“I see amidst the embers the glow of fire, and it wants but little to
burst into a blaze,
And if the wise ones of the people quench it not, its fuel will be
corpses and skulls.
Verily fire is kindled by two sticks, and verily words are the
beginning of warfare.
And I cry in amazement, ‘Would that I knew whether the House
of Umayya were awake or asleep!’”
To the Arab garrisons too, torn by tribal feuds and heedless of the impending danger, he addressed the following verses:* —
“Tell those of Rabí'a in Merv and her brethren*
to rise in wrath
ere wrath shall avail nothing,
And to declare war; for verily the people have raised a war on
the skirts of which the wood is ablaze!
What ails you that ye stir up strife amongst yourselves, as though
men of sense were absent from among you,
And neglect an enemy who already overshadows you, a hetero-
geneous horde, devoid alike of religion and nobility?
They are no Arabs of ours that we should know them, nor even
decent clients, if their pedigree be declared,
But a people who hold a faith whereof I never heard from the
Prophet, and which the Scriptures never brought,
And should one question me as to the essence of their religion,
verily their religion is that the Arabs should be slain!”
Vain, however, were these and other warnings.* Khurásán was seething with disaffection and revolt, and Abú Muslim, Raising of the Black Standard of the 'Abbásids, June 9, A.D. 747. having assured himself at length that all was ready, raised the Black Standard* of the 'Abbásids at the village of Siqadanj, near Merv, on June 9, A.D. 747. This standard bore the following significant inscription from the Qur'án: Permission [to fight] is accorded to those who take up arms because they have been unjustly treated.” Yet for a while the insurrection did not spread beyond the extreme north-east of Khurásán, Nasá, Bíward, Herát, Marwarúdh, and the surrounding regions. In response to the appeal of Naṣr b. Sayyár the Caliph Marwán wrote:* “Verily he who is present seeth what he who is absent seeth not: do thou, then, treat this disease which hath appeared amongst you!” The only practical step which it occurred to him to take was to seize, imprison, and poison Ibráhím the 'Abbásid, whereupon his two brothers Abu'l-'Abbás and Abú Ja'far, accompanied by some of their kinsmen, fled from al-Ḥumayma, their home in Syria, and escaped to Kúfa, where they were concealed and cared for by Abú Salma and other leading men of the Shí'ites.
“Then,” says al-Fakhrí,* “there occurred between Abú Muslim and Naṣr b. Sayyár and the other Amírs of Khurásán engagements Citation from al-Fakhrí. and battles wherein the victory was to the Musawwida, that is the army of Abú Muslim, who were called Musawwida [‘the people who make black’] because the raiment which they chose for the House of 'Abbás was black in colour. Regard now the Power of God (exalted is He!), and how, when He willeth aught, He prepares the means therefor, and how, when He desireth anything, nothing can oppose His command. So when He had decreed that the dominion should pass unto the House of 'Abbás, He prepared for them all the means thereto. For the Imám Ibráhím b. Muḥammad b. 'Abdu'lláh b. al-'Abbás was in Syria or in the Ḥijáz, seated on his prayer-mat, occupied with himself, his devotions, and the concerns of his family, and not possessed of any great worldly power, while the people of Khurásán fought for him, risking their lives and property for him, though most of them neither knew him, nor could distinguish between his name and his personality… Nor did he spend on them any wealth, or bestow on any one of them horse or arms; nay rather it was they who bestowed wealth on him and brought him tribute every year. And since God had decreed the abasement of Marwán and the disruption of the kingdom of the Umayyads, although Marwán was the acknowledged Caliph, and was possessed of armies, and wealth, and weapons, and worldly goods to the fullest extent, yet did men desert in all directions from him, and his authority waxed weaker, and his tenure was shaken, and he ceased not being worsted till he was routed and slain.”
