Banu Ifran emirate

Origins

The Banu Ifran were a Zenata Berber tribe of western Algeria. In the great Berber revolt against the Umayyad Caliphate from 740, they embraced Sufri Kharijism, and around 742 their leader Abu Qurra established a state at Tlemcen, where he was proclaimed imam.

Rule and society

Abu Qurra raised large armies and joined the siege of the Abbasid governor at Tobna in 772. Tlemcen fell to Idris I of the Idrisid dynasty around 790, but the tribe stayed powerful. In the 10th century Ya'la ibn Muhammad founded the town of Ifkan and allied with the Caliphate of Córdoba against the Fatimids. Later Ifranid emirs ruled Salé and Chellah and fought the Barghawata.

Decline and legacy

The Almoravid Empire conquered the Ifranid territories in the second half of the 11th century, and the tribe was dispersed or absorbed into the new order. Ifranid groups survived in the Maghreb and al-Andalus, where some served as soldiers.

Few sources survive for this state; details are uncertain.