Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (6 February 743) was the tenth Umayyad caliph, ruling from 724 until his death in 743. Hisham succeeded his brother Yazid II and presided over one of the longest reigns of the Umayyad Caliphate. His grandson Abd al-Rahman I later founded the Emirate of Córdoba.
Hisham's reign saw major military and political challenges. The caliphate suffered setbacks against the Türgesh in Transoxiana, fought a prolonged war with the Khazars, and continued its conflict with the Byzantine Empire. Hisham also faced the Berber Revolt in North Africa and the revolt of Zayd ibn Ali in Iraq. Within the caliphate, he sought to manage competing tribal factions through provincial appointments and changes in the governorships of Iraq and the eastern provinces. His administration also promoted significant agricultural and commercial development, particularly in Syria, the Jazira, and Iraq.
Towards the end of his reign, Hisham sought to overturn the succession arrangement which named al-Walid II as heir and instead secure the succession for his son Maslama. He failed to do so despite his son Maslama receiving support from Hisham's brother Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik, Hisham's sons, and key tribal chiefs.
Early life Hisham was born in Damascus, the administrative capital of the Umayyad Caliphate, in AH 72 (691–692 CE). His father was the Umayyad caliph Abd al-Malik (). His mother, A'isha, was a daughter of Hisham ibn Isma'il of the Banu Makhzum, a prominent family of the Quraysh, and Abd al-Malik's longtime governor of the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina. According to the history of al-Tabari (d. 923), Hisham was given the kunya (patronymic) of Abu al-Walid.
There is little information about Hisham's early life. He was too young to play any political or military role during his father's reign. He supposedly led the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca once during his brother al-Walid I's reign () and while there, met a respected descendant of Caliph Ali (), Zayn al-Abidin. Hisham is credited by al-Tabari for leading an expedition against the Byzantines across the Caliphate's frontier in 706 and capturing a number of their fortified positions.
Hisham began to demonstrate aspirations for the caliphate at the death of his brother, Caliph Sulayman () in 717. On his deathbed, Sulayman had nominated as his successor their paternal first cousin, Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz, but kept the order secret, entrusting the revelation to his chief adviser Raja ibn Haywa. When Raja informed the Umayyad family of the decision, Hisham protested that the caliphal office was the preserve of Abd al-Malik's direct descendants and only relented from his opposition when threatened by force. He played no political or military role under Umar () but is mentioned in a 10th-century biography of Umar as having issued a letter to the caliph complaining of his and his brothers' treatment under the caliph's rule. Hisham also held no posts under his brother, Caliph Yazid II ().
Caliphate Accession
Upon the counsel of their brother, the prominent general Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik, Yazid nominated Hisham as his successor over his own son al-Walid II, whom he had originally intended to designate as first-in-line. Hisham acceded after Yazid died in January 724. He received the news while at his Syrian desert estate, al-Zaytuna, which is identified as Qasr al-Hayr al-Gharbi, near Hisham's favored residence, al-Rusafa, which is identified as Qasr al-Hayr al-Sharqi. He was given the caliphal ring and staff by a postal messenger, after which he rode to Damascus, where he was publicly acclaimed as caliph.
Provincial politics Among Hisham's first acts was the dismissal of Umar ibn Hubayra al-Fazari from the governorship of Iraq in March 724. Ibn Hubayra had governed as a partisan stalwart of the Qays–Mudar, one of the two tribal-military factions of the caliphate, and aggressively suppressed the opposing Yaman–Rabi'a and its champions, the Muhallabid family. Hisham aimed to neutralize the partisan politics in the eastern caliphate by replacing Ibn Hubayra with Khalid ibn Abdallah al-Qasri, a staunch loyalist of the Umayyad family and member of the factionally neutral Bajila tribe. Hisham extended Khalid's jurisdiction beyond Iraq to the Iranian provinces and Khurasan, i.e. the eastern half of the caliphate. Khalid played a role similar to the Umayyads' former powerful viceroys of the east, Ziyad ibn Abihi and al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, though he lacked their reputation for statesmanship and energetic leadership.
Khalid's fifteen-year term in the east was largely stable and peaceful, save for minor and abortive Kharijite and Shia disturbances in the Jazira and Kufa, respectively, in 737. Despite Khalid's ostensible neutrality, the Qays–Mudar perceived him as an opponent for replacing their benefactor, Ibn Hubayra. Lobbying by the Qays-Mudar or jealousy of Khalid's lucrative enterprises in Iraq led Hisham to dismiss Khalid in 738. Although the Yaman had not necessarily embraced Khalid during his governorship, he became strongly identified with Yamani interests as a result of his dismissal and imprisonment by Hisham's new appointee, Yusuf ibn Umar al-Thaqafi, who restored Qaysi–Mudari dominance of the east.
External challenges Khurasan and the eastern frontier
During the reign of Caliph al-Walid I (), the territories east of Khurasan, in particular Transoxiana and Tukharistan, had been conquered by Umayyad forces but other than the Arab garrisons set up in Samarkand, Bukhara and Balkh, these regions remained largely self-administered by local Iranian and Turkic rulers. Not long after the conquests, there rose a confederation of Turkic nomads in Transoxiana, the Chinese-backed Turgesh under the Suluk, which countered Arab influence. The Arab troops of Khurasan (, 'the Khurasani army') were riven by divisions along Qaysi–Mudari and Yamani-Raba'i factional lines, which weakened their standing.
