Saladin

Saladin (Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub, c. 1137–1193) was a Kurdish Sunni Muslim commander and statesman who founded the Ayyubid dynasty and ruled as the first sultan of Egypt and Syria. He rose from service in the Zengid court of Nur al-Din to become vizier of the Shiʿi Fatimid caliphate, ended that caliphate in 1171, and went on to unite Egypt, Syria and parts of Mesopotamia and Arabia under a single Sunni authority. His defeat of the Frankish army at the Battle of Hattin in 1187 and his capture of Jerusalem later that year are the events for which he is best known. They reshaped the balance of power in the Levant and provoked the Third Crusade, in which he faced Richard I of England.

Saladin matters for several reasons beyond his battles. His dynasty ruled Egypt until 1250 and Syria until 1260, and its institutions, including the iqta land-grant system and a state built around madrasas, shaped the late medieval Middle East. His conduct toward the Christian population of Jerusalem and his negotiated treaty with Richard became part of his reputation for chivalry, which gave him a lasting place in Arabic, European and later national narratives. The entry therefore covers his life in chronological order, his military and administrative methods, the sources that document him and the ways in which he has been remembered from the medieval period to the present.

Origins and Kurdish background

Saladin, whose full name was Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn Yūsuf ibn Ayyūb, was born in Tikrit, a town on the Tigris in what is now northern Iraq. Sources disagree on the year: Saladin was born Yusuf Ibn Ayyub in the central Iraqi city of Tikrit in 1137 or 1138. His family was Kurdish, and his father Ayyūb and uncle Shirkūh were elite military leaders under Imad al-Din Zangi, a powerful ruler who governed northern Syria at the time. Ayyūb had succeeded his father as governor of Tikrit, but the family's position collapsed in the late 1130s. Shirkūh killed a man during a quarrel in the town, and the brothers were exiled. In the account transmitted by Ibn Shaddad, Saladin was born the same night his family left Tikrit. Later accounts differ on the victim and the cause of the dispute, with one version describing him as a Christian and another describing an assault on a young woman.

Move to Mosul, Baalbek and Damascus

The family's next destinations shaped Saladin's contacts with the Zengid court. 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. In 1146 the Burid atabeg Mu'in al-Din Unur besieged Baalbek, and Ayyub surrendered Baalbek and retired to Damascus. Shirkūh meanwhile entered the service of Zengi's son Nur al-Din Zengi, who had designs on Damascus. In 1154 Ayyub and Shirkuh negotiated its surrender to Nur al-Din, and Ayyūb then remained governor of Damascus under Nur al-Din's rule. Through these moves, the young Saladin was connected to the family's service at the centres of Zengid power in Mesopotamia and Syria, and Damascus became the city where Nur al-Din's court and the family's standing were closely linked.

Education and early military training

The evidence for Saladin's youth is thin and partly contradictory. The most common account holds that his father sent him to the Zengid capital of Damascus to study the Qur'an and Islamic sciences and to undertake military training with his uncle Asad al-Din Shirkoh. Some general reference works go further and state that for ten years Saladin lived in Damascus and studied Sunni Theology, at the court of the Syrian ruler Nur ad-Din, but this figure is not well documented. Ibn Shaddad gives a different picture: he claims that Saladin spent his youth in Mosul, with Nur al-Din helping to advance his career, and that his moral, religious and political education came from his father in Baalbek. Modern scholars usually describe the young man as well educated from a young age, and while he was more of a scholar than warrior, he was entered into the military under his uncle's tutelage. Precise dates for his first campaigns and his formal training are therefore largely reconstructed rather than documented.

Reliability of the early sources

Most of what is known about Saladin's youth comes from writers who were not witnesses to it. Ibn Shaddad, the main biographer, was a great admirer of Saladin and was a close associate of his, serving as his qadi al-'askar (judge of the army), from 1188 until Saladin's death in 1193. Since he was born in 1145, after Saladin's own birth, his descriptions of the childhood and the Tikrit departure depend on family tradition and on what others told him. He states that he recorded only what he witnessed or what trustworthy sources told him which I have checked. Accounts of Saladin's early years should therefore be read as a mixture of family memory, court-shaped biography and later reconstruction, with the exact places and dates of his education remaining uncertain.

