The Crusades- Islamic Perspectives

by Carole Hillenbrand

  Figure 7.68 Map of the Syrian Isma‘ili Amirate at the time of the Crusades

  Recent work on Muslim castles

  The last couple of decades or so have seen a dramatic increase in survey and excavation work on medieval Muslim castles in the Levant. While some of these buildings have attracted full-scale publications, like the Ayyubid castle, Qal‘at al-Tur, excavated on Mount Tabor,193 and the Damascus citadel – especially the Ayyubid towers,194 whose modules and unit of measurement suggest the work of Armenian craftsmen195 – the majority of these buildings await systematic examination.196 The sequence begins with small coastal defensive forts built in ‘Abbasid times, like Kefor Lam, Ashdod Yam and the tower at Mikhmoret; these probably supplemented the major fortifications round such ports as Caesarea, Acre, Jaffa, Ascalon and Gaza. Among pre-Crusader fortifications inland, Baysan with its flimsy walls and single gate was clearly not built to withstand a determined siege. Recent research suggests that several castles have been misattributed to the Crusaders, such as Qaqun (mainly Mamluk), Jazirat Fira’un in the Gulf of ‘Aqaba and Banyas north of Lake Hula (both Ayyubid structures with Mamluk additions), Qal‘at Safuriya and Afula (both in Galilee). The Muslim castle of Abu’l-Hasan near Sidon predates 1128; it has features in common with Qasr Zuwayra at the south end of the Dead Sea. Qal‘at ibn Ma’an or Qal‘at Salah al-Din, in Galilee, a well-nigh impregnable eyrie set in a high cliff with numerous caves behind, uses two-tone masonry of Mamluk type. Other Muslim rock -cut fortresses include al-Wu‘ayra in Petra, captured by the Crusaders in 1107; al-Habis, another rock-cut castle in Petra, may also be Muslim. Further castles of probably Mamluk date include that of Jiza/Ziza and Qasr Shabib in Zirka, both in Jordan. Lebanon too attests several rock-cut castles which have strong claims to be regarded as Muslim, like Magharat Fakhr al-Din and Qal‘at al-Dubba; a related structure is Khirbat al-Sila near Tafila in Jordan. The time is ripe for a full-scale co-ordinated study of all these buildings.

  Notes

  1. Qur’an, 8: 60.

  2. Cambridge, 1967.

  3. Cambridge, 1992.

  4. Marshall, Warfare, 6.

  5. D. Pringle, The Red Tower, London, 1986.

  6. Cf., for example, D. Alexander, The Arts of War, London, 1992; D. Ayalon, Gunpowder and Firearms in the Mamluk Kingdom, London, 1956; R. Elgood (ed.), Islamic Arms and Armour, London, 1979; D. Nicolle, Early Medieval Islamic Arms and Armour, Madrid, 1976.

  7. An interesting collection of articles is found in War, Technology and Society in the Middle East, ed. V. J. Parry and M. E. Yapp, London, 1975; and there is an important contribution made by C. E. Bosworth, ‘The armies of the Prophet’, in B. Lewis, The World of Islam, London, 1976, 201–24.

  8. Thus Ibn al-Athir wrote a biographical dictionary of the Prophet’s Companions: ‘Usd al-ghaba fi ma‘rifat al-sahaba, Beirut, 1994.

  9. Usama, Hitti, 177.

  10. Ibn al-Nadim, Al-fihrist, trans. B. Dodge, New York, 1972, vol. II, 737–8.

  11. Cf. the discussion of al-Aqsara’i on pp. 437–8.

  12. Ritter lists 38 such treatises. Cf. H. Ritter, ‘“La parure des cavaliers” und die Litteratur über die ritterlichen Künste’, Der Islam, 18 (1929), 116–54.

  13. The work was partially translated and analysed by C. Cahen, ‘Un traité d’armurie compose pour Saladin’, BEO, 12 (1947–8), 1–61. More recently, it has been edited and translated by A. Boudot-Lamotte, Contribution à l’étude de l’archerie musulmane, Damascus, 1968.

  14. Cahen, ‘Un traité’, 1.

  15. It is entitled Al-tadhkirat al-harawiyya fi’l-hiyal al-harbiyya, trans. J. Sourdel-Thomine, BEO, 17 (1962), 105–268. Cf. also the discussion of it in G. Scanlon, A Muslim Manual of War, Cairo, 1961, 14; H. Ritter, ‘La parure’, 144–6.

