A few days later, al-Karkhī was given the vizierate, but he too was dismissed after only a few days, and al-Muttaqī appointed the Daylamite Kurtakīn commander of commanders.
Bājkam was killed. He had taken up residence in Wāsiṭ and had undertaken to pay al-Rāḍī eight hundred thousand dinars each year. He ruled with fairness, and the sheer quantity of his wealth was the stuff of legend: he would pack the money in chests, place men in other chests, load them on camels, and go out into the open country. There he would open the boxes, have the men dig and bury the treasure, then return them to the chests so that they could not learn the location of the hoard, saying, “I do this only for fear that I might be cut off from my home.” All of it vanished when he died. (1)
Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Barīdī then fought him, and Abū ʿAbd Allāh prevailed. (2) Bājkam had gone out hunting; some Kurds were in the area, and a man named Aswad speared him to death in Rajab 329 AH. (3)
His followers—Kurtakīn, Tuzun, and others—made their way to Syria to Muḥammad ibn Rāʾiq. Al-Muttaqī summoned him, so he left Damascus and appointed a deputy over Syria. Having already seized control there, he designated Aḥmad ibn Maqātil as his lieutenant. When he arrived, al-Muttaqī received him with honor, placing the collar of office around his neck and the belt of authority at his waist.
Muḥammad ibn Ḥamdān (5) submitted to him, sending one hundred thousand dinars, and in Wāsiṭ and Baṣra al-Barīdī had the Friday sermon pronounced in his name and inscribed that name on his standards. Ibn Rāʾiq and Kurtakīn then fell out and fought for several days; Ibn Rāʾiq defeated him, later waned and disappeared, but regained power, exterminated a number of opponents, and captured Kurtakīn in the year 330 AH. (6) At that time a kurr (large measure) of wheat was sold. (7)