Судан и Большой Ближний Восток

310 IV. Ближний Восток и его соседи In our Fig. 1 illumination of the “Cycle of the conquest of Crete” (Fig. 80, Fol. 38r, bottom), the painter presents a group of six Anda- lusian warriors who visit the chief of the state of Spain. Skylitzes’s text reports that the Andalusians were common citizens not warriors, who requested to be helped to emigrate to a richer area because of the poverty of the Spanish land. 1 The leader they visited was supposedly the chief of Spain, called Abu Hafş (“’Απόχαψ”), holding the title of “’Αμερμουμνης”, corresponding to the official title of a caliph, i. e. Amīr al-Mu’minīn (the Emir of the believers). Actually, we meet the proper translation of this term as “Αμιρας των πιστων” (the Emir of the believers) in the Greek papyri of Egypt. 2 Of course, at this time no one could hold such a title in Spain. The emir of Spain was not Abu Hafş but Hakam (r. 796–822), who cruelly persecuted the Andalusian Spanish who had newly converted to Islam ( mualladūn ) and demanded equal rights with the Muslims of Arab descent. 3 The depiction of the six Andalusian suppliants is bizarre. They were supposed to be peaceful Andalusian citizens (from Cordoba) asking assistance from the Emir to emigrate to a prosperous area in the Medi- terranean, but paradoxically they are depicted as soldiers clad inmilitary attire, just as in the later miniatures, where they appear as conquerors of Crete. Their heads are covered with the usual pointed helmets with ear or cheek pieces, which seems to have been common for Byzantine and Arabs in the 13 th –14 th centuries, and a sword attached to their belts 4 . Their double-edged swords, painted black in order to indicate metal, are of the usual type for Byzantines and Arabs. 5 They slightlymove their 1 Narrative in I. Skyltizes, ed. H. Thurn, Ioannis Scylitzae Synopsis His- toriarum , Berlin — New York 1973, p. 42, lines 2–10. 2 See R. Rémondon, Papyrus grecs d’Apollônos Anô, Cairo 1953, no. 37, 10. 3 For an excellent description of Hakam’s policies see É. Levi-Provençal, Histoire de l’Espagne musulmane, vol. I, Paris — Leiden 1950, 169–173. For the situation in Spain at that time see Lirola Delgado, El poder naval de al-Andalus en la época del CalifatoOmeya ,Granada 1993, and IbnHayyān, op. cit., note 1 above. 4 DavidNicolle, TheMamluks 1250–1517 ,Oxford 1993; reprinted 1998, 17. 5 Ada Bruhn Hoffmeyer, Military Equipment in the Byzantine Manuscript of Scylitzes in Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid , Granada 1966, 91; Tsamakda, op. cit. 313.