User:Al Ameer son/Banu Ja'far

Pre-Islamic period

Between 550 and 630, the Ja'far stood out as the most prominent of the ten divisions of the Banu Kilab, and the Banu Amir in general, in military prowess and energy. They were the leading house of the Banu Amir for most of this period, exercising "some vague authority over the Kilab", in the words of the historian Werner Caskel. Before the mid-6th century, the tribes of central northern Arabia, generally grouped together under the Qays confederacy, had been under the sway of the Kindite kings. As Kindite dominance faded around the mid-6th century, the Qays came under the supremacy of Zuhayr ibn Jadhima of the Banu Abs, who had the support of the Lakhmid kings of al-Hira in Iraq. The Abs were a clan of the Ghatafan, which, together with the Hawazin (parent tribe of the Banu Amir), accounted for most of the Qays. Zuhayr's rule was considered oppressive by the Hawazin, moving Khalid ibn Ja'far, a son of the Ja'far's eponymous progenitor, to assassinate Zuhayr. Khalid thereafter became the head of the Hawazin, which separated from the Qaysi confederacy, and gained the Lakhmids' favor.

Conflict with the Tamim

At an uncertain point after the Hawazin's break with Ghatafan, Khalid led a raid against the Banu Murra clan of Ghatafan, in which its chief was slain. In turn, the chief's son assassinated Khalid in the 560s. Khalid's killer gained protection from part of the Tamim, led by Laqit ibn Zurara, provoking the ire of the Banu Amir. Khalid's brother and successor, al-Ahwas ibn Ja'far, led an attack against the Tamim at the battle of Rahrahan and captured Laqit's brother, who soon after died in captivity. In revenge, Laqit gathered a coalition of the Tamim, the Banu Dhubyan of Ghatafan, the Banu Asad, and contingents from the Kindite rulers of Bahrayn and the Lakhmid king al-Mundhir IV (r. 575–580). In the ensuing battle of Shi'b Jabala, the Banu Amir and Abs under al-Ahwas repulsed Laqit and achieved a decisive victory. The battle was one of the three most famous ayyam ('battle days') of the pre-Islamic Arabs, and the historian Franz Krenkow called it "the most remarkable deed recorded of the Kilāb". It weakened Kindite power in northern Arabia and led to the eventual Kindite migration to the Hadramawt. The battle took place sometime between 550 and 582.

Relations with the Lakhmids

At the beginning of the Lakhmid king al-Nu'man III's reign (r. 582–602), a delegation from the Ja'far arrived at al-Nu'man's court in al-Hira to gain favor for their tribe, at a time when the king was a friend and drinking companion of al-Rabi ibn Ziyad, a chief of the Abs and enemy of the Ja'far. The delegation was led by Abu Bara Amir ibn Malik, the nephew and successor of al-Ahwas. Al-Rabi influenced al-Nu'man against the Ja'far, prompting Abu Bara's nephew, the future celebrated poet Labid ibn Rabi'a ibn Malik, to recite his first known poem, a rajaz (prosody), in which he humiliated al-Rabi. In reaction, al-Nu'man expelled al-Rabi from his court in disgrace and granted the Ja'far unspecified requests. In the words of the historian Charles James Lyall, "the members of this illustrious family [the Ja'far] were fully conscious of its eminence". In Labid's rajaz before al-Nu'man's court he proclaimed:

We are the best of ʿĀmir son of Ṣaʿṣaʿah;
We feast our guests on platters ever full,
And smite the heads beneath the battle-din.

The Hawazin's relations with the Lakhmid kings were mainly predicated on transporting goods from al-Hira to the annual fair at Ukaz in the Hejaz (western Arabia), for which they were given a part of the profits. In an unspecified year before 585, the Banu Amir had attacked one of al-Nu'man's caravans on its way to Ukaz, prompting the king to dispatch a punitive expedition against the tribe. During the confrontation that followed, Abu Bara and Yazid ibn al-Sa'iq led their tribe to a decisive victory. Individual tribesmen or clans of the Hawazin at times partook in Lakhmid raids in the Najd, where the kings of al-Hira could typically not enter without escorts from the Hawazin or their allies, the Sulaym. During the early part of al-Nu'man's reign, the Qushayr clan of the Kilab's brother tribe of Ka'b, seized the king's caravan after the king had been compelled to flee from an incoming Sasanian Persian army. When another clan of the Ka'b, the Uqayl, demanded the Qushayr split the booty, fighting ensued between the two clans until a Kilabi chief, Abu Bara's brother Mu'awiya ibn Malik, arbitrated the dispute. Mu'awiya boasted of his household and its leadership position in verse:

A man am I of famous company, active in all good works, whose glory is high of head, inherited from our fathers:
... We render to the tribe all that is due and fitting: and we pardon its offenses against us, and [are admitted by all to be] its chiefs.
And when the tribe loads its burdens upon us, we stand up therewith and bear them: and when it repeats the load, we bear it yet again.

