RAWWADIDS

 

RAWWADIDS (Ar. Rawwādiya, Rawādiya), a family of Arab descent that controlled Tabriz and north-eastern Azerbaijan in the late 8th and early 9th centuries. Their Kurdicized descendants ruled over Azerbaijan and parts of Armenia in the second half of the 10th and much of the 11th century.

There is some uncertainty over the correct spelling of the dynastic name, and it has been suggested that it is necessary to distinguish between Rawwād, the name of the Arab family and Rawād, a later Kurdish form, which are graphically identical in unpointed Arabic script (Kasravi, pp. 132-33; Minorsky, p. 115).  The confusion probably arises from the intermarriage of the Arab Rawwād family with the Kurdish tribe of Rawād; an ode (qaṣida) on the Rawwadid ruler Vahsudān b. Mamlān notes his mixed Arab and Iranian (Ar. ʿajam; q.v.) descent (Kasravi, p. 155). The Rawwadids are described by Ebn Ḵallekān (d. 681/1282) as a branch of the Haḏbāni Kurds, and Ebn al-Aṯir (XI, p. 341) says the Rawwadids were “the most noble of the Kurds.” Although the Haḏbāni Kurds are generally associated with the region of Lake Urmiya, Ebn Ḵallekān states that the village of Ajdanaqān near Dvin in Armenia (see ARMENIA AND IRAN vi), from where the forefathers of the Ayyubids (12th-13th centuries) came, was populated by the Kurdish Rawād (Ebn Ḵallekān, V, pp. 494-95; cf. Minorsky, pp. 124-25, 128-29).

THE RAWWADIDS OF AZERBAIJAN (LATE 8TH-EARLY 9TH CENTURIES)

The first attested family member is Rawwād b. Moṯannā Azdi, who is said to have lived in the time of the ʿAbbasid caliph (see ʿABBASID CALIPHATE) Abu Jaʿfar al-Manṣur (r. 136-58/754-75). The ʿAbbasid governor of Azerbaijan, Yazid b. Ḥāṭem Mohallabi, moved Yemeni tribesmen from Basra to the province.  Among these tribesmen was Rawwād who settled in the area around Tabriz and obtained control of territories as far as the town of Baḏḏ (Yaʿqubi, II, p. 446). The latter has been identified by Kasravi (p. 133) with the modern town of Qarajadāḡ northeast of Ahar. Balādori (p. 462) and Ebn al-Faqih (pp. 284-85) credit Rawwād and his son Wajnāʾ with construction works in Tabriz, including its fortification.  Yāqut (II, p. 13; cf. Safina, p. 439) also mentions the building activity in Tabriz, but he wrongly makes Rawwād a contemporary of al-Motawwakel (r. 232-47/847-61), perhaps because some of the city’s buildings were also attributed to that ʿAbbasid caliph. Balāḏori and Ebn al-Faqih also state that Wajnāʾ and his Azdi client (Ar. mawlā) Ṣadaqa  b. ʿAli rebelled during the caliphate of Hārun al-Rašid (r. 170-93/786-809), so that Ḵozayma, the ʿAbbasid governor of Armenia and Azerbaijan, fortified and garrisoned Marāḡa.  Early Islamic Azerbaijan was largely controlled by Yemeni Arab settlers who often presented severe challenges to the ʿAbbasid governors.  Since control of castles was vital for the assertion of power, the settlers frequently fought each other for their control.  Baʿiṯ b. Ḥalbas, the lord of Marand, is said to have been one of Wajnāʾ’s followers (Ar. ṣuʿluk, pl. ṣaʿālik  “vagabonds, bandits”), but Baʿiṯ’s son Moḥammad seized the castle of Šāhi from Wajnāʾ (Ṭabari, III, p. 1172).  The Rawwadids seem even to have lost control of Tabriz for a time, for Ebn al-Aṯir (VI, p. 447) counts it as one of Moḥammad b. Baʿiṯ’s possessions.

