The spoil.
The spoil was great. Immense stores of grain, as well as herds of cattle, were captured; and, therefrom, supplies were sent to the families in their desert retreat. As Amr ibn Mádekerib rode up with these, the women, mistaking the convoy for a plundering raid, rushed out, with their wild shrill Arab scream, and began attacking them with stones and staves. Moslem women defend their camp.Amr soon made himself known to them, and praised their courageous attitude. ‘It well becometh the wives of such an army,’ he said, ‘thus to defend themselves.’ Then he told them of the victory; ‘and lo,’ he added, as he produced the stores of grain, ‘the first-fruits thereof!’[223]
Mesopotamia and delta regained.
The country was now ravaged without let or hindrance up to Sabât, within sight of the walls of Medâin. The enemy’s garrisons were all driven back; and lower Mesopotamia and the delta anew reoccupied. Parties also scoured the country higher up. Anbâr and Khanâfis were again taken possession of, and many rich markets ransacked. They penetrated to Baghdad (then a mere village on the Tigris above the modern city), and even as far north as Tekrît. Great booty was gathered in these plundering expeditions. It was divided in the usual way, excepting that the Beni Bajîla, who well merited the distinction, received, according to promise, a fourth of the imperial Fifth, beyond their proper share—the remaining portion being sent to Medîna.[224]
Mothanna superseded.
Mothanna lived but a few months after his last great victory. He never entirely recovered from the wounds received in the disastrous battle of the Bridge, and eventually succumbed under them. His merits have not been recognised as they deserve. That he did not belong to the nobility of Medîna was the misfortune which kept him in the background. Jarîr, leader of the Beni Jadîla, declined to serve under him as Ameer, or commander, in Irâc, since he was a mere Bedouin chief, and not a Companion of the Prophet; and he complained accordingly to the Caliph. Omar listened to the appeal; and eventually (as we shall see) appointed another commander over both. But with that opens a new chapter in the Persian war, and before entering on it, we must revert to the course of events in Syria.
Mothanna.
The character of Mothanna, however, deserves more than a passing notice, and as we shall hear little of him in the short remaining period of his life, I may here devote a few lines to his memory. Among the generals who contributed to the triumph of Islam, he was second only to one. Inferior to Khâlid in dash and brilliancy of enterprise, he did not yield to him in vigour and strategic skill. Free from the unscrupulous cruelty so often disfiguring the triumphs of that great leader, he never, like him, used victory to gratify his own ends. It was due alone to the cool and desperate stand which Mothanna made at the Bridge, that the Moslem force was not utterly annihilated there; while the formation so rapidly after that disaster of a fresh army, by which, with the help of Christian tribes (rare mark of Moslem liberality), a prodigious host was overthrown, and the prestige of Islam restored—showed powers of administration and generalship far beyond his fellows. The repeated supersession of Mothanna cost the Caliphate much, and at one time rendered the survival of Islam in Irâc doubtful; but it never, in the slightest measure, affected his loyalty and devotion to Omar. The nobility of the Moslem peerage may have rendered it difficult for the Caliph to place a Bedouin chieftain of obscure origin in command of men who, as Companions, had fought under the Prophet’s banner. But it is strange that no historian, jealous for the honour of the heroes of Islam, has regretted the supersession of one so distinguished, or sought to place Mothanna on the deserved pinnacle of fame, as one of the great generals of the world.[225]
CHAPTER XV.
CAMPAIGN IN SYRIA.—TAKING OF DAMASCUS.—BATTLE OF FIHL.
A.H. XIV. A.D. 635.
The Syrian forces repose on the Yermûk.