Slave Soldiers and Islam_ The Genesis of a Military System - Daniel Pipes

HowMilitarySlavery

FirstOccurred 189

forcedto

do

so,

when

they

hadto,slavesandmawlasusually

did

notdeserttheir
patrons.

The

examples

fromearly

Islaminvolve

Byzantium

andnorthernIran.

Adramatic

story

dating

fromthe

beginning

ofCAbdal-Malik’s

reign(about

65/685)deserves

note.It

began

whenarebellion

took
place

in the Lebanon

region involving

many runaway

slaves.After
great

difficulties,theUmayyadssuppressed

there-

volt,
dispersed

therebels,and

returnedtheslavestotheirmas-

ters.Oneoftheslavescaught

theattentionofthe

caliph

andsub-

sequently

was

employedby

himasacommander

against

the

Byzantines.

Maymfin

al-Jurjumfini,

aGreek

(Rfimi)

slave,

11

belonged

tothe

BanffUmm

al-H.

akam(shewas

thesisterof

CaliphMuewiya),

a

tribeofThaqif....Caliph

eAbdal-Malikheardofhis

courage

and

askedhismasterstomanumithim,whichtheydid.

eAbdal-Malik

put

himincommandofa

body

of

troops

and

stationedhimin

Antioch.He

joined

thecaliph’s

sonMaslamainanattackonat-

Tuwfina

leading1,000

soldiersfromAntioch.Hewasmartyred

aftershowing

valiant

courage

andamemorable

defense,

eAbdal-

Malikfelthislossso

deeply

thathesenta

greatarmy

against

Byzantium

to

avenge

him.

111

Suchanextraordinary

transferralof

loyalty

musthavebeenun-

usual even

for the Muslims. In a similar

spirit,

when al-

Muetas.im’s

troops

attackedAmoriumin223/838,

a

ghulm

of

Byzantineoriginsspoke

totheByzantine

leaderonbehalfofthe

Muslims.

112

In

northernIran,the

king

of

Samarqand

saidtoQutayba

b.

Muslim,theMuslimcommander(in93/712),

"Youare

battling

mewith

my

ownbrethren,"meaning

the

people

ofBukharaand

Khorezm.

n3

Thereis, however,

noindication that

they

were

slavesor

mawlas.More

explicitly,

whenthemawla

H.

ayynan-

110.

Maymfn

isidentifiedasbotha

JurjumSni

anda

Rfimi(Greek);although

the

Jurjumnis

were

frequently

independent

of

Byzantinepower(see

M.

Canard,

"Djardjirna"

inEl2),as

a

Rfimi,Maymfinappears

heretobe

fighting

hisownc-afi"als.

111.FB,pp.

160-61;AA,5:299.

112.

T,3:1253.

113.T,2:1244.