Fraxinetum ( lat. Fraxinetum , Arabic. جبل القِلال ) ( 888 - 972 years ) - a small but strategically important base of Muslim pirates of the " Barbarian Shore " and Muslim Spain in medieval Provence . Jalal-al-Hilal, or Fraxinet (after the name of its largest fortress) occupied the coastal strip and a number of inland areas on the so-called Mavr Plateau between the larger cities of Marseille and Nice that remained under Christian control.
Along with robbery and hard work, the Arabs revived agronomy and agriculture, as well as the trade in luxury goods, that is, reviving those sectors of the economy that fell into decay after the fall of the Roman Empire. Jalal-al-Kiel was completely destroyed by the Burgundian-Provençal army of Christians in 972 during the Reconquista process.
According to some historians, trade and socio-economic contacts established during this period between the population of Provence and the Maghreb countries later came in handy for the establishment of French power in Algeria , Tunisia and Morocco .
Foundation
The pirate base in Fraxinet was allegedly founded in 888-889 by 20 bilingual movalladas from Muslim Spain (from the village of Pechina near the city of Almeria ), who arrived in the Gulf of Saint-Tropez . The capital of the Saracens was the fortress, erected by Arab pirates near the modern La Garde-Freinet . Gradually, the possessions of Muslims expanded, not least due to the support of the local Roman-speaking population, of whom the Arabs' power was less than the power of the German feudal lords of Burgundy. At the beginning of the 10th century, the pirate emirate turned on the village of Saint-Tropez (now the famous resort city) and the village of Ramatuelle (a toponym of supposedly Arab origin), controlling the important Alpine passes between Spain, Italy and France and making predatory attacks on the sea and overland. The Moorish Plateau of Provence also got its name in this period. Jalal-al-Kilal held a marginal position and his positions in Europe have always been fragile. Nevertheless, he managed to survive for 85 years thanks to the support of a whole network of pirate possessions of Muslims in the Western Mediterranean , which in addition to Fraxinet included the Balearic Islands , Corsica , Western Sardinia and other pirate bases and groups in the ports of the Maghreb, Egypt and Spain.
Rise and Fall
Jalal's financial strength rested primarily on the slave trade , which brought huge profits. For this reason, the attitude towards it among different European nations was different. If the nearby feudal lords of France suffered from Muslim raids and sought to resist Islamization , the German princes of Regensburg , Prague and Verdun, on the contrary, collaborated with Muslim merchants, selling Muslims the Slavs captured by the Germans, turned into slaves - Sakaliba . The golden age of the emirate fell on 952–960, when Muslims actually controlled the trade routes to Savoy and Switzerland (including the Saint-Bernard Pass ), Marseille, Nice and Grenoble. But the gradual expansion and strengthening of the Holy Roman Empire in the 960s put an end to the Muslim power in the south of France, since now the territorial and political interests of the Germans came into direct conflict with the Arabs. In the fall of 972, the united army of Christians literally wiped out the former Fraxinet. Burgundians and Provencals attacked from land, and the Byzantine fleet closed the sea, which had generally supported Muslims in the struggle against the “Latins”, but this time burned the Muslim ships with the famous “ Greek fire ”. The surviving Muslims themselves were sold into slavery , and their fortresses destroyed to the ground. Fraxinet has ceased to exist.