Wajnāʾ was succeeded by his brother Moḥammad, who, along with many other governors across Azerbaijan and Iraq, rebelled against al-Maʾmun upon his succession to the caliphate in 198/813-14 (Yaʿqubi, II, p. 540).  The Rawwadid territories were also affected by the rebellion of the Ḵorramis in the early 9th century.  Bābak Ḵorrami (d. 223/838) first raised the standard of revolt in the Rawwadid town of Baḏḏ, which remained a Khorrami stronghold even after the failure of their rebellion (Balāḏori, p. 462).  Bābak  is also said (Ebn al-Nadim, p. 529) to have spent about two years in the service of Moḥammad b. Rawwād Azdi, even though the latter cooperated with al-Maʾmun’s governor of Azerbaijan and Armenia, ʿIsa b. Moḥammad, in his failed attempt to hunt down and kill Bābak ca. 205/820-21 (Yaʿqubi, II, p. 564).  Moḥammad b. Rawwād was not, however, a wholly loyal servant of the ʿAbbasids, for he seems to have been among the leading Azerbaijanis taken captive taken by al-Maʾmun’s general Moḥammad b. Ḥamid, who was sent to suppress Bābak in 212/827-28: Yaʿqubi (II, p. 540) names Moḥammad b. Rawwād as one of those sent to Baghdad when the Khorrami revolt was crushed. At some point Moḥammad b. Rawwād returned to Azerbaijan, for Ebn Kordāḏbeh (p. 119), who wrote before 232/847, states that Marāḡa, Ardabil, Tabriz, and a few other towns belonged to Moḥammad b. Rawwād while Moḥammad b. Baʿiṯ held Marand.  Meskawayh (repr., IV, p. 112) mentions in his report about the rebellion of Moḥammad b. Baʿiṯ in 234/848 that his territories adjoined those of Moḥammad b. Rawwād (Ṭabari, III, p. 1380).

The other early Rawwadid mentioned in the sources is Yaḥyā b. Rawwād, who seems to have been associated with the rebellious Moḥammad b. Baʿiṯ.  When the latter was captured and brought to Baghdad in 235/849, Yaḥya was also taken, but afterwards he assumed a position of leadership (Yaʿqubi, II, p. 594: soyyera lahu esm wa-qiāda), although it is unclear whether this was just of Marand or of Azerbaijan more generally.  The lack of any further references to the Rawwadids for another century suggests that any power Yaḥyā gained was short-lived.  Other than these passing mentions of Rawwadid involvement in rebellions or their suppression, there is little hard evidence for the family’s activities.  Like other Arab settlers in Azerbaijan, they probably started to become to some extent assimilated with Iranian society during the 9th century, just as their rival Moḥammad b. Baʿiṯ is known to have composed poetry in Persian and joined Bābak’s rebellion (Ṭabari, III, p. 1388; Yaʿqubi, II, p. 577).  By the 10th century, according to Ebn Ḥawqal (II, p. 348), Persian was the language of Azerbaijan and most of Armenia, although Arabic was still in use but not universally understood.

THE RAWWADID DYNASTY OF TABRIZ (10TH-11TH CENTURIES)

From the middle of the 9th to the middle of the 10th centuries, no information at all survives about the Rawwadids. It is reasonable to assume that during that period they had intermarried with local Kurdish families, for when they re-emerge into the light of history some of them are known by typically Kurdish names like Mamlān, and from the 11th century onwards the connection with the Haḏbāni Kurds is attested.  The sources show a good deal of confusion about the 10th-century Rawwadids, and many of the details suggested by the Iranian historian Aḥmad Kasravi (1890-1946) need to be revised. 

Moḥammad b. Ḥosayn is counted by Monajjem-baši (d. 1113/1702), on the authority of the now-lost 12th century Taʾriḵ al-Bāb wa’l-Abwāb, as the first of the Rawwadid dynasty, and he is described as “ruler of some districts in Armenia” (tr. Minorsky, p. 168).  During the period 337-42/948-53, while the Mosaferid (Sallarid) ruler Sallār Marzobān b. Moḥammad (r. 941-57) was held captive in a fortress in Fārs by the Buyids, Moḥammad b. Ḥosayn seized some of his territories in Azerbaijan.  Ebn Ḥawqal (p. 254, tr. II, p. 347), however, relates that in 344/944 the Rawwadid ruler of Ahar and Varzoqān, Abu’l-Hayjāʾ b. Rawwād, sent an annual tribute of 50,000 dinars to Sallār Marzobān, indicating that the Mosaferids retained the allegiance of the Rawwadids and a degree of power. Since Abu’l-Hayjāʾ was a popular epithet applied to a number of notables during this period, it is difficult to know whether this Ebn Rawwad was Moḥammad b. Ḥosayn, the ostensible founder of the dynasty, or his son Ḥosayn, or someone else.  The Armenian numismatist Aram Vardanyan (2009, p. 246 n. 8) has recently identified him as Ḥosayn b. Moḥammad b. Rawwād, who is mentioned by Meskawayh (II, p. 180; V, p. 327) as an ally in 349/960 of the Mosaferid Vahsudān b. Moḥammad (r. 941-65) in his attempts to assert control over Azerbaijan.  According to Monajjem-bāši (tr. Minorsky, p. 168), Ḥosayn b. Moḥammad occupied Tabriz in 956 and made the city his capital in 961.  In 351/662 a Nāṣer b. Rawwād issued silver dirhams as a vassal of the Mosaferid Vahsudan b. Moḥammad in Ardabil (Vardanyan, 2009, pp. 247-48, 254 s.v. 1.), and it is possible, although far from certain, that he is identical with the Ebn al-Rawwād who slightly earlier had ruled Ahar and Varzoqān.

