Abu Muslim 1

Prosopography of the Byzantine Empire
SexM
FloruitM VIII
Dates743 (taq) / 754 (ob.)
PmbZ No.72
Variant NamesAboumouslim;
'bw Mwslm;
Abu Salim;
'bu slym
ReligionMuslim
EthnicityArab
LocationsKufa (deathplace);
Syria;
Nisibis;
Persia;
Merv (Khorasan);
Kufa;
Carrhae;
Zab (River);
Amida (Mesopotamia) (workplace);
Amida (Mesopotamia) (residence);
Amida (Mesopotamia);
Khorosan;
Mecca
OccupationWeaver
Textual SourcesChronicon Anonymi ad annum 1234 pertinens, ed. and tr. J.-B. Chabot, I = CSCO 81-82 (Paris, 1916-20), II = CSCO 109 (Louvain, 1937) (chronicle);
Michael the Syrian, Chronicle, ed. and tr. J.-B. Chabot, La chronique de Michel le Syrien (Paris, 1899-1904) (chronicle);
Theophanes Confessor, Chronographia, ed. C. de Boor, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1883-85, repr. Hildesheim/NewYork, 1980); tr. and comm. C. Mango and R. Scott, The Chronicle of Theophanes Confessor, Oxford 1997 (chronicle)

A former slave of those opponents of Marwan II (Marwan 2) who had fled to Arabia, Abu Muslim 1 was sent by them to Khorasan to obtain help for a revolt against Marwan 2 and the Umayyad dynasty; he supported the faction in Khorasan which emerged victorious and with large forces from there he defeated Marwan 2 in a battle at the river Zab (see also Qahtaba 1): Theoph. AM 6240, AM 6241.

He was either a freedman of the parents of Abu Ja`far (al-Mansour 1) or one of the freed slaves of "Muslim" (?= Maslama 1); a weaver by trade, he worked in Amida until the death of the caliph Walid II (in 743) when he abandoned his trade and travelled to see Ibrahim 1 in captivity at Carrhae; on Ibrahim's behalf he then went to Khorasan, where he organised a rebellion against the caliph Marwan (Marwan 2): Chron. 1234, §176 (pp. 323-324). The rebels won two major victories over Marwan 2's generals and entered Kufa, where they found support among the relatives of Ibrahim and made Abu -'l-Abbas (as-Saffah 1) their ruler: Chron. 1234, §§176-177 (pp. 324-325). He was sent to Merv in Khorasan in 746 as the personal representative of the Imam Ibrahim 2; he raised the standard of revolt in 747 and defeated Marwan 2 in 750: see Encyclopaedia of Islam., I, 141. In 754, when as-Saffah 1 died, Abu Muslim 1 was in Persia; he supported al-Mansour 1 and defeated the resistance of Abdullah 5 in Syria in a battle at Nisibis; frustrated by al-Mansour 1 when he wanted to march against the rebellious Arabs of Syria and Palestine, he turned against al-Mansour 1, who lulled him into a false sense of security and then executed him: Theoph. AM 6246. In 754 Abu Muslim 1 and Abu Ja`far (al-Mansour 1) went to Mecca to pray; while there the caliph as-Saffah 1 died and Abu Ja`far (al-Mansour 1) succeeded him; a rebellion broke out led by Abdullah 5 in Syria, and Abu Muslim 1 was sent to crush it; he defeated Abdullah 5, but was then reported to be planning to rebel himself, and the new caliph (al-Mansour 1) deceived him into visiting him in Kufa and then had him executed: Chron. 1234, §184 (p. 339) (Abu Muslim ('bw Mwslm) is presumably identical with the Abu Salim ('bw Slym) mentioned in this passage), cf. Mich. Syr. II 518. See further Encyclopaedia of Islam, I, p. 141.

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