Saladin

Salah ad-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub, better known as Saladin, was a Kurdish military commander and ruler who founded the Ayyubid dynasty. He became the first sultan to rule both Egypt and Syria. A key figure in the Third Crusade, he led Muslim forces against the Crusader states in the Levant. At his peak, his realm covered Egypt, Syria, Upper Mesopotamia, the Hejaz, Yemen, and Nubia. In 1164, Saladin and his uncle Shirkuh, a Kurdish mercenary for the Zengid dynasty, were sent to Fatimid Egypt by the Zengid ruler Nur ad-Din. Their mission was to restore Shawar as vizier to the young Fatimid caliph al-Adid. After Shawar was reinstated, a power struggle broke out between him and Shirkuh. Saladin rose through the Fatimid government thanks to his military successes against Crusader attacks and his close relationship with al-Adid. Following Shawar’s assassination and Shirkuh’s death in 1169, al-Adid appointed Saladin as vizier. As a Sunni Muslim, Saladin worked to weaken the Fatimid establishment. After al-Adid died in 1171, he abolished the Cairo-based Fatimid Caliphate, which followed Isma'ili Shia Islam, and aligned Egypt with the Sunni Abbasid Caliphate in Baghdad. Over the next years, Saladin led campaigns against Crusaders in Palestine, successfully conquered Yemen, and put down pro-Fatimid revolts in Egypt. After Nur ad-Din died in 1174, Saladin began his conquest of Syria. He entered Damascus peacefully at the request of its governor. By mid-1175, he had taken Hama and Homs, angering other Zengid lords who ruled Syria’s principalities. He defeated them at the Battle of the Horns of Hama in 1175, and the Abbasid caliph al-Mustadi then proclaimed him Sultan of Egypt and Syria. Saladin continued his conquests in northern Syria and Upper Mesopotamia, surviving two assassination attempts by the Order of Assassins. He returned to Egypt in 1177 to handle local matters. By 1182, he had completed his conquest of Syria after capturing Aleppo, though he failed to take the Zengid stronghold of Mosul. Under Saladin’s command, the Ayyubid army defeated the Crusaders at the decisive Battle of Hattin in 1187, capturing Jerusalem and reestablishing Muslim military dominance in the Levant. Although the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem lasted until the late 13th century, the 1187 defeat was a turning point in Christian military efforts against Muslim powers in the region. Saladin died in Damascus in 1193, having given away much of his personal wealth to his subjects. He is buried in a mausoleum next to the Umayyad Mosque. He is significant in Muslim culture and is highly respected in Kurdish, Turkic, Arab, and even Western cultures. He is often described as the most famous Kurdish figure in history. Saladin was born in Tikrit, in present-day Iraq. His personal name was Yusuf; “Salah ad-Din” is an honorific epithet meaning “Righteousness of the Faith.” His parents were of Kurdish ancestry, originally from the village of Ajdanakan near Dvin in central Armenia. His father was the Kurdish mercenary Najm ad-Din Ayyub. The Rawadiya tribe his family belonged to was originally Arab but later became Kurdicized. In Saladin’s time, no scholar had more influence than sheikh Abdul Qadir Gilani, and Saladin was strongly influenced and aided by him and his pupils. In 1132, the defeated army of Zengi, Atabeg of Mosul, found their retreat blocked by the Tigris River opposite the fortress of Tikrit, where Saladin’s father, Najm ad-Din Ayyub, served as warden. Ayyub provided ferries for the army and gave them refuge in Tikrit. Mujahid ad-Din Bihruz, a former Greek slave who had become military governor of northern Mesopotamia for the Seljuks, reprimanded Ayyub for helping Zengi. In 1137, Bihruz banished Ayyub from Tikrit after his brother Asad ad-Din Shirkuh killed a friend of Bihruz. According to Baha ad-Din ibn Shaddad, Saladin was born the same night his family left Tikrit. In 1139, Ayyub and his family moved to Mosul, where Imad ad-Din Zengi acknowledged his debt and appointed Ayyub commander of his fortress in Baalbek. After Zengi died in 1146, his son Nur ad-Din became regent of Aleppo and leader of the Zengids. Saladin, who then lived in Damascus, reportedly loved the city, but little is known about his early childhood. About education, Saladin wrote, “Children are brought up in the way in which their elders were brought up.” According to biographers Anne-Marie Eddé and al-Wahrani, Saladin could answer questions on Euclid, the Almagest, arithmetic, and law, but this was an academic ideal. His knowledge of the Qur’an and religious sciences connected him to his contemporaries; several sources say he was more interested in religious studies than joining the military. Another factor that may have affected his interest in religion was that Jerusalem was taken by Christians during the First Crusade. Besides Islam, Saladin knew the genealogies, biographies, and histories of the Arabs, as well as the bloodlines of Arabian horses. He knew the Hamasah of Abu Tammam by heart. He spoke Kurdish and Arabic, and knew Turkish and Persian. According to Baha ad-Din ibn Shaddad, one of Saladin’s contemporary biographers, Saladin was a pious Muslim.