The history of the ʿAwāṣim is a widely known and accepted part of the history of the Byzantine–Islamic frontier and of Abbasid administrative systems more generally. The usual account of the origins and history of this administrative area, as summed up in Marius Canard's article in the second edition of the Encyclopaedia of Islam, shows the area, previously part of the jund of Qinnasrīn, being made into a separate entity by Caliph Hārūn al-Rashīd in the year 170/786. The word itself is, conventionally but rather strangely, translated as ‘protectoresses’, plural of ʿāṣima. The purpose of this change, we are told, was to create a sort of back-up area of fortification to support the advanced outposts in the Thughūr and to province refuge for Muslims when they needed to retreat from the more advanced outposts.

More recently, the great historian of the Arab–Byzantine frontier, Michael Bonner, returned to the question. He accepts without question that the ʿAwāṣim were a series of strongholds, ‘the “protectoresses”, so-called because the warriors could seek refuge with them after their raids or when under attack’. After a discussion of the earlier administrative geography of the Thughūr he goes on to argue that Hārūn had two aims: ‘first to break up the old conglomeration of the Umayyad North, thereby limiting the great barons’ potential for mischief: and secondly, to associate Hārūn's person with the frontier and with the jihād generally’. While the second of these aims is supported by other indications of Hārūn's policy on the holy war at this time, there seems to be no firm evidence for the first at all and none of the texts support it directly. At no point does Bonner provide any evidence that this area was the scene of any military activity.

In an attempt to arrive at some more precision about the origins of the ʿAwāṣim and the meaning of the word, we must turn to the written sources of the Abbasid period. There are two important textual traditions about the formation of the ʿAwāṣim: the taʾrīkh narratives and the writings of the geographers.