Fatima.Mernessi_The-Forgotten-Queens-of-Islam-EN

The jawari or Revolution in the Harem 47
areas of knowledge like the history and power of words, being both
poets and linguists. Subh was a perfect example of this.
Al-Hakam's excessive interest in knowledge and books was cited
by many as one of the reasons that led him, as he grew older, to
neglect the routine management of political affairs and leave it to
his wife. She was an unrivalled assistant. But soon she herself felt
the need for an assistant, and she was given a secretary who was
going to shake up both her life and the life of the Muslim Empire.
His name was Ibn 'Amir; he was 26 years old, of Arab stock, young,
very handsome, superbly educated, with exquisite manners, versed
in all manner of religious knowledge, and endowed with the ability
to bend time and people to his will. As he later admitted, since
earliest youth he had a single fixed idea - to rule Andalusia. 28 Subh,
like the officials who had sent him to her at the palace, was dazzled
by him. The queen and her secretary embarked on an intense
relationship that did not escape the notice of the caliph himself.
One day in conversation with his intimates on the subject of Ibn
'Amir, he said, 'That young man has an incredible sway over the
minds in our harem.' 29 Were they lovers, or did the queen sacrifice
her desires to her duty as wife of the caliph and as mother of a
future caliph who as regent on the death of al-Hakam would be
responsible for the ummal Did she limit her relationship with one
of the most fascinating men in Muslim history - or any other history
- to a strict collaboration in the political domain? The question was
debated by the early historians and is still being debated by the
modern historians. And it is one of the many incidents that gives
us the opportunity to measure the misogyny of both camps.
The debate on the sexual life of Subh is extremely edifying in
this regard. Al-Maqarri, the seventeenth-century author of Nafh altib
min ghusn al-Andalus al-ratib, begins by saying that Ibn 'Amir
always aroused jealousy and intrigues against himself. He very
quickly became the effective sovereign of Andalusia, supplanting
Subh, and he held her son, Caliph Hisham Ibn al-Hakam, hostage
in his own palace. Al-Maqarri explains that there is always resentment
when a person has an unparalleled opportunity in life along
with prodigious talent, and in consequence has too great success in
everything - which was the case with Ibn 'Amir. 30 He continues by
saying that in this way one can understand the rumours about his
being the lover of Subh. The rumours were soon put into rhyme in
satiric poems which proclaimed that the Muslims were on the verge
of an apocalypse 'for the caliph plays in his office while his mother