ABSTRACT

The last part of Mu‘izzı-’s career seems to have been settled and peaceful, apart from one violent incident. The agreement reached between Muh.ammad and Sanjar after Berkya-ru-q’s death, and Sanjar’s continued residence in Khura-sa-n, brought a long period of comparative peace and stability to the great province, devastated by the succession struggle of Berkya-ru-q’s reign. Sanjar seems to have seen his role primarily as the defender of Khura-sa-n from internal and external threats, whether from rival claimants, dissident groups or foreign invaders. He was prepared to take decisive action where necessary against the Qarakha-nids of Transoxania, and he maintained good relations with the Ghaznavid sultans during the strong reigns of Ibra-hı-m and Mas‘u-d III. The rivalry between Mas‘u-d’s sons over the succession after his death in 509/1115 gave Sanjar an opportunity to intervene and to carry out his first major military campaign, the invasion of the Ghaznavid empire, the capture of Ghazna itself in 510/1117 and the establishment of Bahra-msha-h on the throne as the vassal of the Seljuqs. This was followed two years later, after the death of Muh.ammad, by a large-scale foray to western Iran to enforce his supremacy over Muh.ammad’s son Mah.mu-d. About a third of Mu‘izzı-’s 60-odd poems to Sanjar describe or refer to these two campaigns, the chief military events of Sanjar’s reign during Mu‘izzı-’s lifetime; the subject was evidently as acceptable to Sanjar as Farrukhı-’s poems on his Indian conquests had been to Mah.mu-d of Ghazna. The campaigns and the poems referring to them will be discussed in detail later in this chapter. Capable and dominating though he was, Sanjar was a man of less char-

isma and narrower interests than his father, and without the restless ambition and military brilliance that had kept Maliksha-h continually on the move in search of new conquests. Although the Khura-sa-nı-Z. ahı-r al-Dı-n Nı-sha-pu-rı-

says that in Sanjar’s reign Khura-sa-n was ‘the source of religious science, the spring of excellence and the mine of knowledge and learning [mansha-’-i ‘ulu-m u manba’-i fada-’il u ma’dan-i hunar u farhang]’ (ZD p. 45/82), it seems that his court was not a centre of culture, at least in this early period of his reign (Mu‘izzı-’s life covered only the early years of his sultanate, which

lasted for over 30 years after the poet’s death). Mu‘izzı-was not Sanjar’s only court poet, but the poems of ‘Abd al-Wa-si’ Jabalı-and Adı-b Sa-bir, the most notable of his other panegyrists, appear to belong mostly to a later period. The very few historical references in Jabalı-’s 30-odd qas.ı-das to Sanjar, which nearly all address him as sultan and must therefore postdate Muh.ammad’s death in 511/1118, the career of Adı-b Sa-bir, a major panegyrist of the Khwa-razmsha-h Atsiz whose reign did not begin until 521/1127, and the lack of coincidence between the names of Mu‘izzı-’s patrons and those of the other two poets, suggest that most of their poems to Sanjar were written after Mu‘izzı-’s death. The single qas.ı-da in Sana-’ı-’s dı-va-n addressed to Sanjar (pp. 366-70), which, according to the rubric, was written in answer to questions put to Sana-’ı-by Sanjar about doctrine (madhhab), has been dismissed by de Bruijn (1983 pp. 73-74) as a Shı-’ı-forgery. It does seem, however, that Sanjar’s intellectual interests (it will be

