Muhammad ibn al-Zayyat

Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Malik, better known as Ibn al-Zayyāt (Arabic: ابن الزيات‎‎), was a wealthy merchant who became a court official and served as vizier of the Abbasid caliphs al-Mu'tasim, al-Wathiq, and al-Mutawakkil, from 836 until his downfall and death by torture in 847.

Muhammad ibn al-Zayyat belonged to a wealthy family of merchants. The family was probably of Persian. His father, Abd al-Malik, had made a fortune as an oil trader (whence his sobriquet al-Zayyāt) in Baghdad at the time of al-Ma'mun (r. 813–833), and became involved in the lucrative government contracts for tents, ceremonial parasols (al-mushammas), and riding equipment. Muhammad succeeded his father in these activities. By the end of al-Mamun's reign, Ibn al-Zayyat had become secretary in the caliphal chancellery.

According to al-Tabari, al-Mu'tasim's first vizier, al-Fadl ibn Marwan, upbraided Ibn al-Zayyat for daring to appear at court in ceremonial garb, with the black Abbasid robes (durrāʿah) and girt sword, although he was "only a trader". Al-Fadl also tried to have Dulayl ibn Ya'qub al-Nasrani examine Ibn al-Zayyat's financial activities for irregularities, but Dulayl was lenient and did not confiscate anything from Ibn al-Zayyat. In 836, however, al-Mu'tasim dismissed al-Fadl, and appointed Ibn al-Zayyat in his place. He would continue to hold the vizierate for the remainder of al-Mu'tasim's reign, as well as the reign of al-Wathiq (r. 842–847), and into the reign of al-Mutawakkil (r. 847–861), who had him executed.

As vizier, Ibn al-Zayyat became one of the leading men of the state, and the chief civilian minister alongside the head qādī, Ahmad ibn Abi Duwad, with whom he entertained a fierce personal rivalry. He was responsible for much of the construction work on al-Mu'tasim's new capital, Samarra. In 840 he was the chief prosecutor in the show trial against al-Afshin, prince of Ushrusana and until then one of the leading military commanders of the regime; al-Afshin was accused, among other things, of being a false Muslim, and of being accorded divine status by his subjects in his native Ushrusana. Despite putting up an able and eloquent defence, al-Afshin was found guilty and thrown into prison. He died soon after, either of starvation or of poison; his body was publicly gibbeted in front of the palace gates, burned, and thrown in the Tigris.

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