al-Sadūsi; the people gave him their pledge on the first of Jumādā al-Ākhirah in the year 64 AH. Al-Farazdaq (1) composed on that occasion:
“I swore allegiance to men and kept the covenant we had made—
and to Babba, too, I pledged my oath without regret.”

He remained in office for four months, after which he retired to his home. The people of Basra then wrote to Ibn al-Zubayr, and Ibn al-Zubayr in turn wrote to Anas ibn Mālik, instructing him to lead them in prayer for two months; what followed will be related in its proper place. About the same time Najda ibn ʿĀmir al-Ḥanafī rose in al-Yamāmah, the Banū Māḥūr rebelled in Ahwāz and Fārs, and other disturbances broke out whose details will be given later.

The Rule of ʿAbd Allah ibn al-Zubayr (2)
(Ibn Ḥazm and a number of scholars regard him as the Commander of the Believers at that time.)

We have already mentioned that when Yazīd died the army besieging Ibn al-Zubayr in Mecca withdrew, leaving him sheltered in the Sacred House. When Ḥuṣayn ibn Numayr al-Sakūnī marched the troops back to Syria, Ibn al-Zubayr’s authority became firmly established in the Ḥijāz and the surrounding regions. The people there offered him a general pledge of allegiance after Yazīd’s death. He appointed his brother ʿUbayd Allah ibn al-Zubayr over Medina and ordered him to expel the Banū Umayyah, which he did; the Umayyads—among them Marwān ibn al-Ḥakam and his son ʿAbd al-Malik—departed for Syria.

After a series of battles and turbulent events in Basra—too lengthy to recount here, although in less than six months they installed some four governors from among themselves only to see their affairs collapse again—the Basrans sent to Ibn al-Zubayr, who was then in Mecca, asking him to take charge of them. He wrote to Anas ibn Mālik, instructing him to lead them in prayer.

[It is said that the first person to pledge allegiance to Ibn al-Zubayr was Muṣʿab ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, whereupon the people remarked, “This business will be a hard one.” He was also joined by ʿAbd Allah ibn Jaʿfar and ʿAbd Allah ibn ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib. Ibn al-Zubayr sent to Ibn ʿUmar, Ibn al-Ḥanafiyyah, and Ibn ʿAbbās inviting them to pledge, but they refused. The public bayʿa was finally given in the month of Rajab, after the people had spent three months without an imam.] (3)

Ibn al-Zubayr dispatched to Kufa ʿAbd Allah (4) ibn Yazīd al-Anṣārī to lead the prayers, and Ibrāhīm ibn Muḥammad ibn