The enthusiasm of the Musawwida and their devotion to Abú Muslim—“homme sombre et dur que les jouissances de ce monde n'occupaient guère”* —were unbounded, while their obedience was such that they would neither accept ransoms nor slay the enemy who lay at their feet without the command of their chiefs. Amongst the Arabs, on the other hand, there was an utter lack of enthusiasm, patriotism, or loyalty; “chacun avait en vue ses intérêts personnels ou tout au plus l'intérêt de sa tribu: se dévouer pour les Omayades personne n'y pensait; même s'il faut en croire Ya'qoubi, les Yéménites de Merw étaient tout à fait gagnés aux sentiments chiitiques.” Yet Abú Muslim proceeded with caution and deliberation. For seven months he maintained his army in the neighbourhood of Merv without attempting any serious advance, and only when assured of the support of the Yamanite Arabs did he at length seize and occupy the capital of Khurásán. Then indeed the insurrection became general:* —
“They poured in from all sides to join Abú Muslim, from Herát, Búshanj, Marwarúdh, Ṭálaqán, Merv, Níshápúr, Sarakhs, Balkh, Ṣaghániyán, Ṭukháristán, the country of the Khuttal, Kashsh, and Nasaf (Nakhshab).* They came all clothed in black, and carrying clubs half blackened which they called káfir-kúb (maces wherewith to beat the unbelievers).* They kept arriving on horse, on foot, on asses. They urged on their asses with cries of ‘harra Marwán!’ because Marwán II was surnamed ‘the Ass (al-Ḥimár). They numbered about 100,000 men.”
From this moment till Abu'l-'Abbás 'Abdu'lláh aṣ-Ṣaffáḥ (also entitled al-Mahdí), first Caliph of the House of 'Abbás, inaugurated his reign on October 30, A.D. 749, by pronouncing the khuṭba, or homily, customary on such occasions, the progress of Abú Muslim and the other 'Abbásid leaders was one continuous triumph. Naṣr ibn Sayyár—“le seul homme loyal, et qu'on est heureux de rencontrer dans ces temps des perfidie et d'égoïsme”—died a fugitive at Sáwa in November, A.D. 748; Kúfa was occupied by Qaḥṭaba in August, A.D. 749; in the same month Marwán's son 'Abdu'lláh was utterly routed on the lesser Záb by Abú 'Awn; Marwán himself suffered final and irrevocable defeat on the river Záb on January 25, A.D. 750; Damascus, the Umayyad capital, was occupied three months later; and Marwán, last Caliph of the House of Umayya, a fugitive in Egypt, was finally taken and slain on August 5th of the same year, and his head sent to Abu'l-'Abbás. General massacres of members of the Umayyad family, accompanied in most cases by circumstances of inhuman cruelty and revolting treachery, took place in the following year (A.D. 751) in Palestine, at Baṣra, and even in the sacred cities of Mecca and Madína. One, Abdu'r-Raḥmán, the grandson of Hishám, after many hairbreadth escapes, ultimately made his way to Spain, and, being well received by the Arabs there settled, founded the Umayyad dynasty of Cordova, which endured for nearly three centuries (A.D. 756-1031). The desecration of the tombs of the Umayyad Caliphs at Damascus, and the exhumation of their bodies, has also been cast as a reproach against the 'Abbásids;* but since this practice has been recently revived by an English general, and condoned if not applauded Disillusionment of many of the supporters of the revolution. by the majority of his countrymen, it would hardly beseem us to denounce it too violently.
In any case the 'Abbásids, even when, wading through seas of blood, they had finally grasped the Caliphate and become sole and undisputed masters of the Eastern Empire of Islám, were very far from “filling the earth with justice,” so that we find a poet exclaiming:* —
“O would that the tyranny of the children of Marwán might return
to us,
And would that the justice of the children of 'Abbás were in
hell-fire!”
Many of those who had worked most strenuously for the
revolution were most bitterly disappointed when it was an
accomplished fact.*
More especially was this so in the case of
the Shí'ites, who, misled by the delusive belief that by the term
“Háshimites,” in whose name the propaganda was carried on,
the House of 'Alí was intended, discovered, when it was too
late, that not even in the Umayyads had the true descendants
of the Prophet enemies more implacable than in their “Háshi-