lassner translates al-Ìawashi as

‘servants’ and al-khawaÒÒ al-dariya wa-l-barraniya as ‘the servants
attached to the building and the palace grounds’. Perhaps one way to dis-
tinguish between the two categories pertains to location. Al-Ìawashi are
inside the dar, in the corridors, passageways courts and audience rooms,
while the specific categories of khawaÒÒ mentioned in this passage are
located in the outer spaces of the buildings.
In their translation of Tajarib al-Umam, Amedroz and Margoliouth use
the terms retainers, attendants, court-attendants and court to translate the
term Ìashiya.38 They also use the word retainer to translate khawaÒÒ or
khaÒÒa. According to Roy Mottahedeh, sometimes the soldiers and sec-
retaries were lumped together as a common interest group, and were
called khaÒÒa/khawaÒÒ.39 Kamal ¨Abd al-La†if has indicated that the con-
cept of khaÒÒa, as it occurs in the adab al-sul†aniya discourse, does not
point to a particular social group; rather khaÒÒa refers to a number of cat-
egories or classes including the children of the ruler, his relatives, his ser-
vants and slaves, the ministers and secretaries, the officers and soldiers
and all of his aids.40
The khaÒÒa/khawaÒÒ of al-Muqtadir are singled out among those who
refused to partake in the conspiracy of Ibn al-Mu¨tazz. Miskawayh states:
‘There were present the commanders of the army, the heads of

37
AL-KHA†IB AL-BAGHDADI, Taˆrikh Baghdad, I, p. 100. Trans. in J. LASSNER, The
Topography of Baghdad, p. 86-87.
38
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 5-6 and 29; Eclipse, I, p. 6 and 32.
39
IBN AL-ATHIR, al-Kamil fi al-Taˆrikh, ed. C. J. TORNBERG, VIII, Beirut, 1979, p. 15;
R. MOTTAHEDEH, Loyalty and Leadership in an Early Islamic Society, London, 2001,
p. 115.
40
KAMAL ¨ABD AL-LA†IF, Fi TashriÌ UÒul al-Istibdad: Qiraˆa fi NiÂam al-Adab al-Sul-
taniyya, Beirut, 1999, p. 200.
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THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 329

bureaux…the judges and notables (wujuh al-nas), with the exception of

Abu ’l-Îasan b. al-Furat and the khawaÒÒ of al-Muqtadir’.41 One way of
defining the term is by exclusion: The term would thus exclude the
groups that appear on this list. In the translation of this particular passage
Amedroz and Margoliouth translate khawaÒÒ as ‘the persons attached to
al-Muqtadir’. That the two terms khawaÒÒ and Ìawashi are distinct and
define different categories of people seems clear in al-∑abiˆ’s text where
it is stated that al-khawaÒÒ and al-Ìawashi paid official visits to the
vizier.42 One passage is particularly useful is making a distinction between
the two terms: ‘¨Ali b. ¨Isa made himself disliked by al-khaÒÒa, al-¨amma
and al-Ìashiya’. These terms are translated by Amedroz and Margoliouth
as courtiers, the public and the retinue respectively.43 In yet another pas-
sage, ‘Ali b. ‘Isa is said to have been appalled by the misconduct of al-
Ìashiya, this time translated by Amedroz and Margoliouth as courtiers.44
The two terms, khaÒÒa and Ìashiya, are often interchangeable in the trans-
lation of Tajarib al-Umam, although the text appears to create a distinc-
tion between them.
The term al-Ìasham seems to be a sub-category of al-Ìashiya. The
young man in love with the qahramana, mentioned above, appears in
front of the caliph who was sitting on his throne surrounded by judges,
al-Ìasham and the Hashemites.45 In one passage Miskawayh states that
Ibn al-Furat proceeded to examine ¨Ali b. ¨Isa with references to the
allowances of the Ìashiya: ‘You, he said, in the five years of your admin-
istration, reduced the allowances of the Ìarim, the princes, al-Ìasham
and the horsemen’. In his defence, ¨Ali b. ¨Isa answered: ‘Your plan for
meeting expenditure was to transfer sums from the private to the public
treasury, thereby pleasing the Ìashiya…’ From this passage it would seem
that the term al-Ìashiya is inclusive of the Ìarim, the princes, the Ìasham
and the horsemen. In their translation of this passage, Amedroz and Mar-
goliouth use the term ‘attendant’ to translate Ìasham and the term ‘court’
to translate Ìashiya.46 In yet another passage, an ally of Ibn al-Furat, Ibn
Farjawayh, was sending letters to the caliph calling attention to delays in
the payment of salaries to the royal children, the members of the Ìarim
and the Ìasham.47
41
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 5.
42
HILAL AL-∑ABIˆ, Kitab TuÌfat al-Umaraˆ fi Taˆrikh al-Wuzaraˆ, Beirut, 1904, p. 268.
43
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 32; Eclipse, I, p. 36.
44
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 40; Eclipse, I, p. 45.
45
AL-TANUKHI, al-Faraj, IV, p. 362-368.
46
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 108; Eclipse, I, p. 120-1.
47
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 43.
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330 N. M. EL CHEIKH

