Andalusian exiles found the Emirate of Crete
A band of Andalusian Muslims led by Abu Hafs, who had held Alexandria until the Abbasids drove them out, landed on Byzantine Crete in the 820s and conquered it. Their emirate, with its capital at Chandax (Heraklion), defeated the Byzantine counter-attacks and for more than a century was a base for corsairs raiding the Aegean.
- Date
- between 824 and 828exact date unknown: an interval is given
- Place
- Chandax (Heraklion)today: Heraklion, Crete, Greece · Balkans and Anatolia
- Participants
- Emirate of Crete, Byzantine Empire, Michael II, Abbasid Caliphate
- Threads
- Early medieval Europe (500–1000)
- Also known as
- Emirate of Crete; Критский эмират; Cretan Saracens; Критские сарацины; Iqritish; Abu Hafs; Абу Хафс; Chandax; Хандак
Tradition makes the conquerors survivors of the revolt of the suburb of Córdoba, crushed by the emir al-Hakam I in 818, after which the inhabitants of the suburb were banished en masse. Some settled at Fez; others, more than ten thousand strong, took to piracy and seized Alexandria, until in 827 the Abbasid general Abdallah ibn Tahir forced them out of Egypt. They sailed for Crete with their families in 40 ships — Warren Treadgold estimates some 12,000 people, about 3,000 of them fighting men. W. Kubiak doubted the Córdoban origin, since Andalusian corsairs are attested at Alexandria much earlier and Abu Hafs came from Fahs al-Ballut, far from the capital. The date is disputed too: Muslim sources point to 827 or 828, while Byzantine accounts place the landing soon after the revolt of Thomas the Slav (821–823), and V. Christides and C. Makrypoulias argue for about 824. Where the exiles landed is unknown.
Michael II sent expeditions against them, but they were defeated; Krateros, commander of one of them, escaped to Kos, where the Arabs caught and crucified him. The Byzantine tale that Abu Hafs burned his ships to cut off any retreat is probably a later invention, since the settlers had brought their families. The emirate recognized Abbasid suzerainty but was in practice independent. From Chandax — its fortified capital, named after the Arabic word for a moat — its fleets raided the islands and coasts of the Aegean, and Byzantine attempts at reconquest failed until Nikephoros Phokas took the city in 961.
Connections
Related events
- Abd al-Rahman I founds the Emirate of Córdobabetween 14 May and 15 May 756 · Western and Central EuropeTradition makes the conquerors of Crete exiles from Córdoba, banished after the revolt of 818 by al-Hakam I, grandson of Abd al-Rahman I
- Aghlabid conquest of SicilyJune 827 – 1 August 902 · Western and Central EuropeFrom 827 Byzantium had to fight the Arab invaders of Crete and of Sicily at the same time
Same participants
- Battle of Pliska: Krum destroys the army of Nikephoros I26 July 811 · Balkans and Anatoliavia Byzantine Empire
- Fourth Fitna: al-Amin against al-Ma'mun and the siege of BaghdadJanuary 811 – September 813 · Middle East and Egyptvia Abbasid Caliphate
- Georgios of Makuria’s embassy to the caliph and the revision of the baqt835 – between 836 and 837 · Africavia Abbasid Caliphate
- Construction of Sarkelbetween 833 and 841 · Eastern Europevia Byzantine Empire
Adjacent events in the thread
- Sack of Amorium1 August – between 12 August and 24 September 838 · Balkans and Anatolia
Meanwhile in the world
Other regions, within a year of this event
Western and Central Europe
- Aghlabid conquest of SicilyJune 827 – 1 August 902
Eastern Europe
- Saltovo-Mayaki culturec. 750 – between 900 and 950
- The Khazar rulers adopt Judaismbetween 740 and 861
- Volyntsevo culture: the Slavs of the Dnieper Left Bank in the Khazar agebetween 700 and 750 – between 813 and 833
Middle East and Egypt
- The House of Wisdom and the translation movement in Baghdadc. 800 – c. 900
Africa
- Ifriqiya under the Aghlabids800 – March 909
- Igbo-Ukwu: bronze casting in the West African forest800–899 – 1100–1199
Central and Northern Asia
- The Tang–Tibet treaty of 821–822 and the treaty pillar in Lhasa8 November 821 – March 823
- The rise of the Samanids in Transoxiana819–900
South Asia
- The tripartite struggle for Kannaujbetween 783 and 790 – between 915 and 918
East Asia
- Jang Bogo’s Cheonghae garrison and the trade of the Yellow Seabetween 18 May and 15 June 828 – between December 841 and April 846
Southeast Asia and Oceania
- Building of Borobudurc. 780 – c. 833
North America
- Pueblo I: villages of surface rooms on the Colorado Plateauc. 750 – c. 900
- Plum Bayou Mounds: a planned ceremonial centre in the Arkansas valleyc. 650 – c. 1050
- The Late Woodland period in eastern North Americac. 500 – c. 1000
Latin America
- Wari culture and the Middle Horizon state in the Central Andesc. 600 – c. 1000
- Tiwanaku culture at its height by Lake Titicacac. 600 – c. 1000
- Classic Maya collapse in the southern lowlandsc. 800 – c. 950
- Rise of Chichén Itzá in northern Yucatánc. 800 – between 900 and 1000
- Cacaxtla and Xochicalco: the Epiclassic cities of central Mexicoc. 650 – c. 900
The same period
Sources
- Wikipedia (English): Emirate of Crete
- Wikipedia (English): Abu Hafs Umar al-Iqritishi
- Wikipedia (Russian): Критский эмират
- Wikipedia (Russian): Умар I Абу Хафс
- Christides V. The Conquest of Crete by the Arabs (ca. 824): A Turning Point in the Struggle between Byzantium and Islam. — Athens: Academy of Athens, 1984.
- Treadgold W. The Byzantine Revival, 780–842. — Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988.
- Canard M. Iḳrīṭish // The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition. Vol. III. — Leiden: Brill, 1971.