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The Umayyad dynasty () or Umayyads () was an Arab clan within the Quraysh tribe who were the ruling family of the Umayyad Caliphate in 661–750 and the Emirate and later Caliphate of Córdoba in 756–1031.
In the pre-Islamic period, the Umayyads were a prominent clan of the tribe of Quraysh, descended from Umayya ibn Abd Shams. Despite staunch opposition to the prophet Muhammad, the Umayyads embraced Islam before the former's death in 632. Uthman, an early companion of Muhammad from the Umayyad clan, was the third Rashidun caliph, ruling in 644–656, while other members held various governorships. One of these governors, Mu'awiya I of Syria, opposed Caliph Ali in the First Fitna (656–661) and afterward founded the Umayyad Caliphate with its capital in Damascus. This marked the beginning of the Umayyad dynasty, the first hereditary dynasty in the history of Islam, and the only one to rule over the entire Islamic world of its time. Umayyad authority was challenged in the Second Fitna, during which the Sufyanid line of Mu'awiya was replaced in 684 by Marwan I, who founded the Marwanid line of Umayyad caliphs, which restored the dynasty's rule over the Caliphate.
The Islamic empire reached its largest geographical extent under the Umayyads. The Umayyads drove on the early Muslim conquests, conquering the Maghreb, Hispania, Central Asia, Sind, and parts of Chinese Turkestan, but the constant warfare exhausted the state's military resources, while Alid and Kharijite revolts and tribal rivalries weakened the state from within. Finally, in 750 the Abbasid dynasty overthrew Caliph Marwan II and massacred most of the family. One of the survivors, Abd al-Rahman, a grandson of Caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik, escaped to Muslim Spain, where he founded the Emirate of Córdoba, which his descendant, Abd al-Rahman III, transformed into a caliphate in 929. Under the Umayyads, al-Andalus became a centre of science, medicine, philosophy and invention during the Islamic Golden Age. The Caliphate of Córdoba disintegrated into several independent taifa kingdoms in 1031, thus marking the political end of the Umayyad dynasty.
Umayya succeeded Abd Shams as the qaid (wartime commander) of the Meccans. This position was likely an occasional political post whose holder oversaw the direction of Mecca's military affairs in times of war, instead of an actual field command. This early experience in military leadership proved instructive, as later Umayyads were known for possessing considerable political and military organizational skills. The historian Giorgio Levi Della Vida suggests that information in the early Arabic sources about Umayya, as with all the ancient progenitors of the tribes of Arabia, "be accepted with caution", but "that too great skepticism with regard to tradition would be as ill-advised as absolute faith in its statements". Della Vida asserts that since the Umayyads who appear at the beginning of Islamic history in the early 7th century were no later than third-generation descendants of Umayya, the latter's existence is highly plausible.
By circa 600, the Quraysh had developed trans-Arabian trade networks, organizing caravans to Levant in the north and Yemen in the south. The Banu Umayya and the Banu Makhzum, another prominent Qurayshite clan, dominated these trade networks. To secure these routes, they developed economic and military alliances with the Bedouin tribes that controlled the northern and central Arabian desert expanses, gaining them a degree of political power in Arabia.
Abu Sufyan and his sons, along with most of the Umayyads, embraced Islam toward the end of Muhammad's life, following the Muslim conquest of Mecca. To secure the loyalty of prominent Umayyad leaders, including Abu Sufyan, Muhammad offered them gifts and positions of importance in the nascent Muslim state. He installed another Umayyad, Attab ibn Asid ibn Abi al-Is, as the first governor of Mecca. Although Mecca retained its paramountcy as a religious center, Medina continued to serve as the political center of the Muslims. Abu Sufyan and the Banu Umayya relocated to the city to maintain their growing political influence.
Muhammad's death in 632 created a succession crisis, while nomadic tribes throughout Arabia that had embraced Islam defected from Medina's authority. Abu Bakr, one of Muhammad's oldest friends and an early convert to Islam, was elected caliph (paramount political and religious leader of the Muslim community). Abu Bakr showed favor to the Umayyads by awarding them a prominent role in the Muslim conquest of Syria. He appointed an Umayyad, Khalid ibn Sa'id ibn al-As, as commander of the expedition, but replaced him with other commanders, among whom was Abu Sufyan's son, Yazid. Abu Sufyan had already owned property and maintained trade networks in Syria.
