Cannibalism in the Arab world

Cannibalism in the Arab world refers to documented instances, reported practices and historical allegations of cannibalism involving Arabs and societies within the Arab world. Accounts occur in Arabic chronicles, Arabic literature, eyewitness narratives, Islamic jurisprudence, poetry, oral traditions and modern historical scholarship.

Reported forms include famine cannibalism, consumption or attempted consumption of enemies following warfare, acts of revenge, alleged cannibalism among early Arab tribes, the use of human organs or body parts, and legal discussions concerning circumstances in which another human being could be eaten.

Some of the strongest surviving evidence concerns Egypt during the famine of 597–598 AH (1200–1202 CE), when the physician and scholar Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi recorded extensive cannibalism during a catastrophic subsistence crisis. Other reported episodes occurred in Iraq, Morocco, Greater Syria, the Arabian Peninsula and Sudan.

Cannibalism attributed to Arab tribes

The ninth-century Arab author al-Jahiz preserved traditions dealing explicitly with cannibalism among early Arabs. A modern English edition of his writings places the material under the heading "Cannibalism among the early Arabs".

Al-Jahiz reported that the Banu Asad had been accused in satirical poetry of eating human flesh as well as dogs.

One of the specific traditions preserved by al-Jahiz concerns Ramla bint Fa'id. According to the account, Ramla was killed and eaten by her husband and her brother, Abu Arab, with anger and jealousy rather than famine presented as the motive.

Poetry subsequently mocked the perpetrators and their lineage over the alleged [...] and consumption of Ramla.

The episode is particularly notable because it represents alleged cannibalism among Arabs outside conditions of starvation.

Hind bint Utba and the body of Hamza

One of the best-known early Arabian traditions of anthropophagy concerns Hind bint Utba following the Battle of Uhud in 625.

Hamza ibn Abd al-Muttalib, uncle of Muhammad, was killed in the battle by Wahshi ibn Harb. Muslim historical traditions subsequently described the mutilation of Hamza's body and reported that Hind chewed or attempted to eat his liver.

The act was represented as revenge for members of Hind's family who had been killed at the Battle of Badr. Later Muslim literature made the mutilation of Hamza an important feature of accounts of his martyrdom.

Although individual details of the narrative have been disputed, the tradition of Hind attempting to consume Hamza's liver became well established in Muslim historical literature.

Islam and cannibalism

Islamic jurisprudence contains detailed discussions concerning the consumption of human flesh.

The Quran does not command cannibalism. Qur'an 49:12 instead uses the image of eating the flesh of one's dead brother as a repulsive metaphor for backbiting.

Nevertheless, Muslim jurists subsequently debated whether the doctrine of extreme necessity could permit human flesh to be eaten. Some legal authorities went further and considered whether particular categories of human beings could deliberately be killed for food.

Doctrine of necessity

Several Qur'anic passages prohibit carrion, blood and pork but allow otherwise forbidden foods when a person is compelled by extreme necessity.

Muslim jurists developed the doctrine of ḍarūra, or necessity, and debated whether preservation of a starving person's life could override the normal inviolability of another human body.

The resulting legal discussions included not only consumption of corpses but, in some legal opinions, the deliberate [...] of another person for consumption.

Hanafi position

Hanafi jurists generally rejected consumption of human flesh even where a person faced death from starvation.

Their reasoning emphasised the dignity and inviolability of the human body.

Hanafi authorities also prohibited a person from cutting flesh from his own body and eating it.

Maliki position

The predominant Maliki position likewise prohibited consumption of human flesh during starvation.

Some Maliki authorities disagreed. Abu Bakr ibn al-Arabi permitted consumption of human flesh where doing so was considered certain to preserve the starving person's life.

Hanbali position

Hanbali jurisprudence distinguished between legally protected persons and people whom medieval Islamic law classified as lacking such protection.

The body of a Muslim or protected non-Muslim could not ordinarily be consumed.

Some Hanbali authorities nevertheless permitted a starving person to eat someone classified as mubāḥ al-dam, meaning a person whose blood was regarded as legally unprotected.

One category discussed was the ḥarbī, a person regarded under medieval Islamic jurisprudence as belonging to an enemy population outside Muslim protection.

According to Çiğdem's examination of Ibn Qudamah, certain Hanbali authorities went further and permitted a starving person to kill such an individual in order to obtain food.

This amounted to legal permission, under specified conditions, for intentional [...] followed by cannibalism.

Shafi'i position and homicidal cannibalism

The Shafi'i material examined by Çiğdem contains still more permissive rulings.

