PEOPLEwearing a thin black garment with a piece of cloth over his head to
protect him from the sun, he was mistaken for a dihqan.^29
However, there is no evidence that Arabs went so far as to adopt
the Sasanian clothing codes as a means of distinguishing different levels
in the social order, as L0kkegaard suggests.^30 The richness of the fabric
in their clothing was a reflection of relative wealth, but clothing did
not serve as symbols of status in the formal, late Sasanian sense. The
only example of the adoption of such Persian customs in the seventh
century concerns the royal privilege of uniqueness. It is said that when
ArdashIr I was crowned, no one in his kingdom put a branch of sweet
basil on his head in imitation, and that this privilege was claimed by
certain Arab Muslims after the conquest. After Sa'Id ibn al-'A~ (d.
ca. 676-77), who had been 'Uthman's governor at Kufa, retired to
Makka, no one wore a turban when he did. When al-I:Iajjaj wore a
long qalansuwwa, no one wore anything like it in his presence.^31
Muslims began to employ distinctions in clothing to indicate social
status or occupation only in the eighth century, when 'Umar 11 forbade
his Christian subjects to wear the qaba', silk clothing, or the turban.^32
Eventually, I:Ianafl law forbade dhimmis to wear the taylasan,33 but
there does not appear to be any Sasanian precedent for basing such
distinctions on religious differences.
During the seventh century, clothing was worn in the garrison cities
in a haphazard mixture of Arab and Persian styles. People combined
or alternated Persian garments with black and white turbans worn
alone or wound around a qalansuwwa or burnous. But the burnous,
shawl (Ar. mitraf), and turban could be of red or green silk.^34
There were practical difficulties to such sartorial acculturation. The
qalansuwwa and taylasan were meant to be worn in an upright, stately,
dignified position and were most appropriate to a ceremonial setting.
When two Azd tribesmen from Kufa tried to wear their qalansuwwas
while fording the Euphrates on horseback in 656, they lost the head-
pieces and had to dismount and retrieve themY And most obviously,
29 Ibid., VII(l), 10-11.
30 L0kkegaard, Islamic Taxation, p. 168.
31 Taj, p. 47.
32 Abii Yiisuf, Kharaj, p. 196.
33 Khadduri, Islamic Law of Nations, p. 277.
34 DInawarI, Akhbar at-#wal, p. 269; Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi, 'Iqd, V, 24; Ibn Sa'd,
Tabaqat, VI, 83, 96, 146, 175-76, 186; VII(l), 11, 14, 15, 117, 148; Tabarl, Ta'rikh,
II, 115, 863.
3S Tabari, Ta'rtkh, I, 3260.