SIEGE OF MECCA

[1Sidenote: [692-698 A.D.]]

2Hajjaj ben Yusuf, appointed to command the expedition to Mecca, was joined by five thousand troops under Tarik ben Amru. The former general is celebrated in Moslem history as the ablest and most eloquent man of his day. Free pardon and protection were proclaimed to all who would join the standard of these generals. Abdallah sent troops to check their progress, but his precaution was unavailing. Hajjaj arrived at the city gates. Before commencing the assault, arrows, whereto proclamations and letters for the inhabitants were attached, were discharged over the walls, warning the inhabitants to desert Abdallah, who was so obstinate as to resist to the last, though their sacred city should crumble into ruins. The city was assailed with battering-rams, whilst flaming balls of pitch and naphtha were thrown over the walls and set fire to the houses.

3Abdallah, though old and infirm, held out bravely against the besiegers. It is said that his mother displayed wonderful energy and courage during the siege, she being a granddaughter of Abu Bekr; ten thousand are said to have deserted to the camp of Hajjaj, and many supporters of Abdallah were slain. In this forlorn plight he was offered his own conditions of surrender; but, consulting his mother as usual, she reminded him that his father Zobair had died for the same cause, and advised him not to bend to the yoke of the line of Omayyah; saying that it were better to die honourably than live dishonoured for the few years that yet remained for him.

4Finally, after prodigies of valour, the poor old man was struck down by a brick, which hastened his death; and he sank exhausted, fighting to the last, dying, after a disastrous nine years’ reign, in the seventy-second year of his age and the seventieth year of the Hegira; so that in those climates, where girls are frequently mothers at fourteen and fifteen, the aged mother of Abdallah, who aided in the fight to the last, must have passed her eighty-sixth year. She died in a few hours after hearing of her son’s gallant conduct and death. Thus ended the rival caliphate.

5The oath of fealty was administered to all the Arabs of those districts. Hajjaj remained governor of Mecca and Medina, as notorious for his cruelty as he was renowned for his valour.

6In the year seventy-three of the Hegira peace was again restored throughout the Moslem dominions, which were now united, under the caliphdom of Abdul-Malik; and this caliph, being freed from the bonds of civil discord, now turned his thoughts to foreign conquest, hoping to revive in his name the early triumphs of Islam. First, he threw off the tribute to the Greek emperor, which, originating in the reign of Moawiyah I at 3000 dinars of gold annually, had now augmented to the yearly sum of 365,000. The Christian emperor Leontius had made himself unpopular; and the caliph, availing himself of the troubled state of his affairs, sent Ibn Walid on a depredatory expedition.

7Ibn Walid returned with much booty; and Lazuca and Baruncium were taken by the Moslems, through the treachery of Sergius, one of the Greek emperor’s generals. During the civil wars in the Moslem empire the Christians had retaken most of their African possessions, slaying Zohair, the commander of Barca; so that it was only in the interior that the Moslems yet held any strong positions. The caliph determined to recover all these. In the seventy-fourth year of the Hegira, Hassan ben Nohman was sent, with forty thousand picked men, to subjugate the northern coasts of Africa; and proceeded to Carthage, of which he after a time made himself master. Most of the inhabitants fell by the sword, but some escaped by sea to Sicily and Spain.

8The walls were demolished, the city given up to plunder, and several beautiful females were taken captives. But while rejoicing over their late victories, a fleet suddenly appeared in the offing, bringing troops from Constantinople and Sicily, reinforced by Goths from Spain; the expedition being under the command of the prefect John, an experienced and valiant soldier.

9The Arab commander, finding himself unable to contend against overwhelming numbers, retired to Kairwan, where the Islams fortified themselves, patiently awaiting the reinforcements, which in due time arrived. With their combined forces the Moslems routed John and his adherents, besieged Carthage, and razed that noble city to the ground, giving the place up to flames. The imperial troops were rapidly expelled from the coast of Africa. But the Moslems had a formidable enemy to contend with in Kahina the sorceress, the mother of that Ibn Kahina who had so harassed the troops of the noble and gallant Achbar. Under this pseudo-prophetess and queen the Moors and Berbers made a valiant stand, and after several engagements Hassan was compelled to fall back upon the frontiers of Egypt.

