Yusuf ibn 'Abd al-Rahman al-Fihri

Abd al-Malik, governor of Al-Andalus from 732 to 734, is a very wealthy member of a noble Arab family.

Spurred by critics who lashed out at his lack of military victories, he had led an expedition north to Pamplona, where a Frankish or Aquitanian party had taken over after the Battle of Poitiers.

Despite his failure to capture the Basque fortress, he had left troops to invest it, and had decided to continue his way north across the Pyrenees, where he engaged the Basques in skirmishes and was eventually overcome, but managed to escape back to Al-Andalus.

After being deposed and incarcerated by his successor Uqba ibn al-Hajjaj or possibly the governor of Ifriqiya ("was bound in chains"), he had made his way back to prominence in 740, when he is appointed wali (governor) of Al-Andalus again after the natural death of the former.

Abd al-Malik is a more popular figure among local Arabs and Berbers alike The news of the Berber victory in Morocco echoes through Spain.

Berbers heavily outnumber Arabs in al-Andalus, and the Andalusian Arab elite fear the Berber garrisons in their own lands might take inspiration from their Moroccan brethren.

The Berber Uprising in Al-Andalus (741 CE)

The coup that installed Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan al-Fihri as ruler of Al-Andalus in early 741 CE was intended as a failsafe measure to maintain stability. However, when news of the disastrous defeat at Bagdoura (in North Africa) spreads, a general Berber uprising in Spain becomes inevitable.

The Berber Mutiny and Rebellion

In October 741 CE, Berber garrisons in northwestern Galicia mutiny, overthrowing their Arab commanders, abandoning their fortifications, and forming a Berber rebel army to challenge Andalusian Arab rule in the south.

Although the names of their leaders are lost to history, the Spanish Berber rebel army is well-organized into three columns, each assigned a strategic objective:

1. One force marches on Toledo, targeting the main garrison city of the central march.
2. Another heads for Córdoba, the Umayyad capital of Al-Andalus.
3. A third advances toward Algeciras, hoping to seize the Andalusian fleet and ferry reinforcements from North Africa.

This large-scale Berber rebellion threatens to overthrow Arab dominance in Al-Andalus, ushering in a period of instability and power struggles across Muslim Spain.

Command of the Syrian armies devolves to Thalaba ibn Salama al-Amili, who is of 'Yemenite' tribal stock, like most Andalusian Arabs, rather than the usual 'Qaysid' stock of the Syrians.

For the next few months, the Syrians remain bunkered down in Córdoba, while …

…the Andalusians (soon joined by what remains of the Berber rebels), assemble in Mérida.

Thalaba ibn Salama.

Much of the ensuing few months is spent in an intercenine Arab civil war, the Berber question relegated to a secondary concern.

Sometime in late 642 or early 643, Thalaba marches onto Mérida, an area of rebel activity, but soon finds himself trapped with his small army in the citadel by the Andalusians.

Calculating there is no escape, Andalusians carry the siege of Mérida in a leisurely fashion.

The siege camp soon takes on the character of a fair, attracting numerous onlookers and their families, but one early morning, when the besiegers are preparing for a much-anticipated festival, Thalaba launches an unexpected sally out of Mérida, and quickly overwhelms the siege camp, taking as many as ten thousand prisoners, including many women and children.

Thalaba marches his prisoners to Córdoba, where he is said to have sold many of the high-ranking Andalusian captives as discount-price slaves.

The remnant of the Syrian expedition, some ten thousand men under Balj ibn Bishr, had remain trapped in Ceuta through much of the winter of 741-42, besieged by the Berber rebels.

The Andalusian ruler Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan al-Fihri, wary that the presence of the Syrians in Spain will only aggravate matters, refuses them passage across the water.

Indeed, he forbids any relief of the stranded Syrians, going so far as to publicly torture to death an Andalusian merchant who had dared to dispatch a couple of grain boats to Ceuta to feed the desperate Syrians.

But news soon reaches the Andalusian governor that the Berber rebel armies from Galicia had been organized and are now barreling south in three columns, towards Toledo, Córdoba and Algeciras.

Not having enough Arab forces at hand, the Andalusian governor Abd al-Malik realizes he has little choice but to make use of the stranded Syrian force to defeat the Berber armies.

In a carefully negotiated treaty, Abd al-Malik grants the Syrians permission to cross over, on the condition that they promise to return to North Africa within a year of the settlement of the Berber matter in Spain.

Hostages are taken to secure Syrian compliance.

The Syrian junds under Balj ibn Bishr cross the straits in early 742 and immediately head to the environs of Medina-Sidonia, where they intercept and dispose of the Berber column aiming for Algeciras.

The Syrians next join the Andalusian Arabs in crushing the main Berber rebel army in a ferocious battle outside of Córdoba in the spring of 742.

Shortly after, …

…the Syrians proceed to defeat the third Berber army, now laying siege to Toledo.

The Berber rebellion has been quashed in Spain, but the Syrians show no signs of intending to leave.

When the Andalusian governor Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan ibn Fihri presses the point, Balj ibn Bishr decides to simply depose him and proclaim himself governor, invoking his credentials as designated successor to his uncle, the late Ifriqiyan governor Kulthum ibn Iyad al-Qasi.

In revenge for the merchant of Ceuta, Balj orders the elderly Ibn Qatan publicly tortured to death and has him crucified on the outskirts of the city flanked by a similarly killed pig and dog on either side.

The reaction is not long in coming.

Andalusian Arabs, rallied by Qattan and Umayya, the sons of the late Fihrid governor, take up arms against Balj ibn Bishr and the Syrian junds.

The Syrians deliver a decisive defeat upon the Andalusians at the Battle of Aqua Portora, outside of Córdoba on August 6, 742, but Balj ibn Bishr is mortally wounded in the process and dies two days later.

He is succeeded by his lieutenant and designated successor Thalaba ibn Salama al-Amili.

The chronicler Ibn al-Khatam asserts Balj ibn Bishr was killed in the battle by Abd al-Rahman ibn Habib al-Fihri, the future ruler of Ifriqiya, who had accompanied the Syrians to al-Andalus, but defected to the Andalusians upon the execution of the Fihrid governor.

But this is likely confusion with Abd al-Rahman ibn al-Qama al-Lakhmi, the Andalusian governor of Narbonne, who is reported elsewhere to have, in the heat of battle, as his army was falling apart, sought out Balj among the Syrian cavalry and struck him with his spear.