Abu Hatim Yaqub b. Labid al-Mazuzi al-Nafusi

Abu Hatim Yaqub b. Labid (also given as Labib or Habib) al-Mazuzi al-Nafusi was an Ibadi imam in the Maghrib. The encyclopaedia's entry is signed by A. de Motylinski and T. Lewicki. The orthodox Arab historians present him as a leader of Berber rebels. The Ibadis of Tripolitania gave him the title imam al-difa' ("imam of defence"), and the article says his role was more defined than that. ¹

According to the chronicle of Abu Zakariyya' al-Warjlani, the revolt began in Rajab 145/September-October 762, a year after the death of Abu l-Khattab. Al-Shammakhi gives a start in 154, which the article thinks is probably an error for 145. He captured Tripoli, massacred many of his enemies and made the city his capital. Abu Zakariyya' says he was in contact with 'Abd al-Rahman b. Rustam, the future founder of the imamate of Tahart, who was then in the mountain of Sufjajin. ¹

In 154/771 he joined the general rising in Ifriqiya led by 'Umar b. Hafs, called Hazarmard. His troops besieged Tubna in the Zab, and another detachment spent eight months investing Kairouan, which fell at the beginning of 155/771-2. An 'Abbasid army from Egypt then appeared on the eastern frontier of Tripolitania, and he defeated it, a battle the Ibadi chroniclers place near Maghmadas, probably wrongly. Another 'Abbasid army under Yazid b. Hatim al-Azdi advanced from Cairo, and on 27 Rabi' I 155/7 March 772 Abu Hatim met it with the Ibadi tribes of Tripolitania, west of Dinbi, east of Jabal Nafusa. The Ibadi army was cut to pieces, and the article says he was left on the battlefield with 30,000 of his men. ¹