18 chapter one
The Kindites
Once again, the Kindites were of South Arabian origin. The influence
of South Arabians on the Northern Arabian kingdoms was more
obvious in that kingdom than in others, as the first Kindite king was
appointed by the South Arabian king to rule over some tribes in
Central Arabia, whom the latter had conquered in 480 A.C. The
Kindite kingdom lasted from 480 to 529 A.C. At its zenith the
Kindite kingdom extended to the Euphrates, and after the death of
the Persian Emperor the Kindite king stretched his influence to the
capital of the Lakhmìds (Hitti, 1963). The end of the Kindites came
at the hand of the Lakhmìd king in 529 A.C. when the latter defeated
them and put their king to death along with many others from the
royal family. The rest of the Kindite prominent members went back
to Œadramawt, from where they originally came. After embracing
Islam the Kindites showed a great zeal in the Islamic conquests in
Syria and Iraq and some of them were rewarded by being appointed
provincial governors. Also, some of the Kindites became great Islamic
thinkers such as Ya"qup ibn-Ishaq al-Kinidi who earned the title
“the philosopher of the Arabs” (Shahid, 1970).
Though short lived, Kindah provides an interesting case of Arab
uprising. Different from the other Northern Arabian kingdoms, which
were to some extent client-kingdoms influenced by the power of the
two great Empires in the north, Kindah was neither a Persian nor
a Byzantine client-kingdom. It was the first attempt by the inner
Arabs to unite their tribes under one leader. In this sense, Kindah
could be regarded as a precedent for the Islamic state that emerged
from Central Arabia.
The study of the above civilizations in North Arabia, as Hitti says,
is significant not only in itself but as an illustration of the cultural
heights which the Arabians of the desert were capable of attaining
when the proper opportunities present themselves (Hitti, 1963). A
common factor among the above civilizations was that they were
founded by Arab stock: the language was Arabic and personal names
and the names of the kings were also Arabic. This ability was reflected
in the development of Islamic civilisation and Islamic thought.
Central Arabia
Nomadism was the main feature of life in pre-Islamic Central Arabia.
This was dictated by the nature of land which, apart from sporadic