ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād b. ʿUbayd. He is also known as Ibn Ziyād b. Abī Sufyān. He is also referred to as Ziyād b. Abīhi or Ibn Sumayya. After his father Ziyād, he served as governor of Iraq.
Ibn Maʿīn said: He was called ʿUbaydullāh b. Marjāna. Marjāna was his mother's name. According to others, Marjāna was a Magian woman. His teknonym was Abū Ḥafṣ. After Yazīd b. Muʿāwiya, ʿUbaydullāh settled in Damascus. He had a house near Dīmas, which after him became known as the house of Ibn Aʿjlān. According to Ibn ʿAsākir, citing Aḥmad b. Yūnus al-Dabbī, ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād was born in the thirty-ninth year of the hijra. Also according to Ibn ʿAsākir, he narrated hadith from Muʿāwiya, Saʿd b. Abī Waqqāṣ, and Maʿqil b. Yasār. Al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī and Abū l-Malīḥ b. Usāma also narrated hadith from him. Abū Naʿīm al-Faḍl b. Dukayn said: It is reported that ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād was twenty-eight years old when he killed al-Ḥusayn.
I say: In that case, his birth must have been in the thirty-third year of the hijra. Allah knows best.
According to the narration of Ibn ʿAsākir, Muʿāwiya wrote to Ziyād: "Send your son ʿUbaydullāh to me." When ʿUbaydullāh came to him, Muʿāwiya asked him various questions, all of which he answered. Finally, when Muʿāwiya asked his opinion about poetry, he did not receive a satisfactory answer and asked: "What prevented you from learning poetry?" He replied:
– O Commander of the Believers! I did not wish to keep the speech of the Merciful and the speech of Satan together in my heart, so I did not learn poetry.
– Get out of here! By Allah, it was this poem of Ibn Aṭnaba that prevented me from fleeing the battlefield at Ṣiffīn:
"With my chastity and hardship, I have purchased praise at a dear price,
I have given my wealth to prevent deprivation and charged against the betrothed hero,
Whenever he surged and whenever I surged, I would say to myself: 'Stay your ground so that you may be praised or die and be delivered.'
And my preservation of those noble deeds, my defense of myself with sound strength—these all prevented me from fleeing the front."
After this, Muʿāwiya wrote to Ziyād, ʿUbaydullāh's father: "Have ʿUbaydullāh study poetry. Saturate him with poetry." His father then had him study poetry extensively, so much so that he would not forget any of the poems he learned. From this period, one of the poems recited by ʿUbaydullāh was:
"Even Marwān, the son of women, will know that when two horsemen meet, I will be the one to strike the fiercest blow,
When guests arrive and I have nothing to offer them but my horse,
I will slaughter my horse without hesitation and feed it to them."
One day, Muʿāwiya asked the people of Basra about Ibn Ziyād. They replied: "He is very refined, but he speaks enigmatically." Muʿāwiya responded: "Does not his enigmatic speech make him even more refined?"
Ibn Qutayba and others said: "When the Basrans said he practiced laḥn, they meant he spoke enigmatically. This made his argument even stronger." As a poet said:
"A brilliant logic, sometimes also laḥn; the best of words are those with laḥn."
According to another narration, the Basrans meant that he did not speak eloquently. Another narration says they meant he lied when he practiced laḥn, and this is more plausible. Allah knows best. Muʿāwiya appreciated ʿUbaydullāh's relaxed manner of speech. Muʿāwiya himself did not speak in a heavy, affected manner, nor did he exaggerate his pronunciation. Another narration says the Basrans meant his speech had a Persian accent, since ʿUbaydullāh's mother Marjāna was the daughter of Yazdegerd, one of the Persian kings, or another. He would pronounce Persian words in his speech.
One day, ʿUbaydullāh asked one of the Khārijites: "Are you a ḥarūrī?" but pronounced the "ḥāʾ" as "hāʾ". Another time, he recited the phrase "man qatalnāhu qatalnāhu" as "man qātalnāhu qatalnāhu", pronouncing the "qāf" as "kāf". Muʿāwiya said that this manner of speech increased his refinement, and that he took after his Persian maternal relatives, who were known for their good governance and character.