Ḥosayn b. Moḥammad must have succeeded his father between 342/953 and 345/956, if Monajjem-bāši’s dates are to be trusted (tr. Minorsky, p. 168).  Ḥosayn b. Moḥammad was then succeeded by his son Moḥammad, better known as Abu’l-Hayjāʾ, or as Mamlān, the Kurdish version of Moḥammad.  This had probably occurred by 975, when Abu ’l-Hayjā’ is attested to have captured Derenik, the ruler of the Armenian province of Andzevacikʿ (Zozan, Zavazan). By this date Ḵoy and Salmas by Lake Urmiya seem to have been controlled by Rawwadids (Matthew of Edessa, pp. 35-36; cf. Vardanyan, 2009, p. 248).  Monajjem-bāši credits Abu’l-Hayjāʾ with the conquest of the remaining parts of Azerbaijan from the Mosaferid Marzobān b. Esmāʿil b. Vahsudān (r. 355-87/966-97) in 373/983 or 374/984 (tr. Minorsky, p. 168). 

According to Stephen of Tarōn (11th cent.; bk. 3, chap. 18), Abu'l-Hayjāʾ seized the remaining Mosafarid territories, including Dvin, ca. 987-88.  But a Muslim ruler named Abu’l-Hayjāʾ also led a campaign against Armenia in those same years in alliance with Mušeł, the Bagratid (see BAGRATIDS) ruler of Kars, and attacked Abu Dolaf, the ruler of Ḵoy.  Abu Dolaf captured Abu’l-Hayjāʾ who was obliged to cede to him Dvin and other territories, and yet the following year, after having vainly sought the assistance of the Byzantine emperor Basil II (r. 976-1025), Abu Dolaf died.  It has been suggested that the latter Abu’l-Hayjāʾ was the Rawwadid Abu’l-Hayjāʾ, though he was more likely a member of the Musafarid dynasty with the same name (Stephen of Tarōn, bk. 3, chap. 12; Vardanyan, 2009, pp. 249-50 and n. 25; cf. Kasravi, p. 146; for a different interpretation of these complicated events see Ter-Ghewondyan, pp. 101-2). 

It is moreover possible that these events have been confused with the Rawwadid Abu’l-Hayjāʾ's invasion of Vaspurakan and his seizure of Ḵoy in 377-78/988-89, reported by Stephen of Tarōn bk. 3, chap. 19); according to Stephen of Tarōn, the Rawwadid Abu’l-Hayjāʾ died in that year.  In contrast, Monajjem-baši states that in 386/996 Abu’l-Hayjāʾ captured his brother Marzobān, who had opposed him, and died in 391/1000.  The conflicting evidence of the Muslim and the Christian sources is further complicated by coins from Marāḡa struck in the name of Moḥammad b. Ḥosayn Rawwād in 393/1002 and 405/1014, and one struck in Ardabil in 400/1009 (Album, pp. 100-102; Vardanyan, 2009, pp. 254-55).  As the Rawwadid Abu’l-Hayjāʾ is also known as Moḥammad b. Ḥosayn Rawwād, the coins raise the possibility that he reigned far longer than either Monajjem-baši or Stephen of Tarōn indicate.  Alternatively, the coins were struck by another, later ruler of this name who is unattested in the literary sources.  Indeed, the numismatic evidence casts severe doubt on Monajjem-baši’s trustworthiness, or that of his source.  Monejjem-baši identifies as Abu’l-Hayjāʾ’s successor his son Abu Naṣr Ḥosayn, whom he claims to have died in 416/1025.  However, a coin was struck in the name of Abu Nasr Ḥosayn's brother Vahsudān b. Moḥammad already in 407/1016.  These coins indicate he must have ascended to the throne between 1014 and 1016. It is possible that the Rawwadid realm was divided between the two brothers, or that Abu Naṣr Ḥosayn enjoyed an ephemeral rule, but there is no firm evidence for either.  Vahsudān may well have succeeded his father directly (Album, p. 101; cf. Kasravi, pp. 153-54).

