Al-Bukhārī (1) also related the story of Ḥamzah’s death through the chain of transmission that runs: ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Salamah al-Mājishūn → ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Faḍl → Sulaymān ibn Yasār → Jaʿfar ibn ʿAmr ibn Umayyah al-Ḍumrī, who said:
“I went out accompanied by ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿAdiyy ibn al-Khiyār.”
He then recounted the incident as given above. He mentioned that ʿUbayd Allāh had wound his turban around his face so that Wahshī could see nothing of him save his eyes and his feet, yet Wahshī still recognised him, as has already been described. This is a remarkable example of physiognomic deduction—just as Mujazziz al-Mudlijī once identified the footprints of Zayd and his son Usāmah despite the difference in their complexions (2).
In the course of his narration he said:
“When the battle-lines had been drawn, Sibāʿ came forward and cried, ‘Is there anyone who will duel me?’ Ḥamzah ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib stepped out to meet him and said, ‘O Sibāʿ! Son of Umm Anmār, the clitoris-cutter! Do you dare defy Allah and His Messenger?’ Then he charged at him, and Sibāʿ was finished—gone as yesterday is gone.
“I had been lying in wait for Ḥamzah behind a rock. When he came close I hurled my spear at him; it lodged in his lower abdomen and emerged between his thighs. That was the last I saw of him.
“After the Messenger of Allah ﷺ passed away and Musaylimah the Liar emerged, I said, ‘I shall go after Musaylimah; perhaps I can kill him and thereby settle the score for Ḥamzah.’ So I went out with the Muslim army, and events unfolded as they did.
“There I saw a man standing in a breach in a wall, towering like a dapple-grey camel, his hair bristling. I hurled my spear at him, planting it between his breasts until it came out through his shoulders. Then a man from the Anṣār leapt upon him and struck the crown of his head with his sword.”
ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Faḍl said: Sulaymān ibn Yasār told me that he heard ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUmar say: “A slave-girl standing on a rooftop cried, ‘Alas for the commander (3)! The black slave has killed him!’”
Ibn Hishām (4) relates: “I have been informed that Wahshī was repeatedly punished for drinking wine until he was struck from the military register. ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb used to say, ‘I knew that Allah would not leave the killer of Ḥamzah unpunished.’”
I [the author] add: Wahshī ibn Ḥarb, Abū Dasmah—some say Abū Ḥarb—died in Ḥimṣ, and he was the first to wear garments dyed by boiling.
Ibn Isḥāq (5) says: “Muṣʿab ibn ʿUmayr fought in front of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ until he was slain. The one who killed him was Ibn Qamiʾah [al-Laythī], who thought he had killed the Messenger of Allah ﷺ himself; he returned to Quraysh saying, ‘I have killed Muhammad.’”
I [the author] say: Mūsā ibn ʿUqbah, in his Maghāzī (6), transmits from Saʿīd ibn al-Musayyib that the man who killed Muṣʿab was Ubayy ibn Khalaf. Allah knows best.