Sheikh Jamal al-Din Hamdan () was a

Lebanese Druze Lebanese Druze ( ar, دروز لبنان, durūz lubnān) are Lebanese people who are Druze. The Druze faith is a monotheistic and Abrahamic religion, and an ethnoreligious esoteric group originating from the Near East who self identify as ...

Sheikh Sheikh (pronounced or ; ar, شيخ ' , mostly pronounced , plural ' )—also transliterated sheekh, sheyikh, shaykh, shayk, shekh, shaik and Shaikh, shak—is an honorific title in the Arabic language. It commonly designates a chief of a ...

living in the nineteenth century in

Mount Lebanon Mount Lebanon ( ar, جَبَل لُبْنَان, ''jabal lubnān'', ; syr, ܛܘܪ ܠܒ݂ܢܢ, ', , ''ṭūr lewnōn'' french: Mont Liban) is a mountain range in Lebanon. It averages above in elevation, with its peak at . Geography The Mount Le ...

in Bater,

Chouf District Chouf (also spelled Shouf, Shuf or Chuf, in ''Jabal ash-Shouf''; french: La Montagne du Chouf) is a historic region of Lebanon, as well as an administrative district in the governorate (muhafazat) of Mount Lebanon. Geography Located south-east o ...

History

Following the Lebanese civil war of 1859-1860, Hamdan was sentenced to death by the Ottoman Turkish authorities alongside ten other Druze sheikhs : Sheikh Sa'id Jumblat, Sheikh Hussein Talhuq, Sheikh As'ad Talhuq, Sheikh Qasim Abu Nakad, Sheikh As'ad 'Imad, Amir Muhammad Qasim Arslan, Sheikh Salim Jumblat, Muhyi al-Din Shibli, 'Ali Sa'id, and Bashir Miri Sa'id. The Ottoman government's extraordinary envoy to the region, Fuad Pacha, had ordered that these men be executed for their participation in the atrocities of the Lebanese civil war of 1859-1860 against the Maronite Christians. According to C.H. Churchill's 1862 ''The Druzes and the Maronites'', "none of these sentences have carried into execution, whether of death or of penal imprisonment". A Part of the

Hamdan Hamdan ( ar, حمدان ') is a name of Arab origin of aristocratic descent and many political ties within the middle east and the Arab World, controlling import/export mandates over port authorities. Among people named Hamdan include: Given nam ...

family had been banished from Mount Lebanon following the

battle of Ain Dara The Battle of Ain Dara took place in the town of Ain Dara in 1711 between the Qaysi and Yamani tribo-political factions. The Qays were led by Emir Haydar of the Shihab dynasty and consisted of the Druze clans of Jumblatt, Talhuq, Imad and Abd a ...

in 1711. This battle was fought against two Druze factions : the Yemeni and the Kaysi. The Kaysi were represented by the

Jumblat The Jumblatt family (, originally , meaning "steel-bodied" or "soul of steel"), also transliterated as Joumblatt and Junblat) is a prominent Druze family based in the Chouf area of Mount Lebanon that has dominated Druze politics since the 18th cent ...

and Arslan families and the Yemeni by the

and Al-Atrash families. And the other part stayed in Lebanon, and ruled Al Mnasef region, which contained many villages, and made Deir Koushe as their home village. and then moved to Bater,

; after Sheikh Bashir Jumblat, their relative, asked them to go and stay there, by an order from Prince Bashir Shehab, because of their daily fights/wars with their neighbors Al Nakad (which they wanted to be the leaders in Mnasef). The Hamdan Family used to be and are still from the wealthiest Druze Sheikhs (Lords) in Lebanon and Al-Sham. Following their dramatic defeat, the Yemeni faction migrated to Syria in the Jebel-Druze region and its capital,

Soueida As-Suwayda ( ar, ٱلسُّوَيْدَاء / ALA-LC romanization: ''as-Suwaydāʾ''), also spelled ''Sweida'' or ''Swaida'', is a mainly Druze city located in southwestern Syria, close to the Jordan–Syria border, border with Jordan. It is the ...

. There are presently numerous Hamdan family members, both Druze and Muslims living in Lebanon, but only the Hamdan family in Bater,

is the descendant of the Royal Hamdanides. Ottoman period in Lebanon Year of birth missing Year of death missing Druze people from the Ottoman Empire 19th-century people from the Ottoman Empire {{Lebanon-bio-stub