  16. Scanlon, A Muslim Manual, 14.

  17. Ibid., 6–7.

  18. D. Ayalon, ‘Notes on the Furusiyya exercises and games in the Mamluk sultanate’, Scripta Hierosolymitana, 9 (1961), 34.

  19. Cf. R. Smith, Medieval Muslim Horsemanship, London, 1979.

  20. Ritter considers it to be the most important work of its kind (‘La parure’, 125). This work has been extensively analysed, with accompanying illustrations, by two scholars; cf. R. Smith, Medieval Muslim Horsemanship and G. Tantum, ‘Muslim warfare: a study of a medieval Muslim treatise on the art of war’, in Elgood, Islamic Arms and Armour, 187–201.

  21. Ibid., 190.

  22. Ibid., 194.

  23. Nizam al-Mulk, The Book of Government or Rules for Kings, trans. H. Darke, London, 1978.

  24. Other eleventh-and twelfth-century Mirrors for Princes either deal with other military traditions connected only distantly with the theatre of war in the Levant (such as the Qabusnama) or do not mention military matters at all (such as the Bahr al-fawa’id, already mentioned, and the Nasihat al-muluk, normally attributed to al-Ghazali).

  25. Cf. Bosworth, ‘Armies of the Prophet’, 204–6.

  26. For a discussion of the Muslim armies at the time of the Crusades, cf. Smail, Crusading Warfare, 66 ff.

  27. Usama, Hitti, 149.

  28. Cf. C. Hillenbrand, ‘The career of Najm al-Din Il-Ghazi’, 276–7.

  29. V. Minorsky, Sharaf al-Zaman Tahir Marvazi on China, the Turks and India, London, 1942, 38.

  30. J. Sauvaget, Alep, Paris, 1941, 118.

  31. The Book of Government, 100.

  32. Ibid., 102.

  33. Ibid., 99.

  34. Ibid., 93.

  35. Ibid., 93.

  36. These remarks are based on the scholarly research of Y. Lev in a number of articles and books.

  37. Cf. W. J. Hamblin, The Fatimid Army during the Early Crusades, Ph.D. thesis, Michigan, 1985, 294–301; analysed by M. Brett, The battles of Ramla (1099–1105)’, in Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta: Egypt and Syria in the Fatimid, Ayyubid and Mamluk Eras, ed. U. Vermeulen and D. de Smet, Louvain, 1995, 17–38.

  38. Cf. Gibb, The armies of Saladin’, 138–57.

  39. Abu Shama, RHC, IV, 277.

  40. Cf. the many articles and books by D. Ayalon.

  41. A point made by Ayalon in many of his articles about the Mamluks. The information here is based on his work.

  42. Such as al-Walid II.

  43. Ibn Shaddad, Eddé, 74; Sauvaget, Alep, 118.

  44. Similarly, in the ‘Abbasid clover-leaf race-course at Samarra there was a central grandstand.

  45. H. Rabie, The training of the Mamluk Faris’, in Parry and Yapp, War, Technology and Society, 162.

  46. Illustrated in Smith’s book (see note 19).

  47. Smith, illustration 14.

  48. For specialist work on this topic, cf. the various works of D. Nicolle cited in the Bibliography; J. D. Latham and W. F. Paterson, Saracen Archery, London, 1970; D. Alexander, The Arts of War.

  49. Mayer, ‘Saracenic arms and armor’, 10.

  50. Usama, Hitti, 78, 87, 90, 114, 125–6, 151.

  51. Al-Jahiz, Manaqib al-turk, trans. C. T. Harley-Walker, 671.

  52. Quoted by Gabrieli, 173.

  53. Trans. Cahen, ‘Un traité’, 32.

  54. Usama, Hitti, 68.

  55. Cf. the evidence of the floor fresco at Qasr al-Hayr al-Gharbi, east of Damascus. Cf. B. Spuler and J. Sourdel-Thomine, Die Kunst des Islam, Berlin, 1973, pl. XLII (in colour).

