The Chaliphate - Muir - The Search For Mecca

—
A.u. 749-54] HIS DEATH AND CHARACTER 445
As-Saffah nominated his nephew 'Isa to be heir-apparent
after his brother Abu Ja'far. The patent, inscribed upon
a silken sheet, and sealed with the signets of the Caliph
and of the chief heads of the family, was placed in custody
of himself, now i^overnor of Al-Kufa.
The name by which this Caliph is most commonly known,
As-SaJJd/i, the Blood-thirsty, is well chosen ; for as such
A.ll. 13
136.
'Isa nominated
heirapiKirenl
after Abu
J a' far.
Saffah the
Blood-
he is distinguished beyond all others in a d)'nast)- that thirsty.
had small respect for human life. He intensified his
cruelty and guilt, if that were possible, by treachery in
the face of solemn oaths, and also by ingratitude, for
amongst his victims were not a few who had spent their
lives in helping him to the throne. That the attempt
should have been made to extenuate his crimes is strange
;
and is thus referred to by the impartial Weil, in whose
judgment I concur ;
"Wc can but marvel,'' lie says, "that many Ein'opcans liavc sought
to defend this Caliph who was worse than any Umciyad,—as if he
did not deserve the name of Blood-shedder, which indeed he himself
assumed. He may not with his own hands have strangled victims ;
but not the less was it by his express mandate that the Umeiyads
in Syria, and Suleiman in his very presence, were perfidiously slain.
At his command must Abu Muslim hire the assassin of Abu Salama,
to whom the 'Abbasids owed so much. It was at his repeated requisition
that Abu Ja'far, in treacherous disregard of solemn oaths, slew
Ibn Hubeira and his fellows ; and it certainly is not due to his
innocence that the fate of Abu Sahima did not during' his own reign
overtake Abu Muslim also ;
tyrant ; lie was a perjured and ungrateful traitor."
Abu'l-'Abbas was not merely a barbarous
Such is the not overdrawn character of the first of the
'Abbasids, Abu'l-'Abbas, As-Saffah, the " Blood-shcdder."