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Tawwaf ibn Ghallaq

طواف بن غلاق

685~

al-Jund

Tawwaf ibn Ghallaq, one of the leaders of the rebels (khawarij) in Basra as al-Zirikli describes him: he rose against Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad with seventy men of Abd al-Qays, defeated the force sent against him and entered Basra, then its people and the troops fought him, most of his men were killed, and he was killed and crucified.

Depth

At a glance

Roles
General
Era
The Umayyad Period
Region
Levant & Iraq

Life in time

625650675700725750775 c. c. c.
The Early Abbasid Caliphate · The Prophetic Era · The Rashidun Caliphate · The Umayyad Period Contemporaries: Abd al-A'la ibn Abdallah ibn Amir · Abd al-Aziz ibn Marwan · Abd al-Malik ibn Abi Hurra · Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan · Abd al-Malik ibn Umayr

In space

al-Jund

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

Summary

Tawwaf ibn Ghallaq was one of the leaders of the rebels (khawarij) in Basra, according to his entry in the first edition of al-A'lam. 1 Al-Zirikli describes him as brave, devout and scrupulous - al-Zirikli's own characterisation. 1

Rising and death

Al-Zirikli says he rose against Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad with seventy men of the Abd al-Qays; Ubayd Allah sent a force against him, which Tawwaf defeated, and he entered Basra; its people fought him together with the troops, most of his men were killed, and he was killed and crucified. 1

Not covered here

The year of his rising in the entry head is not clearly legible in the OCR, and what other histories and heresiographies say of him is not given here.

Connections

Explore the connections

Member of
Khawarij
Opposed
Ubaydallah ibn Ziyad
Ruled over
Al-Qays
Lived in
al-Jund

People and things also explored

Battle of al-Khazir· Battle of Nahrawan· Ubaydallah ibn Ziyad's flight from Basra after Yazid's death· Ibn al-Ash'ath's Tabaristan Campaign· The killing of Muslim ibn Aqil in Kufa· Ubaydallah ibn Ziyad's Baykand Campaign· Ibadiyya· Ahmad ibn Yusuf al-Tifashi

Sources

  1. al-Zirikli, al-A'lam: Qamus Tarajim, vol. 2 (first edition, al-Matba'a al-Arabiyya, Cairo, 1346/1927) , p. 52
Cite this page

islam.museum contributors. “Tawwaf ibn Ghallaq”. islam.museum, https://islam.museum/en/person/tawwaf-ibn-ghallaq/. CC BY-SA 4.0. Last updated 2026-11-09.

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Wing

People

Prophets, companions, scholars, rulers, scientists, poets, travelers: women and men who shaped the story. Related

Battle of al-Khazir

In 66 AH Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad set out with the armies of Syria toward Iraq. When he reached Mosul he met Ibrahim ibn al-Ashtar al-Nakha'i, who commanded the cavalry of Iraq on behalf of al-Mukhtar, at al-Khazir. It was a great battle in which Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad, al-Husayn ibn Numayr, Shurahbil ibn Dhi al-Kala' and leading men of Syria were killed. The book states that al-Mukhtar ibn Abi Ubayd sent a force led by Ibrahim ibn al-Ashtar to fight Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad, that the victory went to Ibn al-Ashtar, and that the Syrian troops suffered killing and drowning. It also says that the rout of the Syrian troops came at the moment when the vein of tribal zeal between Qays and Yemen throbbed.