Then the year 581 AH began. It opened (1) while the Sultan was encamped outside Hama. He marched (2) to Aleppo, where his brother al-‘Adil came out to greet him and the armies gathered around him. In the month of Ṣafar he set out (3) from there with the intention (4) of taking Mosul. He crossed the Euphrates and reached Ḥarrān, where he arrested its ruler, Muzaffar al-Din (5) ibn Zayn al-Din, the brother (6) of Zayn al-Din, lord of Irbil. Later, when the Sultan recognized the soundness of his intentions (7), he became reconciled with him and reinstated him in his domain.

From Ḥarrān he advanced toward Mosul. The kings of every surrounding region came out to meet him, and ‘Imād al-Din Abū Bakr ibn Qara Arslan, ruler of Diyar Bakr and Amida, entered his service. While with the Sultan he received word of the death of his brother Nūr al-Din (8) ibn Qara Arslan (9). He asked leave to take possession of his brother’s principality, and permission was granted.

The Sultan then pressed on and encamped against the Isma‘ilis near Mosul. The lord of Irbil, Zayn al-Din ibn Zayn al-Din—one (10) of the princes of that region who had already submitted to him, as noted earlier—also came to wait upon him.

The Sultan dispatched Ḍiyā’ al-Din (11) ibn Kamāl al-Din al-Shahrazūrī to the Caliph to inform him of his intention to besiege Mosul; his sole aim was to bring its people back under obedience to the Imām (12) and to champion Islam.

He invested the city for a time, but toward the end of Rabī‘ al-Ākhir he broke camp (13) without having taken it. He then marched to Khilāṭ (14) and took control of