emirate · Egypt, North Africa and Sudan

Aghlabid emirate

800 CE – 909 CE · capital Kairouan

The Aghlabid emirs of Ifriqiya, who ruled Tunisia for the Abbasids, built Kairouan's Great Mosque and conquered Sicily.

Origins

In 800 the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid granted Ibrahim ibn al-Aghlab, an Arab army commander, the governorship of Ifriqiya as a hereditary office in return for annual tribute. The Aghlabids ruled from Kairouan and their palace city al-Abbasiyya, and later Raqqada, as autonomous emirs of the Abbasid Caliphate.

Relying on an Arab military elite and slave soldiers, they faced frequent army revolts. Ziyadat Allah I launched the conquest of Byzantine Sicily in 827, and Aghlabid fleets raided Italy and took Malta in 870. They rebuilt the Great Mosque of Kairouan, built the ribat of Sousse and great water cisterns, and Kairouan became a centre of Maliki law under the jurist Sahnun.

In the 890s the Kutama Berbers, mobilised by the Ismaili missionary Abu Abdallah al-Shi'i, rose against them. In 909 the last emir, Ziyadat Allah III, fled to the east, and the Fatimid Caliphate was proclaimed in Ifriqiya.

Cite this page

APA: The Epoch Institute. (2026). Aghlabid emirate. In The Epoch Institute States Register. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/aghlabid-emirate
MLA: “Aghlabid emirate.” The Epoch Institute States Register, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/aghlabid-emirate. Accessed .
Chicago: The Epoch Institute. “Aghlabid emirate.” The Epoch Institute States Register. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/aghlabid-emirate.
Harvard: The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Aghlabid emirate’, The Epoch Institute States Register. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/aghlabid-emirate (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random state ↻