Abu Bakr's successor, Caliph Umar (), while actively curtailing the influence of the Qurayshite elite in favor of Muhammad's earlier supporters in the administration and military, did not disturb the growing foothold of Abu Sufyan's sons in Syria, which was all but conquered by 638. When Umar's overall commander over the province, Abu Ubayda ibn al-Jarrah, died in 639, he appointed Yazid governor of the Jund Dimashq, Jund Filastin and Jund al-Urdunn districts of Syria. Yazid died shortly after and Umar installed his brother Mu'awiya in his place. Umar's exceptional treatment of Abu Sufyan's sons may have stemmed from his respect for the family, their burgeoning alliance with the powerful Banu Kalb tribe as a counterweight to the aristocratic tribes who dominated the Jund Hims district, or the lack of a suitable candidate amid the plague of Amwas, which had already killed Abu Ubayda and Yazid.
The assassination of Uthman in 656 became a rallying cry for the Qurayshite opposition to his successor, Muhammad's cousin and son in-law Caliph Ali of the Banu Hashim. The Qurayshite elite did not hold Ali responsible, but opposed his accession under the circumstances of Uthman's demise. Following their defeat at the Battle of the Camel near Basra, during which their leaders Talha ibn Ubayd Allah and Zubayr ibn al-Awwam, both potential contenders of the caliphate, died, the mantle of opposition to Ali was taken up chiefly by Mu'awiya. Initially, he refrained from openly claiming the caliphate, focusing instead on undermining Ali's authority and consolidating his position in Syria, all in the name of avenging Uthman's death. Mu'awiya and Ali, leading their respective Syrian and Iraqi supporters, fought to a stalemate at the Battle of Siffin in 657. It led to an indecisive arbitration, which weakened Ali's command over his partisans, while raising the stature of Mu'awiya as Ali's equal. As Ali was bogged down combating his former partisans, who became known as the Kharijites, Mu'awiya was recognized as caliph by his core supporters, the Syrian Arab tribes, in 659 or 660. When Ali was assassinated by a Kharijite in 661, Mu'awiya marched on Kufa, where he compelled Ali's son, Hasan, to cede caliphal authority and gained recognition from the region's Arab tribal nobility. As a result, Mu'awiya became widely recognized as caliph, though opposition by the Kharijites and some of Ali's loyalists persisted at a low level.
... the Umayyads, leading representatives of those who had opposed the Prophet Muhammad until the latest possible moment, had within thirty years of his death reestablished their position to the extent that they were now at the head of the community which he had founded.
In contrast to Uthman's empowerment of the Umayyads, Mu'awiya's power did not rely on the clan and, with minor exceptions, he did not appoint Umayyads to the major provinces or his court in Damascus. He largely limited their influence to Medina, where most of the Umayyads remained headquartered. The loss of political power left the Umayyads of Medina resentful of Mu'awiya, who may have become wary of the political ambitions of the much larger Abu al-As branch of the clan—to which Uthman had belonged—under the leadership of Marwan ibn al-Hakam. Mu'awiya attempted to weaken the clan by provoking internal divisions. Among the measures taken was the replacement of Marwan from the governorship of Medina in 668 with another leading Umayyad, Sa'id ibn al-As. The latter was instructed to demolish Marwan's house, but refused. Marwan was restored in 674 and also refused Mu'awiya's order to demolish Sa'id's house. Mu'awiya appointed his own nephew, al-Walid ibn Utba ibn Abi Sufyan, in Marwan's place in 678.
In 676, Mu'awiya installed his son, Yazid I, as his successor. The move was unprecedented in Muslim politics—earlier caliphs had been elected by popular support in Medina or by the consultation of the senior companions of Muhammad. Mu'awiya's Umayyad kinsmen in Medina, including Marwan and Sa'id, accepted Mu'awiya's decision, albeit disapprovingly. The principle opposition emanated from Husayn ibn Ali, Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr, Abd Allah ibn Umar and Abd al-Rahman ibn Abi Bakr, all prominent Medina-based sons of earlier caliphs or close companions of Muhammad.
