six thousand horsemen together with his nephew, but Ibn Ghāniya routed them. Yaʿqūb then marched out in person; the armies met, ʿAlī was defeated with grievous losses, and Yaʿqūb recovered the provinces—yet Ibn Ghāniya’s dominion endured for fifty years (1).

Saladin pressed the siege of al-Karāk with renewed vigor.

In 581 AH Saladin advanced on Mosul and maintained a close blockade; he then proceeded to Mayyāfāriqīn, which surrendered to him under a guarantee of safety. While in Harran he fell seriously ill, and the hair of his beard began to fall out. The lord of Ḥimṣ, Muḥammad ibn Shīrkūh, died, whereupon the Sultan entrusted the city to his son Asad al-Dīn and conferred on him the honorific al-Malik al-Mujāhid.

In 582 AH a fierce conflict broke out between the Kurds and the Turkmans across Mosul, the Jazīra, Azerbaijan, Syria, and Shahrazur. It dragged on for years, countless people were killed, and the roads became impassable until Qaymaz, the deputy of Mosul, reconciled them. The whole affair had begun with a Turkman wedding.

That same year, al-ʿImād relates: Astrologers throughout the realm agreed that the world would be ruined when the six planets converged in Libra, bringing a whirlwind that would inundate every land. Many people set about digging and reinforcing caves, while our Sultan remained unmoved, certain their pronouncement was sheer falsehood. When the appointed night arrived, not so much as a breeze stirred.

Ibn al-Buzūrī adds: During that month the air over Baghdad stood still and turned dark, and no one winnowed the grain.