Then there took place the strange conversation about dowry...

Then there took place the strange conversation about dowry, about which a poet says: “I have neither seen in Arabia nor anywhere else any person so generous that he should have given to any woman dowry equal to that of Qattam i.e. three thousand dirhams, one slave, one slave-girl and the assassination of Ali with a sharp sword. Howsoever large a dowry may be it cannot be greater than Ali, and every murder is easier as compared with that of Ali, which was committed by ibn Muljam”.

The conversation of Qattam and ibn Muljam ended with this remark of the latter: “All right. It will be as you wish. I undertake to assassinate Ali”. The three Kharijites who had plotted against…