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Yusuf ibn 'Abd al-Rahman al-Fihri was the Umayyad governor of Narbonne in Septimania and later governor of Al Andalus from 747-756, ruling independently following the collapse of the Umayyad Caliphate in 750. Between 716 and 756 Al Andalus was ruled by governors sent from Damascus or appointed on the recommendation of emirs of Ifriqiya to which it administratively belonged.^[1]

After becoming ruler al-Fihri conducted a census,^[2] as part of which Bishop Hostegesis prepared a list of tax and jizya payers. The bishop then made annual visits to makes sure the taxes were collected properly.^[3]

He led a campaign against the Basques of Pamplona in 755 but was defeated,^[4] and is said to have horrified tribal sensibilities by raping two of Abd ar-Rahman's slaves, thus contributing to the factional conflicts in Al Andalus at that time.^[5]

Yusuf al-Fihri was defeated at the Battle of Musarah^[6] just outside Córdoba in March 756 by Abd ar-Rahman I, who, having fled Syria in 755 to escape from the Abbasids, became the first Emir of Córdoba.

• Battle of Avignon
• Battle of Narbonne (737)
• Timeline of the Muslim presence in the Iberian peninsula

1. ^ Abun-Nasr, Jamil M. (1987). A History of the Maghrib in the Islamic Period. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-33767-4, p. 71.
2. ^ Wolf, Kenneth Baxter (2000). Conquerors and Chroniclers of Early Medieval Spain. Liverpool University Press, ISBN 0-85323-554-6, p. 156.
3. ^ Imamuddin, S. M. (1981). Muslim Spain - 711-1492 A.D: A Sociological Study. Brill Academic Publishers. ISBN 90-04-06131-2, p. 58.
4. ^ Trask, R. Larry (1996). The History of Basque. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-13116-2, p. 12.
5. ^ Scales, Peter C. (1994). The Fall of the Caliphate of Cordoba: Berbers and Andalusis in Conflict. Brill Academic Publishers. ISBN 90-04-09868-2, p. 66.
6. ^ Al-Sulami, Mishal Fahm (2004). The West and Islam: Western Liberal Democracy Versus the System of Shura. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-31634-0, p. 207.