holders be allowed to emigrate to another place, after which he destroyed it. When Sufyân ibn-ʿAuf al-Ghâmidi made an expedition against the Greeks in the year 30, he started from Marʿash and made a tour in the land of the Greeks. Marʿash was built by Muʿâwiyah and populated by him with troops. After the death of Yazîd ibn-Muʿâwiyah, the Greeks reiterated their attacks on the city and so the inhabitants had to desert it. ʿAbd-al-Malik ibn-Marwân, after the death of his father, Marwân ibn-al-Ḥakam, and after asserting his claim upon the caliphate, made terms with the Greeks, agreeing to pay them a certain sum. But in the year 74, Muḥammad ibn-Marwân attacked the Greeks, and thus the peace was broken.
In the year 75, Muḥammad ibn-Marwân once more led the summer campaign, and the Greeks went forth in Jumâda I from Marʿash to al-Aʿmâḳ [valleys]. The Moslems marched against them under Abân ibn-al-Walîd ibn-ʿUḳbah ibn-abi-Muʿaiṭ accompanied by Dinâr ibn-Dinâr, a freedman of ʿAbd-al-Malik ibn-Marwân and a governor of Ḳinnasrîn and its districts. The two armies met in ʿAmḳ [valley] Marʿash where a fierce battle was fought, resulting in the defeat of the Greeks. The Moslems chased them, massacring and capturing. In this same year, Dinâr came across a band of Greeks at Jisr [bridge] Yaghra about ten miles from Shimshâṭ, and routed them. Later al-ʿAbbâs ibn-al-Walîd ibn-ʿAbd-al-Malik came to Marʿash, built it, fortified it, moved people into it and erected in it a cathedral mosque. He imposed upon the people of Ḳinnasrîn a contingent of troops to be sent to Marʿash.
When Marwân ibn-Muḥammad during his caliphate was busy fighting against Ḥimṣ, the Greeks came against Marʿash and invested it until its inhabitants made terms to evacuate it. Accordingly, they together with their families left for Mesopotamia and the district of Ḳinnasrîn, upon which
