Al-Aḥnaf then marched from Marw al-Rūdh to Balkh; he laid the city under siege until its people agreed to a settlement of four hundred thousand. He appointed (1) his cousin Usayd ibn al-Mutashammis (2) to take charge of collecting the money. After that he set off, intent on further jihad, but winter overtook him. He asked his men, “What do you think?” They replied, “ʿAmr ibn Maʿdīkarib (3) has said:
[from the wāfir metre]
If you cannot accomplish a thing, then leave it
and move on to what you can achieve.

Al-Aḥnaf therefore ordered a march back to Balkh and remained there for the whole winter. He later returned to [Ibn] ʿĀmir. People said to Ibn ʿĀmir, “No one has opened as many lands as you have: Fārs, Kirmān, Sijistān, and most of Khurāsān.” He replied, “Very well; my gratitude to Allah for that shall be to enter a state of iḥrām for ʿumrah right here, with my cloak drawn up.” So he assumed iḥrām for ʿumrah from Naysābūr. When he reached ʿUthmān, the Caliph reproached him for entering iḥrām while still in Khurāsān.

In this same year Qārīn advanced with forty thousand men. ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ḥāzim confronted him with four thousand, placed six hundred men in the vanguard, and ordered each of them to carry a firebrand on the tip of his spear. They fell upon the enemy in the middle of the night and mounted a surprise attack. The foe sprang to arms and became pre-occupied with the vanguard, whereupon ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ḥāzim brought up the rest of the Muslims. They converged, and the polytheists turned and fled. The Muslims pursued them, striking down whom they wished however they wished, and seized abundant booty and great wealth. ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ḥāzim then dispatched news of the victory [to Ibn ʿĀmir, who was pleased with him and reinstated him over Khurāsān—he had previously removed him—so ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ḥāzim remained there] (4) thereafter.

Deaths of notable persons in this year

Al-ʿAbbās ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib (5) ibn Hāshim ibn ʿAbd Manāf al-Qurashī al-Hāshimī, Abū al-Faḍl of Mecca, the uncle of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and the progenitor of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs. He was two, or according to some sources three, years older than the Messenger of Allah ﷺ. He was taken captive on the day of Badr and ransomed himself with money, and he ransomed his two nephews as well—ʿAqīl ibn Abī Ṭālib and Nawfal ibn al-Ḥārith. We have already mentioned that when he was captured, bound in fetters, and night had fallen, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ could not sleep. When he was asked, “Messenger of Allah, what is troubling you?” he said, “I can hear al-ʿAbbās groaning in his bonds, so I