Yazid acceded in 680 and three years later faced a revolt by the people of Medina and Ibn al-Zubayr in Mecca. Yazid's cousin, Uthman ibn Muhammad ibn Abi Sufyan, and the Umayyads residing in Medina, led by Marwan, were expelled. Yazid dispatched his Syrian army to reassert his authority in the Hejaz and relieve his kinsmen. The Umayyads of Medina joined the Syrians in the assault against the rebels in Medina and defeated them at the Battle of al-Harra. The Syrians proceeded to besiege Mecca, but withdrew upon the death of Yazid. Afterward, Ibn al-Zubayr declared himself caliph and expelled the Umayyads of the Hejaz a second time. They relocated to Palmyra or Damascus, where Yazid's son and successor, Mu'awiya II, ruled at a time when most provinces of the Caliphate discarded Umayyad authority.
Abd al-Malik concentrated power into the hands of the Umayyad dynasty. At one point, his brothers or sons held nearly all governorships of the provinces and Syria's districts. Abd al-Aziz was retained over Egypt until his death shortly before Abd al-Malik's in 705. He was replaced by Abd al-Malik's son Abdallah. Abd al-Malik appointed his son Sulayman over Palestine, following stints there by his uncle Yahya ibn al-Hakam and brother Aban ibn Marwan. In Iraq, he appointed his brother Bishr over Kufa and a distant cousin, Khalid ibn Abdallah ibn Khalid ibn Asid, in Basra, before combining both cities under the governorship of his trusted general al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf. Abd al-Malik's court in Damascus was filled with far more Umayyads than under his Sufyanid predecessors, a result of the clan's exile to the city from Medina. He maintained close ties with the Sufyanids through marital relations and official appointments, such as according Yazid's son Khalid a prominent role in the court and army and wedding to him his daughter A'isha. Abd al-Malik also married Khalid's sister Atika, who became his favorite and most influential wife.
After his brother Abd al-Aziz's death, Abd al-Malik designated his eldest son, al-Walid I, his successor, to be followed by his second eldest, Sulayman. Al-Walid acceded in 705. He kept Sulayman as governor of Palestine, while appointing his sons to the other junds of Syria, with Abd al-Aziz over Damascus, al-Abbas over Homs and Umar over Jordan, as well as giving them command roles in the frontier wars against the Byzantines in Anatolia. He retired his uncle Muhammad ibn Marwan from the Jazira, installing his half-brother Maslama there instead. Al-Walid I's attempt to void his father's succession arrangements by replacing Sulayman with his son Abd al-Aziz failed and Sulayman acceded in 715. Rather than nominating his own sons or brothers, Sulayman appointed his cousin, Umar II, the son of Abd al-Aziz ibn Marwan, as his successor. While the traditional sources present the choice as related to the persuasion of the court theologian, Raja ibn Haywa, it may have been related to Umar II's seniority and his father's previous position as Marwan I's second successor. The family of Abd al-Malik protested the move, but were coerced into a compromise whereby Yazid II, the son of Abd al-Malik and Atika, would follow Umar II.
The Umayyads longed for the Levant, and they established in al-Andalus the same trees, plants and food crops which their ancestors had cultivated in Syria, serving the same traditional foods. Wholesale importation of Syrian styles of living contributed to an extensive Syrianization of the entire countryside of al-Andalus.
Two of the sons of Abu al-As, Affan and al-Hakam, each fathered future caliphs, Uthman and Marwan I, respectively. From the latter's descendants, known as the Marwanids, came the Umayyad caliphs of Damascus who reigned successively between 684 and 750, and then the Cordoba-based emirs and caliphs of Muslim Spain, who held office until 1031. Other than those who had escaped to al-Andalus, most of the Marwanids were killed in the Abbasid purges of 750. However, a number of them settled in Egypt and Iran, where one of them, Abu al-Faraj al-Isfahani, authored the famous source of Arab history, the Kitab al-Aghani, in the 10th century. Uthman, the third Rashidun caliph, who ruled between 644 and 656, left several descendants, some of whom served political posts under the Umayyad caliphs. From the Abu al-Is line came the politically important family of Asid ibn Abi al-Is, whose members served military and gubernatorial posts under various Rashidun and Umayyad caliphs. The al-As line produced Sa'id ibn al-As, who served as one of Uthman's governors in Kufa.
