I Banu Abi'l-Husayn o Kalbiti tra Palermo e il Cairo (X-XI secolo): note su una interazione familiare e politica, rileggendo al-Maqrizi.

The Banū Abī’l-Ḥusayn or Kalbiti between Palermo and Cairo (x-xi sec.): Notes on a family and political interaction, rereading al-Maqrīzī · This article aims at investigating a crucial issue with regard to thehistory of Islamic Sicily, the Fatimid presence on the island during the 10th and the 11th century, as well as the integration of the largest island – and ṯaġr – in Muslim hands into the network of the Mediterranean relationships, particularly those between Sicily and Egypt, immediately after the Fatimid Caliph imām al-Mu‘izz li dīn Allāh (d. 975) moved to Cairo in 972. Since the subject of Fatimid Sicily has been scarcely explored, I have chosen to deal with the particular relationship between Palermo and Cairo during the 10th and the 11th centuries, as clearly outlined in the works of the Egyptian historian al-Maqrīzī (1364-1442). Through a close analysis ofthe sources, it clearly emerges that, in both Palermo and Cairo, the family of Banū Abī’l-Ḥusayn, orKalbids, contributed to the consolidation of the Fatimid dawlah, as well as to the construction ofthe Fatimid maritime domain in the Mediterranean. Such a role also took shape thanks to political, military and institutional ties with the Kutama Berbers, first in Ifrīqiya, then in Palermo and Cairo, where the Kalbids acted as official representatives of the maġāribah.