Ibn ʿAsākir relates in his History, in the biography of Rayāʾ, the nursemaid of Yazīd ibn Muʿāwiyah, that when Yazīd placed al-Ḥusayn’s head before him he broke into the verses of Ibn al-Zubʿarā, namely:
“If only my forefathers at Badr could witness
The panic of al-Khazraj beneath the thrust of the spears!”
He then displayed the head in Damascus for three days, after which it was deposited in the royal armory. When the reign of Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Malik arrived, it was brought to him—by then nothing remained but a white piece of bone. He shrouded it, perfumed it, performed the funeral prayer over it, and buried it in the Muslim cemetery. When the Masawwida—that is, the ʿAbbāsids—came to power, they exhumed it and carried it away.

Ibn ʿAsākir also states that this woman lived on after the fall of the Umayyads and surpassed one hundred years of age (1); Allah knows best.

The group known as the Fāṭimids, who ruled Egypt from before 400 AH until after 660 AH, claimed that al-Ḥusayn’s head had reached Egypt, that they buried it there, and that they built over it the famous Cairo shrine called “the Crown of al-Ḥusayn,” sometime after 500 AH. More than one leading scholar has affirmed that this story has no foundation; their sole purpose was to lend credibility to the false noble lineage they claimed for themselves. In this they were lying traitors. Qāḍī al-Bāqillānī and other eminent scholars of their own era—around 400 AH—made this plain, and, God willing, we shall detail the matter fully when we reach the appropriate section.

[I say: most people fall for tales of this sort. Someone produced a head, placed it in the site of that mosque, and declared, “This is the head of al-Ḥusayn.” The claim circulated and the public accepted it; Allah knows best] (2).

[Section: A selection of his virtues]
Al-Bukhārī transmits, through Shuʿbah and Mahdī ibn Maymūn, from Muḥammad ibn Abī Yaʿqūb, who said: I heard Ibn Abī Nuʿm (3) say, “I heard ʿAbd Allah ibn ʿUmar—when a man from Iraq asked him about a pilgrim in iḥrām killing flies—reply, ‘The people of Iraq ask about killing flies after they themselves killed the grandson of the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him! The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, said: “They two are my fragrant flowers from this world.”’” (4)