Page 136 - Arabian Studies (I)

120 A rabian Studies /

well built stone houses, and upon which the whole life of the village
depends. The first building of prominence is the congregational
mosque ('/ami6), a whitewashed stone structure with a dome and
minaret from the summit of which a solitary impudent cactus is
growing. Local informants said that the jdmic now standing dates
from the time of the ZaydT imam, al-Mu’ayyad 0Abbas b. cAbd
al-Rahman, who ruled the Yemen fora brief time in 1266/1850. The
path continues to rise, always close to the ghayl and threading its
way through more houses until the small simply constructed square
mosque called al-Masjid al-Ahmar is reached.4 It is here that the
inscription (No. 1 below), first copied by Niebuhr over 200 years
ago, can be located in the south wall.5 A further climb up the
picturesque footpath brings the visitor to Birkat al-Aqmar, a stone
cistern built, according to its inscription (No. 2 below), in early
Rasillid times. The cistern marks the end of the village.

Historical Notes

The earliest mention of Thacbat in the Yemenite histories is about
the year 540/1145-6, perhaps a little before then, but not after
544/1149-50, when the Sulayhid amir, Mansur b. al-Mufaddal b.
Abi’l-Barakat, took over the village as a place of recreation
(mutanazzah).6 Mansur b. al-Mufaddal had been the wazir of the last
Sulayhid ruler, al-Sayyidah bint Ahmad (492-532/1098-1138).
Both his father and his grandfather before him had held the same
post under different Sulayhids from the time of al-Mukarram b.c AIT
b. Muhammad al-Sulayhl (458-84/1066-91). When the Queen died
in 532/1138, she had left instructions that Amir Mansur was to
administer the remaining Sulayhid fortresses and towns, amongst the
most important of which were Dhu Jiblah, al-Tackar and Ibb. In
547/1152-3, however, feeling himself old and weak, Mansur sold
these fortresses and towns to a fellow IsmacIlI, the Zuraycid ruler of
Aden, DacI Muhammad b. Saba’ (533-50/1 138-55), leaving for
himself the hisns of Tacizz and Sabir. The transaction was completed
for 100,000 dinars. It can be assumed that after his withdrawal to
Tacizz and Sabir, the Sulayhid amir had more time to spend in the
pleasant setting of Thacbat.7
From the complete silence of the sources of the period we can
assume that the Ayyubids, who held the Yemen between the years
569-626/1173-1228, paid no particular attention to Thacbat.8
Though our historical sources are lacking also in news of Thacbat in
the very early Rasulid period which followed, inscription No. 2
below provides clear evidence that the first Rasulid ruler, al-Malik