Yazīd ibn al-Muhallab

Yazīd ibn al-Muhallab in Arabic يزيد بن المهلب(* 673 ; † 720 ) with the Kunya Abū Chālid or Abū Saʿīd was an Arab military leader from the Azd tribe in the Umayyad Empire , who played an important role in the political fighting between North and South Arab tribes at the beginning of the 8th century. After serving as governor of Khorasan from 702 to 704 and governor over the entire east of the empire from 715 to 717, he led an unsuccessful uprising against the ruling family in Basra in 720, which resulted in his death and a bloodbath on his Kinship, the so-called Muhallabids, ended.

Governor in Khorasan and conflict with al-Hajjaj

Yazīd ibn al-Muhallab was the son of the military leader al-Muhallab ibn Abi Sufra , whom al-Hajjaj ibn Yūsuf had commissioned in 694 to fight the Azraqites , and the Azditin Dahma. After Muhallab had defeated the Azraqiten, he was 698 of al-Hajjaj with the office of the governor of Khorasan rewarded. Shortly before al-Muhallab died in January 702, he appointed his son Yazīd, who from an unknown point in time himself had taken part in the fight against the Azraqites, as his successor. Al-Hajjādsch confirmed Yazīd in his office, but relations with him soon deteriorated when, after the suppression of Ibn al-Ash Aath's rebellion, Yazīd only extradited those who had moved into his territory from the rebels who had moved into his territory belonged to northern tribes of the Mudar, but not to members of the South Arabian Azd. A prisoner demonstrated this to al-Hajjaj with the following verses:

Li-anna-hū kāsa fī iṭlāqi usrati-hī
wa-qāda naḥwa-ka fī aġlāli-hā Muḍaran
waqā bi-qaumi-ka wirda l-mauti usrata-hū
wa-kāna qaumu-ka adnā ʿinda-hū ḫaṭaran

Because he (Yazīd so) was clever at releasing his relatives (the southern Arabs)
and brought the mudar (the northern Arabs) to you (al-Hajjaj) in chains.
He saved his kindred from the potion of death by your people (the North Arabs).
Your people were less important to him.

Because of this incident, among other things, al-Hajjaj asked Yazīd in the spring of 704 to leave the governor's post to his brother al-Mufaddal and to come to him in Iraq. According to a different tradition from Oman, Yazid was only deposed during the caliphate of al-Walid I , who allowed al-Hajjaj to rule even more freely in the provinces he ruled. In October 705, al-Hajjaj arrested Yazīd with several brothers and had them tortured in prison in order to gain access to their property.

Escape to Sulaimān and governorship over the east

After Yazīd and his brothers managed to escape from prison in disguise in the year 709, they went to the designated Umayyad heir to the throne Sulaimān , who was the governor of Palestine in his newly built city of Ramla . Sulayman, who was married to a woman from the Azd and had an antagonistic relationship with al-Hajjaj, granted him and his family protection.

After his accession to the throne in 715, Sulaimān appointed Yazīd, who had become his personal friend, governor of Iraq and Khorasan, and gave him various titles of ownership over lands in Iraq. Yazīd, who thus rose to be the indirect successor of al-Hajjaj, was given a completely free hand in the provinces he administered and held several offices, which were previously in the hands of followers of al-Hajjaj, with brothers and members of South Arabian tribes. However, as his deputy in al-Wāsit , the capital of Iraq newly founded by al-Hajjāj, he appointed a northern Arab, al-Jarrāh ibn ʿAbdallāh al-Hakamī.

In order to evade the financial control of the caliph's officials, Yazīd moved his residence to Khorasan in 716. There he undertook several campaigns against the Turks in the areas south of the Caspian Sea and subjugated the area of Dschurdschān . Before returning to Khorasan, he founded the city of Gorgan in the newly conquered province , where one of his military leaders set up his residence. A peculiarity of Yazid's governorship was that for the first time he also deployed Syrian troops on the territory of Iran.

During his stay in Khorasan Yazīd considered several of his relatives with posts in subordinate authorities. Al-Yaʿqūbī writes: “Yazīd entrusted his brothers and sons with the lands: he entrusted [his son] Machlad with Samarkand , [his brother] Mudrik ibn al-Muhallab with Balkh, and [his brother] Muhammad ibn al-Muhallab with Marw . Yazid's influence (amr) grew great in Khorasan ”. According to al-ʿAutabī, Machlad was only twelve years old when his father Yazīd installed him as governor of Transoxania.

Al-Farazdaq's praises of Yazīd ibn al-Muhallab

Yazīd even FARMED generous in Khorasan and attracted many poets to his court, including the famous poet al-Farazdaq, the previously in the service of the Caliph al-Walid I had stood. He described the earlier departure of the Muhallabids from Khorasan and the appointment of Qutaiba ibn Muslim from the Bāhila tribe as the new governor as a great misfortune:

Bakat ǧazaʿan Marwā Ḫurasān iḏ raʾat
bi-hā Bāhilīyan baʿda āli Muhallabi

"The two Merw wept with grief when they saw
a Bāhilite after the departure of the Muhallabids"

Abā Ḫālidin badat Ḫurasān baʿda-kum
wa-qāla ḏawu l-ḥāǧāt aina Yazīd
fa-mā li-surūrin baʿda faqdi-ka bahǧatun
wa-lā li-ǧawādin baʿda faqdi-ka ǧūd

Abū Chālid, Khorasan was lost since you left
and whoever was in need said: Where is Yazīd?
And no pleasure brings more joy since your absence,
and no bountiful man practices bounty since you left.

