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Himyar was a polity in the southern highlands of Yemen, as well as the name of the region which it claimed. Until 110 BCE, it was integrated into the Qataban, afterwards being recognized as an independent kingdom. According to classical sources, their capital was the ancient city of Zafar, relatively near the modern-day city of Sana'a. Himyarite power eventually shifted to Sana'a as the population increased in the fifth century. After the establishment of their kingdom, it was ruled by kings from dhū-Raydān tribe. The kingdom was named Raydān.Jérémie Schiettecatte. Himyar. Roger S. Bagnall; Kai Brodersen; Craige B. Champion; Andrew Erskine; Sabine R. Huebner. The Encyclopedia of Ancient History, John Wiley & Sons, 2017, 9781444338386.ff10.1002/9781444338386.wbeah30219ff. ffhalshs-01585072ff
The kingdom conquered neighbouring Sabaeans in c. 25 BCE (for the first time), Qataban in c. 200 CE, and Hadramaut c. 300 CE. Its political fortunes relative to Saba' changed frequently until it finally conquered the Sabaeans around 280.See, e.g., Bafaqih 1990. With successive invasion and Arabization, the kingdom collapsed in the early sixth century, as the Kingdom of Aksum conquered it in 530 CE.
The Himyarites originally worshiped most of the South-Arabian pantheon, including Wadd, ʿAthtar, 'Amm and Almaqah. Since at least the reign of Malkikarib Yuhamin (c. 375–400 CE), Judaism was adopted as the de facto state religion. The religion may have been adopted to some extent as much as two centuries earlier, but inscriptions to polytheistic deities ceased after this date. It was embraced initially by the upper classes, and possibly a large proportion of the general population over time. Native Christian kings ruled Himyar in 500 CE until 521–522 CE as well, Christianity itself became the main religion after the Aksumite conquest in 530 CE.
Descendants of the Himyarites, namely the aristocratic families of Dhu'l-Kala and Dhu Asbah, played a prominent role in Bilad al-Sham. They led the South Arabian contingents of the Muslim army during the conquest of Homs in 638 and contributed to making Homs a center for South Arabian settlement, culture and political power. Their chiefs supported Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan against Caliph Ali in the First Muslim Civil War (656–661). Their influence waned with their defeat at the Battle of Marj Rahit against the Quda'a confederation and the Umayyad caliph Marwan I in 684 and practically diminished with the death of their leader at the Battle of Khazir in 686. Nonetheless, members of the Dhu'l-Kala and Dhu Asbah played important roles at different times through the remainder of Umayyad rule (661–750) as governors, commanders, scholars, and pietists.
The trade linking East Africa with the Mediterranean world largely consisted of exporting ivory from Africa to be sold in the Roman Empire. Ships from Ḥimyar regularly travelled the East African coast, and the state also exerted a large amount of influence both cultural, religious and political over the trading cities of East Africa whilst the cities of East Africa remained independent. The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea describes the trading empire of Himyar and its ruler "Charibael" (probably Karab'il Watar Yuhan'emII), who is said to have been on friendly terms with Rome:
Ẓafār's ruins cover scattered over 120 hectare on Mudawwar Mountain 10 km north-north-west of the town of Yarim.Paul Alan Yule, Late Antique Arabia Ẓafār, Capital of Ḥimyar, Rehabilitation of a ‘Decadent’ Society, Excavations of the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg 1998–2010 in the Highlands of the Yemen, Abhandlungen Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft, vol. 29, Wiesbaden 2013, , Early, Empire and Late/Post art periods have been identified.Paul Yule, Himyar–Die Spätantike im Jemen/Late Antique Yemen, Aichwald 2007, pages 123–160; R. Stupperich and Paul Alan Yule, Ḥimyarite Period Bronze Sculptural Groups from the Yemenite Highlands, in: A. Sedov (ed.), Arabian and Islamic Studies A Collection of Papers in Honour of Mikhail Borishovic Piotrovskij on the Occasion of his 70th Birthday, Moscow, 2014, 338–67. Around the same time in the north a Himyar General by the name of Nuh Ifriqis led an expedition to Barbaria and took control of eastern ports in modern-day Djibouti. Other Himyarite generals went as far as invading Rhapta in modern-day Mozambique.
By the 4th century, the rich Himyarite export of incense, which had once supplied pagan Rome in its religious offerings, now began to wane with the Christianization of Rome, contributing to a collapse in the local economy.
Historically, however, Judaism itself was introduced during the reign of Malkikarib Yuhamin, the father of Abu Karib.Robin, Christian Julien (2015). "Before Ḥimyar: Epigraphic Evidence for the Kingdoms of South Arabia". In Fisher, Greg (ed.). Arabs and Empires Before Islam. Oxford University Press. pp. 90–126.
