Banu Lam

Banu Lam (Arabic: بنو لام‎‎) is an Arab tribe of central Arabia and southern Iraq. The tribe claims descent from the ancient Arab tribe of Tayy, and dominated western Nejd (the region between Medina and al-Yamama) before the 15th century. The tribe split into three main bedouin (nomadic) groups: the Fudhool, the Al Kathir, and the Al Mughira , and Al-Dhafeer. The Bani Lam tribes gradually left Nejd, settling mostly in southern Iraq, where they converted from Sunni to Shi'a Islam largely just before or during the 19th century.^[1] Many clans from Bani Lam, however, remained in Nejd as settled townspeople. The Fudhool were the last of Bani Lam to leave Nejd, in the 18th century.

Notes

1. The Shi'is of Iraq By Yitzhak Nakash, pg.27, and Haydari, ‘Unwan al-Majd, pg.110-15, 118