In a long poem in praise of the Muhallabids, al-Farazdaq described Yazīd as a brave prince and praised his campaigns against the Turks. His fame increased the fame of the entire House of Muhallab. At one point in the poem he even praised Yazīd as a pious king:

innī ra'aitu Yazīda ʿinda šabābi-hā
labisa t-tuqā wa-mahābata l-ǧabbār
malikun ʿalai-hi mahābatu t-taqī
qamaru t-tamāmi bi-hī wa-šamsu nahāri

See, I saw Yazīd in his youth,
he was dressed in the fear of God and the venerability of the giant.
A king on whom the venerability of a pious king rests,
the full moon and the sun of day have come together in him.

He also praised Yazīd in the poem for the fact that North and South Arabs fought united in his army.

Deposition and uprising in Basra

Even before Sulayman's death in 717, Yazid's position in Khorasan was shaken, and when ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz became caliph, he deposed his predecessor's friend. The reason given in the sources is a letter from Yazid to Sulaimān, which fell into the hands of ʿUmar after Sulaimān's death. In it, Yazīd is said to have given the caliph a boastful account of his campaign and the booty it gained. ʿUmar demanded the payment of the fifth (ḫum) based on the sum mentioned in the letter and, when Yazīd turned out to be insolvent, held Yazīd in custody .

Shortly before or after ʿUmar's death in February 720, Yazīd ibn al-Muhallab managed to escape from prison again and flee to Basra , the home of his family, where many members of the Azd ʿUmān also lived. He could not expect much good from the new caliph Yazīd II , because he had been a close ally of al-Hajjaj and had married his niece. After Yazīd ibn al-Muhallab (from now on: Ibn al-Muhallab) had tried in vain to obtain the release of his family members from the governor of Basra, ʿAdī ibn Artāh, he brought the city into his power with the support of the Azd and Rabīʿa imprisoned the Umayyad governor.

Apparently under the influence of a Kharijite sect leader, whose name is given in the sources as Samaidaʿ, Ibn al-Muhallab now went over to the open revolt against the Umayyads and sought the caliphate. In the name of the “ Book of God and the Sunnah of the Prophet” he called for a jihad against the Syrians, which was more urgent and more meritorious than the one against the Dailamites and Turks. Many residents of Basra and the surrounding area followed his call, including Kharijites and Murji'ites and even various members of the North Arabian tribe of Tamīm. In the early summer of 720, various areas of Iran that were dependent on Basra, including Chusistan , Kerman and Fars , also expressed their loyalty to Ibn al-Muhallab.

On the other hand, Ibn al-Muhallab's policy was rejected by the Basrian preacher al-Hasan al-Basrī . He accused him of exploiting religion for secular purposes, but in doing so he was able to prevent few people from supporting Ibn al-Muhallab and was even denounced as a traitor. But also the poet al-Farazdaq, who initially stood by Ibn al-Muhallab and sang about his victory over ʿAdi ibn Artāh, now distanced himself from him.

When the caliph Yazīd mobilized the Arab tribes in Syria and let them move towards Iraq under the command of his brother Maslama , the horror was great, so that Ibn al-Muhallab was advised by his brother Habīb to evade to Fars. Against the advice of his brother, however, he moved north to forestall the advancing Syrians and to bring Kufa , the second major center of Iraq, under his control. After taking Wāsit under his control, in August he set up camp at ʿAqr, a small fort near the ancient city of Babylon on the Great Sarāt Canal, which flowed into the Euphrates . While various residents of the city of Kufa, including members of the Tamīm, were still running over to his camp, the Syrian troops under the command of Maslamas advanced and set up camp on the other bank of the canal.

A surprise attack on the Syrians was out of the question, as two sect leaders in Ibn al-Muhallab's army, Samaidaʿ and the Murji'it Abū Ru'ba, insisted that the opponents should first be called to the Koran and Sunna and given the opportunity to to convert. On August 24, 720, Maslama opened the attack. After he set fire to the bridges built by Ibn al-Muhallab, the Tamīm from Kufa fled and a disengagement began. Yazīd ibn al-Muhallab's army was increasingly on the defensive, and he and two of his brothers fell in battle.

The surviving Muhallabids, who were persecuted by the Umayyad troops, first fled to Basra and from there, along with other members of South Arabian tribes, across the sea to Kerman. Since they were not safe there either, they avoided Qandabīl in Sindh . But they were finally recorded there too. Almost all fighting men of the Muhallabids were beheaded; their cut heads were sent to Syria and exhibited there in Aleppo . In Basra, the houses of the Muhallabids were destroyed and their wives and children were taken into slavery. However, an Umayyad official later released them.

