“Strike as warriors strike; then, when you reach your mother, tell her that you have killed Durayd ibn al-Ṣimmah, for—by Allah—there were many a day on which I protected your womenfolk.”

The clan of Banū Sulaym relate that Rabīʿah said, “When I struck him he collapsed and his coverings slipped away; the flesh of his calves and the insides of his thighs was like parchment, from riding horses bare-back. When I returned to my mother and told her that I had killed him, she said, ‘By Allah, he once ransomed three women who are mothers to you!’ ”

Ibn Isḥāq then cited the elegy in which ʿAmrah bint Durayd mourned her father. Among her verses are:

“They said, ‘We have slain Durayd.’ I replied, ‘They speak the truth,’
yet tears keep streaming down my robe in ceaseless flow.
Had it not been for Him who subdues every people,
Sulaym and Kaʿb would have learned how they must obey.
Then, at dawn and in broad daylight, a weighty host
would have fallen on them wherever they had made their camp.”

Ibn Isḥāq continues: The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, sent Abū ʿĀmir al-Ashʿarī in pursuit of those who had fled toward Autās. He overtook a party of the routed enemy; they engaged him, and Abū ʿĀmir was struck and killed. His cousin Abū Mūsā al-Ashʿarī seized the standard, fought on, and Allah granted him victory, routing the enemy. They say that Salamah ibn Durayd was the one who shot Abū ʿĀmir with an arrow that pierced his knee and killed him, and he recited:

“If you would ask who I am—indeed I am Salamah,
son of Samādīr, for all who would know my name.
With the sword I hew the heads of the Muslims.”

Ibn Hishām said: A man whose knowledge of poetry and its reports I trust told me that Abū ʿĀmir al-Ashʿarī met ten brothers from among the idolaters on the Day of Autās. One of them charged him, and Abū ʿĀmir counter-charged while inviting him to Islam and saying, “O Allah, bear witness against him,” then killed him. Another advanced; Abū ʿĀmir confronted him likewise, saying, “O Allah, bear witness against him,” and killed him. They kept coming at him, and he kept repeating the same words, until he had slain nine of them. The tenth attacked; Abū ʿĀmir met him, still calling him to Islam and saying, “O Allah, bear witness against him.” The man replied, “O Allah, do not bear witness against me!” Abū ʿĀmir therefore spared him; he escaped, later embraced Islam, and his Islam was sound. Whenever the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, saw him he would say, “This is the man who fled from Abū ʿĀmir.”

He (Ibn Hishām) added: Two brothers—al-ʿAlāʾ and ʿAwfā, the sons of al-Ḥārith of Banī Jusham ibn Muʿāwiyah—shot Abū ʿĀmir; one arrow struck his heart and the other his knee, and they killed him. Command then passed to Abū Mūsā, who charged the two brothers and slew them. A man of Banī Jusham lamented them in verse:

“Great is the blow—the death of al-ʿAlāʾ
and Awfā together, with none to lend them aid;
They were the slayers of Abū ʿĀmir,
a man of formidable, awe-inspiring might.”