Episode 68: Al Muntasir and the beginning of the end

It’s difficult to overstate the impact al Mutawakkil’s usurpation had on the political reality of the caliphate. Not only did it completely hijack control of the state, but it also had decisive implications for the nature and locus of official authority. We’ll kick off our journey into this brave new world with the short reign of al Muntasir. Its unexpected end will unfortunately only make the umma’s politics more volatile. Things were bad, but they’re about to become a whole lot worse.

Glossary

• Al Fat’h ibn Khaqan: the caliph’s best friend and right hand man died with him on the 11th of December 862. He would have been hunted down even if he wasn’t there though as he was not a fan of al Muntasir but a cheerleader for al Mu’tazz instead. The caliph had even given him the honor of allowing his daughter to marry into their family, so al Fat’h could have been harboring ambitions of seeing a grandson become caliph one day. It actually did happen long after his death, but al Mu’tazz’s son would only rule for 2 weeks before being eliminated by a rival, but we’ll get to that much much later down the line.
• Ubaydallah ibn Yahya ibn Khaqan: the vizier was also on al Mu’tazz’s side, but he was not hunted down after his escape because he posed no danger while in exile. He stayed in hiding for at least a year, and only emerged during al Musta’in’s days when he tried to go to hajj. He was denied and told to remain in house arrest. He comes back to power way later as well.
• Al Muntasir: the new caliph killed his dad and enjoyed a 6 month period of people ruling in his name. Poor kid.
• Al Mu’tazz: the second in line became the heir apparent after his father’s death, but the only thing that would have been *apparent* to him was how hopeless his cause really was. He must have been horrified to see how the enemies of his closest allies had killed and banished them and were now running the roost. At only 15 there wasn’t much he could do about it, but kudos to him for sticking to his guns until he was tortured. Poor kid.
• Al Mu’ayyad: just sort of went with the flow and removed himself from succession.
• Ahmad ibn il Khaseeb: this guy suddenly appears out of nowhere in our sources. So they do mention him earlier but even back then he was a nobody; but after that it was nothing for a few years, then he became al Muntasir’s deputy back when he was heir. He tried to single-handedly run the civil administration, mostly in favor of the Turks. 
• Atameesh: one of al Muntasir’s closest bodyguards or attendants, he was a soldier who just sort of hung around the Abbasid back when he was an heir. Some sources say his name was Utameesh, others that he was actually little Bugha’s nephew. 
• Waseef: the papa Smurf of the Turks. Some sources name him as the main agitator for al Mutawakkil’s death, but those do tend to be pretty biased. At the very least though he must have ok’d the collaboration with al Muntasir as nothing took place without his say so. He was off in Syria getting ready to fight the Byzantines when al Muntasir died and was replaced by al Musta’in. While he wasn’t there for that, his interests were probably well-represented by his partner, little Bugha.
• Big Bugha: the only Turk who had nothing to do with al Mutawakkil’s death. He came back to Samarra from the northwestern border after hearing about the caliph’s passing. I don’t know if he had any foreknowledge of the assassination: it could be that the other generals informed him beforehand, but they certainly could have pulled it off without his involvement. He was an old man by now, in his early 80’s maybe, and passed away soon after.
• Little Bugha: the Turk who is mentioned the most in narrations about al Mutawakkil’s murder. He was close with Atameesh who served as the link with al Muntasir, and the killers who burst in on the caliphs came from his troops.