The Roman Recapture of Alexandria and Its Recovery from Manuel

نقض الإسكندرية واستردادها من منويل

23? AH

Alexandria

In al-Baladhuri: the Romans wrote to Constantine son of Heraclius — then king — telling how few the Muslims among them were and of their humiliation in paying jizya, whereupon he sent one of his men called Manuel with three hundred ships laden with fighters; he entered Alexandria and slew the Muslim ribat there save those God shielded in flight — in year 25. Amr ibn al-As (may God be pleased with him) heard and marched on them with fifteen thousand, finding their fighters out ravaging the villages below Alexandria; the Muslims met them, loosed arrows an hour behind their shields, then charged home, battle joining bitterly, till the unbelievers broke and fled — no halting nor turning short of Alexandria — where they fortified and set up the arrada-engines; Amr fought them hardest, planted mangonels that took the walls, pressed the war till he entered by the sword by force, slew the fighters, captured the offspring — some Romans fleeing to Rome — and Manuel was killed; Amr and the Muslims demolished Alexandria's wall, which Amr had vowed to do should he take it. Some narrators put this raid in year 23, others the breach in 23 or 25 — God knows best. Amr laid kharaj on Alexandria's land and jizya on its people; it is also told that the Muqawqis had withdrawn from Alexandria's folk when they broke, so Amr confirmed him and those with him on their first terms — and also that he had died before this raid. Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz used to say: we opened no village of the Maghreb on treaty save three — Alexandria, Kafr Tis and Sultays — saying whoever of these places' people embraced Islam, his person and property were left free; and Alexandria's jizya was eighteen thousand dinars until in Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik's governorship it reached thirty-six thousand dinars.