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The Ḥusaynid Beys

1117–1376/1705–1957

Tunisia

The Ḥusaynid Beys arose out of the Turkish garrison for the Ottomans in Algiers. The commander al-Ḥusayn b. ‘Alī was raised to the Beylicate after the military defeat and deposition of the previous Bey of Tunis in 1117/1705. While the suzerainty of the Ottomans was to be acknowledged, with the sultans in their turn regarding the Ḥusaynids as provincial goverors or beylerbeyis, al-Ḥusayn and his descendants were granted by the local Ottoman commanders hereditary succession by male primogeniture. In practice, this form of succession did not always happen, and latterly the succession tended to go to elderly collateral members of the family who were no longer fully competent to deal with affairs. But the Ḥusaynids were nevertheless to rule for two and a half centuries, though latterly under French protection. In an absence of Turkish interference, the Beys were able to make diplomatic agreements with European powers like France, England and the Italian states, and their power within Tunisia became somewhat firmer once Ḥam(m)ūda Pasha had suppressed the local corps of Janissaries in 1226/1811.

During the nineteenth century, there were signs that the Beys aimed at a policy more independent of their suzerains in Istanbul. The relationship, with the possibility of Ottoman diplomatic and military protection, still had advantages for Tunis, as in 1259–60/1843–4 when there was tension with Sardinia. Tunisian contingents joined the Ottoman forces during the Greek Revolt and the Crimean War, but in 1261/1845 Aḥmad I Bey managed, with French diplomatic backing, to throw off the obligation to send tribute to Istanbul. The Porte still regarded the Ḥusaynids as linked with themselves, as local müshīrs, marshals of the army, and wālīs, governors, but the link was largely symbolic and was in any case ended in 1298/1881. Reckless spending by the Beys, abolition of the lucrative slave trade, an increased European commercial penetration of Tunisia plus administrative malpractices, brought Muḥammad Ṣādiq Bey to the verge of bankruptcy in 1286/1869, leading to the imposition of an international financial commission in order to regulate Tunisia’s debt. French pressure led to a military occupation of Tunisia in 1298/1881 followed by a Protectorate in 1300/1883, so that subsequent Beys functioned under a French Resident-General. At times, the Beys were able to give some impression of representing Tunisian national interests, despite their foreign origin; but in the twentieth century the nationalist movements of the Destour or Constitutionalists and then the Néo-Destour Parties became strong. In 1956, France agreed to the full independence of Tunisia, but the last Ḥusaynid, who was hailed as King of the Tunisians at Kairouan, ruled for only two months before he was forced out of his homeland by the Néo-Destour Party led by Habib Bourgiba (Ḥabīb Bū Ruqayba) and a republic was proclaimed.

The Beys displayed their dependence on the Ottoman by minting coins at Tunis only in the names of the Ottoman sultans, until in 1272/1856 Muḥammad II b. Ḥusayn II started the practice of adding his own name to that of the sultan; with the French occupation, the Beys and, later, the kings issued their own coins.

Zambaur, 84–5.

EI¹ ‘Tunisia. 2. History’ (R. Brunschvig); EI² ‘Ḥusaynids’ (R. Mantran).

P. Grandchamp, ‘Arbre généalogique de la famille hassanite (1705–1941)’, Rev. Tunisienne, nos 45–7 (1941), 233.

R. Mantran, ‘La titulature des beys de Tunis au XIXe siècle d’après les documents d’archives tures du Dar-el-Bey (Tunis)’, CT, nos 19–20 (1957), 341–8.

L. Carl Brown, The Tunisia of Ahmad Bey 1837–1855, Princeton 1974, with a chronological table of events at pp. xv–xviii.

Hugh Montgomery-Massingberd (ed.), Burke’s Royal Families of the World. II. Africa and the Middle East, London 1980, 225–9.