The al-Ahdal family is an important family of sayyid s (those who claim descent from the Prophet) living primarily in southwestern Arabia. The origins of the family are part of the sayyid elite that developed during the seventh/thirteenth century in the Tihāma region of Yemen (a plain bordering the Red Sea). The namesake of the family, Abū Ḥasan ʿAlī al-Ahdal, and his son Abū Bakr (d. 700/1300) lived in the small town of al-Marāwiʿa, and their graves became the centre of a major pilgrimage site.