Muhammad Bayram V

1840 - 1889

Tunisian reformer, writer, administrator, and newspaper editor.

Muhammad Bayram V was born into an illustrious family of ulama in Tunis. His paternal uncle Muhammad Bayram III was bash mufti (chief jurisconsult) at the time of his birth. His mother was the daughter of Mahmud Khujah, a Mamluk official of Ahmad Bey; his father, Mustafa, was a farmer. His earliest recollections were of his father's laborers complaining of their situation. This, coupled with his maternal grandfather's political involvement, led him to consider a career in politics.

Upon completion of his studies at Zaytuna University, Bayram became a teacher of religion in a secondary school. When his uncle Bayram IV died in 1861, Bayram V was too young to succeed him as Shaykh al-Islam. (Apparently the designation "V" stemmed from the near assumption of this important religious office.)

The death of his uncle enabled Bayram V to establish a closer relationship with political reformers among the Mamluk class, especially Khayr al-Din al-Tunisi. When Khayr al-Din became prime minister in 1873, he appointed Bayram V editor of the official gazette, Al-Ra'id al-Tunisi, and head of the Hubus (waqf) Administration to regulate religious trusts. The hubus constituted an important economic base for the ulama. Bayram V regularized the hubus, eliminating corruption, improving efficiency, and maintaining accurate records of transactions. Bayram V also directed the state printing office, organized the new library at Zaytuna University, and regulated the curriculum at Sadiqi College.

After his ministry collapsed in 1877, Khayr alDin left the country under a cloud of suspicion and failure. Bayram remained in government service until 1879. During these years, Bayram may have conspired with Khayr al-Din, who had become Ottoman prime minister, to seek French assistance in deposing Muhammad al-Sadiq Bey, ruler of Tunisia.

Bayram was allowed to go to Mecca in October 1879. He never returned to Tunisia but went to Constantinople for four years (where he reconciled with Khayr al-Din) and then to Egypt in 1884, where he spent the rest of his life. While in Egypt, Bayram launched an Arabic-language newspaper, Al-Iʿlam (The clarion), which became the most widely read and most influential Arabic newspaper of the 1880s. He also published a history of nineteenth-century Tunisia. He died 18 December 1889.

Bibliography

Barrie, Larry A. "A Family Odyssey: The Bayrams of Tunis, 1756 - 1861." Ph.D. diss., Boston University, 1987.

Green, Arnold H. The Tunisian Ulama, 1873 - 1915: SocialStructure and Response to Ideological Currents. Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 1978.

Perkins, Kenneth J. Historical Dictionary of Tunisia, 2d edition. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow, 1989.

— LARRY A. BARRIE