over him, and al-Nasir thereupon sent him an investiture diploma for the sultanate. He donned the robe of honor and laid siege to Alamut, but a Batinite assassin pounced on his vizier and killed him, and they also slew the head of the Shafiʿi scholars, Sadr al-Din Ibn al-Wazzan.

The Sultan of the Maghrib, Yaʿqub, died, and his son Muḥammad succeeded him.

The ruler of Egypt, al-Malik al-ʿAzīz, son of Ṣalāḥ al-Din, passed away. Al-Afdal came from Sarchad to Egypt, managed the realm on behalf of ʿAlī ibn al-ʿAzīz, then marched with the army to confront his uncle al-ʿĀdil in Damascus. He burned the surrounding settlements, almost took the city, and blockaded it for months. Reinforcements reached al-ʿĀdil; they attacked the Egyptians, and al-Afdal’s cause weakened.

In the year 596 AH Sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Din Tukush ibn Ātsiz, the Khwarazm-Shah, died, and his son Muḥammad assumed the throne.

The siege of Damascus grew fiercer; al-ʿĀdil’s treasuries were exhausted on the army, so he borrowed, and scarcity and hardship in Damascus became acute. When winter set in, al-Afdal and al-Ẓāhir withdrew. Al-ʿĀdil hastened after al-Afdal, caught up with him at al-Ghurābī, entered Cairo, secured control, and drove al-Afdal—ill-starred—back to Sarchad after a clash between them. Al-ʿĀdil then appointed his son al-Kāmil as deputy over Egypt, deposed al-Manṣūr ʿAlī ibn al-ʿAzīz, and said, “This boy belongs in school.” (1)

The Nile fell far below its mark, famine struck, and the people of Egypt perished—one of the great portents—for the river was short of its usual flood by thirteen cubits less three finger-breadths.

When the year 597 AH began, the ordeal was severe: people ate carrion and even human flesh, and horrors occurred that words cannot convey.