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Saintly Descent and Worldly Affairs in Mid-Nineteenth Century Mascara, Algeria

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2009

Allan Christelow
Allan Christelow
Affiliation:
Bayero University, Kano, Nigeria
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Extract

The region of Mascara, Algeria in the mid-nineteenth century is an attractive terrain for one seeking to combine anthropology and history in a North African setting. It was from this milieu that the 'amīr ‘Abd al-Qādir had emerged to lead resistance to the French in the 1830s and’ 40s. And the region abounded in that quintessentially Maghribin social type best known to the Western world as “marabouts,” but known in local parlance as 'awlād sayyid. These were the descendants of walīs, saintly men whose mortal remains are sheltered by the qubbas, or small, white-washed domed shrines one sees throughout North Africa. The two subjects are closely linked, for the 'amīr himself came from a prominent 'awlād sayyid family, as did many of his most important followers.

Type
Articles
Information
International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 12 , Issue 2 , September 1980 , pp. 139 - 155
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1980

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References

NOTES

1 On Moroccan cases, see notes 14–16 below. Studies on Algeria tend to concentrate on the religious and ritual aspects of “maraboutism,” the classic being Dermenghem, Emile, Le culte des saints dans l'Islam maghrébin (Paris, 1954).Google Scholar In a similar vein, Dominique Provansal, “Le phénomène maraboutique au Maghreb,” Genève-Afrique, 14 (1975), pp. 59–77.Google Scholar

2 On the mentalité of Bureau Arabe officers, see Turin, Yvonne, Affrontements culturels dans l'Algérie coloniale: écoles, médecines, religion, 1830–1880 (Paris, 1971).Google Scholar

3 Among the most notable: Roches, Léon, Trente-deux ans à travers l'Islam, 2 volumes (Paris, 1884–1885);Google Scholar and Muḥammad Bin, ‘Abd al-Qādir al-Jazā'irī, Tuhfa al-za'ir fi ta'rīkh al-'amīr ‘Abd al Qadir, ed. DrHaqī, Mamduh (Beirut, 1964).Google Scholar

4 On the potential uses of such documents, see my “Islamic Legal Documents as a Source for Studying Colonial Algeria,” M.E.S.A. Bulletin, 12:3 (12 1978), Pp. 29–33.Google Scholar

5 The register can be found in the Archives d'Outre Mer, Aix-en-Provence (hereafter, A.O.M.), under the côre 30 JJ 335. In the inventory, it is mistakenly labelled “Correspondence du cadi.” For a more detailed treatment of the register, see Chapter 2 of my unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, “Baraka and Bureaucracy: Algerian Muslim Judges and the Colonial State, 1854–1892,” (University of Michigan, 1977).

6 At this time one could find a few impoverished rural immigrants in Bāb ‘Alī, the native faubourg of Mascara. Dislocations were accelerated by large scale sequester of land after the 1871 rebellion, and by the Warnier Law of 1873, which facilitated the purchase of native land by Europeans.

7 Al-sayyid, the title which distinguished members of the saintly lineages, is now used as a general term of respect, analogous to monsieur.

8 The best illustration of this consistency is the one very unusual case where one finds disagreement over use of the title. See below, note 34.

9 Rinn, Louis, “Le royaume d'Alger sous le dernier dey,” Revue Africaine, 42 (1898), pp. 7–13.Google Scholar The two “maraboutic” tribes mentioned were the 'Awlād Sīdī Daḥū and the' Awlād Sīdī 'Amar Bin Dūba. Many other 'awlād sayyid lineages could be found combined in one tribal unit with commoner lineages. For a study of such a tribe near Tlemcen, see the section on the Beni Hediyel in Bel, Alfred, La religion musulmane en Berberie (Paris, 1938), pp. 392–97.Google Scholar

10 These changes occurred at a time when the central government in Algiers was attempting to reassert its control over the provinces, a tendency clearly marked by the deposition of Ṣalāḥ Bey in Constantine.