By the year 500, during the rule of the Jewish monarch Marthad'ilan Yu'nim (c. 400–502) the kingdom of Himyar exercised control over much of the Arabian peninsula.Christian Julien Robin,'Arabia and Ethiopia,'in Scott Johnson (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity, Oxford University Press, 2012, pp.247–333.p.282 It was around this time that the Kingdom of Aksum invaded the peninsula, overthrowing the Himyarite king and installing in his place the native Christian king, Ma'dikarib Ya'fur. A Himyarite prince and hardline follower of Judaism, Dhu Nuwas (who had attempted to overthrow the dynasty several years earlier), took power after Ma'dikarib Ya'fur had died via a coup d'état, assuming authority after killing the Aksumite garrison in Zafār. He proceeded to engage the Ethiopian guards, and their Christian allies in the Tihamah coastal lowlands facing Abyssinia. After taking the port of Mukhawān, where he burnt down the local church, he advanced south as far as the fortress of Maddabān overlooking the Bab-el-Mandeb, where he expected Kaleb Ella Aṣbeḥa to land his fleet. The campaign eventually killed between 11,500 and 14,000, and took a similar number of prisoners. Mukhawān became his base, while he dispatched one of his generals, a Jewish prince named Sharaḥ'īl Yaqbul dhu Yaz'an, against Najran, a predominantly Christian oasis, with a good number of Jews, who had supported with troops his earlier rebellion, but refused to recognize his authority after the massacre of the Aksumite garrison. The general blocked the caravan route connecting Najrān with Eastern Arabia.
After being denied by Justinian, Ma'adi Yakrib sought help from Khosrow I, the Sassanid Persian Emperor, thus triggering the Aksumite–Persian wars. Khosrow I sent a small fleet and army under Persian military commander Wahrez to depose the king of Yemen. The war culminated with the Siege of Sana'a, capital of Aksumite Yemen. Following the capture of Sanaʽa by Sasanian forces, Wahrez placed Ma'adi Yakrib on the throne of Himyar as a vassal of the Sasanian Empire.
In 575 or 578, the war resumed again, after Ma'adi Yakrib was killed by Aksumite servants. Wahrez led another army of 8000, ending Axumite overlordship on Yemen. Subsequently, Yemen was Sasanian Yemen, and Wahrez was installed as its direct governor by the Sasanian emperor Khosrow I. Greater Yemen remained under firm Sasanian control until the rise of the prophet Muhammad in the early 7th century.
There is scanter material regarding the religious affiliations of the locals. All inscriptions are monotheistic, but the religious identity of their authors is not always explicit. However, there is evidence for the practice of Judaism among locals as well. The name "Israel" appears in four inscriptions and replaces the earlier term shaʿb/community: one inscription from the fifth century mentions the "God of Israel". Three inscriptions mention the "God of the Jews". MAFRAY-Ḥaṣī 1, describes the construction of a graveyard specifically for the Jewish community. There is a Hebrew inscription known as DJE 23 from the village of Bayt Hadir, 15 km east of Sanaa. It lists the mishmarot ("guards"), enumerating the twenty-four Priestly families (and their place of residence in Galilee) appointed to protect the Solomon's Temple after the return of the Jews following the Babylonian exile. It is also written in biblical as opposed to Aramaic orthography. Mentions of synagogues, indicating the formal organization of Jews in Southern Arabia, are present in a fourth-century Sabaic inscription and a late sixth century Greek inscription from the port of Qāniʾ which uses the phrase eis Theos to refer to God and mentions a hagios topos, a phrase typically connoting a synagogue. Additional evidence is also known.
Christian Julien Robin argues that the epigraphic evidence argues against viewing the Judaism of Himyar as rabbinic. This is based on the absence of belief in the afterlife (shared by the Sadducees), the predominant use of a local language (Sabaic) as opposed to Hebrew, and the priestly emphasis of DJE 23, Himyarite Judaism may have been more "Priestly" than "Rabbinic". However, Iwona Gajda interprets DJE 23 as evidence for the presence of rabbinic Judaism, and further points to evidence that the loanwords present in Ḥasī 1 indicate that its author was strongly familiar with Jewish law.
Unfortunately, Jewish literary texts outside of Yemen do not discuss the Jewish community there. However, epigraphs from Palestine and Jordan do reflect communication and knowledge from the Yemenite Jewish community:
These communication routes may have also transferred rabbinic and other Jewish teachings.