Further confusion is introduced into the chronology by the Armenian accounts of Mamlān, whom Stephen of Tarōn (bk. 3, chap. 19) describes as Abu’l-Hayjāʾ’s son and successor.  Given the numismatic evidence, however, it seems likely that he is identical with the Abu’l-Hayjāʾ Mamlān mentioned by Monejjem-baši, and that his reign should be dated from some point after 961 to 1014 or 1016.  The Armenian sources discuss in some detail his clashes with David Curopalates (Kuropałates Davitʿ), the Georgian ruler of Tao (Taykʿ; see GEORGIA), the mountainous region to the north of Erzurum (Kasravi, pp. 149-51). The earliest confrontation is recorded by Matthew of Edessa (pp. 37-38) to have occurred ca. 983-4 when Mamlān advanced as far as Apahunikʿ, to the north of Lake Van, and demanded from David ten years of tribute, hostages, and a promise of future military service.  However, both Mamlān’s wife and his war horse were captured in the Georgian counterattack. Stephen of Tarōn (bk. 3, chap. 38) records another confrontation around 997, though this time the aggressor seems to have been David Curopalates who captured the important Muslim frontier fortress of Manzikert (Malāzgerd), expelled its Muslim inhabitants, and moved in Armenian and Georgian settlers.  Since the Georgian ruler ignored Muslim pleas to return the town to them, Mamlān sent a large army against him.  David and his allies Abas of Kars and Bagrat III of Georgia advanced to Vałaršakert (Tk. Eleşkirt, west of Mt. Ararat).  The Rawwadid army was forced to retreat, burning down settlements as it went.  Between 998 and 999 Mamlān organised another major campaign against David, assisted by an amir of Khorasan who has not been satisfactorily identified (Stephen of Tarōn, bk. 3, chap. 41).  According to Stephen of Tarōn, Mamlān’s aim was no less than to conquer Armenia and Georgia, to rebuild Erzurum, and to sack Tao in revenge for David’s destruction of the mosque at Manzikert.  As David was too old to take the field against the Muslim army, he relied on help from the kings Gagik of Armenia and Gurgen of Georgia.  In response to the Christian army’s tactic of hiding behind rocks and refusing to come out and fight, the Muslims attacked, but broke ranks.  Consequently, the Christian army won a famous victory, chasing Mamlān all the way to the gates of Arjiš (Turk. Erciş) on the northern shores of Lake Van.

The troubled reign of Vahsudān b. Mamlān is the best attested period of Rawwadid history because sixty panegyric qaṣidas which Qaṭrān Tabrizi (11th cent.) adressed to rulers have been preserved (for their historical analysis, see Kasravi).  However, almost nothing is known about the early years of Vahsudān’s reign.  Relations between members of the Rawwadid family were sometimes tense, for Abu’l-Hayjāʾ b. Rabib-al-Dawla, a son of a sister of Vahsudan was on bad terms with his uncle.  In 425/1033 Vahsudān incited the Byzantines to capture Barkari (Turk. Muradiye) by Lake Van, which was under the control of Abu’l-Hayjāʾ. The ʿAbbasid caliph al-Qāʾem (r. 422-67/1031-75) encouraged the quarrelling Rawwadids to form a united front to recapture this important fortress, and their counter attack seems to have inflicted great damage, yet Barkari remained in Byzantine hands (Ebn al-Aṯir, IX, p. 437; Aristakes, pp. 47-48).  At an uncertain date Vahsudān also sent a major expedition, commanded by his son Abu Naṣr Mamlān and accompanied by Qaṭrān, against the espahbad of Moḡān (Minorsky, 1954, pp. 524-25). After defeating this espahbad, Abu Naṣr Mamlān built a fortress in Ardabil (Kasravi, pp. 182-83).  Qaṭrān’s poems also contain references to fighting between Vahsudān and another, unidentified, enemy ruler (Kasravi, pp. 185-86).  Above all, however, Vahsudān’s reign was dominated by the Türkmen invasions of Azerbaijan. These erstwhile followers of the Saljuq leader Arslān Esrāʾil b. Saljuq were known as the ʿErāqiya, and their migration westwards preceded the better-known advance of Ṭoḡrel (d. 455/1063) and Čaḡri (d. 452/1060).  The date of the first incursion is unclear.  If the evidence of Armenian sources and the arguments of the Turkish historian İbrahim Kafesoğlu (1914-84) are to be accepted, the first ʿErāqiya raid on Armenia and Azerbaijan should be dated to about 1015. The early date, though, seems to reflect a later desire to explain various misfortunes that befell the Armenians in this period.  Ebn al-Aṯir, the main Islamic source for the Erāqiya, records many of their early activities for the hijra year 420 (began 20 January 1029), and the earliest ʿErāqiya presence in Azerbaijan dates in fact to about 1029 (Kafesoğlu, pp. 259-75; Cahen, pp. 275-79; Peacock, pp. 139-40).

