ARABS: IMMIGRANTSpassed, subgroups within a tribal district tended to form their own
neighborhoods. Such were the districts (ma~alliit) of the Banii Shaytan
clan of Tamim and of the Banii 'Anz ibn Wa'il, who had their own
masjid.^46 By 645 the military population of Kufa had grown to forty
thousand men out of a total population of eighty thousandY
Although the Kufan army was organized along tribal lines, its or-
ganization does not appear to reflect this settlement pattern in any
way. The Muslim army operating in the Sawad had been divided into
tenths at the time of the conquest, but these units had grown unequally.
Sa'd reorganized and equalized the units in the army with the help
of genealogists by dividing them into sevenths on the basis of pre-
Islamic tribal alliances. However, the composition of only six of these
units is given. The first consisted of the Kinana, including Quraysh,
and their allies, and of the Jadila clan of the Qays 'Aylan, both from
the Hijaz. The second was composed of the Yamani tribes of Qu<;ia' a,
including the Bajila, Khath'am, Kinda, I:Ja<;lramawt, Ghassan, and
Azd. The third was made up of another Yamani group: the Madhl).ij,
I:Jimyar, Hamdan, and their allies. The fourth consisted of the Mu<;lar
tribes of Tamim, Ribab, and Hawazin. The fifth combined mainly
Nizari tribes: the Asad, Ghatafan, Mul).adb, Namir, Qubay'a, and
Taghlib. The sixth was composed of the Iyad, 'Akk, 'Abd al-Qays,
Ahl al-I:Jajar, and the Ijamrii'.48 An officer (Ar. amir) was put in charge
of each unit.^49 Even these divisions were not really equal in size. The
first unit was smaller than the others and the second must have been
significantly larger than the rest.^50
These tribal units appear to have been reorganized by the time of
'All, when five of the sevenths were counted among the force of twelve
thousand Kufans who joined 'An at Basra before the Battle of the
as did Jadila and Akhliit, and Akhliit also shared a street with Juhayna. The An~iir and
Muzayna, Tamim and Mul}.iirib, and Asad and 'Amir all shared streets on the east side
(Tabari, Ta'Ttkh, I, 2489-90). This arrangement treated some of the larger and more
important tribal groups in Kufa on an equal footing with severai small and obscure
groups that hardly figured at all in the history of this city. It bears little resemblance
to the actual settlement pattern there.
46 Ibn al-Faqih, Buldiin, p. 183.
47 Ibid., p. 165; Tabarl, Ta'rtkh, I, 2805.
48 Jafri, Shi'a Islam, pp. 104-6; Tabari, Ta'Ttkh, I, 2495. Jafri speculates that the
last seventh consisted of the Tayyi', but in fact it could have been composed of any of
the groups, such as the An~iir, which settled early in Kufa and are not included in the
other six units. According to Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi ('Iqd, IV, 162), the third unit consisted
of the Tamim, Asad, Gha~afiin, and Hawiizin.
49 Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi, 'Iqd, IV, 162.
50 Jafri, Shi'a Islam, p. 104. Jafri (p. 105) estimates that the sixth unit was one of
the largest.