and the bulk of the tribe went to Oman, where they established the Azdi presence in Eastern Arabia. Later they invaded Karaman and Shiraz in Southern Persia, and these came to be known as "Azd Daba". Another branch headed west back to Yemen, and a group went further west all the way to Tihamah on the Red Sea. This group was to become known as "Azd Uman" after the emergence of Islam.
Jafna bin Amr
and his family headed for Syria, where he settled and initiated the kingdom of the Ghassanids. They were so named after a spring of water where they stopped on their way to Syria. This branch was to produce:
left his tribe Al-Azd for the Hijaz and dwelt between Thalabiyah and Dhi Qar. When he gained strength, he headed for Yathrib, where he stayed. Of his seed are the great Aws and Khazraj, sons of Haritha bin Thalabah. These were to be the Muslim Ansar and were to produce the last Arab dynasty in Spain.
Haritha bin Amr
Haritha bin Amr led a branch of the Azd Qahtani tribes. He wandered with his tribe in the Hijaz until they came to the Tihamah. He had three sons Adi, Afsa and Lahi. Adiy was the father ofBariq, Lahi the father of Khuza'a and Afsa, the father of Aslam.
The Zahran tribe is an ancient Arabian offshoot of the Azd tribe, also originating from the Kingdom of Saba'. The shortage of water prompted them to relocate to Al-Bahah in the Arabian Peninsula. Today members of the Zahran tribe can be found all over the Middle East and beyond. According to Arab scholars, the dialect used by the Hejazi tribes, the Zahran and the Ghamid, is the closest to classical Arabic.
Azd 'Uman
The Azd 'Uman were the dominant Arab tribe in the eastern realms of the Caliphate and were the driving force in the conquest of Fars, Makran and Sindh. They were the chief merchant group of Oman and Al-Ubulla, who organized a trading diaspora with settlements of Persianized Arabians on the coasts of Kirman and Makran, extending into Sindh since the days of Ardashir. They were strongly involved in the western trade with India and with the expansion of the Muslim conquests they began to consolidate their commercial and political authority on the eastern frontier. During the early years of the Muslim conquests the Azdi ports of Bahrain and Oman were staging grounds for Muslim naval fleets headed to Fars and Hind. From 637 CE the conquests of Fars and Makran were dominated by the Azdi and allied tribes from Oman. Between 665 CE and 683 CE the Azdi 'Uman became especially prominent due in Basra on account of favors from Ziyad ibn Abihi, the Governor of Muawiya I, and his son Ubaidullah. When a member of their tribe Abu SaidAl- Muhallab ibn Abi Sufra became governor their influence and wealth increased as he extended Muslim conquests to Makran and Sindh, where so many other Azdi were settled. After his death in 702, though, they lost their grip on power with the rise of Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf as governor of Iraq. Al-Hajjaj pursued a systematic policy of breaking Umayyad power, as a result of which the Azdi also suffered. With the death of Hajjaj and under Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik as Caliph, their fortunes reversed once again, with the appointment of Yazid ibn al-Muhallab.
