QMI-INS-036a · 88 AH
Inscription of Yazīd the Engraver (al-Naqqāsh)
نقش يزيد النقّاش
Syrian Ḥajj route, north-western Arabia (exact site not named in the publication)
- هذا ما شهد يزيد بأنه لا
- اله الا الله وحده وان
- محمد رسول
- الله وان الساعة اتية لا ريب
- فيها وان الله يبعث من
- في القبور حييت
- على ذلك ومت
- على ذلك وكتب يزيد
- النقاش في رمضان من سنة
- ثمان وثمانين
This is what Yazīd testified: that there is no god but God alone, and that Muḥammad is the Messenger of God, and that the Hour is coming, there is no doubt about it, and that God will raise up those in the graves. I lived by this and I died by this. And Yazīd the Engraver (al-Naqqāsh) wrote this in Ramaḍān of the year eighty-eight.
A long and carefully cut profession of faith, dated by month and year: Ramaḍān 88 AH (August–September 707 CE), in the caliphate of al-Walīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malik. It opens in the manner of a testimony, “this is what Yazīd testified” (hādhā mā shahida yazīd), and runs from the two parts of the shahādah to the Hour and the resurrection. The last clause (“the Hour is coming, there is no doubt about it, and God will raise up those in the graves”) follows Q 22:7 word for word. The writer then says that he lived by this belief and died by it (ḥayītu ʿalā dhālika wa-mittu ʿalā dhālika), a profession phrased as a testament.
Source: Desert Team (Farīq al-Ṣaḥrā’), “Riḥlat shitāʾ 1445 H (3): nuqūsh wa-suyūl ʿalā darb al-ḥajj al-shāmī”, alsahra.org, 16 December 2023. Reading by ʿAbdallāh ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Saʿīd; photography by the Desert Team.