Another term often translated as ‘courtier’ is that of jalis (pl. julasaˆ).

This is how Marius Canard translates it: ‘Ra∂i ne pensa à aucun de ses
courtisans (aÌad min-a ’l-julasaˆ) et ne donna aucune réception (wa la jal-
isa)’; and ‘…il était l’homme le plus genereux et le plus aimable avec
ses courtisans (julasa’)’.48 A term which is also used seemingly as a syn-
onym for Ìashiya is bi†ana, although it mostly appears in the adab al-
sul†aniya genre.49
The budget statement prepared by ¨Ali b. ¨Isa for the year 306/918 may
provide some help in trying to specify the categories of people who
formed the ‘court personnel’: For the Turks, in the private and public
kitchens, for the feeding of the animals, the monthly allowance prescribed
to Umm al-Muqtadir, to the princes, to the female relatives and to the ser-
vants; the allowance for those in charge of the animals in the various sta-
bles… the allocations for all those connected with the coppers of the sad-
dles; for the men managing the river boats of the distinguished men of
state and those managing the four river boats of the residence… the
salaries paid to al-julasaˆ and to others in their categories; salaries for the
Ìujari ghilman.50
Another list is provided by Miskawayh who states that during his sec-
ond vizierate, ¨Ali adopted strict measures. He reduced the allowance of
the eunuchs (al-khadam), al-Ìasham, al-julasaˆ, the table-companions
(al-nudamaˆ), the minstrels (al-mughannin), the purveyors (al-tujjar), the
intercessors (aÒÌab al-shafaˆat) and those of the retainers (ghilman) and
the dependants of the heads of bureaux (asbab aÒÌab al-dawawin).51 Evi-
dently large categories of people were implicated making it quite diffi-
cult to determine the boundaries between the different categories of
courtiers, retinue and bureaucrats.
Several terms were thus used in the texts to refer to the human group
that surrounded the ruler and which played a political role by assuming
certain functions and positions or, indirectly, through partaking in the
majlis of the ruler where they carried out their role in giving advice. ¨Izz
al-Din al-¨Allam lists the following seemingly synonymous terms in his
discussion of the literary genre of al-adab al-sul†aniya: Ìashiya, khaÒÒa,

48
AL-∑ULI, Akhbar al-Ra∂i bi-llah wa-l-Muttaqi bi-llah, ed. J. HEYWORTH DUNNE,
Cairo, 1935, p. 7 and 19; trans. by M. CANARD, Akhbar ar-Ra∂i billah wa’l-Muttaqi bil-
lah, I, Algiers, 1946, p. 58 and 68.
49
MUÎAMMAD B. ÎARITH AL-THA¨LABI, Kitab Akhlaq al-Muluk (previously attributed
to al-JaÌiÂ), ed. Khalil ¨A†iya, Beirut, 2003, p. 45, 50, 70, 153.
50
Rusum, p. 21-25; trans. p. 23-25.
51
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 152; Eclipse, I, p. 170.
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THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 331

