43

The Yu‘firids or Ya‘furids

232–387/847–997

Yemen, with their centres at Ṣan‘ā’ and Janad

In the mid-ninth century, Yu‘fir b. ‘Abd al-Rahmān assrted his independence of the ‘Abbāsid governors in the Yemen highlands, occupying Ṣan‘ā‘ and Janad and becoming the first local dynasty to achieve power there. His family came from Shibām to the north-west of Ṣan‘ā‘, and claimed a distant descent from the Tubba‘ kings of pre-Islamic times. Yu‘fir was still, however, careful to maintain his own allegiance to the ‘Abbāsid caliphs. Subsequent members of the family became involved with rival powers in confused struggles for the control of Ṣan‘ā‘ and northern Yemen; a new element here was the arrival in 284/897 of the Zaydī Imāms (see above, no. 41) and, shortly afterwards, the appearance of the Qarmatis, supporters of the Fātimids (see above, nos 27, 40). Relative stability was achieved under As‘ad b. Ibrāhīm, but after his death the family was rent by dissensions and by 387/997 lost their ruling power, though apparently surviving in Yemen as obscure, local lords.

Lane-Poole, 91; Zambaur, 116;

EI¹ ‘Ya‘fur b. Abd al-Rahmān‘ (R. Strothmann).

H. C. King, Yaman: Its Early Mediaeval History, 5–6, 223ff.

H. F. al-Hamdānl and H. S. M. al-Juhanī, al-Ṣulayḥiyyūn wa ‘1-ḥaraka al-Fāṭimiyya fi ‘l-Yaman, with a genealogical table at p. 333.

G. R. Smith, in W. Daum (ed.), Yemen: 3000 Years of Art and Civilisation in Arabia Felix, 130–1, 138.