Fijar War

The ambushing and killing of the Ja'far leader Urwa al-Rahhal as he escorted the Lakhmid caravan to Ukaz sparked a series of battles between the Hawazin, under Abu Bara, and the Quraysh. This conflict took place over four years, and is known as the Fijar Wars. Urwa's killer was an ally of the Qurayshite chief Harb ibn Umayya, but the Quraysh also had close relations with the Kilab. Both tribes belonged to the Hums, a socio-economic and religious pact including a number of tribes living in the Haram (the area around Mecca considered inviolable by the Arabs). The Kilab and the Ka'b did not live within the Haram and owed their membership to their maternal Qurayshite descent. Abu Bara's and the Kilab's participation in the Fijar Wars was restricted to the first battle, in which they pursued the Quraysh from Ukaz and bested them at Nakhla, on their retreat to Mecca. When the Quraysh crossed into the Haram, the Kilab halted their pursuit in fear of violating its sanctity.

Modern historians have generally assessed that the Fijar War was related to the Quraysh's attempts to close the caravan route between al-Hira and Yemen through Ta'if, a town which commercially rivaled Mecca, or to redirect the route through Mecca. This assessment was questioned by Ella Landau-Tasseron, who posited that the Banu Amir and the Quraysh had been mutually interested in gaining greater, joint control of the annual Lakhmid caravans to Yemen. Moreover, the Ja'far and the Quraysh were both seen as enemies by the Bakr ibn Abd Manat, the branch of the Kinana to which Urwa's killer belonged. The animosity of the Bakr ibn Abd Manat toward the Ja'far stemmed from the canceling of a protection covenant by Abu Bara's brother al-Tufayl; the Bakr ibn Abd Manat had entered al-Tufayl's protection in Najd after the Quraysh had expelled them from Mecca. In the years preceding the Fijar War the Bakr ibn Abd Manat attempted to obtain commissions from the Lakhmids to guard their caravans. Although the killing of Urwa had been against the interests of the Kilab and the Quraysh, the latter were compelled to fight due to the Kilab's intent on blood revenge against the Qurayshite confederates of Urwa's killer. The Kilab's limited participation in the ensuing war may have reflected their desire not to breach the Hums pact.

Rivalry with the Abu Bakr division

The cohesion of the Kilab in the pre-Islamic period was particularly strong. Although its internal unity generally held in the face of external challenges, there was a recurring rivalry between the Ja'far and the larger Abu Bakr division for leadership of the tribe. Ja'far leadership took a blow after the Kilab was routed and dispersed by the Dhubyan, as the Ja'far became isolated from its brother tribes. This contributed to their subsequent exile to the protection of the Balharith in Najran, which Caskel attributes to the machinations of the Abu Bakr chief, Jawwab Malik ibn Ka'b. The incident which triggered their exodus was the killing of Urwa al-Rahhal's son by a member of the Ghani, and the Ja'far's rejection of the Ghani's payment of blood money, as they regarded the Ghani to be of lesser status; in the resulting tension, the Ghani allied with the Abu Bakr.

The Banu Amir, under the leadership of the Abu Bakr, were soon after routed by an alliance of rival tribes in the battle of al-Nisar. In the subsequent peace settlement, the Banu Amir surrendered half of their property to the victors in return for their captive women. The Ja'far, under Abu Bara, were absent from the battle due to their exodus, but soon after reconciled with the Abu Bakr and their preeminent position in the tribe was restored. The Ja'far's return followed Abu Bara's rejection of a Balharith proposal for a marriage alliance, which he considered tantamount to reducing the Ja'far to a satellite clan of the Balharith. The Ja'far settled the old dispute with the Ghani when the Abu Bakr paid the blood money they owed.

There may have been a second occasion in which the Ja'far left the Kilab, allied with the Balharith, and were replaced by the Abu Bakr as the tribe's leading house. On that occasion, in revenge for the death of an Abu Bakr man slain by the Asad, the Abu Bakr killed an Asad man protected by the Ja'far. Although the Abu Bakr paid the blood money, angry members of the Ja'far took captive a man of the Abu Bakr and humiliated him in captivity. The ensuing tensions between the two Kilabi houses caused the Ja'far's second exodus to Najran. The conflict was eventually settled, and the Ja'far returned to the Banu Amir. In an earlier stage of the dispute, a son of al-Ahwas appealed to the Abu Bakr in verse, offering his son Da'b as a hostage for them to humiliate:

Take Daʾb in exchange for the wrong that I have done you—you have no superiority over Daʾb:
for among those not of royal race none has superiority over us; and among your kinsmen you can find equality in bloodwite.

Later battles with the Ghatafan

In the last decade of the 6th century, the Banu Amir under Ja'far leadership launched a raid against the Murra and Fazara clans of Ghatafan in their abode in Wadi al-Raqam. The Banu Amir attempted to escape with the booty they had captured, as the Murra and Fazara horsemen pursued them. The Banu Amir's horses were slow due to exhaustion, and the Ghatafan clans had the advantage of fighting on their own terrain. The main body of the Banu Amir ended trapped between enemy tribesmen. A son of al-Tufayl and two grandsons of al-Ahwas were slain, and dozens of Banu Amir captives were executed in revenge for previous killings of Ghatafan tribesmen.

