After Sultan Ahmed Mirza’s death, Sultan Mahmud Mirza moved to Samarkand and reigned there for some five or six months, reportedly attempting to regulate the collection of taxes and strengthen his army. But with the deaths of Sultan Ahmed Mirza, Sultan Mahmud Mirza and Umar Shaikh Mirza II, all occurring during the space of a year, civil strife intensified. The richest amirs tried to make use of the child Timurids, preferring to enthrone the weakest of them.