ABD AL-MALIK (685-705):

Life:

Abd AL Malik spent the first half of his life with his father, Marwan ibn al-Hajjaj, fourth Umayyad caliph, in Madinah, where he received religious instruction and developed friendly.

relations with the pious circles of the city that were to stand him in good stead in his later life. At the age of 16, he was entrusted by his kinsman, the caliph Muawiyah, with administrative of the city by Madinese rebels in revolt against the central government in Damascus. responsibilities. He remained at Madinah until 683 A.D., when he and his father were driven out the city of Madinese in the revolt against the central government in Damascus.

He then met the Syrian Umayyad army that was marching on Madina and gave its commander advice about the best means of attacking the city, advice that was followed and p successful. When the caliph Yazid died in November 683 A.D., Marwan was 684 A.D. and was able to affect a partial rally of Umayyad rule but at the cost of a bitter feud that arose between northern and southern Arab tribes. When Marwan died in 685 A.D. and Abd al- Malik succeeded to the caliphate, the forces opposing the Umayyads were still formidable. There were, first, the northern Arab tribes who, under their leader Zufar, were. northern Syria and Iraq. They were finally pacified only in 691 A.D. The second focus of resistance was in Iraq, where three main groups, opposed to each other but united in their resistance to the Umayyads, held sway: the Kharijites, the Shia, and the forces of the anti caliph Abd Allah ibn az Zubayr, who was proclaimed caliph in Makkah in 685 A.D. and had received at least nominalallegiance from many provinces.

The initial attempts by the former Umayyad governor of Iraq, ibn Ziyad, to regain the province failed, and he was killed by the Shiah in 686 A.D. For three years Abd al-Malik made no further attempt to interfere in Iraq but bided his time as the various groups in Iraq exhausted themselves in internecine warfare. Musab, the brother of the anti caliph Ibn az-Zubayr, defeated the Shiah in 687 A.D. but then had to deal with the Kharijites, committing a large part of his forces.

Abd al-Malik first took the field against Musab in 689 A.D. but had to turn back to quell a rebellion in Damascus. In the following year, the campaign again proved fruitless. Only after the defeat of the northern Arab tribes in 691 A.D. was Abd al-Malik finally able to face Musab. The decisive battle took place at Dayr al-Ja Thaliq. The forces of Musab were weakened by their wars against the Kharijites and Musab was then killed in battle. The whole of Iraq now fell into his hands, and the only remaining centre of opposition was the now aging anti caliph, Ibn az-Zubayr.

Abd al-Malik publicly chided him for his temerity and then sent his famous governor al- Hajjaj to Arabia. Al-Hajjaj besieged Ibn az-Zubayr in Makkah and killed him in September 692. The Muslim community was finally unified.

At first, the re-establishment of Umayyad rule was more apparent than real. The Kharijites were still either restless or in open revolt. The Kharijites in Persia were especially dangerous. It was only after Abd al-Malik had appointed al-Hajjaj to govern Basra that campaigns against them began to prove successful. But north of Kufah, another Kharijite trouble centre developed. In 695 A.D. these Kharijites captured Mosul and occupied large areas of central Iraq. Al-Hajjaj, leading his Syrian troops, defeated them too in 697 A.D. The Kharijite movement, however, remained strong, especially among the Bakr tribes between Mosul and Kufah.

Al-Hajjaj had then become governor of all the eastern provinces. He was an efficient administrator, intent upon pacifying all the provinces entrusted to him by Abd al-Malik. A great Muslim army, led by Ibn al-Ashath, and operating in the Afghanistan region, mutinied, swore allegiance to its commander, and turned back to Iraq. Al-Hajjaj, with the aid of Syrian reinforcements, was able to defeat the rebels, and their leader was murdered in 704 A.D. in Afghanistan. Al-Hajjaj, realising that he could no longer trust the Iraqis, built a new city, Wasi.