remembered that he is said by Barthold to have been illiterate) were almost entirely confined to religious and doctrinal matters. According to the Selju-kna-ma he had a great respect for religious dignitaries and scholars; he was also on terms of friendship with less conventional religious figures, hermits, ascetics and ‘holy men’ (abda-l u zuhha-d u ‘iba-d-i nafsı-) and was generous to them (ZD pp. 45-82). This would appear to be consistent with a general simplicity of taste. He was perhaps more at ease with such people than with highly educated scholars and bureaucrats; he paid little attention to dress except on formal occasions, and his private amusements were not of a refined nature. The style of some of Mu‘izzı-’s poems to him may suggest that he also had a preference for simpler forms of verse. His concern with religion and the proper teaching of religious studies is illustrated by his relationship with Ghaza-lı-. In Dhu-’l-Qa’da 499/July-August 1106, his vizier Fakhr alMulk, apparently on Sanjar’s orders (‘it was Fakhr al-Mulk, our servant, who sent you to Nı-sha-pu-r’), compelled – ilza-m (the same word is used by Ghaza-lı-in his autobiography [al-Munqidh, p. 49 of Arabic text] and in letters in Fad.a-’il al-ana-m, e.g. p. 10) – Ghaza-lı-to leave his retreat in T.u-s and resume teaching in the madrasa in Nı-sha-pu-r. It seems plausible that Nas.ı-h.at al-mulu-k, written in Persian during this period, was addressed to Sanjar (the Persian text names the patron as malik-i mashriq), rather than Sultan Muh.ammad, as stated in the Arabic translation, which was made many years after Ghaza-lı-’s death. A few years later, probably in 503-4/1109-10, in an episode for which Fad.a-’il al-ana-m is the only source, Ghaza-lı-was accused by troublemakers of preaching false doctrine and slandering Abu-Hanı-fa. Sanjar, who was at the time encamped near Mashhad, where Ghaza-lı-had sought refuge, insisted that Ghaza-lı-should appear in person to defend himself against these charges, and Mu‘in al-Mulk Abu-’l-Qa-sim ‘Alı-b.Sa‘ı-d, the deputy vizier (mamdu-h. of seven poems by Mu‘izzı-), was instructed to send for Ghaza-lı-, house him in his own quarters, and bring him into Sanjar’s presence. Sanjar treated him with great courtesy, listened to and accepted his

defence, and Ghaza-lı-returned home to a triumphant reception (Fad.a-’il pp. 10-11). Sanjar’s family life was quiet. He had more than one wife, but there is no

record of the domestic in-fighting that was a feature of the reign of Maliksha-h, perhaps because his lack of sons precluded succession struggles. One of Mu‘izzı-’s poems (p. 716/643) congratulates him on the birth of a son, who evidently did not survive. He had several daughters, who were married to relatives and allies, but the most important member of his family was his mother Ta-j al-Dı-n Kha-tu-n, a major patron of Mu‘izzı-, who addressed nine qas.ı-das to her and wrote a marthı-ya on her death in 515/1121. Sanjar’s favourite amusements appear to have been banquets and drinking parties, and several of Mu‘izzı-’s poems record entertainments given to him by his viziers (pp. 111/110, 205/204, 356/335, 377/354, 761/681). His preferred companions, however, were Turkish cronies and ghula-ms with whom he could speak Turkish, and his liking for such people sometimes led him into serious misjudgments. The vizier Muh. ammad b.Sulayma-n Ka-shgharı-was a Turkish merchant who had ingratiated himself with Sanjar through his knowledge of Turkish and an enormous bribe (Khwa-ndamı-r 1938 p. 190; Klausner 1973 p. 133), but his incompetence and corruption led to his dismissal after two years (Muharram 516-S.afar 518/March 1122-March 1124); Sanjar never again appointed a Turk as vizier (Bunda-rı-1889 p. 266). The murder of Fakhr al-Mulk’s son and successor Sadr al-Dı-n Muh. ammad in Dhu-’l-H. ijja 511/April 1118 is attributed by Bunda-rı-to Sanjar’s infatuation with a Turkish ghula-m who took the opportunity, while Sanjar was drunk, to murder the vizier, who had objected to his interference in affairs of state. Sanjar, on hearing of this, immediately had the ghula-m put to death. Ibn alAthı-r gives a less dramatic, though perhaps related, reason for Sadr al-Dı-n’s murder, his extreme unpopularity with Sanjar’s Turkish amirs (Bunda-rı-1889 pp. 266-67; IA X p. 381). The viziers and other senior officials of Sanjar who were Mu‘izzı-’s mam-

du-h. s, though generally competent, were men of less personality and accomplishments than many of the mamdu-h. s of previous reigns, and there is correspondingly less information about them. They were mostly new men, who had been trained in the bureaucracy under Niz.a-m al-Mulk and his successors (three of them were relatives of Niz.a-m al-Mulk), but had not previously held high office. The one exception was Fakhr al-Mulk, the sole survivor of the ‘old guard’; he was born in 434/1042-3, the eldest son of Niz.a-m al-Mulk, but there is virtually no information about the first 50 years of his life, or any indication, apart from his title of Amı-r, of what posts he may have held during Maliksha-h’s reign and his father’s vizierate. It is clear, however, that he had managed to amass an enormous fortune during these years. Mu‘izzı-’s poems to him, a few of which date back well into Maliksha-h’s reign, have some use as a source, though they are more notable for their literary qualities than for historical information or indications of

