Marwan I.

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Marwān ibn al-Hakam ( Arabic مروان بن الحكم, DMG Marwān b. al-Ḥakam , * 623 ; † May 7, 685 ), also Marwan I , was the fourth caliph of the Umayyads (684–685). He was a grandson of Abū l-ʿĀs and thus belonged to the same branch of the Umayyad family as the third caliph Uthman ibn Affan (644-656).

Political role under previous caliphs

At an unknown time, Marwān became the secretary of ʿUthmāns, in 648 he took part in a campaign against Ifrīqiya . The great influence of Marwān on the caliph as his secretary and the fact that a fifth of the booty from the conquest of North Africa went to him were among the most important allegations against erhobenUthmān, which ultimately led to his assassination in 656. After this event, Marwān initially sided with Aisha , but surprisingly paid homage to igteAlī ibn Abī Tālib after the camel battle . Under Muʿāwiya I , he first served as governor of Bahrain and then for two phases (661–668 and 674–677) as governor of Medina .

Activities during the Umayyad Succession Crisis

When the Umayyad caliph Yazid I died in 683 , ʿAbdallāh ibn az-Zubair , the son of az-Zubair ibn al-ʿAuwām , proclaimed himself caliph in Mecca and expelled the Umayyads from the hijaz , including Marwān and his sons, the had to flee to Syria . After the death of Yazid's successor Muʿāwiya II a year later, Ibn az-Zubair received more and more support. Several Qais tribal princes in Syria and Palestine also took his side, including Zufar ibn al-Harith in the military district of Qinnasrīn and ad-Dahhāk ibn Qais al-Fihrī, whom Ibn al-Zubair proclaimed his governor in Damascus. Marwān, who no longer believed that the Umayyads could maintain their power, went to the Hejaz to also pay homage to Ibn az-Zubair and receive a promise of security for the Umayyads from him. In Adhriʿāt, today's Darʿā , he met the former Umayyad governor of Iraq, ʿUbaidullāh ibn Ziyād. This urged him to apply for the caliphate himself, since as a sayyid from the descendants of ʿAbd Manāf ibn Qusaiy he had more claim to it than Ibn az-Zubair. He then turned back and initially settled in Palmyra . At the congress of al-Jābiya , which took place a few weeks later , he was raised to the rank of caliph.

After the elevation to caliph

Immediately after his elevation to caliph, Marwan I set out to fight his opponents. In the battle of Marj Rāhit in August 684, he first defeated ad-Dahhāk and his followers. Following this battle, he set ʿUbaidullāh ibn Ziyād on the march against Zufar, who had holed up with his Qaisitic followers in Qarqīsiyāʾ at the mouth of the Chabur in the Euphrates. The resilience of Zufar turned out to be unexpectedly strong, so that ʿUbaidullāh had to leave without having achieved anything. Marwān's greatest achievement was regaining control of Egypt . An attack by the Umayyads on Medina failed, however. Also, most members of the tribe Association of Qais in Jund of Qinnasrin remained hostile to him. Only ʿUmair ibn al-Hubāb, one of the leaders of the Banū Sulaim , paid homage to him. Shortly before his death from the plague on May 7, 685 , Marwān divided the kingdom between his two sons: the older of them, ʿAbd al-Malik , received Syria, the younger, ʿAbd al-Azīz , Egypt.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See Rotter 17.
  2. ↑ See Bosworth 621b.
  3. ↑ Cf. 135f.
  4. ↑ See Rotter 140.
  5. ↑ See Rotter 187.
  6. ↑ See Rotter 152.
predecessor Office successor
Muʿāwiya II. Umayyad Caliph
684–685 		Abd al-Malik
personal data
SURNAME Marwan I.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Marwan ibn al-Hakam
BRIEF DESCRIPTION fourth Umayyad caliph
DATE OF BIRTH 623
DATE OF DEATH May 7, 685