Sa'ad ad-Din II
| Sa'ad ad-Din II سعد الدين زنكي | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sultan of the Sultanate of Ifat | |||||
| Reign | 1386/7 – 1402/3 or 1415 CE (788 – 805 or 817 AH) | ||||
| Predecessor | Haqq ad-Din II | ||||
| Successor | Sabr ad-Din III | ||||
| Died | 1403 or 1415 Zeila Archipelago | ||||
| |||||
| Dynasty | Walashma dynasty | ||||
| Religion | Islam | ||||
Sa'ad ad-Din II (Template:Lang-ar), reigned c. 1386 – c. 1403 or c. 1415,[1] was a Sultan of the Ifat Sultanate. He was the son of Ahmad ibn Ali and brother of Haqq ad-Din II, and the father of Mansur ad-Din, Sabr ad-Din II, Jamal ad-Din II and Badlay ibn Sa'ad ad-Din. The historian Richard Pankhurst describes him as "the last great ruler of Ifat."[2][3]
Reign
Sa'ad ad-Din II was born in Zelia or the court of the Ethiopian Emperor Newaya Krestos.[4] He and his brother Haqq ad-Din II fought against the Ethiopian Emperor and moved their capital to Adal.[5] Pankhurst adds that Sa'ad ad-Din also fought against the kingdom of the Hadiya and a pastoral people called the Zalan, both of whom were Christian allies.[6]The Gadla Marqorewos records that he "easily destroyed" an army of Emperor Dawit I.[7] The Egyptian encyclopedist Ahmad al-Qalqashandi (died 1418) also praises Sa'ad ad-Din's victories against the Ethiopians.[8]
Sultan Sa’ad ad-Din won 20 battle against the Abyssinians, Sa’ad-Din’s long and elusive campaigns were directed not only against the "infidels" (as the Christians and pagans were called in Muslim literature), but also against the Muslim collaborators with the Christian emperors.[9]Taddesse Tamrat notes,in response to the growing Muslim power in the region Emperor Dawit I strengthened the Ethiopian defenses along the border and established his court at Tilq in Fatagar.
Despite these steps, Sa'ad ad-Din's practice of making quick raids into Ethiopian territory presented a difficult challenge to the Ethiopian Emperor, there were several fights between the Abyssinians which were won by the Sultan and it was not until the Sultan was pursued deep into Ifat territory that the Ethiopians would face him on in a pitched battle. After a battle between Sa'ad ad-Din and the Ethiopian general Barwa, in which the Ifat army was defeated and "no less than 400 elders, each of whom carried an iron bar as his insignia of office" were killed, Sa'ad ad-Din with his remaining supporters were chased to furthest part of Zeila[6] There, the Ethiopian army stormed Zeila, finally killing Sultan Sa'ad ad-Din on the island, Medieval Egyptian historian Al-Maqrizi narrates:
- the Amhara pursued Sa'd al-Din as far as the peninsula of Zeila, in the ocean, where he took refuge. The Amhara besieged him there, and deprived him of water; at last one of the impious showed them a way by which they could reach him. When they came upon him a battle ensued; and after three days the water failed. Sa'd al Din was wounded in the forehead and fell to the ground, whereupon they pierced him with their swords. But he died happily, falling in God's cause.[10]
Death
With Sa'ad ad-Din's death, the Walashma dynasty adopted the title of "kings of Adal".[11] His ten sons took refuge in Yemen at the court of King Ahmad bin al-Ashraf of the Rasulid dynasty.[12]
Legacy
According to al Shardi, Ali ben Omar may have encountered coffee during his stay with the Adal king Sadadin's companions in 1401.[13]Famous 16th-century Islamic scholar Ibn Hajar al-Haytami notes in his writings a beverage called qahwa(coffee) developed from a tree in the Zeila region.[13]
Sa'ad ad-Din's tomb stood as a hallowed site for centuries in Zeila. It was visited by Richard Burton the explorer in 1854, who described it as "a mound of rough stones surrounding an upright pole" near the cemetery, decorated with "the remains of votive banquets, broken stones, dried garbage, and stones blackened by the fire" showing how he was "properly venerated" as the current favorite saint of Zeila.[14] Trimingham notes that at the time he wrote his book (circa 1950), the tomb had been destroyed by the encroaching sea.[15]
The Adal Sultanate was also called Bar Sa'ad ad-din meaning "The country of Sa'ad ad-din" in honour of the Sultan.
Additionally, the Saad ad-Din Islands in northern Somalia, off the coast of Zeila, are named in Sa'ad ad-Din's honour.
According to the chronicle "Conquest of Abyssinia" by Arab faqih, Harla clans descendant from Sa'ad ad-Din II participated in the sixteenth century Ethiopian–Adal War.[16]
See also
Works cited
- Cerulli, Enrico (1931). "Documenti arabi per la storia dell'Etiopia". Memorie della Reale Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. 6 (4): 39–101. OCLC 4178469.
Notes
- ^ Trimingham, J. Spencer (2013) [1952]. Islam in Ethiopia. London: Routledge. p. 74. ISBN 9781136970221. Trimingham reports that he died either in 805 AH / 1402-3 CE during the reign of Dawit I (according to al-Maqrizi) or in 817 AH / 1414-5 during the reign of Yeshaq I (according to a History of the Walashmaʿ edited by Cerulli 1931, p. 45).
- ^ Richard Pankhurst, The Ethiopian Borderlands (Lawrenceville: Red Sea Press, 1997), p. 50.
- ^ Asafa Jalata, State Crises, Globalisation, And National Movements In North-east Africa page 3-4
- ^ Taddesse Tamrat, Church and State in Ethiopia (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), p. 147.
- ^ Baba, Tamon. NOTES ON MIGRATION BETWEEN YEMEN AND NORTHEAST AFRICA DURING THE 13–15TH CENTURIES (PDF). Kyushu University. pp. 81–82.
- ^ a b Pankhurst, Borderlands, p. 51
- ^ Taddesse Tamrat, p. 151
- ^ Taddesse Tamrat, p. 152
- ^ The Oromo of Ethiopia: A History, 1570-1860 p.g 18
- ^ Pankhurst, Richard (1982). History Of Ethiopian Towns. p. 57. ISBN 9783515032049.
- ^ J. Spencer Trimingham, Islam in Ethiopia (Oxford: Geoffrey Cumberlege for the University Press, 1952), p. 74 n.7.
- ^ Trimingham, p. 74.
- ^ a b Houtsma, M. Th.; Wensinck, A. J.; Arnold, T. W.; Heffening, W.; Lévi-Provençal, E., eds. (1993). "Ḳawah". First Encyclopedia of Islam. Vol. IV. E.J. Brill. p. 631. ISBN 978-90-04-09790-2. Retrieved January 11, 2016.
- ^ Burton, First Footsteps in East Africa, 1856; edited with additional material by Gordon Waterfield (New York: Praeger, 1966), p. 75.
- ^ Trimingham, p. 250.
- ^ Chekroun, Amélie. Le" Futuh al-Habasa": écriture de l'histoire, guerre et société dans le Bar Sa'ad ad-din. Université Panthéon-Sorbonn. pp. 197–198.