Al-Abna'

Al-Abnāʾ (Arabic: الأبناء, lit. 'the sons') is a term that was used in South Arabia to refer to people whose lineage was paternally Iranian and maternally Arab. They represented a distinct community that had come into existence following the end of the Aksumite–Persian wars in the 6th century, when Persian soldiers began intermarrying with local Arab women in Sanaa and throughout Yemen. These couples' offspring and their descendants held an ethnic and cultural identity that was influenced by their mixed heritage from the Sasanian Empire and the Himyarite Kingdom, though they eventually assimilated into the society of the latter. In the 7th century, following the rise of Muhammad as an Islamic prophet in the Hejaz, most of the al-Abnāʾ community adopted Islam and took part in the early Muslim conquests, including the Muslim conquest of Persia.