A CASE STUDY of the MAʿN FAMILY* Massoud Daher It Is

THE LEBANESE LEADERSHIP AT THE BEGINNING OF THE OTTOMAN PERIOD: A CASE STUDY OF THE MAʿN FAMILY* Massoud Daher It is diffi cult to fi nd generally acceptable terms and concepts to describe Lebanon and the Lebanese leadership in the sixteenth century. Aft er all, the term ‘Lebanon’ in its current political sense only came into use in 1920 when the French mandate authorities created the state of Grand Liban, Greater Lebanon. Its geographical boundaries were established by the French shortly before the offi cial announcement of the new state on 1 September of that year, and in 1922 the boundaries between Syria (then under French mandate) and Palestine (then under British mandate) were set permanently. Contemporary Ottoman documents do not suggest a strong Leba- nese military presence at the Battle of Marj Dabiq near Aleppo in 1516. Th e Lebanese chronicles claim the opposite, albeit without reference to verifi able sources. Th is discrepancy between the documents and the chronicles raises some questions. Did Fakhr al-Din I (r. 1516–1544) really participate in the Battle of Marj Dabiq? Did he have advance knowledge of the movement of Sultan Selim I’s armies? Th ese and other methodological problems cast long shadows of doubt over the veracity of the Lebanese chronicles describing the rise of the Maʿn family based in Jabal al-Shuf (later known as Jabal al-Maʿn and then Jabal Lubnan). I do not want to comment on the reliability or otherwise of these chronicles, which, again, are not supported by the Ottoman documents. Instead, I will take the narratives that describe the historical reality of local leadership in the Lebanese muqataʿat as my point of departure. Th e Ottoman authorities viewed the assignment of local lords to the administration of the aff airs of the Lebanese muqataʿat as a way of guaranteeing the functioning of the imperial revenue system. It was left to local leaders to seize the chance to demonstrate their personal powers over their enemies, both within and outside their families, in order to earn their commission to collect taxes from local sources of revenue. Once appointed, the emir pocketed what he wanted, when he * Th is paper is translated by W. Matt Malczycki. 324 massoud daher wanted it. Th e Ottoman political-administrative focus was based on one principle: force submission and then collect taxes. Hence the state supported the local lords in their centres of power for several centuries to ensure that it would receive income in a timely manner. Of course, not everyone benefi ted from the arrangement: in times of drought, pestilence, plague, war, local confl icts, infl ation, and crop failure, the suff ering of the peasants and local craft smen was extreme. As the state continued its tyranny through forced taxation, it became imperative for the local leader to pay the taxes regularly so that he would not risk removal or replacement. In consequence, the local lord collected many times the revenue that his commission required, since he needed a surplus to be able to aff ord the costs of administrative and fi nancial corruption. Bribery was common in the muqataʿat as well as within the governorates and in the central administration in Istanbul. Complaints from diff erent districts weakened the ruling emir who became an obedient tool in the hands of the wali. For his part, the wali would oft en put a detachment of soldiers at the disposal of the local emir, which he could use to terrorize the local population into paying taxes. Th e Maʿn period provides a useful illustration of how this system evolved, representative of the changes that took place in the tax-farming system in the Lebanese muqataʿat during the height of Ottoman power. Some features of this system were still in place during the period of imperial decline at the end of the eighteenth century. Th e political signifi cance of the promotion of the Maʿn family to the Emirate of the Lebanese muqataʿat Th e Lebanese chronicles paint the history of the Maʿn emirate in broad strokes, and do not go into the specifi c details of how the family came to power. Th e traditional account begins with the Battle of Marj Dabiq and the subsequent Ottoman take over of Lebanon and Syria. On 15 August 1516 the Ottoman armies came face to face with the Mam- luk forces near Aleppo. On 24 August the Battle of Marj Dabiq took place, which Ivanov describes as ‘one of the most important battles in world history.’1 No sooner had news of the Mamluk defeat begun to spread than a great uprising broke out in Aleppo, in which the 1 N. Ivanov (trs. Yusuf ʿAtallah), al-Fath al-ʿuthmani liʾl-iqtar al-ʿarabiya, 1516– 1574, Beirut, Dar al-Farabi, 1988, 63–66..

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