Banū Qitab

Overview

Banū Qitab — written بنو قتب — are reported in the inland country of the lower Gulf and in the ground running toward the Ẓāhirah of ʿUmān, between the sands and the western skirts of the mountains. The reports of origin differ: some place the tribe with the Azd of ʿUmān, others reckon it Nizārī, that is on the ʿAdnānī side, and the classical books settle neither. This page describes a historical tribe as reported, and makes no claim about any modern family.

The vowelling

The written form بنو قتب is unpointed for its vowels, and later writing gives it as Qitab, Qutub and Qatab without agreeing. Where the vowelling of a name is unsettled, so is any argument built on the sound of it: a name read one way may look like a word or another tribal name that the same letters read differently do not resemble at all. The page keeps the written form and reports the readings rather than choosing among them.

The name

Ibn Manẓūr enters the root q-t-b for al-qatab, the small saddle set over the camel's hump, and for al-qitb and related forms; the root also carries the sense of gathering and drawing together. The lexicon explains the word. It does not say why a people came to be called by it, and it does not mention this tribe.

On sources

The classical works this reference cites — Ibn Ḥazm, al-Qalqashandī, al-Hamdānī, Yāqūt, Ibn Manẓūr and Ibn Khaldūn — do not document Banū Qitab. Al-Hamdānī describes ʿUmān and its country and Yāqūt names its places, but neither names this tribe, and a citation for a land is not a citation for a people in it. The tribe's present shape postdates all six works by centuries, and what is reported about it comes from oral tradition and from modern writing that lies outside what this reference may use. The page records the name and the reported country; it does not record a descent.

On lineage

Branch lists and affiliations here are given as reported, and the genealogists differ among themselves. Nothing on this page establishes any living family's descent: a shared name may reflect descent, alliance (ḥilf) or clientage (walāʾ), and the sources usually say which only when they know.