Saada

Saada, town, northwestern Yemen, in the mountainous Yemen Highlands. It was the original capital of the Zaydi dynasty of imams (religious-political leaders) of Yemen (860–1962 ce). The effective founder of Saada as a base of Zaydi power was Imam Yaḥyā al-Hādī ilā al-Ḥāqq I (reigned 893–911). Under his successors the dynasty briefly extended its power to embrace most of eastern Arabia, from the Hejaz to southern Yemen. Al-Hādī and 11 of his successors are entombed in a domed mausoleum complex in the old city.

After the 17th-century move of the Zaydi capital to Sanaa (110 miles [175 km] south-southeast), Saada declined in national importance, though it has long been an administrative center of the northern part of the country and a hub for Zaydi intellectualism. The town saw significant decline after 1962, when the Zaydi imamate was forcibly abolished and the local sādah (aristocracy) was disenfranchised. In 1979 the establishment in the nearby town of Dammaj of a Salafi madrasah, whose teachings directly contradicted central aspects of Zaydi Islam, sparked outrage from many of the local Zaydis. The development inspired a Zaydi revivalist movement, a contingent of which, following a crackdown by the government of Ali Abdullah Saleh, evolved into the Houthi rebellion in 2004.

Traditional local industries have included the manufacture of leather goods and of stoneware vessels for food preservation. Pop. (2004) 51,870.

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