New Evidence on the Life of ‘Abdullāh B. Yāsīn and the Origins of the Almoravid Movement

Abstract

The Qāḍli ‘Iyāḍ in his biography of ‘Abdullāh b. Yāsīn confirms many details in al-Bakri's record of the rise of the Almoravids. His account differs in a few important respects, and furnishes new information which is valuable in reassessing the life of ‘Abdullāh b. Yāsīn. Since no insular ribāṭ is mentioned, its historicity is increasingly suspect, and in the light of Maghribī cosmological ideas it is better regarded as a myth, and not as a historical fact. This text is the earliest surviving one to mention the Dār al-Murābiṭīn of Wajjāj b. Zalwī al-Lamṭī.The Qāḍī ‘Iyāḍ states that Jawhar, a character who appears to have been confused with Yaḥyā b. Ibrāhīm al-Gudālī, the Ṣānhaja chief who reputedly brought ‘Abdullāh b. Yāsīn to the Sahara, is none other than al-Jawhar b. Sakkum, the Gudāla jurist who was later executed by ‘Abdullāh b. Yāsīn. The cause of the execution appears to have been a combination of religious differences and a struggle for power, probably after the death of Yaḥyā b. Ibrāhīm al-Gudālī. This event may prove to have been a turning point in the Almoravid movement, the main reason for the dominance of the Lamtūna and the eventual withdrawal of the Gudāla from the Almoravid cause, possibly for their militant opposition to it. The confusion in the accounts over the early phase of the stay of ‘Abdullāh b. Yāsīn among the Ṣanhāja casts grave doubts as to how much reliance can be placed on them as historical evidence. The myth may be a good deal more than the ‘island story’.