King (Arab. malik) of Aleppo and northern Syria (10951113), with the title Fakhr al-Muluk (“Glory of the Kings”).
Ridwan was the eldest of five sons of the Saljuq king of Syria, Tutush I. During his struggle for the Saljuq sultanate, Tutush appointed Aytakin in 1094 as atabeg for Ridwan and married him to Ridwan’s mother. When Tutush was killed in Persia (1095), Ridwan and his brother Duqaq engaged in a conflict for power that plunged Syria into a civil war lasting until 1099. Each brother was aided by his own ambitious atabeg. Ridwan ruled Aleppo (his capital) as well as Antioch (mod. Antakya, Turkey), Homs (mod. Hims, Syria), and Hama. He failed in two attempts to capture Duqaq’s capital, Damascus, in 1096. As a result, he took an unprecedented step for a Sunni ruler, and accepted an offer of the Egyptian vizier, al-Afdal, by which he was to adopt the Fatimid Shi‘ite doctrine in return for political support. On 7 September 1097 the name of the Fatimid caliph replaced that of the ‘Abbasid caliph in the khutba (Friday sermon) in Aleppo, but after four weeks the Saljuq sultan persuaded Ridwan to return to the Sunni faith.
By this time, the armies of the First Crusade (1096-1099) had arrived in the northern dominions of Aleppo. Ridwan did not intervene to save the city of Antioch, nor did he participate in the relief expedition mounted by Karbugha of Mosul, fearing his presence in Syria. Until 1103, Ridwan avoided any serious hostilities against the Franks of Antioch or Edessa, a consequence of his economic difficulties and strife with his rebellious atabeg. Tancred, regent of Antioch from 1101, did not attack Ridwan, as he was more afraid of other powers, such as the Byzantine Empire. Ridwan was very keen on a modus vivendi with Antioch and in May 1103 agreed to pay a large annual tribute to protect his realm. He made no attempt to coordinate his policies with the Turcoman rulers of Upper Mesopotamia and Iraq in their wars with the Franks in the county of Edessa, even after the heavy defeat of the Franks at the battle of Harran in 1104. Ridwan maintained the modus vivendi with the Franks during 1105-1110, but broke the peace when the Saljuq sultan started to send massive armies against the Franks in Syria, and plundered Antiochene territory.
The economy of Aleppo suffered from Tancred’s retaliatory attacks, and its citizens, who were losing confidence in Ridwan, sent an embassy to the sultan urging him to promote jihad (holy war) against the Franks. When an army sent by Sultan Muhammad Tapar arrived at Aleppo in 1111, Ridwan closed the city’s gates against it. Distrusting the loyalties of his subjects, Ridwan imposed a curfew with the aid of the Assassins, a minority Isma‘ili sect, until the sultan’s forces withdrew. In his last years, Ridwan was still paying a large annual tribute to Roger of Antioch to safeguard his kingdom. He died after an illness on 10 December 1113. He was succeeded by his son Alp Arslan, with the mamluk (slave soldier) Lu’Lu’ as regent.
-Taef El-Azhari
Bibliography
Edde, Anne-Marie, “Ridwan prince d’Alep de 1095 a 1113,” Revue des etudes islamiques 54 for 1986 (1988), 101-125.
El-Azhari, Taef, The Saljuqs of Syria during the Crusades, 463-459 A. H./1070-1154 a. d. (Berlin: Schwarz, 1997).
World History
