Abd al-Aziz ibn Musa

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Abd al-Aziz ibn Musa bin Nusair (عبد العزيز بن موسى) was the son of the Umayyad governor of Ifriqiya Musa bin Nusair. He crossed the strait of Gilbratar in 712 to take part in the Muslim invasion of the Iberian Peninsula.

With his brother Adb Allah, he suppressed a revolt in Seville, going from there to Málaga, Granada and Orihuela where he signed the Treaty of Tudmir with Count Teodomiro, lord of seven towns in south-east Hispania, on 5 April, 713. In 714, his father, Musa ibn Nusayr was required by the Caliph to surrender bills of the conquest in Damascus and Abd al-Aziz was named as head of the army and governor of Al Andalus.

From this point he undertook the conquest of Christian lands taking Tarragona and arriving as far as Narbonne in Septimania. He married Egilona (also known as Ailo), widow of Visigothic King Rodrigo, whom he had taken prisoner.

Legends and rumors speak of the influence that Ailo had on her new husband in favor of the Christians and her encouragement for him to convert to Christianity and to be crowned king of Hispania.

In 716 Abd al-Aziz was killed in a revolt inspired by Ayyub ibn Habib al-Lakhmi (subsequently fourth Umayyad governor of Al Andalus), the assassin being Ziyad ibn Udhra, one of his fighters, who murdered him whilst he was praying in a mosque in Seville that had been converted from the Church of Santa Rufina.

By Caliph's Sulayman order, his head was sent to Damascus.