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The Hashshashin (also Hashishin, Hashashiyyin, or Hashasheen) from which the word Assassins is thought to originate, was the Persian derived designation of the Nizari branch of the Ismā'īlī Shia Muslims during the Middle Ages. Following a dispute regarding the succession of the Ismā'īlī Fatmid Caliph Al Mustansir, who was also believed to be the spiritual successor of the Muhammad, as designate Imam. They are survived by the Shia Imami Isma'ili Muslims in the contemporary world, otherwise known as the Nizari, and are currently led by the Aga Khan IV.
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Following a dispute regarding the succession of the eighth Fatimide Caliph Al Mustansir, the Nizāriyya, upheld Nizar to be the rightful. The cause was led by Dai Hassan-i Sabbah who was the leader of the Fatimid propagation within the Abbasid Caliphate. Hassan-i Sabbah successfully gained the support majority of Fatimid Shia outside of Egypt within the levant, Persia and Iraq, and a small underground following in Egypt. By breaking with the Fatmid Empire, and consequently losing its support, Hassan-i Sabbah found themselves alone and outnumbered in enemy territory. Under the charismatic Iranian leadership of Hassan-i Sabbah, to survive Nizari formulated a daring strategy of gaining control of strategically important fortresses by covertly converting local inhabitants living in and around fortresses,and seizing control of the fort. They established a new kind of state consisting of a number "island" fortified settlements surrounded by a sea of hostile territory in present day Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, the first, and capital of which was Alamut. Unable to mount a conventional military army, they developed a form of asymmetric warfare by training highly capable sleeper Fedayeen (commandos), who would covertly be sent to infiltrate enemy positions, they would remain covert until they were needed, in which instance they would either place a note, or dagger strategically to invoke fear within their target, or employ assassination if it was deemed necessary to prevent an attack, or in reprisal for an earlier attack to set an example.[1][2]
Although apparently known as early as the 8th century[citation needed], the federation of the Assassins is usually marked as 1090 when Hassan-i Sabbah established his stronghold in the Daylam at the fortress of Alamut (which translates as 'The Place of the Eagle's Teaching'), south of the Caspian Sea at. Hassan set the aim of the Assassins to destroy the threat of the Abbasid Caliphate by assassinating its most powerful anti-Nizari members. Much of the current western lore surrounding the Assassins roots from Marco Polo's supposed visit to Syrian fortress of Alamut in 1273; which is widely considered fictional (especially as the stronghold had reportedly been destroyed by the Mongols in 1256), and from returning crusaders from the levant who encountered their local Syrian leader Rashid Al-Sinan (the old man of the mountain) in the fortress of Maysaf.
Benjamin of Tudela who traveled one hundred years before Marco Polo mentions the Al-Hashshashin and their leader as "the Old Man." He notes their principal city to be Qadmous.
Notable victims include, Nizam al-Mulk (1092; although some historical sources contradict this claim), the Fatimad vizier al-Afdal (1122), ibn al-Khashshab of Aleppo (1124), il-Bursuqi of Mosul (1126), Raymond II of Tripoli (1152), Conrad of Montferrat (1192), and Prince Edward, later Edward I of England was wounded by a poisoned assassin dagger in 1271. It is believed that Saladin, incensed by several almost successful Hashshashin attempts on his life, besieged their chief Syrian stronghold of Masyaf during his reconquest of Outremer in 1176 but quickly lifted the siege after parley, and thereafter attempted to maintain good relations with the sect. The sect's own extant accounts tell of Rashid ad-Din Sinan, stealing into Saladin's tent in the heart of his camp, and leaving a poisoned cake and a note saying "You are in our power" on Saladin's chest as he slept. Another account tells of a letter sent to Saladin's maternal uncle, vowing death to the entire royal line, perhaps no idle threat; whatever the truth of these accounts (and likely it will remain a mystery) he clearly heeded their warning, and desisted.
The Hashshashin were often motivated by outsiders. The murder of the Patriarch of Jerusalem, for example, was instigated by the Hospitallers. It is rumoured the assassination of Conrad of Montferrat may have even been hired by Richard the Lionheart. In most cases they were aimed at retaining the balance of the Hashshashin's enemies.
The power of the Hashshashin was destroyed by the Mongol warlord Hulagu Khan; during the Mongol assault of Alamut on December 15, 1256, The Syrian branch of the Hashshashin was destroyed in 1273 by the Mamluk Sultan Baybars. The Hashshashin, in 1275, captured and held Alamut for a few months but their political power was lost and they were eventually absorbed into other Isma'ilite groups. They continued being used under the Mamluks, Ibn Battuta recording in the 14th century their fixed rate of pay per murder. The library of Alamut was destroyed, along with much of their Persian power base, and thus much of the sect's own records were lost; most accounts of them stem from the polemic of Arab historians of the period. However, Soviet scientists in order to understand more of communities exising within their vast empire set about conducting surveys and discovered small Isma'ili communities living within central Asia, isolated by trechorous terrain, Professor Ivanow collected and published first hand accounts of the Hashashin from original sources with accompanied by commentary. The Hashashin are survived by the Nizari under the leadership of Agha Khan IV, who continued the work started by the soviets, and began to collect literary works from isolated Nizari Isma'ili communities and set up the Institute of Isma'ili studies in order to publish scholarly work by leading western academics on the Nizari much of which deals with the Hashashin period, including history, science, and philosophy.