Service under Nur al-Din and the Egyptian expeditions

Evidence for Saladin's early service in Nur al-Din's wider campaigns against the Crusader states and the Byzantine frontier is sparse. His documented career begins with the Egyptian expeditions of 1163–1169, which were run by his uncle Shirkuh on behalf of the Zengid ruler of Syria. Saladin's military career began under the tutelage of his paternal uncle Asad ad-Din Shirkuh, a prominent military commander under Nur ad-Din, the Zengid emir of Damascus and Aleppo and the most influential teacher of Saladin.

The first expedition and the Crusader siege of Bilbeis

The Egyptian campaigns grew out of a succession dispute at the Fatimid court. Ruzzik was in turn overthrown by Shawar in 1163, but the latter lasted only a few months in office before being overthrown by Dirgham. Shawar fled to Damascus and asked Nur al-Din for help, and Saladin was sent to Fatimid Egypt in 1164, on the orders of the Zengid ruler Nur al-Din, accompanying Shirkuh. Shirkuh's force was large by Zengid standards: Nur al-Din gave him a grant of 200,000 dinars and allowed Shirkuh to select 2,000 soldiers from his regiments, and Shirkuh also brought his own horsemen, including Kurds and Mamluks. Accounts differ on the chronology. Some place the first Crusader move against Bilbeis in late 1163, while others date the siege to 1164. Either way, the Crusaders and their Egyptian allies besieged Shirkuh in Bilbais (August-October 1164), and total victory seemed near.

Saladin's personal role at Bilbeis is poorly recorded. One account says that on this first occasion his nephew Saladin accompanied him as an advisor. Another historian's summary notes that we don't know if Saladin took part in the expedition. The siege was broken by diplomacy rather than by a decisive battle. In response Nur ad-Din attacked the Crusader states and almost captured the Principality of Antioch. Amalric then withdrew, and the siege ended with a stalemate, and both Shirkuh and Amalric agreed to withdraw from Egypt.

The 1167 campaign and the burning of Fustat

Shirkuh returned in 1167, when Shawar again turned to the Crusaders. In 1166, Shirkuh attempted another attack, but Shawar called for reinforcements from Amalric, who arrived at the same time in January 1167. Saladin fought in the engagement at al-Babein, south of Cairo, which was a Zengid victory fought on 18 March 1167. The Crusader and Fatimid side then moved against Shirkuh at Alexandria. The siege of Alexandria took place in summer 1167 and ended in a negotiated settlement. Shirkuh withdrew, but a Crusader garrison remained in Egypt and Amalric allied with the Byzantine Empire, planning to conquer it entirely. Shawar's behaviour in these years was erratic. Shawar was notorious for continually switching alliances, allying first with one side, and then the other, and even ordering the burning of his own capital city, Fustat, just so that the enemy could not have it.

The final expedition, 1168–1169

Amalric's attacks continued in 1168. Amalric utilized the fact that the vizier did not pay the agreed tribute to the Crusaders in Alexandria in time as an excuse, launched a quick attack against Bilbeis in November 1168. Shawar then appealed again to Damascus, and Shirkuh returned. The decisive move came in early 1169. In January 1169, Cairo fell, and Shirkuh had Shawar executed. Shirkuh took the vizierate but died within months, and was succeeded in the viziership by his nephew, Saladin. Nur al-Din also sent reinforcements to secure the Syrian position: on 3 July 1169 Nur al-Din sent new troops to Egypt, under the command of Saladin's older brother, Turan-Shah.

Egypt's political setting in the 1160s

By the 1160s the Fatimid caliphate was weak and divided. The caliph al-Adid was a teenager, and the government passed through a series of competing viziers. The constant power struggles in Cairo enfeebled the Fatimid state, allowing both the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem and the Sunni ruler of Syria, Nur al-Din, to advance their own designs on the country. The Crusaders' stake was financial as well as territorial: the Crusaders repeatedly invaded Egypt, extracting tribute and ultimately aiming to conquer it.