  56. Usama, Hitti, 68.

  57. Usama, Hitti, 70.

  58. Usama, Hitti, 66.

  59. Usama, Hitti, 131.

  60. Usama, Hitti, 76.

  61. Usama, Hitti, 76.

  62. Usama, Hitti, 155.

  63. Ayalon, ‘Furusiyya’, 47–8.

  64. Smith, Medieval Muslim Horsemanship, 8.

  65. Lyons, The Arabian Epic, I, 55.

  66. Cf. Ibn al-Nadim, Fihrist, trans. Dodge, II, 625.

  67. Cf. Cahen, ‘Un traité’, n. 1.

  68. Mayer, ‘Saracenic arms and armor’, 8.

  69. Abu Shama, I, 11; Mayer, ‘Saracenic arms and armor’, 9.

  70. Usama, Hitti, 147.

/>   71. Quoted by Lewis, Islam, II, 123.

  72. Al-Tarsusi, trans. Cahen, ‘Un traité’, 37.

  73. Ibid.

  74. Ibid. Cf. also al-Qalqashandi, II, 135.

  75. According to Gabrieli, 290.

  76. Al-Tarsusi, trans. Cahen, ‘Un traité’, 27–32; Arabic text, 6–10.

  77. Ibid., 31.

  78. Ibid., 27.

  79. Ibid., 34 and 45. See p. 541 below.

  80. Dictionary of the Middle Ages, s.v. ‘bow’, 2/351.

  81. Smail, Crusading Warfare, 85.

  82. Usama, Hitti, 136.

  83. Al-Tarsusi, trans. Cahen, ‘Un traité’, 34.

  84. If made of hide, it was called a daraqa. Cf. al-Qalqashandi, II, 138; Mayer, ‘Saracenic arms and armor’, 12.

  85. Ibid., 35.

  86. Ibid., 35.

  87. Illustrated in Creswell, Muslim Architecture of Egypt, I, plates 49 and and p. 168.

  88. A. Shalem, ‘A note on the shield-shaped ornamental bosses on the facade of Bab al-Nasr in Cairo’, Ars Orientalis, 26 (1996), 58.

  89. Usama, Hitti, 95.

  90. Usama, Hitti, 129.

  91. Usama, Hitti, 130.

  92. Usama, Hitti, 90.

  93. Usama, Hitti, 80.

  94. Usama, Hitti, 88.

  95. Usama, Hitti, 104.

  96. Protective padded clothing.

  97. Ibn al-Athir, Kamil, XI, 285.

  98. Alexander, The Arts of War, 20. Alexander unfortunately gives no reference or date for this information. The most famous example of the talismanic use of the Qur’an in a military context are the shirts of the Ottoman sultans which bear large portions of the Qur’an (J. M. Rogers and R. Ward, Suleyman the Magnificent, London, 1988, 175–6).

  99. Usama, Hitti, 74.

  100. Usama, Hitti, 79–80.

  101. A translation amended from Mayer, ‘Saracenic arms and armor’, 7, quoting Ibn Mangli, Al-tadbirat al-sultaniyya, B.M. Or. 3734, fol. 14V.

  102. Usama, Hitti, 153.

  103. Mayer, ‘Saracenic arms and armor’, 2.

  104. The Book of Government, 93.

  105. Ibid., 94.

  106. Ibid., 131.

  107. D. Schlumberger, ‘Le palais ghaznévide de Lashkari Bazar’, Syria, 29 (1952), 261–7.

  108. U. Scerrato, ‘The first two excavation campaigns at Ghazni 1957–1958’, East and West, N.S. 10 (1959), 23–55.

  109. Thomas Artsruni, History of the House of the Artsrunil?, trans. R. W. Thomson, Detroit, 1985, 357.

  110. A.-M. Eddé, ‘Villes en fête en Proche Orient’, in Villes et sociétés urbaines au Moyen Age, Paris, 1996, 76, quoting Ibn Wasil, III, 220–2.

  111. Usama, Hitti, 54.

  112. Eddé, ‘Villes’, 78; quoting Ibn al-’Adim, Zubda, Dahan, III, 155.

  113. Cf. C. J. F. Dowsett, ‘A twelfth-century Armenian inscription at Edessa’, in Iran and Islam, ed. C. E. Bosworth, Edinburgh, 1971, 197–228.

  114. A good starting point is R. Fedden and J. Thomson, Crusader Castles, London, 1957, and H. Kennedy, Crusader Castles, Cambridge, 1994.

