So weep, and pay no heed to the words of a reproacher;
spare no tears, nor grow weary of sobbing and lament.

Weep for your father and the brothers who fell in his wake—
men who were surely entitled to an ample share of honor.

Take comfort, too, in knowing that I quenched my thirst for vengeance:
I slew every noble warrior the Najjār could muster,

and from the clan of Hāshim I struck down a generous champion—Musʿab—
a man who never flinched when battle raged.

Had I not satisfied my soul by taking revenge on them,
a festering thorn, scarred and aching, would have remained within my heart.

They dragged themselves home again, their cloaked warriors destroyed,
battered, maimed, and weighed down with grief.

They were struck by one whose blood was no match for theirs,
no equal to them in lineage or in plan.

Hassān ibn Thābit replied:

“You have named the gallant chiefs of the house of Hāshim,
but in the lie you have uttered you have not hit the mark.

Do you marvel that you chose Hamzah among them—
a noble man whom you yourself call noble?

Did they not slay ʿAmr, ʿUtbah and his son,
Shaybah, al-Ḥajjāj, and Ibn Ḥabīb—

on the day the rebel challenged ʿAlī and was stunned
by a single stroke of a keen blade, dripping with blood?”

Ibn Isḥāq said: Then Allah sent His aid to the Muslims and fulfilled His promise to them. They hacked the enemy with their swords until they drove them from the camp, and the rout became unmistakable.

Yahyā ibn ʿAbbād ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Zubayr told me—on the authority of his father ʿAbbād, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Zubayr, from al-Zubayr—that he said:

“By Allah, I watched the maidservants of Hind bint ʿUtbah and the women with her, their skirts gathered up, fleeing in panic. Nothing but nightfall—or very little—stood between us and capturing them. Then, after we had driven the enemy from the camp, the archers wheeled around toward it and left our backs exposed to the cavalry, so we were attacked from behind.

A voice cried out, ‘Behold, Muḥammad has been killed!’ We turned back, and the enemy turned back upon us, even though we had already cut down the standard-bearers so thoroughly that none of them could come near the banner.

Some knowledgeable people told me that the banner lay on the ground until ʿAmrah bint ʿAlfamah al-Hārithiyyah took it up and raised it for Quraysh, who then rallied around it. The banner had been carried by Ṣuʾāb, an Abyssinian slave of the Banū Abī Ṭalḥah; he was the last of them to bear it. He fought with it until both his hands were severed. Then he crouched over it, clasped the banner with his chest and neck, and was slain upon it while repeating, ‘O Allah, have I fulfilled my duty?’—that is, ‘O Allah, have I done all that is required of me?’”