The First Dynasty of Islam: The Umayyad Caliphate ad 661-750

Hisham and Khalid al-Qasri
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Hisham, the last of ‘Abd al-Malik’s sons to rule, had been
designated by his predecessor, his brother Yazid II, who had also
proclaimed that his own son, al-Walid, was to rule after Hisham. As
one of the three longest reigning Umayyad caliphs, Hisham is the
subject of numerous stories designed to illustrate his character, and
overwhelmingly attention centres upon his desire for money. His
rule is associated with tight-fisted and grasping financial policies.
He is renowned for his acquisition and exploitation of huge personal
estates, from which he derived great wealth, in this respect outdoing
his governor of Iraq, Khalid al-Qasri. In the sphere of government
he has a reputation for demanding massive sums to be remitted to
Syria by the provincial governors, thus causing pressure to be put on
the subjects and intensifying the problem of taxation and
islamisation. His efficiency, however, became famous and it is
reported that the ‘Abbasid caliph al-Mansur, naturally no admirer of
the Umayyads in general, singled out Hisham for praise on the basis
of the tight control he exercised over the state finances.
In Iraq, the governor from 724, shortly after Hisham’s
succession, until 738 was Khalid b. ‘Abd Allah al-Qasri. Sometimes
his authority extended over the eastern provinces as a whole but on
occasion Khurasan seems to have been removed from his
jurisdiction and its governor appointed directly by the caliph.
Khalid’s family had been prominent in Syria almost from the start of
the Umayyad period, and he had served as governor of Mecca, in the
caliphate of al-Walid. Like Hisham, Khalid is well known for the
wealth he derived from the landed estates in Iraq which he acquired.
Hostility to him in tradition sometimes takes the form of accusations
that he was an enemy of Islam and too favourable to Christians, Jews
or even Zoroastrians. He is said to have remarked on one occasion
that Christianity is superior to Islam and to have had a church built
for his Christian mother behind the mosque in Kufa. He himself is

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Factionalism and Islamisation
sometimes called a Zindiq, a rather vague label which could indicate
Manichaean or even atheistic leanings but which was often used
polemically. His devotion to the dynasty was so great that Khalid is
said to have declared his willingness to tear down the Ka‘ba and
remove it to Jerusalem if so ordered by the caliph. When he was
governor of Mecca, it is said that he installed a supply of fresh water
for the pilgrims and expressed his scorn for the sacred well of
Zamzam and its bitter water, proclaiming the superiority of his
water, provided at the instigation of God’s deputy (the caliph).
Khalid’s tribe was the Bajila, which does not seem to have been
closely tied to either Yemen or Mudar and was not very strong in
Iraq. His appointment as governor, therefore, may have been
intended to diminish the factional rivalry there, which had recently
been stirred up by the revolt of Yazid b. al-Muhallab and the
succeeding Mudari regime of ‘Umar b. Hubayra. If that was the
intention, however, it seems not to have worked, for Khalid, as the
supplanter of Ibn Hubayra, was perceived by Mudar as their enemy
and identified as a pro-Yemeni. Yemen itself was less than
wholehearted in accepting Khalid as its champion, but his fall in 738
and replacement by a Qaysi removed any hesitation which still
existed, and in tradition Khalid is closely identified with the Yemeni
interest.
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His period of governorship in Iraq seems to have been generally
quiet, although in the year before his dismissal from office there was
a small Kharijite outbreak in the north and a movement of Shi‘ite
extremists known as the 
wusafa’
 in Kufa.
18
 Khalid had the two
ringleaders of this latter group, al-Mughira b. Sa‘id and Bayan b.
Sam‘an, arrested and executed. The execution of Ja‘d b. Dirham, a
rather shadowy figure associated with a variety of religious
doctrines, is also sometimes attributed to Khalid, and these reports
mention the strange detail that the execution was carried out on the
Feast of Sacrifices