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32 A HISTORY OF SHARVAN AND DARBAND
disembark (akhraj a-hum). He gave them much money and took them
to Baylaqan, whose inhabitants had revolted against him (A 1054a).
With the help of the Rus he captured Baylaqan and seized and killed
his brother 'Askariya. Then the Rus quitted Arran for Rum and thence
proceeded to their own country.
In 423/1032 the people of the Sarir and the Alans (cf. §38) made an
agreement, raided Sharvan and took Yazidiya by force. There and in
other parts of Sharvan they killed over 10,000 people and stayed ten
days digging the earth and extracting from it the money and goods
which the inhabitants had hidden in it. When their hands were full
of Muslim booty, they went back to their country, but on their reaching
the Wooden Gate (Bab al-*khashaby- the people of the March of al-Bab
attacked them, barred the roads and the defiles to them, and killed a
great many of them—(a slaughter) the like of which has not been recorded.
They took from them all the Muslim property, animate and inanimate,
which they had carried off from Sharvan. Only a small party, including
the lord of the Alans, escaped with their lives. Again in 424/1033 the
lord of the Alans came to take his revenge on al-Bab but this time too,
with God's help, he was defeated.
In 425/1034 the sharvanshah Minuchihr was treacherously murdered
in his house after a reign of seven years. The murderer was his brother
Abu-Mansur b. Yazid, The reason for the murder was that Abu-Mansur
was afraid of the sharvanshah and was hiding from him. Then one
night he entered Yazidiya, when the inhabitants were off their guard,
and sent (a message) to his brother's wife, Sitt,2 daughter of Fadl, by
name. She had an inclination for Abu-Mansur and he let her know of
his position and his arrival at the house of one of her ghulams, as she had
directed him. On being informed the woman sent him one of her entourage
with a kitchen-box. She made him sit in the box and he was brought
into Yazidiya. When he came to her house, she sent for her husband
Minuchihr inviting him to come and showed him a letter from her brother
Musa b. Fadl, lord of Arran. Minuchihr was engaged in reading the
letter, and as he looked at it and was explaining it to her, suddenly from
the farther end of the house there emerged Abu-Mansur with a naked
sword (in his hand), Minuchihr asked: "Who has let thee into my
house?", but he did not finish his speech when Abu-Mansur smote him
on the back of his head with his sword, and he was about to repeat the
blow when his sword slipped from his hand, because of the fear which had
seized his heart. Then the accursed wife gave orders to her handmaidens
to complete the murder. Then they (?) had Minuchihr wrapped up in
1 But A has: Bab-fy,sh.b (without al-) suggesting perhaps some personal name.
2 Apparently her personal name.