ADMINISTRATIVE THEORY AND PRACTICEhim.229 All of this assumed and perhaps helped to create and to per-
petuate an atmosphere of distrust and intrigue. There is, however, very
little discussion in administrative theory of the consequences of relying
on informers except for repeated cautions against the motives of those
who carry false tales and the dangers of bribery. A protest against the
inherent possibility of slander is contained in the answer, recorded in
Arabic literature, given by Khusraw Anushirvan to a man who during
his audience handed him a note naming members of his own retinue
who had evil intentions toward him. He is supposed to have written
at the bottom of the note: "I rule the exterior of bodies, not intentions,
and judge according to justice, not to fancy, and I inquire about actions
(Ar. a<miil) not about secrets (Ar. sarii'ir)."230
The use of confidential agents to gather or to verify information is
described among Muslims fairly early, along with many of the same
attitudes and problems. <Uthman is supposed to have sent l:Iumran
ibn Aban, a native of Iraq who had been taken captive during the
conquest and had become <Uthman's mawlii, to Kufa in 647 to find
out if there was any truth to the complaints of the people about their
governor, al-Walid ibn <Uqba. l:Iumran allowed al-Walid to bribe
him, praised al-Walid to <Uthman, but told Marwan in private that
the charges were serious. Marwan informed <Uthman, who exiled
l:Iuriuan to Basra in anger for lying to him.^231 When <Ali was still at
Madina in 656, he sent Tha<laba ibn Yazid with one hundred horse-
men to investigate the complaints of the inhabitants of the Sawad of
Iraq about the abuses committed by the garrison there.^232 Later, when
<Ali sent al-l:Iarith ibn Murra from Kufa to get information about the
Khawarij, he order him to report to him properly without concealing
anything.m The adoption of Sasanian practice in such matters is as-
sumed for Ziyad, who had the advantage of information from con-
fidential officers. In a tendentious story in which Ziyad's knowledge
about his subjects is consciously put in the pattern of Ardashir ibn
Babak (Ardashir I), it is said that when someone appealed to Ziyad,
he would learn about that person beforehand. When the man arrived
and assumed that Ziyad knew nothing about him, the man would
229 JahshiyarI, Wuzarii', p. 11.
230 Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi, 'Iqd, IV, 222.
231 Baladhurl, Ansiib, V, 57-58.
232 Abii Yiisuf, Kharii;, p. 57; Ya~ya ibn Adam, Kharii;, p. 43.
233 D1nawari, Akhbiir at-tiwiil, p. 220; TabarI, Ta'rikh, I, 3375. Al-l::Iarith was caught
and killed by the Khawarij.