caa a22 4500 386370001 CHVBK 20180307111954.0 cr unu---uuuuu 161130e198905 xx s 000 0 eng 10.1017/S002074380003230X doi S002074380003230X pii (NATIONALLICENCE)cambridge-10.1017/S002074380003230X Havemann Axel Institute of Islamic Studies Free University of Berlin The Vizier and the Raʾīs in Saljuq Syria: the Struggle for Urban Self-Representation [Elektronische Daten] [Axel Havemann] Syria was one of the few areas of medieval Islam where cities emancipated themselves from centralized rule to a certain degree by shaping local self-representative institutions and by transforming "classical” government offices according to their special needs. For nearly two hundred years—from about the second half of the 10th century to the middle of the 12th century—Syrian cities possessed urban heads (ru'asā') and militias of young men (ahdāth) that, in a way, complemented or even replaced the rulers and garrisons representing the Fatimid and Saljuq central governments; in time, they became institutionalized collaborators within the Saljuq regimes. This development is most evident in Damascus and Aleppo, although things evolved differently in the two cities. By gaining the rulers' recognition, the urban forces (ru'asa' and ahdath) not only managed to take over the functions of the police (shurta) and partake in the rulers' military and political tasks, but they also controlled—to a certain degree—the economic, administrative, and financial affairs of the city (these, it will be argued, can be substantiated only with regard to Damascus, not to Aleppo). It is significant, for example, that the Arabic sources reporting on Damascus do not mention the muhiasib, the "classical” official for the urban administration and economy, when there was a ra'īs. Even more striking is the fact that sometimes the ra'īs also functioned as the vizier installed by the ruler. Thus, one can see that the ra'īs, the holder of a local urban office, became a very important member of the central ruling system, normally represented by a foreign-born elite that also supplied the vizier. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1989 International Journal of Middle East Studies Cambridge University Press 21/2(1989-05), 233-242 0020-7438 21:2<233 1989 21 MES https://doi.org/10.1017/S002074380003230X text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI 1 research-article jats NATIONALLICENCE 856 40 https://doi.org/10.1017/S002074380003230X text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI NATIONALLICENCE 100 1- Havemann Axel Institute of Islamic Studies Free University of Berlin NATIONALLICENCE 773 0- International Journal of Middle East Studies Cambridge University Press 21/2(1989-05), 233-242 0020-7438 21:2<233 1989 21 MES CC0 http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0 nationallicence BK010053 XK010053 XK010000 NATIONALLICENCE NATIONALLICENCE NL-cambridge