11 Lespinasse, E., “Notice sur les Hachem de Mascara,” Revue Africaine, 21 (1877), pp. 141–151.Google Scholar

12 Bureau Arabe, Mascara, Report – 4th quarter 1861, A.O.M., 24 J 8.

13 For a reconstruction of such a process, see Spooner, Brian, “Politics, Kinship and Ecology in South Persia,” Ethnology, 8 (1969), Pp. 139–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

14 For a relatively pure case, see Gellner, E., Saints of the Atlas (London, 1969);Google Scholar on a group who seemed to have outlived their usefulness but clung to the symbols of their distinction, Rabinow, Paul, Symbolic Domination: Cultural Form and Historical Change in Morocco (Chicago, 1975).Google Scholar

15 Stewart, C. C., Islam and Social Order in Mauritania (London, 1973).Google Scholar A similar picture emerges for the Tuaregs, in Norris, H. T., The Tuaregs: Their Islamic Legacy and Its Diffusion in the Sahel (London, 1975).Google Scholar

16 Eickelman, Dale, Moroccan Islam: Tradition and Society in a Moroccan Pilgrimage Center (Austin, 1976).Google Scholar

17 It was a convention to attribute insulting remarks to Sidi 'Ahmad Bin Yūsuf. On the life of this saint, see Bodin, Marcel, “Notes et questions sur Sidi Ahmed Ben Youcef,” Revue Africaine, 66 (1925), pp. 125–89.Google Scholar

18 For examples of Moroccan ẓahīrs confirming sharifian status, see Scientifique du Maroc, Mission, Villes et tribus du Maroc: Casablanca et les Chaouia (Paris, 1915).Google Scholar

19 Guinn, L., “De la suppression d'un manuscrit: Anouar el-birgis fi sharh aqd el-nafis,” Revue Africaine, 31 (1887), pp. 72–80.Google Scholar It is interesting to note that to pay the ransom (some 4,000 reals), the notables of Gharis met together to divide it into quotas, which were then collected by squads of armed horsemen from the local tribesmen.

20 The juwād or military nobility is largely confined to the East of Algeria, where the Ottoman state made alliances with powerful local chiefs, who dominated the outlying, difficult to control areas. In the West, the Ottomans preferred a more direct form of domination, through the makhzan tribes.

21 A confirmation of the “sharifian crisis” of the eighteenth century can be found in the case of Sidi Mhammad al-Huwārī, the patron saint of Oran, whose elevation to sharifian status, in spite of his Berber origins, was condoned by al-Nāṣirī. Earlier works never made any mention of his descent from the Prophet. See Destaing, E., “Un saint musulman du XVe siècle: Sidi Mhammed el-Houari,” Journal Asiatique, 10th series, 8 (1906), pp. 295–342 and 385–438.Google Scholar

22 According to an 1861 Bureau Arabe report (see note 12), property was already privately held in the Gharīs Plain when the Ḥasham first arrived.

23 Subdivision/Mascara to Division/Oran, 23 February 1852, in A.O.M., 30 JJ 124.

24 On origins of the office, see Division/Constantine to Gouverneur-Général, 9 January 1845, in A.O.M., 17 H 5 and Ministre de la Guerre to Gouverneur-Général, 26 April 1845, in 17 H 5.

25 The fixed composition majlis seems to have prevailed in new centers, such as Orleansville, which had no institutional traditions to draw on.

26 On his uncles, see Mascara Register, 7rabīʻ II 1271; on his early career, Subdivision/Tlemcen to Division/Oran, 4 September 1851, in A.O.M., I J 55;on the trip to Paris, Ministre de la Guerre to Intendant Militaire/Marseille, 9 December 1855, in A.O.M. 17 H 6.

