, the second caliph ( r. 13/634-23/644), one of the great figures of early Islam, a driving force behind the early conquests and the creation of the early Islamic empire. There is some contradiction among the historical and biographical traditions on ʿUmar b. al-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb, and many of these contain exaggerated or legendary deails. However, a consistent character emerges out of this material: stern, strong-willed, prone to anger, devoted to Muḥammad, the Ḳurʾān and Islam, ʿUmar seems to have had a coherent political programme during and even before his caliphate. ʿUmar reportedly bega…

b. Mirdās al-Fihrī , a poet of Mecca. Chief of the clan of Muḥārib b. Fihr in the Fid̲j̲ār [ q.v.], he fought against the Muslims at Uḥud and at the battle of the Trench, and wrote invectives against the Prophet. He was however converted after the capture of Mecca, but it is not known if he perished in the battle of Yamāma (12/633) or whether he survived and went to settle in Syria. (Ed.) Bibliography Sīra, ed. Saḳḳā, etc., Cairo 1375/1955, i, 414-5, 450, ii, 145-6, 254-5 Ṭabarī, index Muḥ. b. Ḥabīb, Muḥabbar, 170, 176, 434 Buḥturī, Ḥamāsa, index Ibn Sallām, Ṭabaḳāt, ed. S̲h̲ākir, 209-12 Ag̲h̲ānī, i…

, one of the most prominent personalities of the first generation of Muslims, and of the authorities most frequently quoted for Traditions. He derived his reputation not only from being a son of the Caliph, but also because his high moral qualities compelled the admiration of his contemporaries. At a time when the Muslims were being carried by their passions into civil war, Ibn ʿUmar was able to maintain himself aloof from the conflict; furthermore, he followed the precepts of Islām with such scrupulous ¶ obedience that he became a pattern for future generations, to such a degr…

al-Ḥimyarī al-Yamanī , the first imām elected by the Ibāḍīs of the Mag̲h̲rib. He was one of the five missionaries ( ḥamalat al-ʿilm , "carriers of science") sent to the Mag̲h̲rib by Abū ʿUbayda al-Tamīmī of Baṣra, the spiritual head of the sect, in order to preach there the Ibāḍī creed [cf. ibāḍiyya ]. These missionaries received from Abū ʿUbayda the order to establish an imamate amongst the Ibāḍiyya of Tripolitania, with Abu ’l-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb ¶ as imām. The activities of the ḥamalat al-ʿilm were crowned with success. In 140/757-8 the Ibāḍī notables of Tripolitania, in a council he…

, Muslim heresiarch. According to al-Kas̲h̲s̲h̲ī, his father was Miḳlaṣ b. Abi ’l-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb, and he himself used the kunyas Abū Ismāʿīl and Abu ’l-Ẓubyān. He was a Kūfan and a mawlā of the tribe of Asad. In the Nuṣayrī writings he is also called al-Kāhilī. He was one of the chief dāʿīs of the Imām Ḏj̲aʿfar al-Ṣādik, but fell into error and taught false doctrines, as a result of which he was repudiated and denounced by the Imām. Seventy of his followers, assembled in the mosque of Kūfa, were attacked by order of the governor …

al-Mak̲h̲zūmī , an Umayyad g̲h̲azal [ q.v.] poet of re-nown, reputedly a member of the Meccan aristocracy whose paternal uncle, according to Ibn Ḳutayba ( al-S̲h̲iʿr , 348), was Abū Ḏj̲ahl ʿAmr b. His̲h̲ām b. al-Mug̲h̲īra [ q.v.]. His father and brother held administrative posts in South Arabia (whence his family’s wealth is said to have derived) and Baṣra respectively. In his verse, ʿUmar usually refers to himself as ʿUmar, Abu ’l-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb or al-Mug̲h̲īrī and once as Ibn ʿAbd Allāh (P. Schwarz, Der Diwan des ʿUmar Ibn Abi Rebiʿa , Leipzig 1901-9, i, 189, poem …

, called al-ḥāʾik , S̲h̲īʿite heretic. A disciple of Abu ’l-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb [ q.v.], he was, like his master, denounced by the Imām Ḏj̲aʿfar al-Ṣādiḳ as a heretic and was even, according to Nawbak̲h̲tī, disowned by Abu ’l-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb himself. Kas̲h̲s̲h̲ī reports a tradition that when Ḏj̲aʿfar al-Ṣādiḳ was told that Bazīg̲h̲ had been killed, he expressed satisfaction. This would place Bazīg̲h̲’s death before that of D̲j̲aʿfar in 148/765. Like many of the early extremist S̲h̲īʿites, Bazīg̲h̲ was an artisan—a weaver of …

