Maisun bint Bahdal

Maysūn bint Baḥdal (ميسون بنت بحدل, d. 700), is noted as a wife of Caliph Mu‘āwiya I, and as mother of his successor and son Caliph Yazīd ibn Mu‘āwiya. In this capacity, she had a significant role in the politics of the Umayyad Caliphate.

Maysūn bint Baḥdal also enjoys a reputation as one of the earliest attested Arabic-language women poets. However, that reputation seems to belong to another woman of a similar name, Maysūn bint Jandal (see below).

Maysūn bint Baḥdal was a Syriac Orthodox Christian from the Kalb Bedouin tribe, daughter of the Kalb's leader, Bahdal ibn Unayf. Mu‘āwiya's marriage to her, perhaps in 645, was politically motivated, as she was the daughter of the chief of the Kalb tribe. The Kalb tribe had remained largely neutral when the Muslims first went into Syria. After the plague that killed much of the Muslim Army in Syria, Mu‘āwiya, by marrying Maisūn, was able to use the Syriac Orthodox Christians against the Romans. Yazid, born in 646, was, as far as is known, her only child.

In the assessment of Nabia Abbott,

Maisūn somewhat eludes us as a vivid personality. She seems to have been wrapped up in the life of her young son whom she delighted to dress up in fine clothing to gladden the eyes of his affectionate father. She is generally credited with taking an interest in the education of Yazid, whom she took with her to the deserts of the Kalb south of Palmyra. She at one time accompanied Mu'awiyah on an expedition into Asia Minor. All in all, she received Mu‘āwiyah's stamp of approval as maid, wife, and mother.

Maysūn bint Baḥdal, wife of Mu‘āwiya I, is named in some secondary sources as Maisūn bint Jandal. Maysūn bint Jandal seems, however, to have been a different woman, of the Fazārah. This Maisūn is apparently the author of the following celebrated poem, which has often been misattributed to Maysūn bint Baḥdal, enabling the characterisation of Mu‘āwiya I's wife as colourfully committed to country life; the story even circulates that Mu‘āwiya divorced Maysūn bint Baḥdal because of the offence he took at this poem and that she took her young son with her to grow up in the desert. As paraphrased by H. W. Freeland, the poem runs as follows:

This poem is part of a wider trend of women's verse expressing nostalgia for the desert in the context of an increasingly urbanising society.

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