A short time after Abu Obeidah wrote to the Caliph the following letter:
"In the name of the most merciful God, etc.
"This is to acquaint thee that I encamped at Yermouk, where Mahan
was near us with such an army as that the Mussulmans never beheld
a greater. But God, of his abundant grace and goodness, overthrew
this multitude and gave us the victory over them. We killed of them
about a hundred and fifty thousand, and took forty thousand
prisoners. Of the Mussulmans were killed four thousand and thirty,
to whom God had decreed the honor of martyrdom. Finding some heads
cut off, and not knowing whether they belonged to the Mussulmans or
Christians, I prayed over them and buried them. Mahan was afterward
killed at Damascus by Nooman Ebn Alkamah. There was one Abu Joaid
that before the battle had belonged to them, having come from Hems;
he drowned of them a great number unknown to any but God. As for
those that fled into the deserts and mountains, we have destroyed
them all, and stopped all the roads and passages, and God has made
us masters of their country, and wealth, and children.
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