10On this, Kahina is said to have addressed her troops, suggesting that they should lay waste the cities and countries intervening between her own possessions and the land of Egypt, saying that the wealth and the fruitfulness of these parts were the inducements which led these Islams continually to disturb their quiet and predicting that they would be sure, so long as these existed, to return again in greater numbers.

11[Sidenote: [698-699 A.D.]]

12Her suggestion was immediately acted upon. Cities and towns were razed to the ground; fruit trees cut down; fields desolated with fire; and the whole aspect of the country, from Tangiers to Tripoli, converted, from being one extensive garden, into a hideous waste, with not a tree standing to shelter a wayfarer from the sun. But the inhabitants of the plains, who were great sufferers by this extreme measure, hailed the return of the Moslems. Kahina was again in the field. This time her ranks were thinned by desertion, and she was taken prisoner and beheaded. Hassan returned, laden with booty, to Damascus, where he was received with honour, and made governor of Barca, still retaining the military command of the provinces in Africa.

13Hassan, however, fell a victim to his honours; for the caliph’s brother, then viceroy of Egypt, offended that his own lieutenant should be superseded in Barca, waylaid Hassan and deprived him of his appointment, keeping him so closely guarded that he died of a broken heart. Abdul-Aziz ben Merwan, the caliph’s brother, named Musa ben Nosair to the command in northern Africa. Musa was sixty years old, but still hale and vigorous. He was accompanied by his three sons.

14Musa joined the army in Africa, and told the soldiers that he was one of themselves; if they found him act well, to thank God and endeavour to imitate him; if wrong, to reprove, and show him his error; and if any among them had to complain, let them speak out like men. “Finally,” said he, “I have instructions from the caliph to pay you three times the amount of arrears due”: and if anything made the cheers of the soldiers more hearty, it was this winding up to his speech. A sparrow is said to have fluttered into his bosom whilst he was speaking, which Musa interpreted into a favourable omen, crying “Victory, by the master of the Kaaba; the victory is ours;” at the same time scattering the feathers of the poor bird into the air.

15Musa was liberal, and quite divested of pride--points that endeared him to the Moslem soldiers. On first arriving he had to contend with a Berber chief, Warkastaf, who headed a mountain horde that committed depredations between Zaghwar and Kairwan; him he eventually killed, and his sons, Abdul-Aziz and Merwan, scattered the mountaineers and made them retreat beyond the borders of the southern desert. Musa sent his patron a large share of the spoils which had been taken in Africa; and these chanced to arrive in Egypt at the very moment that Abdul-Aziz, the viceroy, was at his wits’ end how to appease the wrath of his brother the caliph. The caliph, who was an avaricious man, immediately decided in Musa’s favour; and confirmed his brother’s appointment; making Musa emir of Africa. It was in the seventy-fifth year of the Hegira that Musa was confirmed in his post; and in the eightieth he fought the severest contest of his African campaign, defeating strong hordes of the barbarians in their own fastnesses amongst the defiles of Mount Atlas.

16[Sidenote: [699-705 A.D.]]

17At last the two armies came to a pitched battle, when a Berber chief challenged any Moslem champion to single combat. There being some delay in answering this challenge, Merwan, the son of Musa, was deputed to undertake the conflict; when, though very inferior in size and strength, he slew both horse and rider, thrusting his javelin through them both. Kasleyah the king of the Berbers was slain, and the victory completed; and Merwan espoused the daughter of the deceased king, having by her two sons.

