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The Ḥafṣids

627–982/1229–1574

Tunisia and eastern Algeria

The Ḥafṣids, the most important dynasty in the history of later mediaeval Ifrīqiya, derived their name from Shaykh Abū Ḥafṣ ‘Umar al-Hintātī (d. 571/1176), a disciple of the founder of the Almohad movement, Ibn Tūmart (see above, no. 15), and one of ‘Abd al-Mu’min’s commanders. His offspring filled various important offices under the Almohads, including the governorship of Ifīqiya, and, once established as a separate dynasty, the early Ḥafṣids were to continue Almohad traditions in many ways. One of these Ḥafṣid governors, Abū Zakariyyā’ Yaḥyā I, in 627/1229 threw off the authority of the Almohad caliph, alleging that the latter had abandoned the true Mu’minid traditions, and proclaimed himself an independent amīr. He now expanded westwards into the central Maghrib, taking Constantine, Bougie and Algiers, making the ‘Abd al-Wādids of Tlemcen (see above, no. 17) his tributaries, compelling the Marīnids of Morocco to acknowledge him and receiving appeals for help from the beleaguered Muslims of southern Spain. He further began the tradition of close commercial relations in the western Mediterranean with such powers as Angevin Sicily and Aragon. The power of the Ḥafṣids was equally great under his son Abū ‘Abdallāh Muḥammad I, who repelled the attacks of Louis IX of France and Charles of Anjou (the Crusade of 668/1270), and assumed the titles of caliph and ‘Commander of the Faithful’ plus the grandiose honorific of al-Mustanṣir, obtaining these titles from the Sharīf of Mecca and claiming to be the heir of the recently-defunct Baghdad ‘Abbāsids (see above, no. 3, 1).

Towards the end of the thirteenth century, however, the unity of the Ḥafṣid amirate became loosened, with Bougie and Constantine, in particular, tending to fall under the authority of separate rulers from the Ḥafṣid family, and with southern Tunisia and the Djerid region also throwing off the control of Tunis during periods of weak rule. At times, there were several contenders for the throne in Tunis, with claimants ruling in various towns, and during the course of the fourteenth century the Ḥafṣid capital was twice occupied temporarily by the Marīnids (see above, no. 16). The dynasty rallied in the fifteenth century under such strong rulers as Abū Fāris ‘Abd al-‘Azīz al-Mutawakkil and his grandson Abū ‘Umar ‘Uthmān, but in the early sixteenth century the establishment of the Turks in Algiers and other ports and the inability of the Ḥafṣids to curb corsair depredations in the western Mediterranean invited attacks and reprisals by the Christians. A Turkish occupation of Tunis in 941/1535 drove out the Ḥafṣid ruler, who was only restored after the Emperor Charles V had planted a Spanish garrison at La Goletta later in that year. The last Ḥafṣids retained a precarious authority with Spanish help against the Turks; in 981/1573 Don John of Austria took Tunis, but in the following year the Ottoman commander Sinān Pasha recaptured it and carried off the last Ḥafṣid captive to Istanbul.

Tunis under the Ḥafṣids enjoyed a great resurgence of prosperity. Before the disruptive activity of the Barbary pirates caused a deterioration in relations, the Ḥafṣids had fruitful commercial treaties with Anjevin Sicily, with the Italian and southern French cities and with Aragon. Both the economy and the culture of the land also benefited from the influx of Spanish Muslim refugees (among whom were the forebears of the historian Ibn Khaldūn). Tunis became a great artistic and intellectual centre, and it was the Ḥafṣids who in the thirteenth century introduced the madrasa system of education already flourishing in the central and eastern lands of Islam.

Lane-Poole, 49–50, 52–3; Zambaur, 74–6; Album, 17.

EI² ‘Ḥafṣids’ (H. R. Idris).

R. Brunschvig, La Berbérie orientale sous les Ḥafṣides des origines à la fin du XV^e siècle, 2 vols, Paris 1940–7, with genealogical tables at II, 446.

H. W. Hazard, The Numismatic History of Late Medieval North Africa, 69–75, 159–81, 273–4, 284.