The terms Qahtanite and Qahtanirefer toArabs who originate from Yemen. According to Arabtradition, the Qahtanites are pure Arabs, unlike the Adnanites who are "Arabized Arabs", descended from Ishmael through Adnan. The Qahtani people are divided into the two sub-groups of Himyar and Kahlan.
Arab tradition maintains that a semi-legendary ancestral figure named Qahtan and his 24 sons are the progenitors of Yemen who controlled the Arabian Peninsula known as Qahtani. Early Islamic historians identified Qahtan with the Yoqtan son of Eber in the Hebrew Bible. James A. Montgomery finds it difficult to believe that Qahtan was the biblical Joktan based on etymology. Among the sons of Qahtan are noteworthy figures like A'zaal, Hadhramaut and Jurhum whose descendants formed the second Jurhum tribe which Ishmael learned Arabic from. Another son is Ya'rub, and his son Yashjub is the father of Saba'. All Yemeni tribes trace their ancestry back to this "Saba", either through Himyar or Kahlan, his two sons. The Qahtani people are divided into the two sub-groups of Himyar and Kahlan, who represent the settled Arabs of the south and their nomadic kinsmen. The Kahlan division of Qahtan consists of 4 subgroups: the Ta' or Tayy, the Azd group which invaded Oman, the 'Amila-Judham group of Palestine, and the Hamdan-Madhhij group who mostly remain in Yemen. The Kahlan branch includes the following tribes: Azd, Hamdan, Khath'am, Bajila, Madhhij, Murad, Zubaid, Ash'ar, Lakhm, Tayy, and Kindah.
Early Semites who developed civilizations throughout the Ancient Near East gradually relinquished their geopolitical superiority to surrounding cultures and neighboring imperial powers, usually due to either internal turmoil or outside conflict. This climaxed with the arrival of the Chaldeans, and subsequently the rivaling Medes and Persians, during the 7th and 6th centuries BCE respectively. Though the Semites lost geopolitical influence, the Aramaic language emerged as the lingua franca of much of the Near East. However, Aramaic usage declined after the defeat of the Persians and the arrival of the Hellenic armies around 330 BCE. The Ghassanids were the last major non-Islamic Semitic migration northward out of Yemen. They revived the Semitic presence in the then Roman-controlled Syria. They initially settled in the Hauran region, eventually spreading to modern Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan, briefly securing governorship of Syria away from the Nabataeans.
Modern historiography
According to Parolin, the Adnanites are believed to be the descendants of Ishmael through Adnan but the traditional Adnanite lineage doesn't match the biblical line exactly. According to Arab tradition, the Adnanite are called Arabised because it is believed that Ishmael was speaking Hebrew and he got married from a Qahtanite Yemeni woman and learned Arabic from her. Therefore, the Adnanites are considered descendants of Abraham. However, Parolin disputes that Adnanites are descendants of Abraham and says that Modern historiography "unveiled the lack of inner coherence of this genealogical system and demonstrated that it finds insufficient matching evidence".
Between the 7th and the 14th centuries, the Arabs had forged an empire that extended their rule from most of Spain, to western China in the east. During this period of expansionism, the Arabs, including Qahtanite tribes, overspread these lands, intermingling with local native populations while yet maintaining their cultural identity. Although you can find the largest number of Qahtanite Arabs in Yemen. Among the most famous examples of Qahtanite Arabs are the social scholar Ibn Khaldun who was born in Tunisia to a family that immigrated from Islamic Spain. Other notable examples are Al Kindi and Ibn al-Baitar.