Nur al-Din's interest was longstanding. Nur al-Din had long sought to intervene in Egypt especially after missing his opportunity when Tala ibn Ruzzik successfully brought the country under control, blocking his ambitions for nearly a decade. Baghdad added pressure: the caliph at Baghdad, who pressured Nur al-Din to act, supported the Syrian intervention. The rivalry between the Zengid and Crusader camps was therefore also a contest over who would control Egypt's revenues and ports. Nur al-Din's trust in the Ayyubid family was limited from the start. Nur al-Din did not trust Saladin and his family, correctly assuming that they were consolidating power, and the tensions that followed the Egyptian expeditions shaped the later dispute over Egypt.

Vizier of Egypt and the end of the Fatimid caliphate

Saladin's rise in Egypt began with his uncle's short tenure. In January 1169 Shirkuh entered Cairo and had Shawar, the Fatimid vizier who had repeatedly switched alliances, executed. Shirkuh took the vizierate but died in March 1169 after about two months in office, and the young Fatimid caliph al-Adid chose Saladin, then about 31, as his successor. Saladin thus held two offices at once: vizier of the Fatimid caliphate and commander of the Syrian troops that Nur al-Din had left in Egypt.

Saladin first worked within the Fatimid structure and was conciliatory toward al-Adid. He then gradually emptied the regime of its power. Fatimid loyalists in the army were removed and replaced by Syrian troops. The most serious challenge came in August 1169, when Sudanese units of the Fatimid army, joined by some Egyptian emirs and townspeople, rose against him. Saladin crushed the revolt in what became known as the Battle of the Blacks, and Cairo did not produce another armed uprising against him. His brother Turan-Shah arrived in Cairo in the summer of 1169 with a large army supplied by Nur al-Din, which reinforced the Syrian presence. Family members were appointed as governors, most of the civilian bureaucracy accepted the new order, and al-Adid was pushed aside even from ceremonial duties. External threats were also addressed: late in 1169, with reinforcements from Nur al-Din, Saladin defeated a combined Crusader and Byzantine force near Damietta.

The formal end of the Fatimid caliphate came in 1171. Al-Adid died in September that year, aged twenty. Saladin had the Friday sermons name the Abbasid caliph al-Mustadi in Baghdad in place of the Fatimid caliph, which ended the Shiʿi caliphate and returned Egypt to Sunni allegiance under the Abbasids. Al-Adid's heir was passed over, and the late caliph's family was placed under house arrest. Isma'ili institutions were gradually dismantled, and Isma'ilism was largely eliminated in Egypt within roughly a century. The Abbasid caliph had himself reportedly encouraged the move against al-Adid, which gave Saladin's action a religious and political legitimacy beyond Cairo.

Saladin's authority over Egypt was nevertheless bound to Nur al-Din. Officially he governed as Nur al-Din's representative and was nominally his vassal, so the 1171 settlement did not make him independent. Egypt's agricultural wealth became his financial base. He used its revenues to build his military and political strength, and in 1174, after Nur al-Din's death, he moved into Syria with a small but disciplined army, claiming to act as regent for Nur al-Din's young son. Tensions also surfaced inside Egypt. In 1173–1174 a conspiracy among former Fatimid elites, which reportedly sought Crusader help while Saladin was away on campaign, was suppressed. Saladin arrested its leaders in March 1174, and their executions followed in the spring. The sources for this conspiracy come mainly from writers favourable to Saladin, so its scale and the extent of Crusader involvement remain debated.

Consolidation of Egypt and the Sunni revival

Saladin's consolidation of Egypt proceeded in two overlapping stages. The first, between 1169 and 1171, removed the Fatimid regime's control of the army, the bureaucracy and the court. The second, which continued through the 1170s and 1180s, rebuilt the state around his own family, Sunni institutions and fortifications. The outcome was a Sunni, Ayyubid government in Egypt that no longer depended on the Fatimid caliphal household.

