az-Zafir

Abu'l-Mansur Ismail ibn al-Hafiz ( Arabic أبو المنصور إسماعيل بن الحافظ, DMG Abūʾl-Manṣūr Ismāʿīl ibn al-Ḥāfiẓ ; * February 23, 1133 ; † April 15, 1154 in Cairo ) was under the ruler name az-Zafir bi-amri'llah ( Arabic الظافر بأمر الله, DMG aẓ-Ẓāfir bi-amriʾllāh ) the twelfth caliph of the Fatimids (1149–1154) and the twenty-second imam of the Shia of the Hafizi Ismailis .

Life

After the death of his father, Caliph al-Hafiz , Prince Ismail was proclaimed the new caliph on October 10, 1149 by the leading minister Salim ibn Masal under the ruler's name aẓ-Ẓāfir bi-amriʾllāh ("the victorious at God's command"). At this point he was seventeen years old and also the youngest of the surviving sons of al-Hafiz. During his brief reign he was only to remain a puppet in the hands of the powerful army officers and ministers and was kept away from them by the state leadership.

The anarchy prevailing in Egypt under his father also continued under az-Zafir. Salim, first appointed by him as a vizier, was expelled from Cairo in January 1150 by the governor of Alexandria Ibn as-Sallar , whereupon the caliph had to appoint him as the new vizier. There was a mutual dislike between the caliph and his new vizier, and each feared being the target of the other's assassination. As early as January 27, 1150, the vizier anticipated an attack by the caliph's pages and was able to use this as a pretext for a cleansing operation at the court in Cairo by eliminating most of the caliph's supporters. Ibn as-Sallar himself was a Sunni and from then on regarded himself as the actual ruler ( sulṭān ) in Egypt, which he underlined by accepting the title al-Malik al-ʿĀdil ("the righteous prince"). In order to involve the Franks of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, who were increasingly pressing against Egypt, in a two-front war, he sought an alliance with the Zengids in Syria . Nevertheless, in the late 1153 with Ascalon (see Siege of Ascalon ) the last Fatimid fortress in Palestine was lost to the Crusaders. The vizier-sultan has never seen this again; on April 2, 1153, he fell victim to an assassination attempt, the instigator of which is said to have been Caliph az-Zafir. The victim's stepson, Abbas , became the new vizier .

On the night of April 15, 1154, az-Zafir himself fell victim to an assassination attempt. There are two different representations of the background to the offense. The Syrian diplomat Usama ibn Munqidh , who later became famous as a chronicler and was a friend of Ibn al-Sallar, reported that the vizier had given Abbas the order to murder the caliph. But according to the traditions of some Egyptian chroniclers, Usama himself is said to have been the driving force behind the act, in that he publicized the homoerotic relationship between the caliph and the vizier's son. This son, Nasr, is said to have committed the murder of Ibn al-Sallar out of love for the caliph. After Nasr saw his honor publicly tainted, Usama is said to have persuaded him that only by murdering the lover could it be washed clean again. When the caliph finally visited the young Nasr in his bedchamber on the night of April 15, 1154, he was expected there by his ready helpers and killed; his body was thrown into a cistern.

After a massacre of the adult prince of the Fatimids, Vizier Abbas proclaimed the five-year-old prince Isa under the name al-Fa'iz († 1160) as the new caliph. Already at the end of May 1154 Abbas and his family were expelled from Cairo by Tala'i ibn Ruzzik , who had the body of az-Zafir recovered and properly buried. His lover and murderer was seized by the Franks while on the run while crossing the Kingdom of Jerusalem and handed over to Cairo, who was cruelly tortured to death there in public.

literature

• Heinz Halm : Caliphs and Assassins: Egypt and the Near East at the Time of the First Crusades 1074–1171. CH Beck, Munich 2014, ISBN 978-3-406-66163-1 .
• Paul E. Walker, Paul Walker: Succession to Rule in Schiite Caliphate. In: Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt , Volume 32, 1995, pp. 239-264.

swell

• Ibn al-Athir : "The perfect chronicle" (Al-Kāmil fī ʾt-taʾrīḫ) . In: RHC, Historiens Orientaux . Volume 1, 1872, pp. 475, 490-494.
• Ibn Challikan : "The Death of Great Persons and the News of the Sons of Time" (Wafayāt al-aʿyān wa-Anbāʾ abnāʾ az-zamān) . In: William Mac Guckin de Slane (Ed.): Ibn Khallikan's biographical dictionary . Volume 1 (1842), p. 222 f; Volume 2 (1843), p. 426.

Remarks

1. ↑ See Halm, p. 223.
2. ↑ See Halm, p. 224 f.
3. ↑ See Halm, p. 228.
4. ↑ See Halm, p. 231 f.
5. ↑ See Ibn al-Athir, p. 492 f .; Ibn Challikan, Volume 2 (1843), p. 426.
6. ↑ See Halm, p. 235 f.
7. ↑ See Halm, p. 237; Walker, p. 263.
8. ↑ See Halm, p. 239.

predecessor	Office	successor
al-Hafiz	Ruler of Egypt ( Fatimid Dynasty ) 1149–1154	al-Fa'iz