Death of al-Hadi

وفاة الهادي

c. September 786 CE · Rabi' II 170 AH

Al-Hadi died in Rabi' II 170 and accounts differ: he pushed a boon-companion off a ledge onto cut reed-stumps and the man clutched him so both fell, a stump entering his anus; or a stomach ulcer; or his mother Khayzuran poisoned him when he resolved to kill al-Rashid and settle the succession on his own son; or — she having ruled affairs absolutely while processions thronged her door — he rebuked her, 'have you no spindle to keep you, no Mushaf, no rosary?', she sent him poisoned food she first fed a dog, and when he fell ill she had his face covered with a carpet they sat upon. He left seven sons ¹.

Overview

al-Hadi died in Rabi' al-Akhir 170 AH and left seven sons. The accounts differ on the cause of his death. ¹

The accounts

al-Suyuti gives several sayings:

He pushed a boon companion from a bank of cut reeds, and the man clung to him, and they both fell and died together.
An abscess in his bowels.
His mother al-Khayzuran poisoned him, when he resolved to kill al-Rashid so that he might name his own son as successor.
His mother was a ruler who had absolute control of great affairs. He rebuked her, then sent her poisoned food, and she fed some of it to a dog, which died. She then worked to have him killed when he fell ill, by covering his face with a carpet, while people sat on its sides. ¹

The source transmits these sayings and does not weigh them against one another.

The Digging of the Anbar Canal

In al-Baladhuri: Anbar's dihqans asked Sa'd ibn Abi Waqqas to dig them a canal they had already asked Persia's lord to dig; he wrote to Sa'd ibn Amr ibn Haram ordering it dug — the men dug until reaching a mountain that could not be cut, and left it. When al-Hajjaj governed Iraq he gathered labourers from every quarter and told his overseers 'see what a digger eats in a day — if it weighs what he hews out, do not hold back from digging,' and they spent on it till finished; that mountain was named for al-Hajjaj and the river for Sa'd ibn Amr ibn Haram. Al-Khayzuran, mother of the caliphs, ordered the canal called Mahdud dug — she named it al-Rayyan — her agent dividing it into sections, each section bounded and a crew assigned to dig it, whence 'Mahdud'; as for the river called Shayla, the sons of Shayla ibn Farrukhzadhan al-Marwazi claim Sapur dug it for their grandfather when he installed him as nighya of Anbar's tassuj — while others say it was named for a man called Shayla who contracted its digging and held a mabqala over it in al-Mansur's days, the canal having been long buried.

Death of al-Hadi

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Overview

The accounts

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The Digging of the Anbar Canal