Introduction

During most of the nineteenth century the southern Levant and the Arabian Peninsula, although officially part of the Ottoman Empire, were virtually independent. The empire had interests in certain parts of it: the Hajj routes and the seaports. It made an effort to keep the main routes open and the ports profitable, but even that proved hard work at times. The region was controlled by tribes and more or less powerful local rulers. The relationship between them and the empire was mostly economic and political, and tribes, as well as towns, were treated as vassals or allies, rather than as subjects. The state used various tactics that were usually successful in manipulating the tribes, something they preferred to confrontational measures. In conflicts, particularly with the large tribes of the area, the empire did not always come out on top.

Nineteenth-century relationships between the government and the tribes

Areas of control

During most of the nineteenth century the Ottoman Empire had no control over the region south of Salt in Transjordan and south of Hebron in the west, or over most of the Arabian Peninsula. Salt was, in effect, an independent town (Burckhardt 1822: 265; Buckingham 1825: 27, 138; Oliphant 1880: 199). To the north of this area the government had some control, and the smaller tribes in the region north of Salt paid tax. The major tribes and many of the towns considered themselves independent of the government. Desert lands, from Syria in the north to the Arabian Peninsula in the south, were dominated by tribes of the powerful Anaze confederation: the Weld Ali in the north, the Rwala in the Syrian Desert, and the Bashir in the peninsula.