The Battle of Dhi Qar (Arabic: يوم ذي قار), also known as the War of the Camel’s Udder,[3] was a pre-Islamic battle fought between Arab tribes and the Sassanid Empire in Southern Iraq. The battle occurred after the death of Al-Nu’man III by the orders of Khosru II.[4]
| Battle of Dhi Qar معركة ذي قار | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| Sassanid Persia Pro-Sasanian Arabs |
| ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Iyas ibn Qabisah al-Ta’i Hamrez al-Tasatturi † Al-Nu’man bin Zara’a † Khalid bin Yazid al-Buhrani † Khanabarin † Hamarz † Hormuzan | Hani’ bin Qubaisah Hantala bin Tha’laba al-Ajli Abd Amr bin Bashar al-Dhubai’y Jabala bin Ba’ith al-Yashkury Al-Harith bin Wa’la al-Thahli Al-Harith bin Rabi’a al-Taimi | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| 2,000 Persian soldiers, with 3,000 Arabs[2] | 2,000-5,000 | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| Almost all the army lost | Minimal | ||||||
The dating of the event is disputed. The Encyclopædia Iranica entry on the subject says:
“According to certain Muslim traditions, the battle took place in the year 1/623 or 2/624… Ebn Ḥabīb… dated it earlier, between 606 and 622, but modern scholars have narrowed this range to 604-11”[2]
The battle of Dhū-Qār is reported in many classical works of Arabic history and literature. The longest, but not necessarily most representative, version is Bishr ibn Marwān al-Asadī’s Ḥarb Banī Shaybān maʻa Kisrá Ānūshirwān (Arabic: حرب بني شيبان مع كسرى آنوشروان).[5]
- ^ Ahmad, Nawawi (1976). Arab Unity and Disunity (PDF) (Thesis). University of Glasgow. p. 2. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2020-06-02. Retrieved 10 May 2021.
Despite the small number of troops involved, the decisive victory of the Arabs is seen as the beginning of a new era, since it gave the Arab tribes a new confidence and enthusiasm.
- ^ a b Landau-Tasseron, Ella. “ḎŪ QĀR”. ENCYCLOPÆDIA IRANICA. Retrieved 8 January 2012.
- ^ Mackintosh-Smith, Tim. “ON THE EDGE OF GREATNESS THE DAYS OF THE ARABS” ARABS A 3,000-YEAR HISTORY of PEOPLES, TRIBES and EMPIRES . Yale University Press, 2019, pp.110.
- ^ Bosworth 1983, p. 3.
- ^ Ḥarb Banī Shaybān maʻa Kisrá Ānūshirwān, ed. by Muḥammad Jāsim Ḥammādī Mashhadānī (Baghdad: s.n., 1988; first publ. Bombay 1887); Hamad Alajmi, ‘Pre-Islamic Poetry and Speech Act Theory: Al-A`sha, Bishr ibn Abi Khazim, and al-Ḥujayjah’ (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Indiana University, 2012), p. 163.
- Bosworth, C. E. (1983). “Iran and the Arabs Before Islam”. In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). The Cambridge History of Iran: The Seleucid, Parthian, and Sasanian periods (1). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 593–612. ISBN 978-0-521-200929.
- Morony, Michael G. (2005) [1984]. Iraq After The Muslim Conquest. Gorgias Press LLC. ISBN 978-1-59333-315-7.[permanent dead link]