Abū ʿUthmān Abān ibn Marwān ibn al-Ḥakam (Arabic: أبو عثمان أبان بن مروان بن الحكم) was an Umayyad prince and governor of Palestine under his brother, Caliph Abd al-Malik (r. 685–705).
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Career
Aban was the son of the Umayyad caliph Marwan I (r. 684–685) and Umm Aban al-Kubra, a daughter of the third caliph, Uthman (r. 644–656). Aban's half-brother, Abd al-Malik (r. 685–705), appointed him, for an undetermined period, governor of Palestine and the Balqa subdistrict of Damascus. According to the historian Moshe Gil, Aban was later made governor of Jordan. Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, one of the most powerful figures in the Umayyad Caliphate as viceroy of Iraq and the eastern provinces, started his career in the shurta (security forces) of Aban.
Family and descendants
Aban was married to Zaynab bint Abd al-Rahman, a granddaughter of the commander al-Harith ibn Hisham of the Banu Makhzum clan. She gave birth to Aban's children; although scholar Majied Robinson holds none of their children are named in the sources, orientalist Leone Caetani names Abd al-Aziz, citing the Kitab al-aghani. According to Ibn Asakir, Abd al-Aziz left numerous descendants in Syria.