That same year a detachment of the Tatars reached Baʿqūbā, where al-Duwaydar met them in battle and routed them.

In Dhū al-Qaʿda the price of a gharāra (grain-sack) of wheat in Damascus climbed to 1,200 dirhams (1).

In 644 AH (2) the Khwarizmians ravaged the countryside and laid the villages waste. The armies of Aleppo and Homs went out to engage them but were disastrously beaten on the shore of Lake Homs; their commander Baraka Khan was killed. Al-Ṣāliḥ Ismāʿīl was thrown into confusion and sought asylum with the ruler of Aleppo.

That same year saw the circumcision of Aḥmad and ʿAbd al-Raḥmān—the caliph’s two sons—and of his brother ʿAlī (3); the banquet featured 1,500 heads of roast meat (4).

Two Tatar envoys arrived, one from Baraka and the other from Bāyjū. They conferred with Ibn al-ʿAlqamī, and the news was deliberately suppressed (5).

In that year the Franks seized Shāṭiba.

In 645 AH (6) al-Ṣāliḥ set out for Egypt, leaving his army to besiege Ascalon and Tiberias, both of which fell. The troops of Aleppo besieged Homs for months until its ruler al-Ashraf, worn down, surrendered the city; the following year he received Tell Bashir in compensation.

And in the year seven (7): the Franks stormed Damietta in Rabīʿ al-Awwal, and he fled—