the ground over and over, while the caliph watched from the window, and the vizier kept imploring, “O Commander of the Faithful, have mercy on my gray hair, my exile, my sons, and my dependents!” He was reinstated as vizier in the following year through the intercession of Dubays ibn Mazyad. Poets lauded him, and the people rejoiced at his return to office; the day he entered Baghdad was unforgettable for the vast crowds and their tearful joy at his arrival.
Among the notable persons who died that year were:
ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Muḥammad ibn Yūsuf (1), Abū Manṣūr, nicknamed “the Eminent Shaykh.” He was unrivaled in his time for enjoining right and forbidding wrong, hastening to good works, bestowing favors upon those who deserved them among the Sunnis, showing firm resolve in opposing and suppressing the innovators, seeking out the modestly needy, giving charity to the poor, and concealing these acts to the utmost of his ability. A remarkable incident occurred in connection with him: each year he assigned ten dinars to a certain man, writing an order for the amount on one called Ibn Riḍwān. When the shaykh died, the man went to Ibn Riḍwān to request what had been allotted to him. Ibn Riḍwān replied, “The one who used to write that order for you has died, and I can give you nothing.” The man then went to the shaykh’s grave, recited some Qur’an, and prayed for him; when he turned away, he found a slip of paper containing ten dinars (2). He took it to Ibn Riḍwān and told him what had happened. Ibn Riḍwān said, “Brother, these must have fallen from me today—take them, and I shall give you the same amount every year.” The shaykh died on the fifteenth of Muḥarram that year at the age of sixty-five. His funeral was attended by a multitude whose number is known only to Allah—exalted is He. May Allah have mercy on him and ennoble his resting place.
Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan al-Ṭūsī (3), a jurist of the Shiʿah, also died this year and was buried at the shrine of ʿAlī. He had been residing there since his house in al-Karkh was burned in 448 AH until Muḥarram of this year, when he passed away and was laid to rest.
Khadījah bint Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allah (4), the preacher known as al-Shāhajānīyah, was born in 374 AH and was buried beside Ibn Samʿūn (5).