{{short description|Term for a female slave in the medieval Islamic world}} {{redirect|Jawari|the musical instrument|Jivari|the language|Ninam language}} [[File:Arabe 3929, 151, Jariya.jpg|thumb|A ''Jāriya'', ''Maqamat of Al-Hariri'', 1200–1210.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Balafrej |first1=Lamia |title=Automated Slaves, Ambivalent Images, and Noneffective Machines in al-Jazari's Compendium of the Mechanical Arts, 1206. |journal=Inquiries into Art |date=19 December 2022 |volume=History |pages=767–768 |doi=10.11588/xxi.2022.4.91685 |url=https://journals.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php/xxi/article/download/91685/87635 |quote=While at a wedding in Sinjar (Iraq), Abu Zayd tells the story of how he lost his enslaved concubine (jāriya). The plan had been to keep her in strict seclusion, but one day, under the influence of alcohol, he made the mistake of revealing her existence to a neighbor. Word got around; eventually, Abu Zayd was forced to sell the concubine to the governor.}}</ref>]] {{Slavery}} '''Jarya''' or '''jariya''' ({{abbr|{{sc|sing}}|singular form}}; {{Langx|ar|جارية}}), also '''jawari''' ({{abbr|{{sc|plur}}|plural form}}), were female slaves in the medieval Islamic world<ref name="Gordon Hain 2017">{{cite book |last1=Gordon |first1=Matthew |last2=Hain |first2=Kathryn A. |title=Concubines and Courtesans: Women and Slavery in Islamic History |date=2017 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-062218-3 }}{{page needed|date=May 2022}}</ref> specifically trained for artistic performance in harems. They contrasted with ''qiyan'', female slaves or free women trained in performance and not restricted to harems.
==History== The slave category of the jarya—similar to the qiyan—rose to fame during the Abbasid Caliphate era,<ref name="Gordon Hain 2017"/> possibly because free Arab women became more and more secluded from society during this time period.<ref name="Gordon Hain 2017"/>
They were acquired by purchase or captured as war booty. The term were applied to such enslaved women who, by instruction or self-education, acquired a great knowledge of artistic skills and intellectual knowledge by which they could entertain a man, rather than by sexuality and physical beauty. They could study issues from music and poetry to religion, history and literature, and many were known to be able to entertain their owner by both intellectual as well as musical abilities. There were many examples of jawaris who managed to gain influence over male rulers.
The jawaris differed from qiyan in that they appear not to perform in public, only in the harem to which they belonged. Royal harems could employ a very large number of jawaris, who acted as the entertainers of the royal harem and who were not necessarily synonymous with the concubines of the ruler.<ref name=El-Azhari2019>{{cite book |last1=El-Azhari |first1=Taef |title=Queens, Eunuchs and Concubines in Islamic History, 661–1257 |date=2019 |publisher=Edinburgh University Press |isbn=978-1-4744-2318-2 |jstor=10.3366/j.ctvnjbg3q }}{{page needed|date=May 2022}}</ref> The Abbasid harem had thousands of jawari as well as concubines who were not always the same, and this was adopted by the harems of many other Islamic rulers, such as the rulers of the Caliphate of Cordoba and the Fatimid Caliphate.<ref name=El-Azhari2019/>
The jariya category of sexual harem slaves were described by the 9th-century writer Al-Jahiz, who accused them of exerting a destructive influence over their owners created by their artistic skills, which created a web of dependent feelings such as love (hub), passion (hawa), affinity (mushakala) and a wish for continued companionship (ilf).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Classen |first1=Albrecht |title=Pleasure and Leisure in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Age: Cultural-Historical Perspectives on Toys, Games, and Entertainment |date=2019 |publisher=Walter de Gruyter |isbn=978-3-11-062307-9 |page=214 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bz7EDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA214 }}</ref>
Though most scholarly attention has gone to courtly contexts, jawari were also present in non-courtly urban settings, including the homes of merchants and artisans, notably as domestic workers. A wide range of representations features jawari, including technical treatises and spiritual literature.<ref>{{cite journal | first=Lamia | last=Balafrej | title=Instrumental Jawārī: On Gender, Slavery, and Technology in Medieval Arabic Sources |journal=Al-ʿUṣūr al-Wusṭā | volume=31 | date=2023 |doi=10.52214/uw.v31i.10486 | pages=96–126| issn=1068-1051 | doi-access=free }}</ref>
==Examples== There were many famous jaryas noted in Islamic literature and history, such as Al-Khayzuran, Alam al-Malika, and Hababah.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Mernissi |first1=Fatima |title=The Forgotten Queens of Islam |date=2003 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-579868-5 }}{{page needed|date=May 2022}}</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
* Category:Arabic-language women poets Category:Arabic-language poets Category:History of slavery Category:Slaves in the medieval Islamic world Category:Slavery in the Abbasid Caliphate Category:Slavery in the Umayyad Caliphate Category:Sexual slavery Category:Women and slavery Category:Islam and women