ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab to Abū ʿUbaydah ibn al-Jarrah: Teach your boys to swim and your fighters to shoot. They used to go out to the targets until a stray arrow came and killed a lad who was sitting in the lap of one of his maternal uncles ⦗1⦘, a boy whose lineage was unknown. Abū ʿUbaydah wrote to ʿUmar asking, “To whom shall I pay the blood-money?” ʿUmar replied, “The Messenger of Allah ﷺ used to say: ‘Allah and His Messenger are the patron of whoever has no patron ⦗2⦘, and the maternal uncle inherits from whoever has no heir.’ ”

ʿAlī ibn al-Jaʿd ⦗3⦘ said: Shuʿbah narrated to us; he said: Qatādah informed me; he said: I heard Abū ʿUthmān al-Nahdī say, “While we were in Azerbaijan ⦗4⦘, a letter from ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab reached us. After the formal opening it read:

‘Gird yourselves with waist-wrappers, put on mantles, wear sandals, cast off leather socks, and discard trousers. Hold fast to the dress of your forefather Ishmael. Beware of luxury and the attire of non-Arabs. Expose yourselves to the sun, for it is the bathhouse of the Arabs. Live like the sons of Maʿadd, toughen yourselves, let your clothes become threadbare ⦗5⦘, shorten your garments to the knees, and vault onto…’”