bi†ana, a¨wan, atba¨, khaÒÒat-al-khaÒÒa. The authors of these texts do not

display great interest in apprehending these terms conceptually as they fail
to elucidate the nature of the tasks for each position or function.52 There
is, again, a lack of clarity as to what these terms exactly mean in the var-
ious contexts in which they appear. The ways in which these terms were
used in the texts and the ways in which they have been translated mask
a confusion and an imprecise conceptual understanding of the terms and
of the categories implied. The specific categories and sub-categories need
to be more clearly explicated, delineated and defined if one it to reach a
definition as well as a conceptual understanding of court and courtier in
this ¨Abbasid context. Given this ambiguity how can one define the term
courtiers? Are the courtiers the Ìawashi or the khawaÒÒ or both? Are the
courtiers specific individuals drawn from either groups and fluctuating
with the fluctuation of the caliph’s whims?
The inhabitants of Dar al-Khilafa numbered by the thousands. A great
many of these were servants, gardeners, stable-boys, and specialised crafts-
men of various kinds who saw to the daily upkeep of the place and its
grounds. They made the Dar al-Khilafa routine practical by their physical
labour so that the menageries, the ships on the canal should be ready at a
moment’s notice, that meals and receptions should be properly prepared.53
According to Adam Mez, at the time of al-Mu¨ta∂id (279-289/892-901)
the court establishment consisted of: the princes of the caliph’s house; the
palace-staff including white and black slaves; freedmen; the guards, the
private secretaries, Qurˆan readers, muezzins, astronomers, officers-in-
charge of the clocks, story-tellers, jesters, couriers, standard-bearers, drum-
mers, trumpeters, water-carriers, workmen from goldsmiths to carpenters
and saddlers; hunters, menagerie-keepers, valets-de-chambre, cooks, physi-
cians, lamp-lighters… and the ladies.54 Al-Muqtadir’s court establishment
was even more elaborate. Indeed, by the fourth/tenth century, the caliphal
court had greatly expanded reaching, in the words of Sourdel, frightening
proportions.55 Hilal al-∑abiˆ states that:

52
¨IZZ AL-DIN AL-¨ALLAM, al-Sul†a wa-l-Siyasa fi ˆl-Adab al-Sul†ani, n. p., 1991, p. 95-99.
53
It has been estimated that those who lived at Versailles, in the palace or outside, with
employment or residence at court, numbered some 25,000. R. HATTON, Louis XIV: At the
Court of the Sun King, in: G. DICKENS (ed.), The Courts of Europe: Politics, Patronage
and Royalty, 1400-1800, London, 1977, p. 233-261.
54
A. MEZ, The Renaissance of Islam, London, 1937, p. 141-2; on the institution of the
boon-companion, nadim, which became important and influential in the third/ninth and
fourth/tenth century see A. CHEJNE, The Boon-Companion in Early ¨Abbasid Times, in:
Journal of the American Oriental Society 85 (1965), p. 327-335.
55
D. SOURDEL, Le vizirat ¨abbaside, II, Damascus, 1960, p. 669-670.
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332 N. M. EL CHEIKH

It is generally believed that in the days of al-Muqtadir bi-llah … the resi-

dence contained 11,000 servants — 7,000 blacks and 4,000 white Slavs —
4,000 free and slave girls and thousands of chamber servants.56

Al-∑abiˆ adds that the residence also contained farms and farmers, private
livestock and four hundred baths for its inhabitants (ahliha) and retinue
(Ìawashiha).57 Thus, a distinction is made here between the household
and the retinue. Another distinction is between household and retinue on
the one hand (serving the ruler) and the bureaucracy (serving the state)
on the other. This distinction between serving the ruler and serving the
state tended to be blurred, however. There was an overlap of functions
that makes it difficult to establish a division between the administration
and those attendant on the caliph’s person.
The interconnection between the two spheres was linked to the fact that
the caliph was, in theory, and usually in practice, the ultimate source of
authority and, therefore, a large part of the business of government was
determined by the politics of intimacy. Indeed, the real criterion for mem-
bership of the court was access to the caliph. Proximity to the caliph was
one sure way of building a power-base at court. Access was closed to all
but a handful of staff. It is important to point out that those who had such
access did not belong necessarily to the household, whereas many house-
hold members of lower station were excluded from access to the ruler.
Regardless of the actual distribution of the various elements, perhaps
one can posit that the court enclosed the caliph by limiting access to him
to a select and favoured entourage. Everything to and from the caliph
had to pass through the filter of this entourage before it could reach him.
The caliph could exert influence only through the mediation of people
closest to him. For the general subject the caliph was in practice not easy
of access. He was always surrounded by those ‘known at court’.58 Prox-
imity had real advantages. Those ‘known at court’ had the privilege of
presenting petitions to the caliph, for introducing someone to the caliph
or to an influential personality at the court. The personal attendants were
feared as men near about the caliph, men who could exercise profound
influence over him. They deployed the power of intimacy or the politics
of intimacy on the public stage. The court experienced the politics of
manipulation acutely. At the same time, the caliph found himself
enmeshed in specific networks of interdependences.
56
Rusum, p. 8, trans., p. 14.
57
Rusum, p. 7-8; trans., p. 13.
58
HATTON, Louis XIV: At the Court of the Sun King, in: The Courts of Europe, p. 233-
261.
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THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 333