27 The three were: Muḥhammad Bin ʻAmur; Muhammad Bin Shaīkh al-Ḥafidh ʻAbī Ra's; and Al Ḥanifī Bin ʻAbdallāh.

28 Among families with important roles under the 'amīr and then on the majlis were the Bin Tuhāmī, the Bin Rukash, and the Masharfi. The 'amīr's relatives were Ḥasan Bin Muṣṭafā and Tayyib and Muhammad Saghir Bin Mukhtār. Tayyib kept up a fairly steady correspondence with the exiled 'amīr– see al-Jazā'irī, Tuhfa al-zā'ir, p. 703, and 'Abd al-Qādir to Tayyib Bin Mukhtār, 11 04 1871 in Reveil de Mascara, 4 09 1881.Google Scholar

29 There is, however, virtually no mention of the term sharīf, nor are there any nisbas suggesting sharifian descent. The 'amīr used “al-Ḥasanī,” but this may have been a practice he adopted in Syria.

30 Mascara Register, 3 Shawal 1271 (20 June 1855).

31 On the scarcity of habus, see Division/Oran to Gouverneur-Général, 22 October 1855, in A.O.M., I JJ 10. For summary inventories of habus, see “Biens Habous-Oran, 1850,” in A.O.M., F80 1087; and Division/Oran to Gouverneur-Général, 4 August 1849, in A.O.M., 22 S 1.

32 See ‘Abd al-Raḥmān Bin ’Ahmad al-Tajinī, “Kitāb ‘aqd al-jumān,” trans. Guinn, L., Revue Africaine, 35 (1892), pp. 139–152.Google Scholar For an interesting interpretation of such stories, see Gilsenan, Michael, “Against Patron-Client Relations,” in Gellner, E. and Waterbury, J., eds., Patrons and Clients (London, 1977).Google Scholar

33 The sum of 1,000 dīnārs was evidently fixed by custom. How much cash was actually exchanged is impossible to tell. Dūrū is conventionally used in Algeria to mean francs.

34 Mascara Register, 12 Shaʻbān 1271 (30 April 1855), and Mid Dhū al-Hija 1271 (late August-early September 1855).

35 The confusion over status here might be construed as symptomatic of the emergence of a new social type, the geographically mobile government employee, who usually came from a wealthy and/or prestigious family to begin with, and, in leaving home to enter government service tapped new source of wealth and prestige.

36 The figures on divorce are as follows: Sayyids – 2 khulʻ, 8 ṭalāq; commoners – 16 khulʻ, 18 ṭalāq.

37 For divorce on the grounds of desertion, see Mascara Register, 27 Sha'bān 1270 (25 May 1854); 6 Rajib 1270 (3 April 1854); and 27 Ṣ afar 1272 (8 November 1855).

38 On land tenure patterns among the Ḥasham, see Bureau Arabe, Mascara, Report – 4th quarter 1861, in A.O.M., 24 J 8.

39 Mascara Register, 18 Jumādā I 1272 (17 January 1856).

40 For instance, the case in which an 'aghā was accused of confiscating a man's share in a mill. Mascara Register, Mid-Shawal 1269 (later July 1853).

41 An analysis of over 500 individuals listed in a sequester inventory of 1857 shows 26% sayyids.

42 Mascara Register, 16 Ṣafar 1270 (19 November 1853).

43 Subdivision/Mascara to Division/Oran, 24 January 1855, in A.O.M., 30 JJ 125.

44 The decree of 31 December 1859 did not actually abolish the majlis, but stripped it of any real power by making them only “consultative.” Since no consultative majlis were appointed, a de facto abolition of the majlis became apparent by 1861.

45 Subdivision/Mascara correspondence with Division/Oran and Procureur-Impérial/Mostaganem in 1860 and 1861 contains numerous references to this problem. In A.O.M., 30 JJ 129.

46 One indication of the cohesiveness of the society is the failure of the baīt al-māl to find unabsorbed inheritance shares, which were quite common in the more atomized urban societies of Algiers and Constantine.

47 For instance, Eickelman, Moroccan Islam and Rabinow, Symbolic Domination.