Banu Lakhm

The Banu Lakhm (Arabic: بنو لخم) was an Arab tribe best known for its ruling Nasrid, or more commonly, 'Lakhmid', house, which ruled as the Sasanian Empire's vassal kings in the buffer zone with the nomadic Arab tribes of northern and eastern Arabia in the 4th—6th centuries CE from their seat in al-Hirah in modern Iraq. After their first ruler Amr ibn Adi ibn Nasr (r. 293–302), nothing was mentioned of the Lakhmid kings in Iraq until the late 5th century when they emerged as commanders of Sasanian campaigns against nomadic Arab tribes and later the Arab allies of the Byzantine Empire. Their origin is thought to be Yemenite.

A section of the Lakhm dwelt in Syria at least from the 4th century, during Byzantine rule, and remained allies of Byzantium until the Muslim conquest of Syria in the 630s. Thereafter, they became one the main tribes that made up the Umayyad Caliphate's Arab tribal soldiery in Palestine and were closely associated with the larger tribe of Judham.