The first group of ʿErāqiya to reach Azerbaijan were protected by Vahsudān.  He formed a marriage alliance with them to use them against his enemies, a move that provoked the hostility of the Shaddadid ruler Abu’l-Ḥasan Laškari (r. 1034-49; see Ebn al-Aṯir, IX, pp. 378, 381, 457; cf. Kasravi, p. 159).  These ʿErāqiya, led by chiefs named Būqā, Göktaš, Manṣur, and Dānā, did not abandon their rapacious ways. They were reinforced by the arrival of another group of Ḡozz in Azerbaijan in 429/1037-38 (Ebn al-Aṯir, IX, p. 457), when the ʿErāqiya plundered Marāḡa.  Consequently, Vahsudān and his nephew Abu’l-Hayjāʾ b. Rabib-al-Dawla, who was chief of the Haḏbāni Kurds, put aside their differences and joined forces against the ʿErāqiya, who dispersed to Rayy, Isfahan, and Hamadān.  However, a group of ʿErāqiya remained in Urmiya, from where they launched a raid on Armenia, while continuing to plunder the Haḏbāni lands (Ebn al-Aṯir, IX, pp. 382-83).  They must have remained a significant nuisance in Azerbaijan, because in 432/1040-41 Vahsudān invited the ʿErāqiya leaders to a banquet and massacred them.  Afterwards most of their followers retreated to Hakkari. A second group of ʿErāqiya reached Azerbaijan in 433/1041-42 (Ebn al-Aṯir, IX, pp. 385-86), having fled from the Jebāl to escape the Saljuq commander Ebrāhim Ināl (or Yenāl; d. 451/1059) who had been sent to bring them order.  Qatrān mentions several battles between Vahsudān and the Ḡozz, although the dates are not certain, including a fierce battle in the desert of Sarāb in which the Rawwadids inflicted a crushing defeat on the Turks (Kasravi, pp. 171-72).

The expulsion of the Ḡozz allowed Vahsudān to improve relations with the Shaddadids, and he travelled in person to Ganja to visit Abu’l-Ḥasan Laškari, as Qaṭrān recorded in an ode on this occasion (Kasravi, pp. 176-78).  However, more suffering was inflicted on Azerbaijan in 434/1042-3 by the earthquake which destroyed much of Tabriz, including the citadel, walls, houses, markets and most of the Rawwadid palace (dār al-emāra).  Ebn al-Aṯir (IX, p. 513) reports that 50,000 people died, while Nāṣer-e Ḵosrow, who passed through Tabriz four years later, gives the figure of 40,000 dead, although he states that the city was flourishing at the times of his visit (pp. 6-7).  Vahsudān himself was only saved because he was in a garden, presumably outside the city.  Fear of Saljuq attack made him temporarily flee to a nearby castle, the location of which is not specified, although he did in due course undertake the rebuilding of the city (Safina, p. 439; cf. Kasravi, pp. 178-80).  The Greek author Skylitzès (p. 373) records destruction caused around Tabriz between 1048 and 1049 by the Türkmen chieftain Ḥasan, apparently a nephew of the Saljuq sultan Ṭoḡrel.  In 446/1054-55, Ṭoḡrel himself came to Tabriz, where Vahsudān proclaimed the ḵoṭba in his name, paid him tribute, and handed over a son as a hostage (Ebn al-Aṯir, IX, p. 598).  This son was perhaps Abu’l-Hayjāʾ Manučehr, who, as Qaṭrān indicates, was brought up in Khorasan (Kasravi, p. 189).  At any rate, Saljuq suzerainty over Azerbaijan seems to have been established without much resistance from the Rawwadids.

