Al-Ḥasan ibn Qaḥṭabah now advanced toward Kūfah, where Muḥammad ibn Khālid ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Qasrī had already risen, urging allegiance to the Banū al-ʿAbbās and donning black. His uprising had begun on the night of ʿĀshūrāʾ, Muḥarram of this very year. He expelled the governor appointed by Ibn Hubayrah—Ziyād ibn Ṣāliḥ al-Ḥārithī—and moved into the Governor’s Palace. He then set out against Ḥawtharah, who was approaching with twenty thousand men on Ibn Hubayrah’s behalf. As Ḥawtharah drew near Kūfah, his soldiers slipped away to Muḥammad ibn Khālid and pledged themselves to the Banū al-ʿAbbās. Seeing this, Ḥawtharah withdrew to Wāsiṭ.
It is also said that al-Ḥasan ibn Qaḥṭabah himself entered Kūfah. Qaḥṭabah had stipulated in his will that the vizierate of the caliphate should pass to Abū Salamah, Ḥafṣ ibn Sulaymān—the freedman of the Sabīʿ clan and a Kufan resident—and Abū Salamah was indeed in Kūfah. When the newcomers met him, he advised that al-Ḥasan ibn Qaḥṭabah set out with a band of commanders to fight Ibn Hubayrah at Wāsiṭ, while al-Ḥasan’s brother should go to al-Madāʾin. He dispatched detachments in every direction to open the surrounding territories. They captured Basrah—Muslim ibn Qutaybah had previously taken it for Ibn Hubayrah—but after Ibn Hubayrah was killed, Abū Mālik ʿAbd Allāh ibn Asīd al-Khuzāʿī arrived and secured Basrah for Abū Muslim al-Khurasānī (1).
That same year, on the night of Friday, the thirteenth of Rabīʿ al-Ākhir, the oath of allegiance was given to Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Saffāḥ—ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbbās ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib. So say Abū Maʿshar and Hishām al-Kalbī. Al-Wāqidī, however, placed the event in Jumādā al-Ūlā of this year; Allah knows best.
[The slaying of Ibrāhīm ibn Muḥammad, the Imām]
We have already mentioned, under the events of 129 AH, that Marwān came upon a letter from Ibrāhīm the Imām to Abū Muslim al-Khurasānī instructing him to leave alive no one in the land of Khurāsān who spoke Arabic, but to exterminate them all (2). When Marwān read this, he enquired after Ibrāhīm and was told that he was in al-Balqāʾ. He therefore wrote to the governor of Damascus, ordering him to produce the man. The governor dispatched a courier with Ibrāhīm’s description and distinguishing features. The messenger found Ibrāhīm’s brother, Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Saffāḥ, mistook him for Ibrāhīm, and arrested him. He was told, “This is not the man; it is only his brother.” Guided to Ibrāhīm, he apprehended him, taking along a concubine dear to Ibrāhīm.
Ibrāhīm instructed his family that the caliphate should, after his death, pass to his brother Abū al-ʿAbbās, and ordered them to depart for Kūfah. They left that very day (3) for the city, a sizeable company that included his six uncles—ʿAbd Allāh, Dāwūd, ʿĪsā, Ṣāliḥ, Ismāʿīl, and ʿAbd al-Ṣamad, sons of ʿAlī—his two brothers, Abū al-ʿAbbās ʿAbd Allāh al-Saffāḥ and Yaḥyā, sons of Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī, his own two sons, Muḥammad and ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, and many others besides. When they reached Kūfah, Abū Salamah al-Khallāl lodged them there.