Governor of Iraq under the Umayyad caliphs Abd al-Malik and Walid.
Al-Hajjaj first distinguished himself in the year 691 by restoring disipline to the troops which the caliph Abd al-Malik intended to send to Iraq against its governor, the brother of Ibn al-Zubayr. After the defeat of the Iraqi governor, al-Hajjaj was sent to Mecca with Syrian troops under his command to subdue the rebellion of Ibn al-Zubayr and his followers. After a seven-month seige, Ibn al-Zubayr was killed and unity was restored to the Muslim empire.
The severity of al-Hajjaj's dealings with the inhabitants of the Hijaz led to his transfer to Iraq in 694. Over the next three years, he successfully subdued a series of Kharijite rebellions and restored order to the region. In 697 Abd al-Malik granted al-Hajjaj the governorships of Khurasan and Sijistan; he subsequently had to contend with a massive rebellion led by the general Ibn al-Ashath, a rebellion which was not quelled until 701. A year later al-Hajjaj built the garrison Wasit midway between Kufa and Basra to house his Syrian soldiers and isolate them from the Iraqis.
Under the caliph Walid, al-Hajjaj was given a free hand. It was his wise selection of generals which contributed to the expansion of the Muslim empire further east to Transoxiana. He is credited with introducing vowel marks to the Qur'anic text, thus earning the displeasure of the Qur'an reciters. Al-Hajjaj also translated the tax diwan into Arabic and invested in the improvement of agriculture. He died one year before Walid, in 714.