Battle of Dhi Qar
| Battle of Dhi Qar | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| Sasanian Persia |
| ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
|
Iyas ibn Qabisah al-Ta'i Hamrez al-Tasatturi † Al-Nu'man bin Zara'a † Khalid bin Yazid al-Buhrani † Khanabarin † Hamarz † Hormuzan |
Hani' bin Qubaisah Hantala bin Tha'laba al-Ajli Abd Amr bin Bashar al-Dhubai'y Jabala bin Ba'ith al-Yashkury Al-Harith bin Wa'la al-Thahli Al-Harith bin Rabi'a al-Taimi | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| 2,000 Persian soldiers, with 3,000 Arabs[3] | 2,000–5,000 | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| Almost all the army lost | Minimal | ||||||
The Battle of Dhi Qar (Arabic: يوم ذي قار), also known as the War of the Camel's Udder,[4] was a pre-Islamic battle fought between Arab tribes and the Sasanian Empire in Southern Iraq. The battle occurred after the death of Al-Nu'man III by the orders of Khosru II.[5]
The dating of the event is disputed. The Encyclopædia Iranica entry on the subject says:
"According to certain Muslim traditions, the battle took place in the year 1/623 or 2/624... Ebn Ḥabīb... dated it earlier, between 606 and 622, but modern scholars have narrowed this range to 604–11."[3]
The battle of Dhū-Qār is reported in many classical works of Arabic history and literature. The longest, but not necessarily most representative, version is Bishr ibn Marwān al-Asadī's Ḥarb Banī Shaybān maʻa Kisrá Ānūshirwān (Arabic: حرب بني شيبان مع كسرى آنوشروان).[6]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ Ahmad, Nawawi (1976). Arab Unity and Disunity (PDF) (Thesis). University of Glasgow. p. 2. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 2, 2020. Retrieved 10 May 2021.
Despite the small number of troops involved, the decisive victory of the Arabs is seen as the beginning of a new era, since it gave the Arab tribes a new confidence and enthusiasm.
- ^ Landau-Tasseron 1995, pp. 574–575: In the Arab sources the Persian force is numbered at 2,000 soldiers, with 3,000 Arabs led by Īās b. Qabīṣa. The enemy was from the Bakr b. Wāʾel, a large tribal confederation whose territory extended from southwestern Iraq into the eastern Arabian peninsula (Donner, pp. 16-18, 28; Ṭabarī, I, pp. 1030-31; Ḥellī, pp. 410-11). The most prominent constituent tribe was Šaybān, the other groups being Banū Ejl, Banū Ḏohl, Banū Qays b. Thaʿlaba, Banū Taym-Allāh b. Thaʿlaba, and Banū Yaškor. These groups do not seem to have coordinated their efforts on the battlefield, nor did they have a single commander-in-chief. Rather, leadership seeems to have shifted among various warriors. Nevertheless, the Bakrīs defeated the combined Persian and Arab forces.
- ^ a b Landau-Tasseron 1995, pp. 574–575.
- ^ Mackintosh-Smith, Tim (2019). "On the Edge of Greatness: The Days of the Arabs". Arabs: A 3,000-year History of Peoples, Tribes and Empires. Yale University Press. p. 110. ISBN 978-0-300-18028-2.
- ^ Bosworth 1983, p. 3.
- ^ Ḥarb Banī Shaybān maʻa Kisrá Ānūshirwān, ed. by Muḥammad Jāsim Ḥammādī Mashhadānī (Baghdad: s.n., 1988; first publ. Bombay 1887); Hamad Alajmi, 'Pre-Islamic Poetry and Speech Act Theory: Al-A`sha, Bishr ibn Abi Khazim, and al-Ḥujayjah' (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Indiana University, 2012), p. 163.
Sources
[edit]- Bosworth, C. E. (1983). "Iran and the Arabs Before Islam". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). The Cambridge History of Iran: The Seleucid, Parthian, and Sasanian periods (1). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 593–612. ISBN 978-0-521-200929.
- Morony, Michael G. (2005) [1984]. Iraq After The Muslim Conquest. Gorgias Press LLC. ISBN 978-1-59333-315-7.
- Landau-Tasseron, Ella (1995). "Ḏū Qār". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). Encyclopædia Iranica. Vol. VII/6: Drugs–Ebn al-Aṯir. London and New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul. pp. 574–575. ISBN 978-1-56859-024-0.