 The Banu Munqidh were an Arab family belonging to the Kinana branch of the Banu Kalb tribe.Though the Banu Kalb were largely concentrated around Damascus in the late 10th century, the Kinana inhabited the eastern environs of the Orontes River in northern Syria.A member of the family, Ali ibn Munqidh ibn Nasr al-Kinani, is first mentioned in 960 when he was taken captive by the Byzantines during a major Hamdanid defeat; also taken prisoner was the poet and governor Abu Firas al-Hamdani.