target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="#fb3_img_img_c219c1b9-65dc-5a5a-8a54-ce4d91710a4b.png" alt="image"/>]. The years of the Hagarenes and the time when they entered Syria and took control, from the year 933 of Alexander. Each one of them by name as follows. Muhammad, 10 years; Abū Bakr, 1 year; ʿUmar, 12 years; ʿUthman, 12 years; no king, 5 years; Muʿāwiya, 20 years; Yazīd, his son, 3 years; no king, 9 months; Marwan, 9 months; ʿAbd al-Malik, 21 years; Walīd, his son, 9 years; Sulaymān, 2 years and 7 months; ʿUmar, 2 years and 7 months; Yazīd, 4 years, 10 months, and 10 days.105
Unfortunately, the chronicler’s knowledge of early seventh-century chronology was rather poor. As Palmer writes, “This text is full of oddities. Of the Byzantine emperors only Phocas reigned for a period approximately equivalent to that shown here. Of the Arab caliphs Abū Bakr is curtailed and ʿUmar I is prolonged.”106 Perhaps the most peculiar item of all, however, is the implication that the Islamic conquest of Palestine took place in the year 618/19. While some of the Christian historical sources place the Islamic conquests before 632, none of them locates it this early: the date precedes even the hijra by three years. Strangely enough, however, a Syriac inscription from a north Syrian church dated to 780 bears the same information: “In the year 930 the Arabs came to the land.”107 Although Palmer and Hoyland both speculate as to possible explanations for this date, it remains a mystery. Nonetheless, for the present purposes the text is clear: in spite of its rather idiosyncratic dating, this short chronicle identifies Muhammad as leading the Islamic invasion of the Roman Near East. While the source of this information is completely unknown, it is conveyed without polemic and in the absence of any sort of apologetic agenda or totalizing explanation.
The Zuqnin Chronicle (ca. 775 CE)
Roughly contemporary with the preceding text is an anonymous chronicle written at the monastery of Zuqnin near Amida (modern Diyarbakır) sometime around 775. Unfortunately, these two chronicles have more in common than just their date of composition: the Zuqnin Chronicle’s chronology is also very weak during the period of the Islamic conquests. In fact, its author warns his readers that he was unable to find reliable sources for most of the seventh and eighth centuries: “From that point (574 CE) up to the present year (775 CE) … I have not found [a history] concerning events which is composed on such solid foundations as the former ones [that is, Eusebius, Socrates, John of Ephesus].”108 In view of the author’s own awareness of the rather poor sources at his disposal, one can hardly fault him for his mistakes in chronology.109 In describing the rise of Islam, the Zuqnin chronicler, in spite of his expectedly weak chronology, nevertheless maintains the tradition of Muhammad’s leadership during the invasion of Palestine:
In 621 the Arabs conquered the land of Palestine all the way to the Euphrates River, and the Romans fled and crossed over to the east of the Euphrates, and the Arabs ruled over them in it [that is, Palestine]. Their first king was a man from among them whose name was Muhammad. They also called this man a prophet, because he turned them away from cults of every sort and taught them that there is one God, the maker of creation. And he established laws for them, because they were especially devoted to the worship of demons, the veneration of idols, and especially the veneration of trees. And because he had shown them the one God, and they had defeated the Romans in battle under his leadership [
The entry for this year concludes with some brief polemical remarks accusing the Arabs of being “an especially greedy and carnal people,” who follow only such laws as suit their desires.111
Excepting these final remarks, the Zuqnin Chronicle’s account of the rise of Islam is relatively free from polemic: it does not serve any obvious apologetic agenda and is not linked with any sort of totalizing explanation. With regard to Abū Bakr, the chronicle notes only his death and the length of his rule (five years), without any indication of his involvement in the conquest of the Near East. The conquests are not mentioned again until the second year of ʿUmar’s reign, when “the Roman Emperor Heraclius went down to Edessa, and the battle of Gabitha took place, and the Persians were defeated and they left Mesopotamia.” Following this is a notice that four years later the Arabs crossed into northern Mesopotamia and defeated the Romans there.112 The chronology is in fact rather chaotic here as elsewhere in the chronicle, but its identification of Muhammad as alive and leading the Muslims during the conquest of Palestine is unmistakable.
A Report from the Continuatio of Abū l-Fatḥ’s Samaritan Chronicle (seventh century?)
Among the sources signaled by Crone and Cook as witnessing to Muhammad’s leadership of the assault on Palestine is the Samaritan Chronicle compiled by Abū l-Fatḥ al-Sāmirī al-Danafī at only the rather late date of 1355.113 Yet despite the comparative youth of this collection, it is widely acknowledged that Abū l-Fatḥ’s chronicle assembles much earlier material from a variety of older sources, several of which Abū l-Fatḥ identifies at the beginning of his composition.114 Commissioned by the Samaritan high priest, the chronicle of Abū l-Fatḥ spans the period from Adam through the appearance of Muhammad, and it is generally regarded as one of the most important sources for the history of the Samaritan people. Although it was compiled only relatively recently, this chronicle is broadly recognized as preserving a great deal of much older material.115 Abū l-Fatḥ’s original composition concluded with Muhammad’s appearance, drawing to a close with a Samaritan version of the Baḥīrā story, an Islamic legend according to which a Christian monk named Baḥīrā met the young Muhammad and identified him as a prophet on the basis of a distinctive birthmark on his back. In Abū l-Fatḥ’s version, three astrologers, a Jew, a Christian, and a Samaritan, discerned Muhammad’s appearance from the stars, and traveling together to his hometown, they each spoke with the young man, but it was (of course) the Samaritan who identified the sign on his back.116 Immediately thereafter, Abū l-Fatḥ’s chronicle appends a list of Samaritan high priests up until the appearance of Muhammad, concluding with the date at which the chronicle was completed.117 Nevertheless, several of the most important manuscripts continue beyond this point, extending the narrative either to the reign of Hārūn al-Rashīd (786–809) or, in one manuscript, until the time of the caliph al-Rāḍī (934–40). There is a clear consensus that Abū l-Fatḥ’s chronicle came to a close with Muhammad’s discovery by the three astrologers,118 and thus the account of the Islamic conquests often preserved in this Samaritan chronicle was not originally part of Abū l-Fatḥ’s late medieval compilation. Rather, these reports belong to another anonymous Samaritan chronicle, known as the Continuatio, that has been appended to Abū l-Fatḥ’s composition to extend its scope into the early Islamic period.
This Continuatio has recently been translated and subject to careful historical analysis by Milka Levy-Rubin, who determines that despite its distinction from Abū l-Fatḥ’s original compilation, the Continuatio is in fact a particularly important source for the history of Palestine in the early Muslim period.119 Levy-Rubin translates the most complete version of the Continuatio, known from only a single manuscript, which ends with the rule of al-Rāḍī, and her arguments for the value of this unique witness are convincing. The manuscript is reproduced following the translation, in lieu of an edition. Nevertheless, in the section covering the period between the Islamic conquests and the reign of Hārūn al-Rashīd, for which additional witnesses exist, Levy-Rubin has made comparative use of the other relevant manuscripts, as reflected in her extensive critical annotations. Even though almost nothing is known regarding the provenance or date of this nameless chronicle, Levy-Rubin’s careful analysis has demonstrated the exceptional value of its witness to the history of early medieval Palestine.
The Continuatio opens with the events of the Islamic conquest of Palestine, and it names Muhammad as a key participant in the assault. Immediately after the “Baḥīrā” legend from Abū l-Fatḥ’s