According to Monajjem-baši, Vahsudān died in 451/1059 (Minorsky, p. 168), but Ebn al-Aṯir (IX, p. 650) writes that Ṭoḡrel confirmed his son Mamlān b. Vahsudān as ruler of Azerbaijan in 450/1058-59. There may have been some kind of power struggle over the succession, for Qaṭrān alludes to Abu’l-Hayjāʾ Manučehr b. Vahsudān’s aspirations to seize power for himself, but when and from whom is uncertain (Kasravi, pp. 189-90). As for Vahsudān’s third son, Abu’l-Qāsem Ebrāhim, we know little more than his name.

Mamlān b. Vahsudān seems to have attempted to throw off Saljuq sovereignty, for in 452/1060 Ṭoḡrel besieged Tabriz, but was eventually forced to give up because of the extreme cold.  His armies nonetheless ravaged the region, and the destruction led to famine (Sebṭ, p. 74). The following year, the Saljuq armies were back in the Tabriz area.  This time Mamlān surrendered in person to Ṭoḡrel, paid him an indemnity, and handed over a son as a hostage. Ṭoḡrel then proceeded to Nakhichevan (Naḵjavān) to receive the allegiance of Abu Dolaf (Sebṭ, pp. 92-94). It is probably this event to which Monajjem-baši refers when he mentions that Ṭoḡrel came in person to Azerbaijan in 1063 and imposed a heavy tribute on Mamlān (Minorsky, p. 169).  Little else is known of Mamlān’s reign.  Qaṭrān alludes to some battles between Mamlān and the Christians and another unidentified enemy, but it is not clear whether this took place before or after the death of Vahsudān (Kasravi, pp. 87-88). Monajjem-bāši claims Mamlān b. Vahsudān remained ruler until 463/1070 when Alp Arslān (r. 1063-73) arrested him and his children, putting an end to Rawwadid rule (Minorsky, p. 169). However, in the early 12th century, descendants of the family managed to regain power in Marāḡa, where the dynasty became known as Aḥmadilis or Atābakān-e Marāḡa (cf. Kasravi, pp. 196-98). In the mid-12th century a certain Rawādi (Rawwādi) is documented in Arrān, where he had been appointed governor of Ganja by the Saljuq sultan Masʿud (r. 529-47/1134-52).  Whether he was connected with the Rawwadids must be regarded as uncertain; possibly he was related to the Kurdish Rawād of Dvin.  He was supposedly of humble origin, so the Türkmen groups who were ravaging Arrān refused to obey him, although he later made peace with them and married a Türkmen woman.  He was also the cousin of the powerful commander Ḵāṣṣ Beg b. Balankiri.  Rawādi was soon deposed as governor of Ganja by the Eldigüzid (see ATĀBAKĀN-E ĀḎARBĀJĀN) ruler Šams-al-Din Eldigüz (r. ca. 530-71/1136-75; see Bondāri, p. 232; Dowsett, pp. 485-87).

Although 11th-century Azerbaijan was a remote frontier province¾much as it had been in the 9th and 10th centuries¾the Rawwadid court did play a certain part in promoting Persian culture.  Mamlān b. Vahsudān seems to have been a poet although none of his works survive (Kasravi, p. 188), while the Rawwadid patronage of Qaṭrān indicates that in the 11th century they shared the growing enthusiasm for Persian literature.  However, little else is known of their cultural activities, and no Rawwadid buildings survive in Tabriz.  Equally scanty is the information how the Rawwadid state was administered.  Outside of Tabriz, the Rawwadids probably relied on the uncertain loyalties of local strongmen such as the amir of Ḵoy.  The Rawwadid intervention in Vaspurakan and Apahunikʿ indicates that the dynasty’s influence did at times extend as far west as Lake Van, where there were significant Muslim populations of Arab origin until at least the mid-11th century. But unless new sources come to light much doubt will remain about even the chronology of Rawwadid rulers, let alone other details.

