ostat in the year 708 (a.h. 86) at the very
time when, with many fresh plans for the future, he had completed the
building of a large and magnificent palace called ed-Dar el-mudahaba
(the golden house), and a quarter of the town called Suk el-hammam (the
pigeon market). The Caliph Abd el-Malik felt deeply the loss of this
brother, whose qualities he highly appreciated and whom he had appointed
as his successor.

He now named as his heir to the caliphate Walid, his eldest son, and
replaced Abd el-Aziz in the government of Egypt with his second son,
Abd Allah ibn Abd el-Malik. The Kopts hoped to obtain from the new
governor the repeal of the act that exacted yearly tribute from the
clergy, but Abd Allah did not think it fair to grant this unjust
discrimination against the poorer classes of the Egyptians. Those monks
who have written the history of the patriarchs have therefore painted
Abd Allah in even blacker colours than they did his predecessor. For
the rest, Abd Allah only held the reins of government in Egypt until the
death of his father, which occurred a few months later.

[Illustration: 337b.jpg COIN OF OTHMAN]

Suleiman succeeded his brother Walid I. The new caliph vigorously put
into execution all the plans his brother had formed for the propagation
of the religion of the Prophet. In the first year of his reign he
conquered Tabaristan and Georgia, and sent his brother Maslama to lay
fresh siege to Constantinople. On his accession to the throne Suleiman
placed the government of Egypt in the hands of Assama ibn Yazid, with
the title of agent-general of finances.

The Koptic clerical historians, according to their usual habit, portray
this governor as still worse than his predecessors, but in this case
the Mussulman authorities are in agreement in accusing him of the most
iniquitous extortions and most barbarous massacres. The gravest reproach
they bring against him is that, calling all the monks together, he told
them that not only did he intend to maintain the old regulations of Abd
el-Aziz, by which they had to pay an annual tax of one dinar ($2.53),
but also that they would be obliged to receive yearly from his agents an
iron ring bearing their name and the date of the financial transaction,
for which ring they were to make personal contribution. He forced
the wearing of this ring continually, and the hand found without this
strange form of receipt was to be cut off. Several monks who endeavoured
to evade t