When Ziyād died in the fifty-third year of the hijra, Muʿāwiya appointed Samura b. Jundab as governor of Basra. After a year and a half, Muʿāwiya dismissed him and appointed ʿAbdullāh b. ʿAmr b. Gaylān b. Salama, who served for six months before being dismissed. In the fifty-fifth year of the hijra, ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād was appointed governor. When Yazīd became caliph, he gave ʿUbaydullāh control of Kufa in addition to Basra. During Yazīd's reign, ʿUbaydullāh built the Bayḍāʾ palace and the Ḥamrāʾ palace on the road to Marbad, spending winters in Ḥamrāʾ and summers in Bayḍāʾ. It is reported that a man once came to ʿUbaydullāh and said:
– May Allah rectify the emir, my wife has died. I wish to marry her mother.
– How much is your salary from the dīwān?
– I receive 700 dirhams.
– Slave! Deduct 400 dirhams from this man's salary. After giving this order, ʿUbaydullāh said to the man:
– Since your knowledge of fiqh is so little, 300 dirhams is enough for you. It is reported that Umm Fajīj and her husband came to ʿUbaydullāh for arbitration. Umm Fajīj wanted to divorce her husband. Her husband Fajīj said to ʿUbaydullāh:
– May Allah rectify the emir, the second half of a man's life is the best, but for a woman it is the worst.
– How so?
– Because when a man ages, his mind becomes sound, his judgment perfect, and his ignorance ends. When a woman ages, her character deteriorates, her mind diminishes, her womb becomes barren, and her tongue sharpens.
– You have spoken the truth. Take your wife by the hand and return home.
Yaḥyā b. Maʿīn said: ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād ordered that 2000 dirhams be given to Ṣafwān b. Muḥriz. After receiving the money, Ṣafwān lost it to theft and said: "Perhaps this is for the best." His wife protested: "How could this be better?" When Ibn Ziyād heard of this, he ordered another 2000 dirhams be given to Ṣafwān. After receiving this, Ṣafwān also recovered the first 2000 dirhams, so he had 4000 dirhams, and indeed, this was better.
After ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād, Hind bint Asmāʾ b. Ḥārija, who married several governors of Iraq, was asked:
– Which of your husbands was the most noble and superior?
– No man was as generous to his wife as Bashīr b. Marwān. No man appeared as awe-inspiring to women as Ḥajjāj b. Yūsuf. If only the Resurrection had come so that I could see ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād, look at him, listen to his speech, and find comfort in it."
Thus she explained her feelings and later married other men.
ʿUthmān b. Abī Shayba narrated from Ibrāhīm: "The first person to recite the Muʿawwidhatayn (the last two surahs) aloud in obligatory prayers was Ibn
Ziyād."
I say: Perhaps he was the first to recite these surahs aloud in Kufa, because Ibn Masʿūd did not include them in his muṣḥaf, and the jurists of Kufa took their transmissions from Ibn Masʿūd's followers. Allah knows best.
ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād was bold in committing acts not permitted by the sharia and would do such things recklessly, though he had no need to. According to the narrations of Abū Yaʿlā and Muslim, ʿĀʾiz b. ʿAmr went to ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād and said: "My son, I heard the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) say: The worst of rulers are the tyrannical ones. Beware lest you become one of them."
ʿUbaydullāh replied to ʿĀʾiz:
– Sit down. You are only the dregs and sediment of the Companions of the Messenger of God,
– Did they have dregs and sediment? Dregs and sediment are only found after the Companions and among others."
According to many narrators from al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī, when ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād visited Maʿqil b. Yasār during his illness, Maʿqil said: "I will relate to you a hadith I heard from the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him):
'If Allah appoints a man as a leader over a people and he dies while oppressing them, Allah will make Paradise forbidden for him.'
According to many narrators, when Maʿqil died, ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād led his funeral prayer but did not attend the burial, leaving without a valid excuse. Another example of his boldness was his insistence on bringing al-Ḥusayn before him—even at the risk of death—when he should have granted al-Ḥusayn's request. Al-Ḥusayn had asked to be sent to Yazīd, or to Mecca, or to one of the frontier towns. Shimr b. Dhī l-Jawshan advised him: "It would be wiser for you to bring al-Ḥusayn before you and then send him wherever you wish." He followed this advice, did not allow al-Ḥusayn to be sent to Yazīd, judged according to his own opinion, and thus perished, suffered loss, and was ruined. It was not fitting for the grandson of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) to be brought before the vile son of Ibn Marjāna.