Many Himyarites participated in the Muslim conquest of Syria in the 630s and, along with other South Arabian tribes, settled in city of Homs after its capture in 637. The city became the center of these tribes in Bilad al-Sham, which served as the center of the Caliphate during Umayyad rule (661–750). The two principal Himyarite families that established themselves in Homs were the Dhu Asbah and Dhu'l-Kala. The latter had been the most influential family in South Arabia before the advent of Islam there.
Among the leaders of the conquering Muslim troops was the Himyarite prince Samayfa ibn Nakur of the Dhu'l-Kala. The Asbah chief Kurayb ibn Abraha Abu Rishdin led the Himyar of Homs, but he later moved to Egypt with most of the Dhu Asbah. Members of that family, Abraha ibn Sabbah and his son Abu Shamir, had participated in the Muslim conquest of Egypt in 640–641. Samayfa was another dominant figure of the city and was referred to in the early Muslim sources as the "king of Himyar". During the governorship of Syria by Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan (640s–661), the Himyarites supported him against Caliph Ali () during the First Muslim Civil War. At the Battle of Siffin with Ali in 657, Samayfa led the Homs contingent in Mu'awiya's army and was slain. He was succeeded by his son Shurahbil as the power-broker of the Homs tribesmen.
According to the historian Werner Caskel, the Himyar and the other South Arabian tribes of Homs, including the Hamdan, formed a confederation called after their supposed ancestor Qahtan in opposition to the Quda'a confederation, whose constituent tribes had long resided in Syria before the advent of Islam. To the chagrin of the South Arabians in Homs and the Qays tribes of northern Syria, the Quda'a, led by the Banu Kalb tribe, held the supreme position among the tribal groups in the courts of the first Umayyad caliphs Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan () and Yazid I (). With the strong presence of the Himyarite elite and South Arabian tribesmen in Homs, their scholars there developed and propagated an ideology of Qahtanite preeminence that sought to compete with the elite groups of Islam, including the Quraysh, whose members held the office of the caliph. To that end, they composed and transmitted narratives of the pre-Islamic South Arabian kingdoms, including war stories of these kings' far-flung conquests and heroics and tales of their wealth.
After the deaths of Yazid I and his son and successor Mu'awiya II in 683 and 684, respectively, the Qahtan and the Qays backed the rival caliphate of Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr, who was based in Mecca, while the Quda'a supported the candidacy of the Umayyad Marwan I. Kurayb ibn Abraha also backed Ibn al-Zubayr in Egypt. The Qahtan joined Ibn al-Zubayr's representative in Syria, Dahhak ibn Qays al-Fihri, in the Battle of Marj Rahit against Marwan and the Quda'a in 684. The latter decisively won that battle. Afterward, Dahhak's commander in Homs, Nu'man ibn Bashir al-Ansari, was tracked down and killed by the Dhu'l-Kala. A member of the family who had served as the head of Yazid I's shurta (select troops), Khalid ibn Ma'dan ibn Abi Karib, decapitated Nu'man and sent his head to Marwan I. Not long after Marj Rahit, Qahtan and Quda'a reconciled under unclear circumstances and formed the super-tribal group of the Yaman in alliance against the Qays. The resulting Qays–Yaman rivalry for political power and privilege persisted through the remainder of Umayyad rule.
In 686 Shurahbil ibn Dhi'l-Kala, the leader of the Himyar in Syria, was slain commanding his troops in the Umayyad army at the Battle of Khazir. As a consequence, the Himyar in Homs "sank to military insignificance", according to the historian Wilferd Madelung. Khalid ibn Ma'dan maintained his position of prestige with the Umayyad dynasty and Syrian Muslim society in general, having shifted to a new role as a prominent Muslim scholar. Kurayb's cousin Ayyub ibn Shurahbil ibn Sabbah served as the governor of Egypt under Caliph Umar II (), while a Dhu'l-Kala member, Imran ibn al-Nu'man, served as the Caliph's governor of Arab Sind.
During the Third Muslim Civil War, the Dhu Asbah tribesmen who had remained in South Arabia are recorded among the supporters of the Kharijite leader Abu Hamza. A possible member of the family in Syria, Nadr ibn Yarim, led a summertime military expedition against the Byzantines under the Abbasid caliph al-Saffah ().
Naturally enough, the competition between Kahlan and Ḥimyar led to the evacuation of the first and the settlement of the second in Yemen.
The emigrating septs of Kahlan can be divided into four groups:
Another tribe of Himyar, known as Banū Quḑā'ah, also left Yemen and dwelt in Samawah on the borders of Iraq.
However, it is estimated that the majority of the Ḥimyar Christian royalty migrated into Jordan, Al-Karak, where initially they were known as Banū Ḥimyar (Sons of Ḥimyar). Many later on moved to central Jordan
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