Abu al-Mughira Ziyad ibn Abihi, also known as Ziyad ibn Abi Sufyan, was an administrator and statesman of the successive Rashidun and Umayyad caliphates in the mid-7th century. He served as the governor of Basra in 665–670 and ultimately the first governor of Iraq and practical viceroy of the eastern Caliphate between 670 and his death.
Sasanian-style silver dirham, struck in the name of "Ziyad ibn Abi Sufyan"
A creek in Basra in the early 20th century. Ziyad began his career in Basra in 636 and served as its governor between 665 and his death in 673
The Umayyad Caliphate or Umayyad Empire was the second caliphate established after the death of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty. Uthman ibn Affan, the third of the Rashidun caliphs, was also a member of the clan. The family established dynastic, hereditary rule with Mu'awiya I, the long-time governor of Greater Syria, who became caliph after the end of the First Fitna in 661. After Mu'awiya's death in 680, conflicts over the succession resulted in the Second Fitna, and power eventually fell to Marwan I, from another branch of the clan. Syria remained the Umayyads' main power base thereafter, with Damascus as their capital.
Arab-Sasanian-style Umayyad coin minted under Mu'awiya I rule in Basra in 675/76 in the name of the Umayyad governor Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad. The latter's governorship later spanned all of the eastern caliphate. His father Ziyad ibn Abihi was adopted as a half-brother by Mu'awiya I, who made him his practical viceroy over the eastern caliphate.
Abd al-Malik introduced an independent Islamic currency, the gold dinar, in 693, which originally depicted a human figure, likely the caliph, as shown in this coin minted in 695. In 697, the figural depictions were replaced solely by Qur'anic and other Islamic inscriptions
The expansion of the Muslim Caliphate until 750, from William R. Shepherd's Historical Atlas. Muslim state at the death of Muhammad Expansion under the Rashidun Caliphate Expansion under the Umayyad Caliphate Byzantine Empire
A 14th-century illustration of the siege of Constantinople