Not long after Hisham's accession, in 724, the Khurasani army under the governor Muslim ibn Sa'id al-Kilabi was trapped by the Turgesh and Sogdian rebels while besieging Ferghana. Their predicament was partly caused by the Yamani troops' refusal to engage while waiting for direction from Ibn Hubayra's incoming replacement, Khalid. In a precarious retreat known as the Day of Thirst, the Khurasani army extricated itself to safety in Samarkand after an eight-day trek. The event left Arab forces on the defensive, with no further conquests undertaken in the east until 739. Khalid appointed his brother Asad ibn Abdallah al-Qasri in Muslim's place. Asad worked to reconcile the local population, relieving Muslim converts from the jizya, a poll tax ostensibly restricted to non-Muslims but generally extended to non-Arab Muslim converts, and making inroads with the Sogdian nobility. His military activities focused on consolidating Umayyad rule west of the Oxus River, with moderately successful campaigns in Ghur and Gharjistan. The Arab soldiery resented Asad's tax overtures to the locals and he alienated them by publicly flogging the leaders of Khurasani army's main tribal factions.
Hisham consequently dismissed Asad in 727 and removed Khurasan from Khalid's overlordship. Blankinship speculates Hisham was alarmed by the slow pace of military progress in the east and the restlessness of the Khurasani troops and thus chose a governor from the more reliable Syro-Jaziran army (), Ashras ibn Abdallah al-Sulami, with a contingent of Jaziran troops as reinforcements. In 729/730, Ashras reduced taxes on converts, leading to mass conversions among the local populace. The resulting prospect of diminished revenues led Ashras to impose humiliating verification measures, namely circumcision tests, and eventually reimpose taxes on converts. This provoked a widescale uprising in Transoxiana, which coincided with an invasion by the Turgesh. The Umayyads consequently lost control of the territory by 728, save for Samarkand and the two minor posts of Kamarja (few leagues west of Samarkand) and Dabusiyya. After lengthy and bitter fighting, Ashras regained control of Bukhara and his troops withstood a two-month siege of Kamarja by the Turgesh. Nevertheless, by the end of Ashras's term in 730, the Umayyad frontier had receded substantially from its place at the start of Hisham's reign and much further still from its limits at Ferghana during al-Walid I's reign. Moreover, the Khurasani troops were becoming exhausted by the ceaseless, costly and unrewarding campaigns.
In 731, the Turgesh besieged Samarkand, while the bulk of the Khurasani army under Ashras's successor, Junayd ibn Abd al-Rahman al-Murri, was suppressing rebellions across Tukharistan. Junayd's attempt to relieve the siege ended in disaster, as the Khurasani army and the defenders of Samarkand were decimated by the Turgesh in the Battle of the Defile. To compensate the troop losses, Hisham ordered the remobilization of 15,000 fighters from the Iraqi garrisons, which were historically opposed to the Umayyad dynasty, and the recruitment of an equal amount of fighters from amongst the tribesmen in Khurasan. Although the Muslims retained Samarkand in the battle, they lost it to the Turgesh between then and 735, during which the Muslims' possessions in Transoxiana were restricted to Bukhara, Kish and al-Saghaniyan. Junayd's term in office left the Khurasani army increasingly disaffected and strained the finances of the caliphate as no war booty was gained, while Hisham expended considerable sums to equip the large number of reinforcements.
Hisham appointed in Junayd's place Asim ibn Abd Allah al-Hilali, who immediately had to contend with a massive and unprecedented revolt of Khurasani Arab troops and Iranian led by al-Harith ibn Surayj. Vacillating taxation policies on Muslim converts had bred dissent and frequent rebellion among the local population, creating fertile ground for anti-Umayyad Arab rebels to make common cause with local converts along religious lines. Among his demands, al-Harith called for the jizya on the to be abolished, a call hearkening back to the reforms of Umar II and the abortive reforms of Ashras. The rebels captured Balkh and threatened Asim in Merv, the provincial capital of Khurasan. While Asim beat back al-Harith, he soon after came to terms, going as far as issuing a joint letter with al-Harith demanding Hisham abide by the Quran and sunnah. This signaled Asim's weak position among the Khurasani troops, particularly its Mudari Tamim and Yamani Azd and Rabi'a elements, and territorially, as his control was limited to Merv and the loyalist Qaysi center of Nishapur.
With both the Khurasani troops and the Iraqi reinforcements deemed unreliable, Hisham resolved to dispatch a Syrian army to Khurasan under the reappointed Asad ibn Abdallah al-Qasri in 735. Asad and the Syrians won a string of victories against al-Harith and returned many Khurasani troops, particularly from the Yamani side, to the Umayyad fold. By 736, Balkh and Tukharistan was recaptured and became a base for the Syrians and al-Harith's rebellion collapsed. In 737, as Asad's troops were campaigning in the Khuttal, the Turgesh set upon them. In the ensuing Battle of Kharistan, the Muslims dispersed the Turgesh and captured the camp and spoils, though Suluk and al-Harith both escaped. The rare signal victory at Kharistan reportedly amazed Hisham, who had become accustomed to news of defeats and setbacks in the east. While modern historians dismiss the battle as no more than a skirmish, the Muslim victory there and Suluk's assassination in the following year by Turgesh rivals ended Turgesh invasions of Transoxiana and Khurasan and the Turkic confederation collapsed.