, the charismatic chief of the Fazāra [ q.v.] at the time of the Prophet Muḥammad. ʿUyayna (“one having prominent eyeballs”) was a nickname, his real name being Ḥud̲h̲ayfa. ʿUyayna b. Ḥiṣn b. Ḥud̲h̲ayfa b. Badr b. ʿAmr descended from famous warriors: his father led the Asad [ q.v.] and Ghaṭafān [ q.v.]; his grandfather, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather commanded the forces of their own tribe, the Fazāra, and those of other tribes belonging to the Ghaṭafān group. ʿUyayna was called wat̲h̲t̲h̲āb or “leaper, jumper” since before the advent of…

b. Ḥabīb, Abu ’l-Sāʾib , of the Ḳurays̲h̲ clan of D̲j̲umaḥ, one of the earliest Companions of Muḥammad, the thirteenth man to adopt Islam and brother-in-law of the second caliph ʿUmar b. al-K̲h̲aṭṭāb. He took part in the hid̲j̲ra to Abyssinia, returned, like some other refugees, on the false news of a reconciliation between Muḥammad and his pagan enemies, and became for some time the client of al-Walīd b. al-Mug̲h̲īra. Soon he renounced this privilege, because he preferred to bear his share in the insults offered to his co-religionists ¶ in Mecca. On a quarrel between ʿUt̲h̲mān and …

, a son of the second caliph and Companion of the Prophet, d. 37/657. ʿUbayd Allāh was the son of ʿUmar b. al-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb by his wife Umm Kult̲h̲ūm Mulayka bt. Ḏj̲arwal of the Ḵh̲uzāʿa, who, divorced by ʿUmar after he converted to Islam, married a kinsman and remained pagan in Mecca. ʿUbayd Allāh is known principally for having avenged his father’s death in Ḏh̲u ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a/23 November 644 at the hands of Abū Luʾluʾa, a Persian slave of al-Mug̲h̲īra b. S̲h̲uʿba [ q.v.]. According to most accounts, once captured, Abū Luʾluʾa killed himself, so ʿUbayd Allāh turned his wrath on…

b. al-mug̲h̲īra al-mak̲h̲zūmī Arab commander at the time of the early conquests. Muslim tradition gives his career as follows. He fought against Muḥammad at Uḥud, but was converted in 6/627 or 8/629 and participated in the expedition to Muʾta and the conquest of Mecca, both in 8 A.H. The Prophet charged him with the destruction of the idol of al-ʿUzzā at Nak̲h̲la and later sent him to the B. D̲j̲ad̲h̲īma, whom he wrongfully attacked. In 9/630 the Prophet sent him from Tabūk to Dūmat al-D̲j̲andal [ q.v.] where he captured the ruler al-Ukaydir and sent him to Medina. In 10/631 he w…

b. ḳatāda al-sadūsī , abu’l-k̲h̲aṭṭāb , a Successor, who was blind from birth and who became proverbial (see, e.g., Ibn Bassām, D̲h̲ak̲h̲īra . i/1, 2) for his prodigious memory and his knowledge about genealogies, lexicography, historical traditions, Ḳurʾānic exegesis and the readings, and ḥadīt̲h̲ . Of Bedouin origin, he spent his life in Baṣra, where he is said to have gone about without a guide. He was the pupil of al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī and Ibn Sīrīn, and also transmitted the Ṣaḥīfa of D̲j̲ābir b. ʿAbd Allāh (Goldziher, Muh . Stud ., ii, 10, Eng. tr. ii, 23). He…

b. ʿAmr b. Nufayl ... b. ʿAdī b. Kaʿb b. Luʾayy, a Companion of the Prophet from the tribe of Ḳurays̲h̲ [ q.v.] and one of Muḥammad’s earliest converts. His mother was Fāṭima bint Baʿd̲j̲a b. Umayya of the clan of K̲h̲uzāʿa. His kunya was Abu ’l-Aʿwar or Abū T̲h̲awr. He was one of ʿUmar b. al-K̲h̲aṭṭāb’s ¶ cousins and at the same time his brother-in-law through his wife, who was ʿUmar’s sister, as well as through ʿUmar’s wife who was his sister. He assumed Islam before Muḥammad entered the house of Zayd b. al-Arḳam and ʿUmar’s conversion is said to ha…

, tribal leader and poet of the Tamīm [ q.v.] who was a Companion of the Prophet Muḥammad. His real name was al-Ḥusayn, but he was nicknamed al-Zibriḳān “the moon” because of his beauty: he used to enter Mecca (at the time of pilgrimage) wearing a turban so as not to seduce the womenfolk; or he was given this nickname because in battle he wore a yellow turban ( yuzabriḳu ʿimāmatahu , i.e. in order to make himself visible to the enemy). He belonged to the Bahdala b. ʿAwf b. Kaʿb b. Saʿd b. Zayd Manāt b. Tamīm (see chart at Vol. X, 174); or more precisely, to the K̲h̲alaf b. Ba…

