Ibn Isḥāq next recounts the story of ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Thāmir: how he embraced Christianity through Faymiyūn, and how Dhū Nuwās slew him and his companions, digging for them a trench—-Ibn Hishām notes that it was a long, rectangular pit like a moat—then kindling a fire in it and burning them alive. He went on killing others as well, until nearly twenty thousand had perished. We have already given the full account in the history of the Children of Israel and have set it out exhaustively in our commentary on Sūrat al-Burūj (“By the heaven with its towering constellations”). All praise belongs to God.

Section: How sovereignty passed from Ḥimyar to the black Abyssinians, just as the two soothsayers Shaq and Satīḥ had foretold.

Of all the people of Najrān only one man escaped: Daws Dhū Thaʿlabān. Mounted on his horse, he rode across the sandy wastes, outdistancing his pursuers, and continued on until he reached Caesar, ruler of the Byzantines. There he sought aid against Dhū Nuwās and his troops, informing him of the atrocities they had suffered, for he too was a Christian and shared their faith.

Caesar said to him, “Your land lies far from ours, but I will write to the king of Abyssinia; he follows this same religion and is nearer to you.” He wrote, instructing the Negus to help him and avenge his people. Daws brought the letter to the Negus, who dispatched with him seventy thousand Abyssinians, placing over them a commander named Aryāṭ, with Abrahah al-Ashram in his army. Aryāṭ crossed the sea and landed on the coast of Yemen with Daws at his side, while Dhū Nuwās advanced against them with the Ḥimyarites and whatever tribes of Yemen obeyed him. When the two forces met, Dhū Nuwās and his men were routed. Seeing the disaster that had overtaken him and his people, Dhū Nuwās turned his horse toward the sea, struck its flanks, and rode into the shallows until he reached the deeper water and plunged in. That was the last anyone saw of him. Aryāṭ then entered Yemen and took possession of the kingdom.