Banū ʿAmr ibn Wadīʿa

Overview

ʿAmr ibn Wadīʿa ibn Lukayz is one of the names that hold the ordering of ʿAbd al-Qays together. Wadīʿa is entered under Lukayz, ʿAmr under Wadīʿa, and beneath ʿAmr the genealogists carry several of the sections that the accounts of the eastern coast then name on their own: al-Dīl, Muḥārib of ʿAbd al-Qays, and — through the further names of al-Ḥārith, Anmār and ʿAwf, which the compilers do not order identically — ʿĀmir ibn al-Ḥārith and Jadhīma.

That is what this page is: a stem. The reports rarely speak of Banū ʿAmr ibn Wadīʿa as an actor; they speak of the sections beneath it. Its use to a reader is that it explains why those sections belong together, and where in the tribe they sit.

Why the whole name is written

ʿAmr is one of the two or three commonest names in the whole of Arab genealogy, and Banū ʿAmr as a bare phrase is close to useless: this reference already carries another Banū ʿAmr, a section reported under Masrūḥ of Ḥarb in the Ḥijāz, which has no relation to this one whatever beyond the word. Sections called Banū ʿAmr occur in most large tribes.

So the father is written, and the grandfather with him: ʿAmr ibn Wadīʿa ibn Lukayz, in the ʿAbd al-Qays chapter. A source that gives only Banū ʿAmr has named a word, and the country or the chapter has to supply the rest.

The names

ʿAmr is from the root ʿ-m-r, inhabiting and long life, the same root as ʿĀmir. Wadīʿa is from w-d-ʿ: in Lisān al-ʿArab al-wadīʿa is what is entrusted to a man for safekeeping, and the same root gives al-daʿa and al-wadāʿa, ease and gentleness of manner — a man wadīʿ is quiet and unhurried. Names of this kind belong to the ordinary stock of Arab naming and imply nothing about the group.

The country

The sections carried under this stem are placed by the geographers on the eastern seaboard: the coast Yāqūt calls al-Khaṭṭ, and writes Khaṭṭ ʿAbd al-Qays after the tribe on it; al-Qaṭīf among its towns; al-Zāra with its palms; the landing place of Dārīn; the island of Awāl offshore; and behind them Hajar and the oasis country of al-Aḥsāʾ. This is one country, and the sections beneath ʿAmr ibn Wadīʿa are recorded within it rather than scattered across the peninsula.

On lineage

This page describes a historical tribe as the classical sources record it, and makes no claim about any modern family. Branch lists and affiliations are given as reported by the genealogists, who themselves disagree. Nothing here 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.