The Lower March (
Arabic: الثغر الأدنى, al-Ṯaḡr al-ʾAdnā;
Portuguese: Marca Inferior) was a
march of
al-Andalus. It included territory that is now in Portugal.[1]
As a borderland territory, it was home to the so-called muwalladun or indigenous converts and their descendants, some of these eventually established dynastic lordship such as the case of Ibn Marwan al-Jilliqi who ruled the
Cora of Merida during the early part of the ninth century, a region with its capital in modern
Merida and included the area of modern
Badajoz.[2] Several rebellions occurred in the territory, most notably caused by
Umar ibn Hafsun and two of his sons refusing to recognize the
Emir of Cordoba's sovereignty;[3] even after Hafsun's death, small pockets of independent resistance persisted.[3] It was not until a decade after Hafsun's demise that the Emir of Cordoba was able to completely quell the rebellion in the Lower March.[3]
In the reign of
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān III (912–961), the Lower March was combined with the
Central March to form an enlarged march with its capital at
Medinaceli in the former Central March. It retained the name of the Lower March.[4][5]
^Safran, Janina (2013). Defining Boundaries in al-Andalus: Muslims, Christians, and Jews in Islamic Iberia. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. p. 172.
ISBN9780801451836.
^
abcFlood, Timothy M. (2018). Rulers and Realms in Medieval Iberia, 711–1492. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. p. 45.
ISBN9781476674711.
^Bosch Vilá, Jacinto (2016) [1962]. "Considerations with Respect to al-Thaghr in al-Andalus and the Political-Administrative Division of Muslim Spain". In Manuela Marín (ed.). The Formation of al-Andalus, Part 1: History and Society. Routledge. pp. 377–387.