Hereditary Transmission of Military Positions in the Umayyad Caliphate: Family Networks, Regional Abstract

Abstract

Objective:This article examines hereditary military succession in the Umayyad Caliphate (661–750 CE) as a structural feature of early Islamic governance. It asks how far military posts were transmitted within specific families, which social and political factors enabled this pattern, and how it affected meritocracy, social hierarchy, and civil–military relations.

Methodology: The study employs a qualitative, historical–analytical approach. It combines close readings of classical Arabic chronicles and biographical works (al-Ṭabarī, al-Balādhurī, Ibn Saʿd, Ibn Khallikān) with a critical synthesis of modern scholarship on the Umayyad period. Using a prosopographical method, it reconstructs the careers of selected military families over two or more generations, organizes them into a structured dataset, and presents the findings in a main summary table and genealogical figures.

Results:The analysis identifies recurring patterns of hereditary succession—direct father–son transmission, lateral succession within kin groups, and multi-generational concentration of military and military–administrative posts. These patterns appear most clearly in Syria, Iraq, and Khurāsān. Hereditary leadership is shown to be largely concentrated in Arab tribal elites, with limited access for non-Arab Muslims (mawālī).

Conclusion: Hereditary military succession emerges as a central mechanism through which the Umayyad state organized coercive power and managed relations between center and provinces. While it provided continuity and local stability, it also reinforced social and ethnic hierarchies and multiplied autonomous centers of authority, contributing to the structural vulnerabilities of Umayyad rule.