so he banished him and forbade him to speak in public or issue fatwas, because of his audacity and haste in pronouncing takfīr (excommunication) and in permitting blood-shed, as well as the ignorance that prompted him to this and other excesses. (1)

On Friday, the first of Ṣafar, Ibn al-Zamlakānī read a royal decree from the sultan’s gallery in the presence of the viceroy and the chief judge. It ordered the abolition of the tax-leases on the bow-makers and on the shadd (2) along with various other imposts, whereupon the people offered prayers for the sultan.

In the latter part of Rabīʿ al-Awwal the judges assembled in the Great Mosque to review the conduct of the court witnesses. They forbade them to sit in the mosques, ruled that none of them might hold two posts at once, prohibited them from registering documents, from taking payment for giving testimony, from backbiting anyone, and instructed them to be fair to one another in their livelihoods. The judges met a second time for the same purpose and arranged a third session, but that meeting never materialised and no one surrendered his post. (3)

On Wednesday the 25th of that month a council was convened in the house of Ibn Ṣaṣrā for Badr al-Dīn ibn Biṣkhān. (4) Some aspects of his Qurʾānic readings were challenged, so he undertook to give up teaching recitation altogether. A few days later he sought permission to resume; leave was granted, and he sat between the noon and afternoon prayers in the mosque, where a study circle formed around him as usual.

In mid-Rajab the deputy governor of Aleppo, Emir Sayf al-Dīn Sūdī, died and was buried in his mausoleum. In his place ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Alṭunbughā al-Ṣāliḥī—formerly chamberlain in Egypt—was appointed. (5)

On the 9th of Shaʿbān robes of investiture were conferred upon the Sharif Sharaf al-Dīn ibn ʿAdnān, granting him the office of naqīb al-ashrāf after his father Amīn al-Dīn Jaʿfar, who had died in the previous month. (6)

On the 5th of Shawwāl King Shams al-Dīn Dhūbāj ibn Malikshāh ibn Rustam, the ruler of Gīlān, was buried in his well-known tomb at the foot of Mount Qāsiyūn. (7)(8) He had set out for the ḥajj that year, but when he reached Qubāqib (9) death overtook him on Saturday, the 26th of Ramaḍān. His body was carried to Damascus; the funeral prayer was held for him, and he was interred in that mausoleum, which had been purchased and completed for him.