Shafi'i jurists permitted a starving person to consume a human corpse under conditions of extreme necessity.

Certain authorities also permitted the [...] and consumption of people belonging to categories considered legally expendable, including some condemned criminals and persons classified as ḥarbī.

Çiğdem characterises the implication of these rulings as approval of "homicidal cannibalism".

The significance of this formulation is that the jurisprudence went beyond consumption of an already dead human being. It contemplated intentionally [...] a living person for the purpose of eating the body.

Eating one's own flesh

Shafi'i jurists also debated whether a starving person could cut flesh from his own body and consume it.

Al-Nawawi recorded two positions. One allowed the act where sacrificing part of the body might preserve the person's life. Another rejected it because the resulting wound could prove more dangerous than the starvation itself.

Ethical criticism

The most permissive rulings are controversial because they did not merely excuse desperate conduct after it occurred. They created legal categories specifying which human beings could be consumed and, in some circumstances, which people could deliberately be killed for that purpose.

A particularly severe feature was the distinction between protected and legally unprotected lives. Under some rulings, another person's right to life could be subordinated to the survival of the starving Muslim because the proposed victim belonged to a legal category considered outside normal protection.

The jurisprudential record therefore shows that Muslim legal authorities did not speak with one voice on cannibalism. Some prohibited it, while other influential authorities expressly legalised consumption of human bodies and, under restricted circumstances, [...] for the purpose of cannibalism.

Famine of 1069–1070

Cannibalism was reported during the severe famine that struck Fatimid Egypt in 462 AH (1069–1070 CE).

Arabic chronicles contain stories of people consuming corpses and allegedly murdering others for food.

Ibn Kathir preserved an account in which a man was said to have killed his wife and children and prepared their flesh before subsequently being killed and eaten himself.

Related cannibalism narratives appear in Ibn al-Jawzi and other Muslim historical works.

Famine of 1200–1202

The famine of 597–598 AH (1200–1202 CE) provides some of the strongest surviving evidence for cannibalism in an Arab society.

Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi, a physician and Muslim scholar living in Egypt during the catastrophe, recorded extensive starvation, social collapse and anthropophagy.

His narrative describes repeated consumption of human flesh, including corpses and people allegedly [...] specifically for food.

Children were among the reported victims. Abd al-Latif's account describes cases in which children disappeared and their remains were discovered prepared for consumption.

Modern scholarship treats his work as one of the most important eyewitness accounts of cannibalism preserved in medieval Arabic literature.

The importance of the testimony lies partly in the identity of its author: Abd al-Latif was a Muslim intellectual describing events within the society in which he was living.

Iraq

Arabic chronicles contain reports of cannibalism during severe subsistence crises in medieval Iraq.

In 439 AH (1047–1048 CE), reports from Mosul stated that plague and scarcity had become so severe that inhabitants were consuming human corpses.

The report was preserved by the Egyptian historian Ibn Taghribirdi.

Other medieval reports describe cannibalism during subsequent Iraqi famines.

Morocco

Seventeenth-century Morocco experienced repeated droughts, epidemics and food shortages. A particularly severe famine began around 1661. The Moroccan historian Muhammad al-Qadiri claimed that inhabitants of Fez initially scavenged dead animals and subsequently resorted to cannibalism.

Syria and Lebanon during the First World War

A catastrophic famine affected Greater Syria during World War I, particularly between 1915 and 1918.

The crisis affected Lebanon, Syria and neighbouring territories.

Historian Najwa al-Qattan has examined memoirs, poetry, oral histories and other sources preserving accounts of extreme starvation and cannibalism.

Some accounts described parents eating children or other relatives, while others concerned children allegedly killed for consumption.

The stories formed part of the historical memory of the wartime famine.

Saudi Arabia and central Arabia

The modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was founded in 1932. Earlier events in Najd therefore concern regions later incorporated into Saudi Arabia.

Year of Hunger

Najd suffered an exceptionally severe famine around 1909, remembered as the Year of Hunger.

Dhaifallah Alotaibi documents extreme food scarcity, widespread starvation and deaths of people and livestock during the crisis.

Contemporary British political reporting cited by Alotaibi recorded deaths from starvation in Unaizah.

Later traditions associate the famine with extreme survival behaviour. The securely documented material establishes catastrophic starvation, although evidence for completed human cannibalism in the 1909 Najd famine is considerably less direct than the Egyptian evidence from 1200–1202.