The group transformed the act of political assassination into a system of survival and within Iran of Persian nationalism against foreign domination and injustice, directed largely against Seljuk Turks, rulers who had been persecuting their sects. They were meticulous in killing the targeted individual, seeking to do so without any additional casualties and innocent loss of life, although they were careful to cultivate their terrifying reputation by slaying their victims in public, often in mosques. Typically, they approached using a disguise. Preferring a small hidden blade or dagger, they rejected poison, bows and other weapons that allowed the attacker to escape and live. For unarmed combat, the Hashshashin practiced a fighting style called Janna which incorporates striking techniques, grappling and low kicks. However, under no circumstances did they commit suicide, preferring to be killed by the master himself.
There are also, possibly apocryphal, stories that they used their well-known deadliness for political goals without necessarily killing. For example, a victim, usually high-placed, might one morning find a Hashshashin dagger lying on their pillow upon awakening. This was a plain hint to the targeted individual that he was not safe anywhere, that maybe even his inner group of servants had been infiltrated by the assassins, and that whatever course of action had brought him into conflict with them would have to be stopped if he wanted to live.
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The Qur'ān · The Ginans |
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| History | |
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Druze · Shoaib · Nabi Shu'ayb |
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Most Muslim contemporaries were hostile toward Nizari; in fact they were described using the term Batini. The term was sometimes used pejoratively to refer to those, especially Isma'ili, who discerned an inner, esoteric level of meaning (batin) in the Qur'an. This constant religious estrangement would eventually see them go so far as allying with the Occidental Christians against Muslims on a number of occasions when it suited their interests.
The original place they started their elite group was in Alamut, Iran (Persia) and later traveled to other countries. Legends abound as to the tactics used to induct warriors into what became both a religious and a political organization. One legend is that future assassins were subjected to rites similar to those of other mystery cults, in which the subject was made to believe that he was in imminent danger of death. The twist was that they were drugged to simulate "dying", to later awaken in a garden flowing with wine and served a sumptuous feast by virgins. The supplicant was then convinced he was in Heaven and that the cult's leader, Hassan-i Sabbah, was a representative of the divinity and all his orders should be followed, even unto death.
This legend derives from Marco Polo, who claimed to have visited Alamut during his journey east, although it was already abandoned and in ruins after it fell to the Mongols in the thirteenth century. The use of intoxicants are never mentioned in contemporary Ismaili sources, nor from rival Sunnis and Shia, despite them suffering from the assassination acts of that rival sect.
For example, Daftary says: "At the same time, within the crusading-culture of a pre- and early-modern Europe, the Syrian and Persian Nizaris took shape as Muslim mercenaries-cum-fanatics who murdered their victims while high on opium or hashish. If this propagandist concoction of a 'stoned' assassin fails to fit the complex reality of the discipline and training required for committing what was always an explicitly political act, the popular notion of Nizaris as a community of killers also denies their rich, multivalent culture."
Edward Burman, in his The Assassins - Holy Killers of Islam says: "There is no mention of that drug [hashish] in connection with the Persian Assassins - especially in the library of Alamut ('the secret archives')." As well, Encyclopedia of the Orient refutes this allegation. See also here.
Indeed Hassan-i Sabbah is recorded as being particularly harsh with users over intoxicant which he felt undermined the strict discipline required for the Nizari to survive. He made a public example of his two sons executing them for drinking alcohol, which he believed set a bad example for the community facing such insurmountable odds.
The name "assassin" is commonly believed to be a mutation of the Persian haššāšīn (حشّاشين); however, there are those who dispute this etymology, arguing that it originates from Marco Polo's account of his visit to Alamut in 1273[3] It is suggested by some writers that assassin simply means 'followers of Hassan' (or Hassan-i Sabbah, the Sheikh of Alamut (see below)). The term Hashshashin, a name given to them by their Arab enemies, was derived from the Arabic "haššāšīn" (حشّاشين, "hashish user"). It also means the ones who produce hashish, which they are alleged to have ingested prior to their attacks, but this etymology is disputed. The sect referred to themselves as al-da'wa al-jadīda (Arabic:الدعوة الجديدة), which means the new doctrine, and were known within the organization as
The word Hashish (of probable Persian origin) refers to resin collected from cannabis flowers. The true meaning of the word in Persian is actually "healers" or "herb sellers" .
Nevertheless, the most acceptable etymology of the word assassin is the simple one, it comes from Hassan (Hassan ibn al-Sabbah) and his followers, and so had it been for centuries. The noise around the hashish version was invented in 1809, in Paris, by the French orientalist Sylvestre de Sacy, whom on July the 7th of that year, presented a lecture at the Academy of Inscriptions and Fine Letters (Académie des inscriptions et belles lettres) –part of the Institute of France- in which he retook the Marco Polo chronicle concerning drugs and this sect of murderers, and associated it with the word. Curiously his theory had great success and apparently still has.
– Jacques Boudet, , Les mots de l’histoire}, Ed. Larousse-Bordas, Paris, 1998
Many scholars have argued, and demonstrated convincingly, that the attribution of the epithet 'hashish eaters' or 'hashish takers' is a misnomer derived from enemies of the Isma'ilis and was never used by Muslim chroniclers or sources. It was therefore used in a pejorative sense of 'enemies' or 'disreputable people'. This sense of the term survived into modern times with the common Egyptian usage of the term Hashasheen in the 1930s to mean simply 'noisy or riotous'. It is unlikely that the austere Hassan-i Sabbah indulged personally in drug taking. ...There is no mention of that drug [hashish] in connection with the Persian Assassins - especially in the library of Alamut ("the secret archives").
– Edward Burman, The Assassins - Holy Killers of Islam
Another variation on the theory described by Burman above is that haššāšīn was a derogatory epithet applied by the Assassins' Syrian neighbors due to the Assassins' behavior or their secretive, heterodox theology, meaning "crazy people," as in "those people who are addled, as if by cannabis."
