In this year:
The ascent of Sultan Muḥammad ibn Malik-Shāh began. He was the full brother of Sultan Sanjar, and his authority soon swelled until, in Dhū al-Ḥijjah of the present year, the Friday sermon in Baghdad was proclaimed in his name.
In the same year:
He marched on Rayy, found Zubaydah Khātūn—the mother of his brother Barkiyārūq—and ordered that she be strangled. She was at that time forty-two years old.
Likewise, in Dhū al-Ḥijjah of this year he fought five momentous engagements with Barkiyārūq.
During this year prices in Baghdad soared so high that many people perished from hunger, and a violent epidemic struck them, so that the survivors were unable to bury the dead because of their sheer numbers.
Among the notable deaths recorded this year were:
The sultan Ibrāhīm, son of Sultan Masʿūd (1) son of Sultan Maḥmūd ibn Subuktikīn (2), ruler of Ghazna, the borders of India, and other regions. He enjoyed complete prestige and truly magnificent pomp. Al-Kiyā al-Harrāsī, whom Sultan Barkiyārūq had once dispatched to him on an embassy, related what he witnessed of the trappings of sovereignty surrounding him—his dress, his court, and the wealth he possessed—manifestations of worldly prosperity. He said, “I saw something astonishing,” and then admonished him with the ḥadīth:
“The napkins of Saʿd ibn Muʿādh in Paradise are better than this.” (3)
At these words the sultan wept.
Al-Kiyā added: “Ibrāhīm would never build a residence for himself without first erecting a mosque, a madrasa, or a ribāṭ.” He—may Allah the Exalted have mercy on him—died in Rajab of this year, having surpassed the age of ninety. His reign lasted forty-two years.
ʿAbd al-Bāqī ibn Yūsuf ibn ʿAlī ibn Ṣāliḥ (4) Abū Turāb al-Marāghī (5).