among the Umayyad caliphs; he mentioned them one by one, but left out Marwān ibn Muḥammad.

I asked, “And who comes after that?”

He replied, “The son of the Ḥārithiyyah woman—your own son.”

At that time my son by the Ḥārithiyyah woman was still in the womb.

Later the people of Madinah came as a delegation to al-Saffāḥ. They all hurried to kiss his hand except ʿImrān ibn Ibrāhīm ibn ʿAbd Allah ibn Muṭīʿ al-ʿAdawī. He did not kiss the hand; he merely offered the greeting of allegiance and said, “By Allah, Commander of the Faithful, if kissing it would increase your stature and gain me greater access to you, none of these men would have outstripped me to it. But I have no need of an act for which there is no reward, and which may even lead us to sin.” Then he sat down.

By Allah, this did not diminish his standing with the caliph in the least; rather, al-Saffāḥ loved him and honoured him even more than his companions.

The judge al-Muʿāfā ibn Zakariyyā further related that al-Saffāḥ once sent a man who, in the middle of the night, proclaimed the following two verses in Marwān’s camp and then returned:

O House of Marwān, Allah will bring your ruin,
Replacing your safety with fear and dispersal.
May Allah grant no long life to anyone among you,
But scatter you abroad through lands of dread. (1)

Al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī narrated (2) that al-Saffāḥ—one of the handsomest of men—looked at himself in a mirror one day and said, “O Allah, I will not repeat what Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Malik said—‘I am the youthful caliph.’ Rather I say: ‘O Allah, grant me long life in obedience to You, enjoying good health.’” He had scarcely finished speaking when he heard a servant say to another, “The term fixed between you and me is two months and five days.” Al-Saffāḥ took this as an evil omen and exclaimed, “Allah is sufficient for me; there is no power and no might except through Allah. In Him I place my trust and from Him I seek help.” He died exactly two months and five days later.

Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allah ibn Mālik al-Khuzaʿī reports that Hārūn al-Rashīd told his son to listen to what Isḥāq ibn ʿĪsā ibn ʿAlī transmitted from his father about al-Saffāḥ. Isḥāq related that his father ʿĪsā entered upon al-Saffāḥ early on the morning of the Day of ʿArafah and found him fasting. The caliph asked him to keep him company with conversation throughout the day and to end by breaking the fast together. “I spoke with him,” he said, “until drowsiness overcame him, so I rose and said, ‘I shall rest at my house and then return.’ I slept briefly, then came back to his residence, where I found a herald at the door bringing the glad tidings of the conquest of Sind, its people’s oath of allegiance to the caliph, and their handing over of affairs to his deputies. I praised Allah for guiding me to enter with such news and went inside—only to meet another herald bearing news of the conquest of Ifrīqiyyah. Again I praised Allah, then entered to congratulate him while he was combing his beard after completing wuḍūʾ. The comb fell from his hand and he said, ‘Glory be to Allah! Everything perishes except Him. By Allah, news of my own death has reached me.’ He then told me: ‘Ibrāhīm al-Imām related to me from Abū Hāshim, from ʿAbd Allah ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, from ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, from the Messenger of Allah—peace and blessings be upon him—who said: “A man will come to me in my city…”’