date. They also suffer from an unusual amount of textual confusion. One wrongly addressed poem (p. 178) has already been mentioned; the poems on pp. 587/532 and 662/599 are virtually identical, and the mamdu-h. is probably Sanjar, not Fakhr al-Mulk as in the rubric, while the short poem on p. 412/ 386 is reproduced on p. 741/665 as the first verse of a tarkı-b-band, to which it clearly does not belong. Fakhr al-Mulk’s career during the nine or ten years after Maliksha-h’s

death is almost as confusing as the texts of these poems, and the historical data are so scanty that it can be difficult to explain some of Mu‘izzı-’s rather throw-away references to his patron’s activities and place of abode; Mu‘izzı-

did not feel the need to be explicit when they both knew what he was talking about. Ibn al-Athı-r, the most comprehensive source, recording the events of 487/1094, says that Fakhr al-Mulk had been in Khura-sa-n, but left in order to join Berkya-ru-q. On the way he was intercepted by Amı-r Quma-j, a partisan of the child Mah.mu-d b.Maliksha-h, who seized his possessions and apparently threatened his life. Fakhr al-Mulk fled to H. amada-n, which had recently been captured by the forces of another claimant, Tutush b.Alp Arsla-n. At first Tutush wanted to kill him, but was persuaded by one of his amirs that Fakhr al-Mulk would be more useful as his vizier, because of the general respect for the house of Niz.a-m al-Mulk. He was sent to Baghdad to try to persuade the new caliph al-Mustaz.hir to include Tutush’s name in the khut.ba. His persistent lobbying finally met with success, after the defeat of Berkya-ru-q’s forces by Tutush, and he returned to H. amada-n (IA X p. 158). In the following year, 488/1095, the position was reversed. Tutush was defeated and killed, and Fakhr al-Mulk was arrested, but was later released, and stayed in Rayy (IA X p. 167). As related in the previous chapter, he bought the vizierate from Berkya-ru-q, and remained nominally Berkya-ru-q’s vizier until he was replaced in about 492/1099. It was probably about this time that he cast in his lot with Sanjar, but he seems to have spent some years in retirement in Nı-sha-pu-r before being appointed vizier by Sanjar after the fall of Ardista-nı-, in 497/1104 or a year or two earlier. He was assassinated by a Ba-tinı-on ‘Ashu-ra-500/11 September 1106 (IA X pp. 228-29). It is difficult to gain much impression of Fakhr al-Mulk’s personality from

the available information. He comes across as a rather nebulous character, generally lacking in initiative, and pushed from one precarious situation to another, whose strongest characteristic was his acquisitiveness; Mu‘izzı-, naturally, sees him with other eyes. Bunda-rı-, in a passage evidently taken directly from the hostile Anu-shı-rva-n b.Kh.a-lid, says he was a mere figurehead, without capacity, merit or morals; his lineage was his only virtue, and he had nothing of the vizier but the name (pp. 86, 265). This harsh judgment is to some extent confirmed by one of Ghaza-lı-’s letters to him, apparently written soon after he became Sanjar’s vizier. Ghaza-lı-, taking up the cause of the people of T.u-s, as he had done with Ardista-nı-and was to do with Sanjar, writes in a tone which suggests that he thought Fakhr al-Mulk was lazy,

self-indulgent and neglectful of his duties, but that he had hopes of shaming him into better behaviour and restoring order in T.u-s. He describes his letter as a bitter but wholesome draught sent by the hand of a true friend, and urges Fakhr al-Mulk to follow the example of his martyred father (pidar-i pı-r-i shahı-d-i tu-) in good works and attention to business. T.u-s had been ruined by oppression and famine, and when people heard from Isfara-’ı-n and Da-mgha-n that Fakhr-al-Mulk was on his way, they were terrified; the farmers sold their corn, and the oppressors asked pardon of the oppressed. But now that he has arrived matters are much worse; the farmers and bakers have locked up their corn and their shops, and the oppressors have reverted to their old ways. Ghaza-lı-’s advice to the ‘amı-d of T.u-s has been disregarded, and he appeals to Fakhr al-Mulk, for the sake of his own soul, to help his subjects and the poor, in words reminiscent of Abu-Nas.r-i Mishka-n’s admonitions to Mas‘u-d of Ghazna.