Only unity of action could now save the Nestorians, and that unity was wanting.

The Buhtan Koords came upon them from the northwest, and the Hakary tribes from the northeast and east.

On the south was a Turkish army from the Pasha of Mosul, while the Ravandooz Koords are said to have been ready for an onset from the southeast.

Diss, the district in which the Patriarch resided, and Tiary were soon laid waste by the combined force of the Buhtan and Hakary Koords.

Many were slain, and among them the Patriarch's mother, a brother, and a fine youth who was regarded as the probable successor to the Patriarch.