Page:Muhammad Diyab al-Itlidi - Historical Tales and Anecdotes of the Time of the Early Khalîfahs - Alice Frere - 1873.djvu/266

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there being no other person in the empire capable of disputing his title or standing in competition with him, he was declared Khalîfah, Ibrahîm himself recognizing his authority, 127. So short indeed was Ibrahîm's reign, that many writers scarcely mention him. He died 132. But the manner of his death is uncertain: some say he was assassinated, some that he was drowned, and others that he was poisoned.

Marwân, however, though proclaimed Khalîfah, did not long enjoy peace. The very same year ( 127) the people of Hems rebelled against him. The Damascenes followed their example, and also the people of el-Básrah, who had proclaimed Sulaimân-ibn-Hishâm Khalîfah at that place. And though Marwân was successful in, to a certain extent, quelling these insurrections, yet the partisans of the house of el-Abbâs were now beginning to grow powerful in some of the interior provinces of the empire. El-Abbâs was the Prophet's uncle; and the first of the family who made any considerable figure was his descendant in the third generation, Muhammad-ibn-ʾAly, who flourished in the time of ʾOmar-ibn-ʾAbd-el-Azîz. ʾOmar succeeded Sulaimân-ibn-ʾAbd-el-Mâlik 99 ( 717). Muhammad-ibn-ʾAly was nominated chief or Imâm of the house of el-Abbâs in the hundredth year of the Hijrah. He is reported to have said to the deputation sent to him on this occasion, "I shall soon die, and my son Ibrahîm will be your leader till he shall be slain. After his death, my other son, ʾAbd-Allâh, surnamed Abu-ʾl-ʾAbbâs, es-Saffâh, shall preside over you, and settle the government of the Muslims upon a solid and lasting basis." Muhammad died 125, and was succeeded in the honourable post of Imâm by his son Ibrahîm. It was Ibrahîm who two years later appointed Abu-Muslîm-ʾAbd-er-Rahmân-ibn-Muslim, el-Khurasâny, then a youth of nineteen, to go as his representative to Khorassân. Abu-Muslim is called in the text the founder or establisher of the