The most well-known family of the Anabisa branch was that of Harb's son Abu Sufyan Sakhr. From his descendants, the Sufyanids, came Mu'awiya I, who founded the Umayyad Caliphate in 661, and Mu'awiya I's son and successor, Yazid I. Sufyanid rule ceased with the death of the latter's son Mu'awiya II in 684, though Yazid's other sons, Khalid and Abd Allah, continued to play political roles, and the former was credited as the founder of Arabic alchemy. Abd Allah's son Abu Muhammad Ziyad al-Sufyani, meanwhile, led a rebellion against the Abbasids in 750, but was ultimately slain. Abu Sufyan's other sons were Yazid, who preceded Mu'awiya I as governor of Syria, Amr, Anbasa, Muhammad and Utba. Only the last two left progeny. The other important family of the Anabisa were the descendants of Abu Amr, known as the Banu Abi Mu'ayt. Abu Amr's grandson Uqba ibn Abu Mu'ayt was captured and executed on Muhammad's orders during the Battle of Badr for his previously harsh incitement against Muhammad. Uqba's son, al-Walid, served as Uthman's governor in Kufa for a brief period. The Banu Abi Mu'ayt made Iraq and Upper Mesopotamia their home.
| Umayyad Caliphate | |
| Muawiyah I | 28 July 661 – 27 April 680 |
| Yazid I | 27 April 680 – 11 November 683 |
| Muawiyah II | 11 November 683– June 684 |
| Marwan I | June 684– 12 April 685 |
| ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Marwān | 12 April 685 – 8 October 705 |
| Al-Walid I | 8 October 705 – 23 February 715 |
| Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Malik | 23 February 715 – 22 September 717 |
| ʿUmar II ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz | 22 September 717 – 4 February 720 |
| Yazid II | 4 February 720 – 26 January 724 |
| Hishām ibn ʿAbd al-Malik | 26 January 724 – 6 February 743 |
| Al-Walid II | 6 February 743 – 17 April 744 |
| Yazid III | 17 April 744 – 4 October 744 |
| Ibrāhīm ibn al-Walīd | 4 October 744 – 4 December 744 |
| Marwan II | 4 December 744 – 25 January 750 |
| The dynasty ended when the Umayyad Caliphate was overthrown by the Abbasid dynasty. | |
| Rulers of al-Andalus | |
| Emirate of Córdoba | |
| ʿAbd al-Raḥmān I ibn Muʿāwiya al-ʾUmawī | 15 May 756 – 30 September 788 |
| Hishām I ibn ʿAbd al-Rahmān al-ʾUmawī | 6 October 788 – 16 April 796 |
| Al-Hakam I | 12 June 796 – 21 May 822 |
| ʿAbd al-Raḥmān II ibn al-Ḥakam al-ʾUmawī | 21 May 822 – 852 |
| Muḥammad I ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-ʾUmawī | 852–886 |
| Al-Munḏhir ibn Muḥammad al-ʾUmawī | 886–888 |
| Abdullah ibn Muḥammad al-ʾUmawī | 888 — 15 October 912 |
| ʿAbd al-Raḥmān III ibn Muḥammad al-ʾUmawī | 16 October 912 – 16 January 929 |
| After Abd al-Rahman III proclaimed himself Caliphate of Córdoba, the jurisdiction changed from an emirate to a caliphate. | |
| Caliphate of Córdoba | |
| ʿAbd al-Raḥmān III al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh | 16 January 929 – 15 October 961 |
| Al-Hakam II | 15 October 961 – 16 October 976 |
| Hisham II | 16 October 976 – 1009 |
| Muḥammad II al-Mahdī bi'llāh | 1009 |
| Sulaymān al-Mustaʿin bi'llāh | 1009–1010 |
| Hisham II | 1010 – 19 April 1013 |
| Sulaymān al-Mustaʿin bi'llāh | 1013–1016 |
| ʿAbd al-Raḥmān IV al-Murtaḍā bi-llāh | 1017 |
| Dynasty ended by the Hammudid dynasty (1017–1023) | |
| Caliphate of Córdoba (Restored) | |
| ʿAbd al-Raḥmān V al-Mustaẓhir bi-llāh | 1023–1024 |
| Muhammad III al-Mustakfi bi-llāh | 1024–1025 |
| Interregnum of the Hammudid dynasty (1025–1026) | |
| Caliphate of Córdoba (Restored) | |
| Hisham III al-Muʿtad bi-llāh | 1026–1031 |
| Dynasty overthrown | |
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