Note 650 — Chapter VI · (continued 2)

Barkíarok, son of Malik shah, was the fourth sultan of the house of the Seljucides. He received at the circumcision the Muselman name of Kassem, and the title of Rokn-eddin, “the column of religion,” was given to him by Mectadi, the khalif of Baghdad. Barkiarok was the eldest son of Malik shah, whom he succeeded in the year of the Hejira 485 (A. D. 1092).

His stepmother, Turkan Khatun, had a son by Malik shah, called Mahmúd. At the death of the Sultan, being in the town of Baghdad, she obtained, by solicitations and presents, from the khalif Mortadi, letters of investiture in favor of her own son Mahmud, who, then only four years old, was proclaimed the legitimate heir of his father’s empire, whilst Barkiarok was at Ispahan, then the seat of the Seljucides, recognised, by right of primogeniture, the only legitimate successor of his father. But Turkan Khatun marched to Ispahan with an army, surprised Barkiarok, and seized the town, and the person of her step-son. The latter however, aided by the faithful servants of his father, escaped from her hands, and found a refuge at Shiraz, the residence of Takash-teghin the Atabek, or “lieutenant-general” of Persia. With this chief’s assistance, Barkiarok presented himself with an army of two hundred thousand men before Ispahan, and besieged Mahmud and his mother. A peace was concluded: the Sultana and her son were to possess the town and dependencies of Ispahan, but to divide Malik shah’s treasury with Barkiarok; he received five hundred thousand gold dinars for his share, and, having raised the siege, moved to Hamdan, where Ismâil, one of his uncles, commanded.

Ismâil had declared himself for the Sultana: a battle was fought in the plain of Hamdan, in the year of the Hejira 486 (A. D. 1093); Bakiàrok gained the victory: his uncle fell.

In the very same year, the victor was obliged by another uncle of his, Takash, son of Aslan shah, to retire towards Ispahan. He was kindly received by his brother Mahmud, then free from the tutelage of his mother, who had died; both brothers appeared linked in the bonds of perfect amity; but the partizans of the younger seized the person of the elder, and imprisoned him in the castle. It was the sudden death of Mahmud by the small pox which liberated Barkiarok, and gave him the possession of the empire. This was not left undisturbed, but this is not the place to relate the events of his agitated reign, of about thirteen years, which terminated in the year of the Hejira 498 (A. D. 1104). I have said enough to show how, among such disturbances, the power of the Ismâilah could grow in the Persian provinces: to this I shall add that during the reign of Barkiarok, the European crusaders took Nicæa and Antiochia, and the cross was fixed upon the walls of Jerusalem, Akka, and Edessa.