18But Musa, not satisfied with triumphs by land, longed to launch out upon the seas. The caliph had ordered his predecessors to erect an arsenal at Tunis; and Musa undertook to carry out this project, building dockyards and a fleet to carry out his proposed enterprise. Many people opposed this scheme, even as their descendants the modern Arabs set their face against any improvements, as innovations which were not practised by their ancestors before them. One old Berber advised him to persevere; and he followed the advice to such purpose that, by the end of the year eighty-one of the Hegira, 701 A.D., the arsenal and dockyard were completed, and a strong fleet rode at anchor in the port of Tunis. About this time, a fleet sent by Abdul-Aziz took the island of Lampedusa, capturing immense booty; with which his ships were returning heavily laden, when a mighty tempest arose; the fleet was driven upon the rocky coast of Africa, and nearly all hands perished.

19[Sidenote: [705-715 A.D.]]

20Early in the eighty-second year of the Hegira, Musa embarked with a thousand volunteers, chosen from the bravest amongst his followers, upon his first naval expedition; but when the fleet was ready to set sail, much to the disappointment of those whom he had enlisted, he disembarked and handed over the command to his third and yet untried son, Abdallah. He returned laden with spoil; so much so that each of his followers laid claim to one thousand dinars of gold as his share in the booty. This expedition was the terrible Algerine scourge in embryo, which in after years carried death and devastation wherever the black flag waved triumphant.

21These vessels returned to port about the same time when tidings reached Musa of the death of the caliph Abdul-Malik, which occurred in the eighty-sixth year of the Hegira, 705 A.D., in the sixtieth year of his age and twentieth of his reign. His son Walid was immediately proclaimed twelfth caliph or successor of the prophet at Damascus; and Musa, immediately transmitting the caliph’s due of the immense booty brought home by the late marine expedition from Tunis, at once obtained his own confirmation in his post as governor or emir of northern Africa, while the interests of his sons were proportionately advanced.

22Walid was an idle and voluptuous man; he intrusted the government of his vast dominions entirely to the emirs appointed by his father, while he himself, hating to be troubled with the affairs of state, lived almost secluded from the world within the precincts of his extensive harem, where he had no less than sixty-three wives and yet died without leaving any issue. His reign is only distinguishable for the vast improvements he introduced in the architectural style of the East. His enervated life secluded him from the well-won and well-worn laurels which had secured for his ancestors a home and a name. One of his fourteen brothers, Maslama, invaded Asia Minor, marching on Cappadocia, and besieging the city of Tyana strongly garrisoned by Christians. Finally, Tyana was won; and while Maslama extended his conquests, his son was spreading the faith of Islam in the East.

23In the early part of Walid’s caliphate the fleets of Musa continued to be the scourge of the western parts of the Mediterranean. Some vessels proceeded to Sicily, some to Sardinia; Syracuse was plundered; and hundreds of beautiful women were borne away by these corsairs and sold to adorn the harems of the wealthier Moslems. Abdallah also made a successful descent upon Majorca, whilst Musa and his eldest sons triumphed over Fez, Daguella, Morocco, and Sus; the valiant tribes of the Zeuetes capitulated, till finally the caliph Walid was acknowledged throughout Almagreb to Cape Nov on the Atlantic; and there remained only Tingitania, the northern extremity of Almagreb, to be subdued.

24While the two vast continents of Europe and Africa were divided by the Straits of Hercules, Ceuta and Tangiers were the rocky defences of this narrow passage on the African side; there remained but the opposite stronghold of Gibraltar to secure the key to the Mediterranean; and beyond this, in the haze of distance, Musa shaded his eyes to gaze upon the purple mountains of the fair Andalusia; perhaps the night breeze wafted across that narrow channel the strange fragrance of a thousand orange groves, intermixed with the wild herbs and flowers of the mountains of Spain, and woke the weary Arab from his dream of the dreary reality of his hot African clime to the desired conquest of that unknown country. Brightly were such dreams realised in the siege and subsequent capture of Ceuta, and in the ultimate conquest of Spain.[b]

25Leaving the story of the Arabian invasion of Europe to a later chapter, we may continue with the destinies of the Omayyad dynasty.[a]