Cannibalism outside famine conditions

Arab historical traditions also contain reports of anthropophagy unconnected with starvation.

The al-Jahiz tradition concerning Ramla bint Fa'id attributes her [...] and consumption to anger and jealousy.

The tradition of Hind bint Utba chewing or attempting to eat the liver of Hamza ibn Abd al-Muttalib represents anthropophagy associated with vengeance after warfare.

A nineteenth-century report from eastern Sudan likewise describes an Arab combatant consuming the heart of an African enemy following battle.

These cases differ substantially from famine cannibalism because eating part of the victim's body appears as an act of revenge, humiliation or battlefield violence rather than a response to starvation.

Black African victims

Black Africans were subjected to extensive enslavement in Arab-controlled and Arab-majority societies in Egypt, Sudan, the Arabian Peninsula and elsewhere around the Red Sea.

Historical evidence also contains at least one explicit report in which an Arab combatant consumed an organ taken from an African opponent.

Abyssinian victim and Shukriyya Arab

During travels in Sudan and north-eastern Africa in 1881–1882, British traveller Josiah Williams recorded information concerning fighting between Abyssinian forces and Arab groups in eastern Sudan.

Williams stated that a nephew of Emperor Yohannes IV had been killed while fighting Arab tribes approximately a year earlier.

According to Williams's informant:

"a Shukeryiah Arab took out his heart and ate it on the spot."

The Shukriyya were an Arab-identified population of eastern Sudan.

The reported act was not connected to famine. It describes the deliberate removal and consumption of an African enemy's heart following combat.

Williams was not himself an eyewitness to the [...]; he recorded information supplied by an informant relatively close to the alleged event.

Black African slaves in Arab societies

Large numbers of Black Africans were enslaved within Arab societies.

In nineteenth-century Egypt, census evidence analysed by economic historian Mohamed Saleh shows that the great majority of enslaved people recorded in the available population data were Black Africans originating principally in the Sudan, including Darfur, Kordofan and Sennar.

Black Africans were likewise transported through Red Sea ports and sold in the Hejaz, including Jeddah, Mecca and Medina.

Nineteenth-century testimony concerning enslaved Ethiopian and Oromo children records individuals transported through Jeddah and subsequently sold to Arab owners.

The existence of large Black slave populations is relevant when examining periods of extreme cannibalism in Arab societies, particularly Egypt.

However, many famine accounts identify victims simply as men, women, children or corpses rather than stating whether they were free or enslaved or providing their ethnic origin.

Accordingly, individual victims can only be identified specifically as Black Africans or Black slaves where the historical source supplies that information.

Black victims during periods of Egyptian cannibalism

Black African populations, including enslaved people, formed part of Egyptian society during periods in which severe cannibalism occurred.

The famine of 1200–1202 produced extensive reports of people being [...] and eaten.

Abd al-Latif's surviving descriptions, however, do not consistently record the ethnicity or legal status of individual victims.

The presence of Black African slaves means that Black people formed part of the population exposed to the catastrophic famine, but unidentified victims should not be assigned an ethnicity unless the historical record permits it.

The clearest currently identified direct report of an Arab consuming an African victim is therefore Williams's account of the Shukriyya Arab eating the heart of an Abyssinian opponent.

Historical interpretation

The surviving historical evidence records or alleges several distinct forms of cannibalism within Arab societies.

The strongest documentation concerns famine cannibalism, particularly the eyewitness testimony of Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi concerning Egypt in 1200–1202.

Arabic and Arab historical traditions also preserve allegations of cannibalism outside famine, including the [...] and consumption of Ramla bint Fa'id, Hind bint Utba's attempted consumption of Hamza's liver, and the reported consumption of an Abyssinian combatant's heart by a Shukriyya Arab.

Islamic jurisprudence separately contains explicit discussions of human consumption. Some jurists prohibited it, while other legal authorities permitted eating corpses under conditions of necessity. Certain Hanbali and Shafi'i authorities went further and permitted intentional [...] followed by consumption of persons placed within particular legally unprotected categories.

The documentary record therefore includes famine cannibalism, interpersonal [...] and consumption, battlefield anthropophagy, revenge, and religious-legal authorisation of anthropophagy under specified conditions.

See also

• Cannibalism
• List of incidents of cannibalism
• Arab world
• Arabs
• Arabian Peninsula
• History of slavery in the Muslim world
• Slavery in Egypt
• Slavery in Saudi Arabia
• Arab [...]
• Trans-Saharan [...]
• Red Sea [...]
• Islamic jurisprudence
• Islamic dietary laws