  115. D. Pringle, ‘The state of research: the archaeology of the Crusade Kingdom of Jerusalem: a review of work 1947–1972’, Journal of Medieval History, 23/4 (1997), 398.

  116. Ibn al-Athir, Kamil, XII, 5–6.

  117. Al-Maqrizi, trans. Broadhurst, 68.

  118. Ibn al-Furat, Lyons, 47–8.

  119. Ibn Jubayr, Broadhurst, 319–20.

  120. Ibn Shaddad, RHC, III, 358.

  121. Quoted by Boase, Castles, 49.

  122. For a recent discussion of Sahyun, cf. Kennedy, Crusader Castles, 84 ff.

  123. Abu Shama, RHC, IV, 364–7.

  124. Ibn Shaddad, RHC, III, 111–12; cf. also al-Dimishqi, Kitab nukhbat al-dahr, 208.

  125. Abu Shama, RHC, IV, 197.

  126. Abu Shama, RHC, IV, 197.

  127. Abu Shama, RHC, IV, 206.

  128. Abu Shama, RHC, IV, 206.

  129. Cf. EI2: Hisn Kayfa; ‘Izz al-Din Ibn Shaddad, Al-a‘laq al-khatira, Bodleian ms., Marsh 333.

  130. Rabbat, The ideological significance’, 15.

  131. Ibid.; cf. also Elisséeff, Nur al-Din, III, 705–20.

  132. ‘Imad al-Din, Fath, 562, 565, 582, 610.

  133. Lundquist, Arabic text, VII, 53; cf. also Chapter 4, 192.

  134. Lundquist, Arabic text, VII, 53.

  135. Little, ‘Jerusalem’, 179.

  136. The citadel of Cairo has recently received detailed treatment in an excellent scholarly monograph. Cf. N. O. Rabbat, The Citadel of Cairo, Leiden, 1995.

  137. D. Behrens-Abouseif, ‘The citadel of Cairo: stage for Mamluk ceremonial’, Annales Islamologiques, 24 (1988), 25–6.

  138. Ibn Jubayr, Broadhurst, 43.

  139. Al-Nuwayri, 365–6.

  140. Rabbat, The Citadel of Cairo, 69.

  141. Ibid., 51.

  142. Cf. Kennedy, Crusader Castles, 183.

  143. Cf. J. Sauvaget, ‘La citadelle de Damas’, Syria, XI (1930), 60.

  144. Ibid., 62–3.

  145. Ibid., 221.

  146. Ibid., 227–9.

  147. Al-Dimishqi, Kitab nukhbat al-dahr, 202.

  148. J. Sauvaget, Alep, Paris, 1941.

  149. J. M. Rogers, The Spread of Islam, Oxford, 1972, 43–8.

  150. Sauvaget, Alep, 145.

  151. Sauvaget, Alep, 116; RCEA, IX, inscription no. 3275, 52.

  152. Sauvaget, Alep, 116.

  153. Ibn Jubayr, Broadhurst, 260.

  154. Rogers, The Spread of Islam, 43–6.

  155. Ibid., 45.

  156. For a drawing of part of this inscription, see Sauvaget, Alep, 146, fig. 35.

  157. Ibid., 145.

  158. Lewis, Islam, I, 92.

  159. Sauvaget, Alep, 156 and 159.

  160. This information is based on a conference paper given by G. King at The Art of the Zengids and the Ayyubids Conference held at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, on 18 November 1998. The inscriptions in the name of Shirkuh II were read by M. van Berchem.

  161. Cf. Boase, Castles, 71. Cf. al-Qalqashandi, Subh, IV, 105; Abu’l-Fida, RHC, I, 70, 86, 143.

  162. He cites one or two stones with characteristic diagonal chisel-dressing. Cf. C. N. Johns, ‘Medieval ‘Ajlun’, Quarterly of the Department of Antiquities in Palestine, 1 (1931), 29.

  163. Ibid., 31.

  164. Ibid., 30.

  165. Burns, Monuments of Syria, 183; Boase, Castles, 82.

  166. Ibid.

  167. Ibn Jubayr, Broadhurst, 258.

  168. See now C. Tonghini, Qal‘at Ja‘bar, London, 1998.

  169. R. Ellenblum, ‘Who built Qal‘at al-Subayba?’, Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 43 (1989), 103–12.

