The Shihab dynasty (alternatively spelled Chehab; , ALA-LC: al-Shihābiyūn) were an Arab family whose members served as the paramount tax farmers and local chiefs of Mount Lebanon in the 18th-mid-19th centuries, during Ottoman rule. They were established as the traditional chiefs of Wadi al-Taym in the southern Beqaa Valley from 1172, according to the family history, and were traditional allies and marital relatives of the Ma'n dynasty, which established a practical emirate over Mount Lebanon from the late 16th century. They succeeded the Ma'ns after the death of the last Ma'nid chief without male progeny in 1697. The transfer of leadership was decided by the Qaysi faction of the emirate's Druze feudal chiefs and confirmed by the Ottoman authorities, who conferred to the family authority over the tax farms of Mount Lebanon. Under Emir Haydar Shihab, the Qaysi faction and the Shihabs consolidated control over Mount Lebanon from their Yamani Druze rivals at the 1711 Battle of Ain Dara. Their victory also precipitated an exodus of Druze tenant farmers from Mount Lebanon and their gradual replacement with Maronite and Melkite Christians. During the era of Emir Yusuf Shihab, members of the family, including the latter, began to convert from Sunni Islam to the Maronite Church.