From the letter (1) of al-Qadi al-Fadil to Baghdad describing the fortress that Salah al-Din—may Allah grant him victory—(2) destroyed:

“(3) Its wall was thickened until it surpassed ten cubits. Massive blocks of stone were hewn for it; each single slab measured seven cubits—sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less—and the total exceeded twenty thousand stones. Not one stone was set in its place, nor raised into the structure, for less than four dinars apiece, and often more. Between the two faces of the wall a filling of solid rock was packed, forcing the proudest mountain peaks to bow. The whole was coated with a lime plaster that, when a man’s hand closed round a stone, blended with it body for body, binding to it more firmly and solidly than the stone itself, and warning every iron tool not to attempt its demolition.”

In this same year the Sultan al-Nasir Salah al-Din granted the city of Baalbek to his nephew ‘Izz al-Din Farrukhshah [son of Shahanshah ibn Ayyub] (4). Farrukhshah then launched a raid on Safad (5) and its districts, killing a large number (6) of their fighting men (7) and inhabitants. Farrukhshah was one of the redoubtable champions, a celebrated and lauded warrior in combat.

In that year:
Al-Qadi al-Fadil performed the pilgrimage from Damascus and returned to Egypt, suffering terrors on the road and meeting with hardship, fatigue, and exhaustion. The previous year he had gone on pilgrimage from Egypt and returned to Greater Syria, but that journey proved easier than this one.

In that year:
A mighty earthquake struck; because of it fortresses and villages collapsed and great multitudes of people perished. Huge rocks fell from mountaintops and, despite the wide distances that separated those mountains, they crashed against one another in the plains (8) and desolate wastes (9) and (10) (11).

In that year:
The people were afflicted by severe high prices, sweeping mortality (12), devastating famine (13), and crushing hardship (14), so that many died