CHAPTER X
The Battle of al-Yarmûk
A description of the battle. Heraclius gathered large bodies of Greeks, Syrians, Mesopotamians and Armenians numbering about 200,000.[1] This ary he put under the command of one of his choice men[2] and sent as a vanguard Jabalah ibn-al-Aiham al-Ghassâni at the head of the "naturalized" Arabs [mustaʿribah] of Syria of the tribes of Lakhm, Judhâm and others, resolving to fight the Moslems so that he might either win or withdraw to the land of the Greeks[3] and live in Constantinople. The Moslems gathered together and the Greek army marched against them. The battle they fought at al-Yarmûk was of the fiercest and bloodiest kind.[4] Al-Yarmûk [Hieromax] is a river. In this battle 24,000 Moslems took part. The Greeks and their followers in this battle tied themselves to each other by chains, so that no one might set his hope on flight. By Allah's help, some 70,000 of them were put to death, and their remnants took to flight, reaching as far as Palestine, Antioch, Aleppo, Mesopotamia and Armenia. In the battle of al-Yarmûk certain Moslem women took part and fought violently. Among them was Hind, daughter of ʿUtbah and