Consequences of the uprising

The unsuccessful uprising of Ibn al-Muhallab intensified the tribal polarization in the Umayyad state that was already emerging at the beginning of the 8th century . Immediately after Yazid's death, the poet al-Farazdaq changed his political side, placed himself in the service of the Umayyads, and insulted the Muhallabids and with them the South Arab tribes in a series of satirical poems. While the most important offices in Iraq and in the east of the empire were now almost exclusively occupied by members of North Arabian tribes from the Syrian-Mesopotamian border region, the South Arabian tribes regarded the overthrow of Ibn al-Muhallab as one of their worst humiliations by the Umayyads and left permanently in opposition to them. Because of their rejection of the Umayyads, they also supported the uprising movement of Abū Muslim Khorāsānī , which led to the collapse of the Umayyad state. The catchphrase under which they joined this uprising was “Revenge for the Muhallabids”.

literature

• Patricia Crone : Art. "Muhallabids" in The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition Vol. VII, pp. 358b-360b. Here p. 359a.
• Reinhard Eisener: Between fact and fiction. A study on the Umayyad caliph Sulaimān b. Abdalmalik and his picture in the sources. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 1987. pp. 23-28, 84-90, 98-114.
• Francesco Gabrieli : "La rivolta dei Muhallabiti nel ʿIrāq e il nuovo Balāḏurī" in Rendiconti della Reale Accademia dei Lincei ser. 6, 14 (1938) 199-236.
• Gerald R. Hawting: The first dynasty of Islam. The Umayyad caliphate AD 661-750 . 2nd edition. London: Routledge 2000. pp. 73-76.
• J. Hell: "Al-Farazdaḳs Lieder auf die Muhallabiten" in the magazine of the Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft 59 (1905) 589–622 and 60 (1906) 1–48.
• Martin Hinds: An early Islamic Family from Oman: al-ʿAwtabī's Account of the Muhallabids . Manchester, Univ. of Manchester, 1991. pp. 53-74.
• Muḥammad Ibn-Nāṣir Ibn-Aḥmad al-Mulḥim: Yazīd Ibn-al-Muhallab Ibn-Abī-Ṣufra wa-dauruhū fī bilād aš-Šarq, 53-102 H, 672-720 M: dirāsa tārīḫīya taḥlīlīya . Riyāḍ: Wizārat at-Taʿlīm al-ʿĀlī, Ǧāmiʿat al-Imām Muḥammad Ibn-Saʿūd al-Islāmīya, al-Idāra al-ʿĀmma li-ṯ-Ṯaqāfa wa-'n-Našr, 2003.
• Ibn Jarīr at-Tabarī : The History of al-Tabari Vol. 24: The Empire in Transition: The Caliphates of Sulayman, 'Umar, and Yazid AD 715-724 / AH 97-105 . Translated by Stephan David Powers. New York Press, Albany 1989. pp. 31-39, 79-82, 89-91, 111-150.
• Julius Wellhausen : The Arab Empire and its fall. Reimer, Berlin, 1902. pp. 195-99.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ See Hell 1906, 1f.
2. ↑ See Hell 614f.
3. ↑ See Hawting 74.
4. ↑ Cf. aṭ-Ṭabarī : Annales II 1121, lines 16-17 Available online here .
5. ↑ Dt. Translation, cit. after Eisener 25.
6. ↑ See Eisener 24f and Hinds 55f.
7. ↑ See Eisener 23.
8. ↑ See Hinds 53f.
9. ↑ See Eisener 26, Hinds 60.
10. ↑ See Crone 359a.
11. ↑ See Hell 618.
12. ↑ See Hinds 62.
13. ↑ See Hawting 74.
14. ↑ See Hell 619.
15. ↑ See Eisener 85.
16. ↑ See Hinds 65.
17. ↑ See Eisener 86–90.
18. ↑ See Hawting 75.
19. ↑ See Eisener 86.
20. ↑ See Eisener 101.
21. ↑ See Eisener 105.
22. ↑ Quoted in Eisener 110.
23. ↑ See Hinds 65.
24. ↑ See Hinds 65.
25. ↑ Namely Marw ar-Rūdh and Marw asch-Shāhijān
26. ↑ Quoted from Hell 1906, 3.
27. ↑ See Hell 1906, 7–24.
28. ↑ See Hell 1906, 12.
29. ↑ See Hell 1906, 16.
30. ↑ See Hell 1906, 24.
31. ↑ See Eisener 112.
32. ↑ See Hell 1906, 28, 45.
33. ↑ See Wellhausen 196.
34. ↑ See Wellhausen 196.
35. ↑ See Hell 1906, 26f.
36. ↑ See Hell 1906, 28.
37. ↑ See Hinds 68f.
38. ↑ See Hell 1906, 31.
39. ↑ See Hinds 69.
40. ↑ See Wellhausen 198.
41. ↑ See Wellhausen 198f.
42. ↑ See Hinds 74.
43. ↑ See Wellhausen 199.
44. ↑ See Hell 1906, 35–48.
45. ↑ See Hawting 76.