History of concubinage in the Muslim world

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Concubinage in the Muslim world was the practice of Muslim men entering into intimate relationships without marriage,^[2] with enslaved women,^[3] though in rare, exceptional cases, sometimes with free women.^[4][5][6] If the concubine gave birth to a child, she attained a higher status known as umm al-walad.^[7]

It was a common practice in the Ancient Near East for the owners of slaves to have intimate relations with individuals considered their property,^[a] and Mediterranean societies, and had persisted among the three major Abrahamic religions, with distinct legal differences, since antiquity.^[8][9][b] Islamic law has traditionalist and modern interpretations,^[10] and while the former historically allowed men to have sexual relations with their female slaves,^[11][12] most modern Muslims and Islamic scholars consider slavery in general and slave-concubinage to be unacceptable practices.^[13]

Concubinage was widely practiced throughout the Umayyad, Abbasid, Mamluk, Ottoman, Timurid and Mughal Empires. The prevalence within royal courts also resulted in many Muslim rulers over the centuries being the children of concubines. The practice of concubinage naturally declined with the abolition of slavery.^[14]

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