Ultimately, access to the caliph was what mattered. The history of the
court is, to a large extent, the history of those who enjoyed that access.
What were the rewards of access? How influential were the ‘persons
known at court? What part did they play in the factional struggles to
place men and dictate politics? The example of the harem stewardesses
or qahramanas, is a case in point as they managed to forge alliances with
powerful and influential people through their intercession with the caliph
and his mother. Acting as messengers between the harem and the court
since they had the privilege of going in and out of the palace, their lever-
age was great and their exercise of political power real as exemplified by
the qahramana Zaydan who was attached directly to al-Muqtadir. Pris-
oners of state of high rank were committed to the custody of the qahra-
mana Zaydan for mild incarceration in the caliphal complex. Her role as
jailer allowed Zaydan to come into contact with influential persons, indi-
viduals who had temporarily fallen out of favour but who had the poten-
tial to rise to power and influence once again. Her exclusive access to
these important personalities, her ability to act as a mediator between her
prisoners and the caliph provided her with important leverage and allowed
her to develop a web of influence built on past favours and moral debt.
This was certainly the case with the famous vizier Ibn al-Furat who was
put in the custody of Zaydan.
Al-Muqtadir deliberated much about Ibn al-Furat, at times craving after his
money, at others, disliking the thought of his dying in Îamid’s hands.
Zaydan the stewardess, having ascertained this of al-Muqtadir's mind told
Ibn al-Furat…59

Zaydan, thus, communicated to Ibn al-Furat al-Muqtadir’s predisposi-

tions towards him. Consequently, Ibn al-Furat decided to pay the required
fine. Ibn al-Furat’s dependence on the intercession of Zaydan was com-
mented upon by his successor to the vizierate, Îamid who told him: ‘you
depended on the qahramana... to plead your case and defend you…’.60
Upon his re-appointment to the vizierate, Ibn al-Furat bestowed fiefs upon
Zaydan in the region of Kaskar on the Tigris as well as proceeds from
yields in Basra.61 The relationship between Ibn al-Furat and Zaydan was
to remain good for the remaining of his life. Al-∑abiˆ mentions that, in
his correspondence, Ibn al-Furat used to address Zaydan as ‘my sister’.62

59 MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 66; Eclipse, I, p. 72.

60
AL-∑ABIˆ, al-Wuzaraˆ, p. 91.
61
AL-∑ABIˆ, al-Wuzaraˆ, p. 31.
62
AL-∑ABIˆ, al-Wuzaraˆ, p. 153. See my The Qahramana in the ¨Abbasid Court: Posi-
tion and Functions, Studia Islamica, 97 (2003), 41-55.
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334 N. M. EL CHEIKH

The personal attendants built a career of pleasing the caliph on a daily

basis. They were, naturally, subject to greater fluctuations in favour and
disfavour. Rusum Dar al-Khilafa warns the chamberlains in the follow-
ing way:
Beware of arguing with the sultan when he is angry or of urging him to
leniency when he is obstinate … Try to avoid him when you detect his
wrath mounting. Wait to present your excuse … until his anger is calmed
… guard against the temptation of speech. Let your answer about matters
with risky consequences be more of a hint than a direct expression; more
of the probable than of the definite. It is easier for you to say what you have
not said than to retract what you have already uttered … Beware of exces-
sive informality with the sultan … If he gives you a gift do not disparage
it, and if he performs a good deed towards you do not belittle it. Do not com-
plain … do not persist … be thankful … be patient …63

