City on its great citadel mound in the plain between the Zabs, Gokbori's seat since 1190-1191.
He rebuilt the citadel and the Friday mosque (586/1190), founded the house of Hadith (al-Muzaffariyya, 1198), a madrasa, Sufi hospices, a hospital and houses for the blind, widows and orphans, and kept the Prophet's birthday as a great public feast.
Who holds it
- Name
- Muzaffar al-Din Gokbori
- Title
- lord
- Confidence
- high
Wikipedia 'Gokbori'; TDV 'Begteginliler', 'Zengiler'.
Lord in 1200
Muzaffar al-Din Gokbori, in residence.
How things stand that morning
Held by Gokbori.
Charter
No charter or commune: the town is governed by its lord's castellan (wali), its judge (qadi) and the market inspector (muhtasib); notables (a'yan) speak for it.
Council
No town council; notables and the qadi deal with the lord's governor.
Communities
Muslims; a metropolitan of the Church of the East (Arbela) and Christians; Jews; Kurds of the surrounding hills.
Militia
Garrison of the lord's soldiers; townsmen's own militia (ahdath) not recorded here.
Walls and castle
The citadel on the mound, the lower town round it (later famous minaret of the Friday mosque).
Trade and crafts
Grain of the plain; road from Mosul to Shahrazur and Persia; pilgrims and scholars drawn by Gokbori's charity.
Where the sources disagree
Evidence: Foundations dated (1190, 1198); mawlid not dated.
Primary sources for Irbil
Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.
- The Complete History, Izz al-Din Ibn al-Athir (about 1200 to 1231, at Mosul). The widest Muslim narrative for the years 596 to 597 AH (1199 to 1201): al-Adil's entry into Cairo and his taking of the sultanate from his nephew al-Mansur Muhammad early in 1200, the quarrels of the Ayyubid princes at Damascus, Aleppo and Hama, the Nile failure and the great famine of Egypt, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah and the Jazira under Gokbori and the Artuqids, Baghdad under the caliph al-Nasir, the Khwarazmshah Tekish's death in 1200 and Muhammad's accession, the Ghurid wars in Khurasan, the Eldiguzids and Georgia, the Almohads in the west, and the Seljuks of Rum in passing. Read online
- The Mirror of Time, on the History of Notables, Sibt ibn al-Jawzi (Shams al-Din Yusuf) (about 1240 to 1256, at Damascus). A Damascene preacher's year-by-year chronicle with obituaries, written by a grandson of the Baghdad scholar Ibn al-Jawzi, so it carries both the Baghdad view (the caliph al-Nasir and his court) and the Damascus view (al-Adil's court, the famine refugees of 1200, prices, the plague of 1201). Read online
Sources and studies
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.