assassins
Publié le 22/02/2012
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Popular name for a medieval Shi'ite
Muslim community more properly known as the
Nizari Ismailis. The Nizari Ismaili community is a
group within SHI'ITE ISLAM about which much imaginative
lore has circulated. Europeans called them
"assassins." Arabs called them hashishiyah, that is,
"marijuana smokers." Travelers such as Marco Polo
(c. 1254–1324) spread rumors that the assassins
were incited to murder by being drugged, taken
to gardens, and thus given a foretaste of paradise.
These rumors remain entirely unsubstantiated.
The Nizaris broke away from the Fatimid
Ismaili community of Egypt in the late 1000s. As
so often in Shi'ite Islam, the dispute concerned
who should be the next IMAM. They established a
state in parts of Syria and Iran, which continued in
existence until the 1250s. The rumors about them
certainly derive from military and guerrilla actions
taken in defending and extending this state.
The Nizari Ismaili community still exists, but
the name "assassins" is not associated with it. In
the early 1800s, the community's imam received
the title of AGA KHAN.
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