CHAPTER XLVII
DEATH OF MUʿĀWIYA. YEZĪD SUCCEEDS. AL-ḤOSEIN AND
IBN AZ-ZUBEIR. TRAGEDY OF KERBALĀ, DEATH OF
AL-ḤOSEIN
60–61 A.H. 680 A.D.
Death of Muʿāwiya,
vii. 60 A.H.
April, 680 A.D.After a long and prosperous reign, Muʿāwiya died about seventy-five years of age. As he felt the end approach, he brought forth a casket, carefully kept, with parings of the Prophet's nails. Of these, ground fine, he bade them sprinkle the powder in his eyes and mouth when dead, and bury him, for a winding-sheet, in a garment given to him by Moḥammad. Fortune had favoured his protracted rule. Since the abdication of Al-Ḥasan, there had been peace throughout the Empire. Wise, courageous,[1] and forbearing, he held the dangerous elements around him in check; consolidated and extended the already vast area of Islām; and nursed commerce and the arts of peace, so that they greatly flourished in his time. The secret of his success probably lay in the fact that he always took the offensive. All through his Caliphate he waged unremitting war against the Emperor. Domestic affairs he left to his stadtholders. But he looked to the future with anxiety.
- ↑ His courage, however, was moral rather than physical. Both he and ʿAlī, as already stated, had become obese (at Al-Kūfa, ʿAlī went by the nickname of "the pot-bellied"), and in their later years there was little occasion for active bodily exertion. Still, even as late as Ṣiffīn, we have seen that ʿAlī fought with his early gallantry; while Muʿāwiya shrank from a personal encounter. ʿAlī was, without doubt, the braver of the two in physical courage; but Muʿāwiya, beyond comparison, the abler and bolder ruler. Muʿāwiya was a politician rather than a soldier. He preferred to gain his end by money rather than by force. And he is a fine example of l'homme qui sait attendre.
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