Alam al-Din dynasty
The Alam al-Dins, also spelled Alamuddin or Alameddine, were a
The Alam al-Dins' first definitive appearance in the historical record was in 1633 under their chief Ali, who was appointed by the Ottomans to replace Fakhr al-Din as the tax farmer and paramount chief of the Druze districts. Ali soon after exterminated the Ma'ns' Buhturid allies. Although he lost control of the
Origins
The origins of the Alam al-Din family are uncertain. The historian
Shidyaq traced the origins of the Alam al-Dins to a certain 14th-century
Muzaffar al-Andari of the Jurd
The Alam al-Dins moved from Ramtun to Ain Dara in the Jurd in the 16th century.[5] A certain Druze muqaddam (local chieftain) "Alam al-Din" of the Matn, a Druze district bordering the Jurd to the north, is mentioned in Ottoman documents as having surrendered his muskets and defected to the Ottomans during their 1585 expedition against Qurqumaz Ma'n and his Druze warriors.[7] The preeminent chieftain of the Jurd in the early 17th century, Shaykh Muzaffar al-Andari, was likely a member of the Alam al-Din.[8] Hourani notes that he was "apparently identical" to the Muzaffar ibn Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Zahr al-Din Husayn ibn Nur al-Din Ishaq Alam al-Din mentioned in the Sijill al-Arslani as the brother-in-law of an Arslan chief.[9]
Muzaffar was among the early Druze opponents of the governor of
The Ma'n regained the good graces of the Ottomans by 1616 and used the momentum to confront their Druze rivals. Muzaffar, the Sawwafs and the son of Muhammad ibn Jamal al-Din, backed by the Sayfas, were routed by the Ma'n led by Fakhr al-Din's son Ali and brother Yunis in four August engagements at
Paramount chiefs of the Druze
Chieftainship of Ali
The first mention of Ali Alam al-Din in the sources was by Duwayhi in 1633.
In 1635 Ali and his Druze ally Zayn al-Din Sawwaf supported Ali Sayfa in his struggle to gain control of Tripoli from his uncle Assaf Sayfa in 1635.
By 1636 Mulhim had gained control of the Chouf, though Ali retained his chieftainship over the Gharb, Jurd and Matn.[12] Ali continued to control these districts at the time of Mulhim's death in 1658, by which time Mulhim's tax farms had expanded to the Safad Sanjak (e.g. the Galilee and Jabal Amil) and Batroun. Mulhim was succeeded in his tax farms and leadership of the Qays by his son Ahmad.[12]
Chieftainship of Muhammad
Ali died in 1660 and was succeeded by his sons Muhammad and Mansur. The former became the paramount chief of the Druze-dominated southern Mount Lebanon in 1662.[12] The following year Mansur defeated a Qaysi Druze force at Adma.[23] In 1667 Ahmad Ma'n defeated the Alam al-Dins in a battle outside of Beirut and took over their domains across the Druze districts and Keserwan.[12] After their 1667 defeat the Alam al-Din chiefs resettled in Damascus and became politically inactive in Mount Lebanon.[12]
In 1669–1671 Muhammad held the tax farm for the village of
Attempts to return and demise under Musa
According to the history of Duwayhi, in 1693 a son of Muhammad, Musa, successfully petitioned the Sublime Porte (imperial Ottoman government) in Constantinople for a commission to evict and replace Ahmad Ma'n. With Ottoman backing, he forced Ahmad out of Deir al-Qamar, but shortly after he withdrew to Damascus and Ahmad was restored to his seat.[12] Firmans from the Porte dated June 1694 and May 1695 appointed "the prominent emir, Musa Alam al-Din" to replace Ahmad in the latter's tax farms.[26] In June 1695 another firman noted that Musa fled his Mount Lebanon districts while he was collecting taxes due to attacks by the Ma'ns and the Ma'ns' non-Druze marital relatives, the Shihabs of Wadi al-Taym. The firman orders the governor of Sidon Eyalet to restore Musa to his position and suppress the Ma'ns and Shihabs.[27]
Ahmad died in 1697 without male progeny. His chieftainship was inherited by his non-Druze marital relatives, the
Although the general consensus among historians is that the family was exterminated in the Battle of Ain Dara, Sami Swayd's Historical Dictionary of the Druzes holds that surviving members of the Alam al-Din fled to
References
- ^ Salibi 1973, pp. 281–282, 284.
- ^ Salibi 1973, pp. 286–287.
- ^ a b Salibi 1973, p. 286, note 2.
- ^ Hourani 2010, pp. 948, 950.
- ^ a b Hourani 2010, p. 950.
- ^ Harris 2012, p. 116.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 2004, pp. 9, 13, 178.
- ^ Harris 2012, p. 101.
- ^ a b Hourani 2010, p. 951.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, p. 36.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, pp. 28–29, 75.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Salibi 1973, p. 283.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, p. 40.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, p. 44.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, p. 53.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, pp. 73, 75.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, p. 117.
- ^ Salibi 1973, pp. 272, 282.
- ^ Salibi 1973, p. 282.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, p. 57.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 1985, pp. 57–58.
- ^ a b Abu-Husayn 1985, p. 58.
- ^ Hourani 2010, p. 954.
- ^ Hourani 2010, p. 953.
- ^ Firro 1992, pp. 36–37.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 2004, pp. 44, 48.
- ^ Abu-Husayn 2004, p. 59.
- ^ Harris 2012, p. 115.
- ^ Firro 1992, p. 40.
- ^ Swayd 2015, p. 38.
Bibliography
- Abu-Husayn, Abdul-Rahim (1985). Provincial Leaderships in Syria, 1575–1650. Beirut: American University of Beirut. ISBN 9780815660729.
- Abu-Husayn, Abdul-Rahim (2004). The View from Istanbul: Lebanon and the Druze Emirate in the Ottoman Chancery Documents, 1546–1711. Oxford and New York: The Centre for Lebanese Studies and I. B. Tauris. ISBN 1-86064-856-8.
- Firro, Kais (1992). A History of the Druzes. Leiden: Brill. ISBN 90-04-09437-7.
- Harris, William (2012). Lebanon: A History, 600–2011. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-518-111-1.
- Hourani, Alexander (2010). New Documents on the History of Mount Lebanon and Arabistan in the 10th and 11th Centuries H. Beirut.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - Salibi, Kamal S. (July 1973). "The Secret of the House of Ma'n". International Journal of Middle East Studies. 4 (3): 272–287. S2CID 163020137.
- Swayd, Sami (2015). Historical Dictionary of the Druzes (Second ed.). Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield. ISBN 978-1-4422-4616-4.