• ʿAli ibn Muwafaq, the Ascetic ⦗1⦘.

• Muhammad ibn Sahnun ⦗2⦘.

Ibn al-Athir relates in his al-Kamil ⦗3⦘:

In this same year, Abu al-Fadl al-ʿAbbas ibn al-Faraj al-Riyashi—an associate of Abu ʿUbayda and al-Asmaʿi—was slain; the Zanj killed him in Basra.

Yaʿqub ibn al-Layth al-Saffar ⦗4⦘ was one of the shrewd and heroic kings. He opened many lands, among them the country of Rukhkhaj ⦗5⦘, whose ruler was carried on a golden litter borne upon the heads of twelve men. That ruler had a house atop a lofty mountain which he had named “Mecca.” Yaʿqub persisted until he killed him, seized his realm, and its people embraced Islam at his hands. However, he had broken his allegiance to the caliph, and Abu Ahmad al-Muwaffaq fought him, as noted earlier.

When Yaʿqub died, they invested his brother ʿAmr ibn al-Layth with everything that had been under Yaʿqub’s authority, together with the command of the shurṭa (police) of Baghdad and Samarra ⦗6⦘, as will be mentioned.

Then the year 266 AH began.

In Safar of that year, Asatikin overpowered the city of Rayy, expelling its governor. He then proceeded to Qazwin; its inhabitants sued for peace, so he entered the city ⦗7⦘ and took from it a large sum of money. He subsequently returned to Rayy, whose people barred him from entry; he fought them and captured it by force.

That same year, a Byzantine detachment raided the district of Diyar Rabiʿa, killing, mutilating, and plundering roughly two hundred and fifty—