and he imprisoned Karbuqā, then marched out, taking possession of the Jazīrah, then Khilāṭ (1), and after that the whole of Azerbaijan. His power became formidable, but Barkyāruq raided his camp; he was routed, his treasuries were lost, and he withdrew to Isfahan, whose people opened their gates to him in deceit and then seized him. His brother, the ruler of Isfahan, Maḥmūd, a seven-year-old child, died of smallpox, whereupon Barkyāruq was proclaimed sultan, with al-Muʾayyad ibn Niẓām al-Mulk as his vizier, and he mustered men and material.
The Egyptian caliph al-Mustanṣir died, as did the commander of the armies, Badr, and the governor of Mecca, Muḥammad ibn Abī Hāshim—the man who had plundered the pilgrims’ delegation. Barkyāruq next met his uncle Tutush; Tutush was killed in the battle, and Damascus passed to his son Duqāq Shams al-Mulūk.
The ruler of Samarqand, Aḥmad Khān, was killed as well. Courtiers had encouraged him in permissiveness until he lapsed into outright heresy. The emirs arrested him and testified against him; the scholars issued a legal verdict for his execution, and they enthroned his cousin in his stead.
In the year ninety, the ruler of Marw, Arghūn—brother of Sultan Malikshāh—was killed. A ruthless tyrant, he was slain by one of his own mamlūks. He had governed Nishapur and Balkh too, but rebelled and tore down the walls of his cities.
The Fatimid deputy in Ṣūr (Tyre) rebelled; an army came, besieged the city, stormed it, and killed many of its inhabitants, the deputy among them.
Sultan Barkyāruq then equipped an army under his brother Sanjar. News of Arghūn’s death reached them, so the sultan joined the force, seized the whole of Khurasan, and the Friday sermon was delivered in his name in Samarqand. Nations submitted to him. He appointed his brother Sanjar—still a youth—as his viceroy in Khurasan, and he placed over Khwarazm Muḥammad ibn Anushtekīn, a Seljuk freedman noted for virtue, culture, and justice. After him his son, Khwarazm-Shah Atsiz—the father of Khwarazm-Shah ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn—succeeded to power.