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

AnExplanation

ofMilitarySlavery 55

beforethe
appearance

ofIslam;

butitdidnot.

2

Furthermore,

military

slaveryoccurredalso

inwetterareassuchassouthern

andeastern

India.

Turksareoftenassociatedwith militaryslavery,

with

good

reason.TheAbbasiduseofslavesoldiers

coincidedwiththeir

importation

ofTurks;

Turksservedinalmost

everymilitary

slavecorps

intheMiddleEast andnorthernIndia; andthey

dominated the best-known and

most

spectacular group,

the

Mamluksof

Egypt.

Theirclose

connectiontotheinstitutionof

military

slavery

bothassoldiersandasrulersmakesitreasonable

toconsidertheTurksits

originators

and

propagators.

Twoconsiderationsshow

thatthiswasnotso,however.The

firstresemblesthe

argument

against

aclimatic

explanation;

if

Turkswerethe

cause,

why

did

militaryslavery

notexistamong

TurksoutsideofIslamdom?Turksinthe

pre-Islamic

Middle

Eastandinnon-Muslimareasdidnot

institute

militaryslavery.

Mostnotably,

forcenturies

they

faced

Byzantium

andnumerous

empires

inChinaand

pre-Islamic

Iran;

they

alsofought

forthe

Muslimsfor

150 years

before

becomingmilitary

slaves?Non-

Muslimsmadeeffortsto

incorporate

Turksintotheirservice,

yet

nonedevised

the

system

of

militaryslavery.

4

Nordidthe

system

existintheTurks’InnerAsianhomelands.

A second

argument against

the

Turkic

explanation

comes

fromthe

Umayyad

dynasty

in

Spain.

It

appears

thatsimulta-

neouslywiththedevelopment

of

militaryslavery

in

Iraq

under

theAbbasids,thisSpanishdynasty

was

independentlymaking

systematic

useofslavesassoldiers.NoTurkswere

present

in

early3d/9th-century

Spain.

s

Later,

too,

sub-Saharan

dynasties

madeextensiveuse

ofslave

soldiers,

andalmostnoneofthem

wereTurks.Thus,Turkscorrelatemuchlessclearly

withmili-

taryslavery

than doesIslam.

The

stirrup

offersamuchbetterreason

for

militaryslavery.

Tounderstandhow,

Ishallsummarize

Lynn

White,

Jr.’s

ideas

2.Pp.

161-66discussessomeofthesepossibilities.

3.D.

Pipes,

"TurksinEarlyMuslimService,"documents

this.

4.OntheTurksandCrusaders,seenote 95

below,

5.Pp.192-93.