Second Fitna

The Second Fitna, or Second Islamic civil war, was a period of general political and
military disorder that afflicted the Islamic world during the early Umayyad dynasty,
following the death of the first Umayyad caliph Muawiyah I. There seems to be a lack
of solid consensus on the exact range of years that define the conflict, with several
different historians dating the Second Fitna differently. Some see the end of
Muawiya's reign in 680 AD as marking the beginning of the period, while the year
683 (following the death of Muawiya's son the caliph Yazid I) is cited by others.
Similarly, the end is variously dated from 685 (after the ascension of caliph Abd al-
Malik ibn Marwan) to 692 (following the death of Ibn al-Zubair and the termination
of his revolt). The dates 683-685 seem to be the most commonly used.

The Second Fitna was a time of complexity in the Islamic world, involving a number
of different occurrences that were seemingly not directly connected with one another.
A brief sketch of the major events of the period may however be given as follows.

The first Umayyad caliph Muawiya I was succeeded upon his death in 680 by his son,
Yazid I. Yazid's first opposition came from supporters of Husayn ibn Ali, who was the
grandson of the prophet Muhammad and the son of the former caliph Ali ibn Abi
Talib, who had been assassinated. Husayn and many of his closest supporters were
killed by Yazid's troops at the Battle of Karbala. This battle is often cited as the
definitive break between the Shi'a and Sunni sects of Islam, and until this day it has
been commemorated each year by Shi'a muslims on the Day of Ashura.

Following these occurrences, Yazid faced a second revolt from Ibn al-Zubair, who
was the son of a former Sahabi, Zubayr ibn al-Awwam, who had previously revolted
against the caliph Ali at the Battle of Bassorah. Ibn al-Zubayr's rebellion was seen by
many as an attempt to return to the pristine values of the the early Islamic community,
and his revolt was welcomed by a number of parties that were unhappy with the
Umayyad rule for various reasons. Following the sudden death of Yazid and his son
Muawiyah II in 683, Ibn al-Zubayr gained widespread recognition as caliph, but he
was isolated in the Hejaz region when Kharijite rebels established an independent
state in central Arabia in 684.

Other Kharijite uprisings followed in Iraq and Iran, while Shiites revolted in Kufah to
avenge the death of Husayn and to promote another of Ali's sons as a candidate for
caliph. Eventually, order was restored by Syrian forces supporting the Umayyad chief
Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, who attained the caliphate in 685. He was able to defeat all
of his various rivals, and he killed Ibn al-Zubair in 692, bringing this period of
exceptional turbulence to an end.