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Marinid dynasty

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The Marinid, Merinid or Benimerine ethnic group (also Mariníes in Spanish) was a Zenata-Berber tribe of North Africa. The Marinid stock was related to the Umayyads in Córdoba, Spain.

The tribe formed a dynasty (known as the Marinid/Merinid/Benemerine dynasty) in 1244, largely concentrated in present-day Morocco, which lasted until 1465. It overtook the Almohad dynasty in controlling most of the Maghreb from the mid-1300s to the 15th century. They also intervened in the Iberian peninsula (specifically Al Andalus) in the 12th and 13th centuries. The last Marinid fortress in Spain fell to Castile in 1344, and they were in turn replaced by the Hafsid dynasty.

The Anglicised name used for this article derives from the Arabic Banu Marin (also Benī Merīn, which is the source of the Spanish name).

History

The Marinids originally came from Ifriqiya, through the southeast of present-day Morocco, from which they were expelled in 1224 by another tribe, the Hilali. As early as 1145 the Marinids engaged in battles with the Almohad dynasty, which defeated them until 1169.

In 1169, the Marinids began their pursuit of taking Morocco from the Almohads, the ruling dynasty at the time. Following their expulsion from the south, they moved northwards under command of Abu Yahya and took Fes in 1248, making it their capital. This marked the beginning of the Marinid dynasty.

The Marinid leadership installed in Fes declared the war on the Almohads with the aid of Christian mercenaries there. Capturing Marrakech in 1269, they took control of the control of most of the Maghreb towards the end of 1268, including present-day Morocco, Algeria and part of Tunisia.

Having obtained this control, the Marinid dynasty tried to extend its control to the commercial traffic of the Strait of Gibraltar. To this end, they declared "holy war" on the Christians (themselves being Muslims) and occupied the cities of Rota, Algiers and Gibraltar successively, surrounding Tarifa for the first time in 1294.

The Marinids also strongly influenced the policy of the Kingdom of Granada, from which they enlarged their army in 1275. In the mid ], Spain made several incursions into Morocco and in 1267 an full-scale invasion of Morocco, but the Marinids successfully defended Morocco and drove out Spanish forces. This series of damaging attacks and a resounding defeat in the "Batalla del Salado" ("Battle of Salt", 1340) at hands of an Castilian-Aragonese coalition, set back the Marinids pursuit of the Iberian Peninsula. In 1351 the Marinid ruler Abu Hasan, the "Sultán Negro" (Black Sultan) died. His son, Abu Inan, who had rebelled against Hasan, ruled for seven years before being strangled by his own vizier in 1358. A state of anarchy then arose and extended through the Marinid realm. The empire became fractured into multiple small kingdoms and city-states.

Chronology of Marinid Rulers


References

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