Tuzun (amir al-umara)

Tuzun was a Turkish slave-soldier (ghulam or mamluk), who initially served the autonomous Iranian ruler Mardavij ibn Ziyar.

[6] In the meantime, following Bajkam's death, Tuzun, Nushtakin, Khajkhaj and several other Turkish military leaders at first went north to Mosul and tried to enter the employ of Nasir al-Dawla, but he turned them away.

[8] Now master of the capital, the head of the Baridi family Abu'l-Husayn appointed Tuzun as sahib al-shurta of the eastern half of the city, across the Tigris.

Tuzun and the other Turks conspired to seize Abu'l-Husayn, but was betrayed by Nushtakin, and his attack on the Baridis' palace was repulsed by the forewarned Daylamite troops.

In a hotly contested battle near al-Mada'in that lasted from 16 to 19 August 942, the Hamdanid and Turkish troops routed the Baridis, who abandoned Wasit for their original base of Basra.

The Hamdanid was able to escape through the desert to Baghdad, while at Wasit the Turkish officers acclaimed Tuzun as their chief (amir), bringing him myrtle and herbs in accordance with ancient Persian custom, and Khajkhaj was made commander-in-chief (ispahsalar).

[15] Tuzun pursued a peace with the Baridis, who now had to face an unexpected attack by Yusuf ibn Wajih, the ruler of Oman, on Basra itself.

A Hamdanid army under Nasir al-Dawla's cousin Abu Abdallah al-Husayn appeared before the Harb Gate of Baghdad, and both the vizier and the Caliph went over to him and were escorted north to Mosul.

In response, the Ikhshid launched a campaign across Syria and in August 944 met with the Caliph at Raqqa, where he tried to persuade al-Muttaqi to move to Egypt.

[21][22] Until his death in August 945, Tuzun remained in control in Baghdad, but his position was increasingly threatened by the ambitions of a new power, the Buyids, and particularly Ahmad ibn Buya.