But while they might routinely endure personal abuse, they could also
receive rich rewards from proximity. The pensions and wages of those
close to the caliph became part and parcel of the political strategising
that the viziers and potential viziers had to follow since winning over
the courtiers was of primordial importance. Court society’s complex
structure of personal and institutional allegiances were cemented by tips
and gratification. We know that the eunuch MufliÌ was granted
allowances, fiefs and gifts.64 They and others like them could have had
income from land-grants and also income that came from salaries,
grants, kickbacks, or gifts associated with court life and which formed
a substantial component of their revenues. These servants in turn rein-
forced the ties binding them to the rest of the court through their own
largesse.
Indeed, the ‘court’ was never a single entity, nor did it offer a single
route to favour, patronage, or power. In reality, the caliph’s mother, his
influential servants, and his military commanders fostered a series of sub-
ordinate patronage networks. Umm al-Muqtadir had her own retinue, sec-
retaries, and other officials who all formed a formidable network of
patronage. Her qahramana Umm Musa became herself a locus of such a
major patronage network that she became a real threat to the caliph’s
mother and to the caliph himself. The vizier Ibn al-Furat also had his
own micro-court. During the visit of the Byzantine ambassadors, they
were first made to visit the palace which the vizier Ibn al-Furat occupied
in al-Mukharrim. Instructions were given that:

63
Rusum, p. 70-1.
64
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 87 and 155-6.
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THE ‘COURT’ OF AL-MUQTADIR 335

[h]is own retainers and troops with the vice-chamberlains posted in his
palace should form a line from the doorway of the palace to the reception
room. A vast saloon with gilt roof in the wing of the palace called Dar al-
Bustan was splendidly furnished…the vizier himself sat on a splendid pray-
ing carpet, with a lofty throne behind him, with serving men (al-khadam)
in front and behind, to the right and to the left, while the saloon was filled
with military and civil officials.65

Thus, there was a sequence of subsidiary ‘courts’ that could act as rival
foci of policy and patronage.66 The influential courtiers and the mem-
bers of the household not only advanced themselves but promoted oth-
ers. The court and the patronage networks based at the court comple-
mented government by bureaucratic institutions. All of this demands a
subtler analysis of court politics as it concealed a diversity of foyers
competing for power. Of course court politics remained on one level a
politics of access and the ruler almost invariably continued to be the
one to whom access was most keenly sought. But he was not the sole
focus of the courtiers’ attention or the only agent through which busi-
ness could be done.67

Rather that presenting a clear definition of the ¨Abbasid court, this

article has revealed the ambiguities surrounding this concept. The Ency-
clopaedia of Islam reflects this confusion and uncertainty. The entry on
‘Ìashiya’ is briefly defined as ‘the entourage of the ruler’ and refers the
reader to the entry on ‘QaÒr’ which in turn refers the reader to the entry
on ‘Bala†’. However, this last entry does not explain in any way the
term Ìashiya. The Arabic terminology used in the medieval texts is
vague and equivocal. Navigating between Ìashiya/Ìawashi, Ìasham,
khaÒÒa/khawaÒÒ, to mean, in a variety of contexts, attendant, court atten-
dant, courtier, servants, the terminology does not translate adequately
into any clear definition of court and courtier. The ambiguity of our
sources is, of course, telling: The court was not an institution in any
formal sense but rather a gathering of people, often fluid in composition
and constantly changing. Ample work still needs to be carried out in

65
MISKAWAYH, Tajarib, I, p. 53-4; trans. Eclipse, I, p. 57.
66
John Adamson defines the court of the ancien regime as a ‘polycentric entity’. J.
ADAMSON, The Making of the Ancien-Regime Court 1500-1700, in: The Princely Courts
of Europe, p. 7-41 and 314-320.
67
See R.J.W. Evans in his discussion of European courts in R.J.W. EVANS, The Court:
A Protean Institution and an Elusive Subject, in: R.G. ASCH and A.M. BIRKE (edd.),
Princes, Patronage, and the Nobility: The Court at the Beginning of the Modern Age c.
1450-1650, Oxford, 1991, p. 481-491.
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336 N. M. EL CHEIKH

order to come to a clearer definition as to who were the individuals and

groups concerned and implied in particular contexts and to arrive to an
approximation of the conception and meaning of court and courtiers in
the ¨Abbasid context.

NADIA MARIA EL CHEIKH

American University of Beirut