, Arab tribal chieftain and hero of the early Islamic conquest of ʿIrāḳ. Al-Mut̲h̲annā’s tribe, the Banū S̲h̲aybān, was part of the Bakr b. Wāʾil group and had its home on the eastern desert fringes of southern ʿIrāḳ in the late 6th and early 7th centuries A.D. Although the leading clans of S̲h̲aybān had been involved in battles against the Persians before the rise of Islam—most notably the famous battle of D̲h̲ū Ḳār ( ca. 611 A.D. [ q.v.])— the same clans seem initially to have opposed the Muslim advance into ʿIrāḳ; al-Mut̲h̲annā, on the other hand, was from the minor S̲…

, a subdivision of Ḳurays̲h̲ [ q.v.] whose pedigree is Taym b. Murra b. Kaʿb b. Luʾayy b. G̲h̲ālib b. Fihr. All of the important figures among the Taym before Islam and in its early days belonged to the genealogical line of ʿAmr b. Kaʿb b. Saʿd b. Taym. They included Abū Bakr [ q.v.], Ṭalḥa b. ʿUbayd Allāh [ q.v.] and Ṭalḥa’s paternal uncle, Maʿmar b. ʿUt̲h̲mān (cf. M. Lecker, Biographical notes on Abū ʿUbayda Maʿmar b. al-Muthannā , in SI, lxxxi [1995], 71-100, at 77-83, 96-7; Mālik b. Anas [ q.v.] was reportedly a mawlā of the Taym; on p. 263a of the entry about him…

b. ʿAbīda b. Rayṭa (Rāʾiṭa) al-Numayrī al-Baṣrī, Abū Zayd, expert in ak̲h̲bār on history as well as poets and poetry, very important source for some of the most prominent works of Arabic literature and himself author of ak̲h̲bār collections which mostly survive in the quotations of later authors (173-262/789-878). His father’s name was Zayd, “S̲h̲abba” being a nickname taken from a song that his father’s mother used to sing for him when he was a boy. ʿUmar was born at Baṣra as a mawlā of the Banū Numayr, as mentioned by Yāḳūt ( Irs̲h̲ād , vi, 481-2) and al-Ṣafadī ( Wāfī , …

, true name Maʿḳil b. Ḍirār, of the T̲h̲aʿlaba b. Saʿd of the Banū D̲h̲ubyān (G̲h̲aṭafān), a muk̲h̲aḍram poet and, according to some sources, a Companion after his conversion in 9/630 (Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr, Istīʿāb , i, 324; Ag̲h̲ānī , viii, 98; Iṣāba , iii, 210). This information is to be treated with caution: according to Ibn Sayyid al-Nās [ q.v.], the author of a work on the poets of the Prophet, it was his brother al-Muzarrid who met him and composed a poem in his honour ( Minaḥ al-midaḥ , Damascus 1407/1987, 310-11). Al-S̲h̲ammāk̲h̲ must have been too young at this time. Reliable information con…

b. Ḳabīṣa b. al-Muhallab b. Abī Ṣufra (d. 18 Ramaḍān 174/28 January 791) was the fourth governor from the Muhallabids [ q.v.] of Ifrīḳiya, where there preceded him successively a distant cousin, ʿUmar b. Ḥafṣ b. ʿUt̲h̲mān b. Ḳabīṣa (151-4/768-71), his brother Yazīd (19 D̲j̲umādā II 155-18 Ramaḍān 170/27 May 772-13 March 787) and his nephew Dāwūd b. Yazīd who, on his father’s death, took over in the interim until the arrival of his uncle Rawḥ on 1 Rad̲j̲ab 171/16 December 787. Rawḥ had first served in the army before rejoining, in 159/776, the group of governors. He is mention…

(d. during Muʿāwiya’s caliphate), a leading Companion of the Prophet and commander of the Arab armies during the conquest of ʿIrāḳ. His clan was the Banū Zuhra b. Kilāb of Ḳuraysh. His own kunya is given as Abū Is̲ḥāḳ but he is also known as (and sometimes listed in biographical dictionaries under) Saʿd b. Mālik since his father’s name was Mālik b. Wuhayb (or Uhayb) b. ʿAbd Manāf b. Zuhra. There does not seem to be any explanation why Malīk should have had the kunya Abū Waḳḳās. A tradition says that Saʿd asked the Prophet who he was and received the answer…