Muhammad al-Tabari: Caliphate of Yazid

In this year, the oath of allegiance as caliph was given to Muʿwiyah b. Yazīd b Muʿāwiyah b. Abī Sufyān in Syria, and to ʿAbdallāh b. al-Zubayr in the Ḥijāz.

When Yazīd b Muʿāwiyah died, al-Ḥuṣayn b. Numayr and the Syrians continued fighting against Ibn al-Zubayr and his companions in Mecca—according to Hishāmʿs report from ʿAwānah—for forty days. The Syrians had strenuously besieged Ibn al-Zubayr and his men and blockaded them. Then news of Yazīdʿs death reached Ibn al-Zubayr and his companions, but not al-Ḥuṣayn b. Numayr and his.

According to Isḥāq b. Abī Isrāʿīl—ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. Khālid b. Rustam al-Ṣanʿānī. Abū Muḥammad—Ziyād b. Jiyal. While Ḥuṣayn b. Numayr was fighting against Ibn al-Zubayr, news of Yazīdʿs death arrived unexpectedly. Ibn al-Zubayr then shouted to the Syrians saying, “Your tyrant is dead. Whoever of you wishes to enter what the people have entered into, let him do to; but whoever is unwilling, let him take himself to his Syria!” Consequently, they left off fighting him.

Ibn al-Zubayr said to al-Ḥuṣayn b. Numayr, “Draw close to me and I will speak with you.” He did so and Ibn al Zubayr spoke with him. The horse of one of them began to drop dung (yajfilu; a gloss in the text explains that the word jafl here refers to dung, rawth) and the pigeons of the sanctuary area started to scavenge in the droppings. Al-Ḥuṣayn reined back his horse from them and Ibn al-Zubayr said, “What is the matter with you?” He replied, “I am afraid lest my horse kill the pigeons of the sanctuary area.” Ibn al-Zubayr said, “You would refrain from this sin and yet you wish to kill the Muslims!” Al-Ḥuṣayn answered, “ will not fight you; allow us to perform the ritual circumambulation of the sanctuary and then we will leave you.” He did so, and they departed.

‘Awānah b. al-Ḥakam said, according to the report of Hishām from him: When news of the death of Yazīd reached Ibn al-Zubayr, whom the Syrians, unaware of it, had strenuously besieged and blockaded, he and the Meccans began to shout out to them, “Why are you fighting? Your tyrant is dead!”At first they would not believe them, until Thābit b Qays b. al-Munqaʿal-Nakhaʿī of the Kūfans arrived from the leaders of the Iraqis and passed by al-Ḥuṣayn by Numayr. He was a confidant of his, there were marriage ties between them, and he had used to see him at Muʿāwiyahʿs court. Ibn Numayr recognized the excellence of his character, the strength of his Islam, and the nobility of his descent, and he asked about the news. Thābit told him about Yazīdʿs death and thereupon al-Ḥuṣayn b. Numayr sent to ʿAbdallāh b. al Zubayr, saying “Let us meet tonight in al-Abṭaḥ to discuss what concerns us.” When they met, al- Ḥuṣayn said to Ibn al-Zubayr, “If it be that this man is dead, then you, of the people, have the most right in this matter. Come, and we will give you the oath of allegiance, and then leave with me for Syria. This army which is with me consists of the foremost of the Syrians and their champions. By God, there are not two of them who will disagree about you if you will grant the men security and indemnity for the blood spilled between us and you and between us and the people of the Ḥarrah.”

Saʿīd b. ʿAmr used to say that the only thing which prevented Ibn al-Zubayrʿs accepting the oath of allegiance from them and leaving for Syria was a foreboding [taṭayyur], because it was at Mecca where God protected him—that was from the army of Marwān—and, by God, if ʿAbdallāh had gone with them to Syria, no two of them would have disagreed about him. Some of Quraysh claimed that Ibn al-Zubayr said, “Shall I grand indemnity for this shed blood! Indeed, by God, I will not be satisfied if I killed ten for every man of those killed!”

Al-Ḥuṣayn began to speak with him in private, but he answered publicly, saying, “No, by God, I will not do so.” Al-Ḥuṣayn b. Numayr said to him, “May God shame whoever, henceforth, counts you as a subtle or intelligent man! I thought you had perception, but do I not address you privately while you address me publicly, and I call you to the caliphate, but you threaten me with death and destruction.”

Al-Ḥuṣayn arose and left, called out to his men, and set out with them toward Medina. Ibn al-Zubayr, however, repented of what he had done and sent a message to him, “As for going to Syria, I will not do it, for I do not like to leave Mecca; but give me the oath of allegiance here and I will grant you security and act justly among you.” Al-Ḥuṣayn answered, “What do you think I am to do if you will not come yourself while I have found there (in Medina and/or Syria) many members of this family who are seeking it and to whom the men will respond?” So he continued with his men and those with him in the direction of Medina.

ʿAlī b. al-Ḥuṣayn b. ʿAlī b. ʿAbī b. Ṭalib met him. With him he had dates of fodder quality and barley, and he was riding a camel of his. He greeted al-Ḥuṣayn, but the latter scarcely paid any attention to him. Al-Ḥuṣayn b. Numayr had a well-bred mare of his own, but his own dates and barley for the mounts had run out and he was worried. He was reviling his serving lad, saying, “Where will we find here fodder for our mounts?” ʿAlī b. al-Ḥuṣayn said to him, “We have fodder with us, so feed your mounts from it.”Thereupon he gave his attention to ʿAlī, and the latter ordered that the fodder he had with him be offered to him.

The people of Medina and the Ḥijāz became emboldened against the Syrians, who were humiliated so much that no man of them could go out alone without the bridle of his mount being seized and he pushed off it. Consequently, they gathered in their army camp and kept together. The member of the Umayyad family said to them, “Do not leave without taking us with you to Syria.” So they did that and the army continued until it reached Syria. There, Yazīd b. Muʿāwiyah designated his son Muʿāwiyah b. Yazīd as caliph, but the latter only survived forty days.

Umar told me on the authority of ʿAlī b. Muḥammad: When Muʿāwiyah b. Yazīd had been designated caliph, gathered together the officials of his father and the oath of allegiance given to him in Damascus, he perished there after forty days of his rule. His kunyah was Abū ʿAbd al-Rahmān and also Abū Laylā. His mother was Umm Hāshim bint Abī Hāshim b. ʿUtbah b. Rabīʿah, and when he died heh was thirteen years and eighteen days old.

In this year also, the Baṣrans gave the oath of allegiance to ʿUbaydallāh b. Ziyād on the understanding that he would remain in control of their affairs until the people settled on an imām satisfactory to themselves. Then ʿUbaydallāh sent a messenger to al-Kūfah summoning the Kūfans to do the same as the Baṣrans, but they refused and threw stones at the prefect who was over them. Next the Baṣrans, too, came out in opposition to ʿUbaydallāh, civil commotion sprang up in al-Baṣrah and ʿUbaydallāh b. Ziyād betook himself to Syria.

 

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Source: Reprinted by permission from The History of al-Tabari Vol. 20: The Collapse of Sufyanid Authority and the Coming of the Marwanids: The Caliphates of Muʿawiyah II and Marwan I and the Beginning of the Caliphate of ‘Abd al-Malik A.D. 683-685/A.H. 64-66 translated by G. R. Hawting, the State University of New York Press (c) 1989, State University of New York. All rights reserved.