Soon afterward, the Dhubyan raided the Banu Amir at a place called Sahuq and captured a large number of their camels. The Banu Amir pursued the Dhubyan and in the ensuing fight were defeated and forced to retreat. Another son of al-Tufayl became separated from the tribe and hanged himself presumably to avoid death by thirst or torture at the hands of the Dhubyan. His death was satirized by the Ghatafani poets Salama ibn Khurshub al-Anmari and Urwa ibn al-Ward al-Absi. In a later battle, the Day of al-Batha'a, a son of al-Tufayl and a son of Abu Bara were killed in an abortive raid by the Banu Amir against the Abs. According to Lyall, the poetry of Amir ibn al-Tufayl indicated that there were many more battles between the Banu Amir and Ghatafan, with outcomes more favorable for the former, but details were not provided by the sources.

Islamic period

Expedition of Bir Ma'una

Main article: Expedition of Bir Maona

The Banu Amir had developed a reputation for military prowess in Arabia by the time the Islamic prophet Muhammad began his teachings in Mecca in the early 7th century. Despite their close ties with the Quraysh, which opposed Muhammad, the Banu Amir remained on generally peaceful terms with the nascent Muslim community; they had a mutual opponent in the Ghatafan tribes. In July 625 a party of Muslims dispatched by Muhammad to the Najd were killed at Bir Ma'una, a watering place, by Bedouin tribesmen. The traditional Islamic accounts of the event are contradictory, differing on the Muslim expedition's peaceful or military character, its aim, and the composition of the involved parties.

The expedition to the Najd had been prompted by a meeting between Abu Bara and Muhammad, where the former had declined the latter's invitation to embrace Islam, but proposed to Muhammad that a Muslim deputation be sent to proselytize in the Najd under Abu Bara's protection. The historian M. J. Kister concluded that Abu Bara, an elderly man by then, had sought to buttress his position within the tribe by backing Muhammad, but without embracing Islam. Muhammad had sought to win over at least part of the powerful Banu Amir, particularly following his military setback against his Quraysh enemies at the Battle of Uhud four months prior.

Although Abu Bara and his son, Rabi'a, promised the Muslims the protection of their tribe, the Muslims were attacked upon encountering the tribesmen of the Sulaym at Bir Ma'una, where the Sulaym encamped under the Kilab's protection. Amir ibn al-Tufayl and his cousin, Jabbar ibn Sulma, a grandson of Abu Bara, were the only two Kilabi tribesmen mentioned by name as participants in the Bedouin party. The sources generally implicate Amir ibn al-Tufayl with leading the Sulaymi assault against the Muslims. Kister placed the Sulaymi chief Anas ibn al-Abbas al-Ri'li, who sought to avenge the slaying of his nephew by the Muslims at the Battle of Badr in 624, as the assault's overall leader, but did not discount that Amir ibn al-Tufayl approved or participated in the assault.

The survivors of the attack killed two men of the Kilab on their return to Medina in revenge, prompting Muhammad to offer Abu Bara blood money for their slayings, which were judged to be illicit. Abu Bara's cooperation with Muhammad was largely seen as an aberration by the Banu Amir, and cost him his pre-eminent position in the tribe. Not long after, Abu Bara died, and was succeeded by Amir ibn al-Tufayl as leader of the Ja'far.

Under Muhammad, the Rashidun and the Umayyads

Relations between the Banu Amir and the Muslims remained peaceful despite the Bir Ma'una incident, but tensions followed Muhammad's calls for a religious union of the Muslims and the nomadic tribes. Amir ibn al-Tufayl and his cousin, Arbad ibn Qays, a grandson of Khalid ibn Ja'far, are held by the traditional Muslim sources to have negotiated their tribe's membership in the Muslim community with Muhammad in his capital at Medina in September/October 629, but with no result. The two Kilabi chiefs died soon after. Amir ibn al-Tufayl was succeeded as leader of the tribe by his cousin and rival, Alqama ibn Ulatha. Alqama converted to Islam, the first among the Banu Amir to do so. Other members of the Ja'far who are recorded in the Kilabi delegations to Muhammad were Labid and Jabbar ibn Sulma. An agreement was reached and Labid converted to Islam.

Alqama left Islam before or soon after the death of Muhammad in 632. He was targeted in an expedition by Khalid ibn al-Walid, and consequently declared his Muslim faith and made peace with Abu Bakr. Alqama may have been appointed the governor of the Hauran, a region in southern Syria, by Caliph Umar (r. 634–644).

During Mu'awiya's caliphate (661–680), the chief of the Ja'far was Abd Allah ibn Bishr, a grandson of Abu Bara. He was involved in a dispute of an unspecified nature with the chief of the Abu Bakr, Abd al-Aziz ibn Zurara ibn Jaz. The latter was slain in the army of Mu'awiya's son and future successor Yazid I, during a campaign against the Byzantines in 669. The caliph Marwan I (r. 684–685) married Abd Allah ibn Bishr's sister, Qutayya, with whom he had his son Bishr, the governor of Iraq in 694.