—the two northern minarets had in fact vanished in remote antiquity; for thousands of years nothing of them remained save the base of this north-western minaret, and that proved one of the greatest aids in rebuilding the wall so quickly. What is even more remarkable is that the mosque’s superintendent, Ibn Marājil, did not deduct a single dirham from the stipends of any of those on the mosque’s payroll while all this construction was under way⦗1⦘.
On the night of Saturday, 5 Jumāda al-Ūlā, a great fire broke out in the Furriers’ Market⦗2⦘, spread to the Spear-makers’ quarter, and consumed the qaysariyya and the mosque located there. A vast amount of people’s furs, broadcloth, and textiles was destroyed—surely to Allah we belong and to Him we shall return⦗3⦘.
On Friday the 10th, after the congregational prayer, the funeral prayer was performed for the judge Shams al-Dīn Ibn al-Ḥarīrī, the Ḥanafī chief judge of Egypt, and an absentee funeral prayer was offered for him in Damascus.
That same day a royal courier arrived summoning Burhān al-Dīn Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥaqq al-Ḥanafī⦗4⦘ to Egypt to succeed Ibn al-Ḥarīrī. He set out immediately, entered Cairo on 25 Jumāda al-Ūlā, and met the sultan, who appointed him to the office, honoured him with a robe of investiture, and presented him with a mule fitted with a zinārī saddle-cloth⦗5⦘. He delivered his inaugural judgement in the Ṣalāḥiyyah Madrasa in the presence of the judges and chamberlains, and a decree was issued granting him all the jurisdictions that had belonged to Ibn al-Ḥarīrī.
On Monday, 9 Jumāda al-Ākhirah, every book, paper, inkwell, and pen in the possession of Shaykh Taqī al-Dīn Ibn Taymiyyah was removed; he was barred from keeping books or reading them, and at the beginning of Rajab his books were transferred to the library of the Great ʿĀdiliyyah. [Al-Barzalī said: They amounted to about sixty volumes and fourteen bundles of loose quires. The judges and jurists examined them and then divided them among themselves]⦗6⦘.
The reason for this was that he had responded to what Taqī Ibn al-Akhnaʾī al-Mālikī had written against him concerning the question of visitation. [Shaykh Taqī al-Dīn replied, branded him ignorant, and told him his stock of knowledge was meagre]⦗6⦘. Ibn al-Akhnaʾī then went to the sultan and lodged a complaint, [whereupon the sultan ordered the confiscation of everything he possessed, and events unfolded as we have related]⦗6⦘.
Toward the end of the month an order was issued appointing ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Ibn al-Qalānsī⦗7⦘ to the dast in place of his brother Jamāl al-Dīn⦗8⦘, as a mark of respect.