  170. Sibt, Jewett, 392–3.

  171. Ellenblum, ‘Who built …?’, 112.

  172. Kennedy, Crusader Castles, 184.

  173. Ellenblum, ‘Who built …?’, hi.

  174. Al-Yunini, III, 259–60.

  175. Boase, Castles, 68.

  176. Ibid., 82.

  177. Ibid., 67.

  178. Ibid., 70.

  179. Ibid., 53–4.

  180. Ibid., 54.

  181. Ibid., 59.

  182. Creswell, ‘Fortifications’, 123.

  183. Cf. M. Situdeh, Qila‘ Isma‘iliyya, Tehran, 1983.

  184. Cf. the map of these citadels on p. 503. Cf. also N. A. Mirza, Syrian Ism?ilism, London, 1997. These castles were al-Qadmus, al-Kahf, al-Khariba, Masyaf, al-Khawabi, al-Qulay’a, al-Mayniqa and al-Rusafa. Other castles built or used by the Isma‘ilis include Qamugh, al-‘Ullayqa and Qal‘at al-Qahir near Masyaf.

  185. Ibn Muyassar, 68.

  186. Ibn Muyassar, 68; cf. also al-Dimishqi, Kitab nukhbat al-dahr, 208.

  187. Ibid.

  188. Boase, Castles, 82. Some were probably Byzantine in origin and others were Fatimid constructions or built by local rulers.

  189. Burns, Monuments of Syria, 152, 176–7.

  190. For a brief gui
de to the Isma‘ili castles, see R. Boulanger, trans. J. S. Hardman, The Middle East, Paris, 1966, 443–4 and especially 448–51.

  191. Cf. Kennedy, Crusader Castles, 154–5.

  192. Cf. Smail, Crusading Warfare, 214–44.

  193. A. Battista and B. Bagatti, La fortezza saracena del Monte Tabor (A.H. 609–15: A.D. 1212–18), Studia Biblica Franciscana, col. min., 18, Jerusalem.

  194. H. Hanisch, Die ayyubidischen Toranlagen der Zitadelle von Damaskus, Wiesbaden, 1996; idem, ‘Masssystem und Massordnung der ayyubidischen Bauten der Zitadelle von Damaskus’, Ordo et Mensura IV-V (1998), 341–50.

  195. H. Hanisch, personal communication. Similar work is to be found in the citadel of Harran.

  196. What follows summarises information most generously provided by Andrew Petersen, and partly delivered by him in a lecture entitled ‘Qal‘at ibn Ma’an and Qasr Zuweira. Two medieval castles and their position in the military architecture of Muslim Palestine’ delivered at the 8th Colloquium on Egypt and Syria in Fatimid, Ayyubid and Mamluk Times (University of Leuven, May 1999).

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The Conduct of War

  Victory in warfare is from Allah and is not due to organisation and planning, nor to the number of troops and supporters.1 (Usama)

  Muslim Military Strategy

  The Tactics of the Fatimid Armies

  IN THE PAST, military historians spoke of the vast size and resources of the Fatimid army.2 Smail, in particular, attributed Fatimid failure in the early Crusading period to the fact that their army was old-fashioned. Its ‘mass of bowmen on foot, and horsemen who were capable of awaiting attack’ were an ideal target for the Franks’ most powerful weapon – ‘the charge of the mailed and mounted knights’.3 Smail argues that the mounted archers of the Turkish armies were a far more dangerous foe to the Crusaders. However, more recent research has modified this view. Brett argues convincingly that the Bedouin Arab cavalry may well have played a more significant part in the Fatimid army than has been thought hitherto.4

  Lev attacks the rather simplistic assumption that the Fatimids fielded enormous armies of low quality. Although it has often been alleged that the Frankish knights were more heavily armed than their Muslim counterparts, Brett stresses that by the end of the tenth century the Fatimid cavalry wore armour in battle.5 They were therefore as heavily armoured as the Franks. It should also be remembered that the effectiveness of the Frankish cavalry depended not only on the amount of armour worn by the horse and rider but on the strength and size (not necessarily the speed) of the Frankish horses. As for the Fatimid infantry, it contained troops armed with pikes, maces, javelins and crossbows;6 clearly this too was a well-equipped fighting force.