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Several monks who endeavoured to evade this strict order were pitilessly mutilated, while a number of them, rebelling against the payment of the tax, retired into convents, thinking they could safely defraud the treasury. Assama, however, sent his soldiers to search these retreats, and all the monks found without rings were beheaded or put to death by the bastinado.
But of all the financial transactions of Assama, the one that vexed most the inhabitants of Egypt, and which brought down on him the most violent and implacable hatred, was the ordinance by which all ascending or descending the Nile were obliged to provide themselves with a passport bearing a tax. This exorbitant claim was carried out with an abusive and arbitrary sternness.
Careful about all that related to the Egyptian revenues, Assama commanded the keeping up of the various Nilometers, which still served to regulate the assessment of the ground tax. In the year 718 he learned that the Nilometer established at Helwan, a little below Fostât, had fallen in, and hastened to report the fact to the caliph.
On his accession to the throne Suleiman placed the government of Egypt in the hands of Assama ibn Yazid, with the title of agent-general of finances.
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