Muḥammad b. Saʿd narrated from ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād's chamberlain:
"When ʿUbaydullāh killed al-Ḥusayn, I entered the government palace with him. His face was aflame. He covered his face with his sleeve and said: 'Do not tell anyone about this.'"
Shurayk, narrating from Mughīra, said that someone said to ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād, son of Marjāna: "O wicked one! Did you kill the grandson of the Messenger of God? You will never see Paradise."
As mentioned earlier, after Yazīd b. Muʿāwiya died, the people of Egypt pledged allegiance to ʿUbaydullāh until an imam was chosen. Then they rebelled against him and expelled him from Egypt. He went to Damascus and met with Marwān, pledging allegiance to him. Afterwards, he called people to pledge allegiance to himself and aspired to the caliphate. He opposed Ḍaḥḥāk b. Qays, marched against him, expelled him from Damascus, and drove him to Marj Rāhiṭ. He then called people to pledge allegiance to himself and deposed Ibn al-Zubayr. Thus, order collapsed and the Battle of Marj Rāhiṭ occurred. Ḍaḥḥāk b. Qays and his followers were killed there. When Marwān became caliph, he sent ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād at the head of a military force to Iraq. On the way, he encountered the army of the Tawwābīn and their commander Sulaymān b. Ṣurad, defeated them, and continued toward Kufa. However, on the way, he encountered enemies from the Jazīra who supported Ibn al-Zubayr and were prevented from reaching Kufa. Then Ibn Ashtar confronted him with an army of 7,000. Although ʿUbaydullāh's forces were much larger, Ibn Ashtar defeated him and killed him in a terrible manner on the banks of the Khāzir river, five stations from Mosul.
Abū Aḥmad al-Ḥākim said: This event occurred on the day of ʿĀshūrāʾ.
I say: Al-Ḥusayn was killed on the day of ʿĀshūrāʾ. Afterwards, Ibn Ashtar sent the severed heads of ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād, Ḥusayn b. Numayr, Shuraḥbīl b. Dhī l-Kilā, and some of their leading men to Mukhtār. Mukhtār rejoiced greatly at this.
Yaʿqūb b. Sufyān narrated from Yazīd b. Abī Ziyād:
"When the severed heads of Ibn Marjāna—that is, ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād—and his companions were brought and placed before Mukhtār, a thin snake came and slithered among the heads, entered the mouth of Ibn Marjāna, came out of his nose, then entered his nose and came out of his mouth. It did this only to Ibn Marjāna's head, not the others."
Al-Tirmidhī, in another variant from ʿAmmāra b. Umayr, narrated:
"When the severed heads of ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād and his companions were brought, they were set up in the courtyard of the mosque of Kufa. When I arrived, the people were saying: 'Here it comes, here it comes.' I saw a snake come and slither among the heads, then enter the nostrils of ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād. After a while, it came out and disappeared. Then again, when they said, 'Here it comes, here it comes,' the snake repeated this two or three times."
Abū Sulaymān b. Zayd said: In the sixty-sixth year of the hijra, ʿUbaydullāh b. Ziyād and Ḥusayn b. Numayr were killed by Ibrāhīm b. Ashtar. Ibrāhīm sent their severed heads to Mukhtār, who then sent them to ʿAbdullāh b. al-Zubayr. These heads were mounted on poles and displayed in Mecca and Medina. According to Abū Aḥmad's narration, these events occurred on the day of ʿĀshūrāʾ in the sixty-sixth year of the hijra. According to the well-known narration from Ibn Jarīr and others, this event took place in the sixty-seventh year of the hijra. However, it is impossible that the severed heads were sent to Ibn al-Zubayr in that year, because at that time, enmity between Mukhtār and Ibn al-Zubayr had intensified. Shortly thereafter, Ibn al-Zubayr went from Basra to Kufa and ordered his brother Musʿab to besiege and fight Mukhtār. Allah knows best.