Battle of Maskin

The Battle of Maskin (Arabic: معركة مسكن‎), also known as Battle of Dayr al-Jathaliq (Arabic: معركة دير الجثاليق‎) from a nearby Nestorian monastery, was a decisive battle of the Second Islamic Civil War (680s-690s), fought near Baghdad on the western bank of the river Tigris between the army of the Umayyads under Caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan and the forces of Mus'ab ibn al-Zubayr, governor of Iraq for his brother, the Meccan anti-Caliph Abdallah ibn al-Zubayr.

Location

Baghdad's Dayr al-Jathaliq (Catholicos monastery), originally Dayr Kelilishu (Syriac: ܕܝܪܐ ܟܠܝܠܐ ܝܫܘܥ‎, means Wreath of Yeshua/Jesus monastery), which was renamed after Catholicos Timothy I where he was buried, was a Nestorian monastery built on the western bank of the river Tigris during the Sassanid Empire rule over Mesopotamia.[1]

Background

In 687, Mus'ab ibn al-Zubayr who were the ruler of Basrah managed to defeat Mukhtar al-Thaqafi, the ruler of Kufa, in that he controlled Iraq entirely.

Battle

In 691, Abd al-Malik came to a region called Maskin near Dujail where he had carefully cultivated contacts among the Arabs in Iraq, and most of Mus'ab's army deserted him. With a few followers such as Ibrahim ibn al-Ashtar, Mus'ab fought on and was killed. His tomb later became a site of pilgrimage.

Aftermath

The battle was the turning point of the long civil war, as Abd al-Malik took possession of Iraq. Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr was now isolated in his original stronghold of Mecca, which was retaken after a siege in 692.

References

  1. ↑ "دير الجاثليق أو دير كليليشوع". kaldaya.net. Retrieved 22 August 2017.
  • Kennedy, Hugh N. (2001). The Armies of the Caliphs: Military and Society in the Early Islamic State. London and New York: Routledge. p. 33. ISBN 0-415-25093-5.
  • Kennedy, Hugh N. (2004). The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates: The Islamic Near East from the 6th to the 11th Century (Second ed.). Harlow, UK: Pearson Education Ltd. pp. 97–98. ISBN 0-582-40525-4.
  • Streck, M. (1987). "Dair al-Djāthalĩq". In Houtsma, Martijn Theodoor. E.J. Brill's first encyclopaedia of Islam, 1913–1936, Volume II: Bābā Fighānī–Dwīn. Leiden: BRILL. pp. 897–898. ISBN 978-90-04-08265-6.
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