The ḥadith-scholar Ibn ʿAsākir (1) relates that when ʿUthmān ordered the people inside the house to leave and only his own family remained, the rebels scaled the wall, set the door ablaze, and forced their way in. No Companion—or son of a Companion—was among them except Muḥammad ibn Abī Bakr. Some of them reached ʿUthmān first and beat him until he lost consciousness. When the women screamed, the attackers panicked and went out; Muḥammad ibn Abī Bakr then entered, assuming the caliph had already been killed.
When he saw that ʿUthmān had revived he said, “On what religion (2) are you, O Naʿthul?”
He replied, “Upon the religion of Islam; I am not Naʿthul, but the Commander of the Faithful.”
Muḥammad retorted, “You have altered the Book of Allah.”
ʿUthmān answered, “The Book of Allah will judge between you and me.”
Muḥammad stepped forward, seized his beard, and declared, “On the Day of Resurrection it will not be accepted of us to say, ‘Our Lord, indeed we obeyed our masters and our elders, and they led us astray from the path’ ⦗Al-Aḥzāb 33:67⦘.”
He dragged him from the room to the doorway while ʿUthmān kept saying, “My nephew, your father would never have taken hold of my beard.”
A man of Kindah from the Egyptian contingent—nicknamed Ḥimār and known as Abū Rumān—came forward. Qatādah said his name was Rumān; others described him as blue-eyed and fair-haired; it was also said that his name was Sūdān ibn Rumān al-Murādī.
Ibn ʿUmar reported that the man who killed ʿUthmān was Aswad ibn Ḥumrān: he struck him with a spear while wielding a drawn sword, then returned and drove it into his chest until he felled him (3). He placed the sword’s point on ʿUthmān’s belly, leaned on it, and pressed until he killed him. Nāʾilah tried to shield him, and the blade severed her fingers—may Allah be pleased with her. It is also narrated that Muḥammad ibn Abī Bakr stabbed him with small spear-heads in his ear until they reached his throat, but the sounder view is that someone else did that. Muḥammad felt shame and withdrew when ʿUthmān said, “You have seized a beard that your father used to honor.” He was abashed (4), covered his face, went back, and tried to keep them off, but it was to no avail. The decree of Allah was a pre-ordained destiny, written in the Book long before.
Ibn ʿAsākir (5) also narrates—from Ibn ʿAwn—that Kinānah ibn Bishr struck ʿUthmān’s forehead and the front of his head with an iron bar, causing him to fall on his side. Sūdān ibn Ḥumrān al-Murādī then struck him as he lay and killed him. ʿAmr ibn al-Ḥamq leapt upon him, sat on his chest while life still remained in him, and stabbed him nine times, saying, “Three of them were for Allah, and six for what I harbored in my breast against him.”
Al-Ṭabarānī (6) said: Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Ṣidqah al-Baghdādī and Isḥāq ibn Dāwūd aṣ-Ṣawwāf at-Tustarī both narrated to us, saying: Muḥammad ibn Khālid ibn Khidāsh related to us, Salm (7) ibn Qutaybah related to us, Mubārak related to us from al-Ḥasan, who said: “The executioner of ʿUthmān told me…”