Bibliography:

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Matthew of Edessa, Armenia and the Crusades, Tenth to Twelfth Centuries: The Chronicle, tr. Ara Edmond Dostourian, Belmont, Mass., 1993.

Abu ʿAli Aḥmad b. Meskawayh, Tajāreb al-omam, ed. Sayyed Kasravi Ḥasan, Beirut, 2003.

Aḥmad b. Loṭf-Allāh Monajjem-bāši, Jāmeʿ al-dowal, partial Eng. tr. in Vladimir Minorsky, Studies in Caucasian History, London, 1953, pp. 22-55.

Nāṣer-e Ḵosraw, Safar-nāma; tr. Wheeler M. Thackston as Book of Travels, Albany, N.Y., 1986; repr., Costa Mesa, Calif., 2001.

Safina-yi Tabriz, Tehran, 2003 (facsim. of MS Per. 13490 in the Majles-e šura-ye eslāmi, Tehran).

Sebṭ b. Jawzi, Merʾāt al-zamān fi taʾriḵ al-aʿyān, ed. A. Sevim, Ankara, 1968.

Jean Skylitzès, Empereurs de Constantinople, tr. from the Greek by Bernard Flusin and annotated by Jean-Claude Cheynet, Paris, 2003.

Stephen of Tarōn, Patmutʿiwn tiezerakanʿ, tr. Timothy W. Greenwood as The “Universal History” of Stepʿannos Taronecʿ'i, Oxford, 2017.

Moḥammad b. Jarir Ṭabari, Ketāb taʾriḵ al-rosul wa’l-moluk, ed. M. J. de Goeje et al., 3 vols. in 15, Leiden, 1879-1901; repr., Leiden, 1964.

Aḥmad b. Abi Yaʿqub Yaʿqubi, Taʾriḵ, ed. M. Th. Houtsma, 2 vols., Leiden, 1883.

Yāqut b. ʿAbd-Allāh Ḥamawi, Moʿjam al-boldān, 5 vols., Beirut, 1955-57.

Studies:

Stephen Album, “Notes on the coinage of Muhammad ibn al-Husayn al-Rawwadi,” Révue numismatique 6/14, 1972, pp. 99-104.

Paul Blau, “Life in a Rough Neighborhood: Byzantium, Islam, and the Rawwadid Kurds,” International Journal of Kurdish Studies 20/1-2, 2006, pp. 1-50.

C. Edmond Bosworth, The New Islamic Dynasties: A Chronological and Genealogical Manual, New York, 1996, pp. 148-150 for the Mosaferids and the Rawwadids.

Claude Cahen, “A propos de quelques articles du Köprülü Armağanı,” JA 242, 1954, pp. 275-79 (included in his Variorum Reprint Turcobyzantina et Oriens Christianus, London, 1974).

İbrahim Kafesoğlu, “Doğu Anadolu’ya ilk Selçuklu akını (1015-1021) ve tarihi ehemmiyeti,” in Mélanges Fuad Köprülü, Istanbul, 1953, pp. 259-74.

Aḥmad Kasravi, Šahriārān-e Gom-nām, Tehran, 1928; repr., Tehran, 2000.

Vladimir Minorsky, Studies in Caucasian History, London, 1953.

Idem, “A Mongol Decree of 720/1320 to the Family of Shaykh Zāhid,” BSOAS 16, 1954, pp. 515-27.

A. C. S. Peacock, Early Seljūq History: A New Interpretation, London, 2010.

Aram Nahapeti Ter-Ghewondyan, The Arab Emirates in Bagratid Armenia, tr.Nina G. Garsoïan, Lisbon, 1976. 

Aram Vardanyan, “The History of Iranian Adharbayjān and Armenia in the Rawwādid Period (Tenth Century AD) According to Narrative Sources and Coins,” Numismatic Chronicle 169, 2009, pp. 245-60 and plates 32-33.

Idem, The Coins as Evidence for the History of Armenia and Adharbayjan in the Xth Century AD, Tübingen, 2013.

(Andrew Peacock)

Originally Published: June 15, 2017

Last Updated: June 15, 2017

Cite this entry:

Andrew Peacock, “RAWWADIDS,” Encyclopædia Iranica, online edition, 2017, available at http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/rawwadids (accessed on 15 June 2017).