generous fiefs (1), and from the public treasury and its revenues he set aside what the fleet required for all its affairs. The Sultan then returned to Cairo in the middle of Ramadan and completed the fast there.

In that same year:
• Sultan Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn Yūsuf ordered that a Shāfiʿī madrasa be constructed over the tomb of Imām al-Shāfiʿī (2), appointing Shaykh Najm al-Dīn al-Khabūshānī (3) as its professor and superintendent.

• He also commanded that a mārastān (hospital) be built in Cairo and endowed it with numerous waqfs (4).

• In Mosul, the amir Mujāhid al-Dīn Qīmāz (5), deputy of the citadel, erected an elegant congregational mosque, a ribāṭ (hostel for warriors or Sufis), a madrasa, and a mārastān side by side outside the city walls. His death was delayed until 595 AH—may Allah have mercy on him (6). He founded several other madrasas, khānqāhs (7), and mosques beyond what we have mentioned. He was devout, virtuous, and eminent, a Hanafi jurist who loved to discuss literature, poetry, and fiqh, frequently fasted, and spent many nights in prayer. May Allah sanctify his soul.

• In this year the people afflicted with leprosy were removed from Baghdad to one of its outskirts so that they might be set apart from those in good health—may Allah, by His grace and generosity, grant us well-being (8).

Ibn al-Jawzī relates in al-Muntaẓam (9) that a woman said: “I was walking along the road and a man kept confronting me whenever I passed by. I told him, ‘The only lawful way to what you desire from me is through a contract and witnesses.’ He therefore married me before the judge, and we lived together for a while. Then his belly became swollen; we thought he had dropsy and treated him for it. After some time he gave birth to a child just as women do, and it turned out that he was an ambiguous hermaphrodite. This is among the strangest of occurrences, and Allah knows best.” (10)

Among the notable persons who died this year was ʿAlī ibn ʿAsākir ibn al-Muraḥḥab ibn al-ʿAwām, Abū al-Ḥasan al-Baṭāʾiḥī, the Qurʼān-reciter and linguist (11).