حادثة بربشتر

Name: حادثة بربشتر
Start: 1064

1064 CE · 456 AH

Ibn Hayyan's account of the Barbastro catastrophe of 456: the Nordmanni host besieged the town forty days, its underground water channel collapsed, the people surrendered on safe-conduct for their lives alone — then the aman was broken, over six thousand killed, fifty to a hundred thousand reckoned dead or captive, virgins apportioned house by house. He closes with the Jewish merchant's eyewitness scene of a Frankish soldier seated in a Muslim's own bed while the householder's daughter sang to him, tears on her cheeks ¹.

Depth

At a glance

Era: Abbasid Fragmentation
Region: al-Andalus & Europe
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In time

The Buyid, Fatimid and Seljuk Era

In space

Map: Natural Earth, public domain · places and route from the graph

Wars and campaigns

Overview

al-Maqqari, in "Nafh al-Tib", reports on the authority of Ibn Hayyan that the enemy overcame Barbastro, the capital of a Britannian district near Saragossa, in 456 AH. ²

The siege

The army of the Ardamaniyyun (Ardamanīyūn) besieged it for forty days. Yusuf ibn Sulayman ibn Hud fell short in protecting it. The enemy entered the first city, and the people took refuge in the inner city. Then the channel that brought the water collapsed, the water was cut off, and people despaired of life. ²

The surrender

The people asked for safe-conduct for themselves, without their property and families, and the enemy granted it. Then he broke faith with them and killed more than six thousand of them, as Ibn Hayyan relates. ²