Reorganizing the administration

Saladin first secured the military. Fatimid loyalist units were purged, and the failed revolt known as the Battle of the Blacks, fought by the Sudanese and Nubian troops in 1169, was crushed. Syrian and Kurdish soldiers loyal to him took their place. He then placed members of his own family in the governorships and principal posts, while the civilian bureaucracy was largely won over to the new regime. The chancery and financial administration were supervised by Qadi al-Fadil, who ran Egyptian affairs when Saladin was on campaign in Syria, although he never held the title of vizier. Fatimid officials who were thought to be dangerous were kept under watch. Some 252 members of the Fatimid clan were placed under house arrest in the palace of Barjawan, and the Fatimid treasures and libraries were divided among Saladin's officials and Nur al-Din's agents.

Ending Isma'ili predominance

The religious changes were gradual but systematic. The Fatimid state had been organized around Isma'ili Shi'i jurisprudence and the missionary network known as the da'wa, which had dominated the judiciary since 974. Saladin removed Isma'ili judges and placed Sunni jurists in their posts, with a preference for scholars of the Shafi'i school. Isma'ili communities were persecuted, and many fled to Upper Egypt. The formal end came on 10 September 1171, when a Shafi'i jurist publicly named the Abbasid caliph al-Mustadi in the Friday sermon in place of the Fatimid caliph al-Adid, who died a few weeks later.

Sunni institutions and patronage

Saladin's religious policy relied on institutions as much as on proclamations. He founded madrasas in Cairo and Alexandria, where students were trained in the Sunni legal schools, and he gave special attention to the Shafi'i school. The clearest example is the tomb of Imam al-Shafi'i in the cemetery now known as the City of the Dead. In 1176 he built a turbah and a madrasa on the site, and in 1178 a carved wooden cenotaph was installed over the grave. The complex turned a tomb of a jurist, who had died in Cairo in 819, into a symbol of the Sunni legal order that Saladin was restoring. Patronage of this kind also supported the broader public image of Saladin as a defender of orthodoxy.

The Cairo Citadel and the fortification of Cairo

Saladin's most lasting building project was the Cairo Citadel, begun in 1176 on a spur of the Mokattam Hills. Its purposes were both defensive and political. It overlooked Cairo and Fustat, which Saladin intended to join within a single fortified perimeter, and it guarded the capital against Crusader attack and any Fatimid or Isma'ili uprising. Construction continued until about 1183, and the Citadel went on to serve as the seat of government in Egypt for several centuries. Wall building around Cairo and Fustat accompanied the work on the Citadel, so that the two cities were protected as one defended urban space. These projects, like the madrasas, made the new Ayyubid regime visible in the urban landscape of its capital, urban planning being one of the main instruments through which the regime expressed its authority.

Ruler of Syria and the Zengid succession

Nur al-Din's death and the move into Damascus

Nur al-Din died in May 1174, and he left behind one young son and a gaggle of family members who vied for control of his kingdom. Saladin was then nominally the Zengid governor of Egypt, and the two men had been moving toward open conflict before the death. Nur ad-Din and Saladin were headed towards open war on these counts when Nur ad-Din died in 1174. Saladin used the succession crisis to claim the Zengid inheritance for himself. He joined the fray, claiming to be the true heir of Nur al-Din's position. He swiftly marched his forces into Damascus to make the case.

The sources differ on how the entry into Damascus took place. One account describes a peaceful arrival, with Saladin peacefully entering Damascus at the request of its governor. Medieval accounts present the move as guardianship. Saladin arrived in Damascus in November 1174, under the guise of protecting the eleven-year-old son of Nur al-Din from his threatening cousins in Mosul. He also reinforced his claim by marrying Nur al-Din's widow, Ismat al-Din Khatun, a step that reinforced his legitimacy there in the time-honoured way. Her earlier marriage to Nur al-Din is itself disputed in the sources (see Zengid dynasty).

Campaigns against Aleppo, Hama and the Mosul frontier

Saladin's position in Syria was contested by the remaining Zengid lords. In 1174 or 1175, depending on the source, he met the rulers of Mosul and Aleppo in the field. One account states that in 1174 he defeated two of his strongest Muslim enemies, the lords of Mosul and Aleppo, at the Battle of the Horns of Hama. Another dates the battle to 1175 and describes the Zengid forces as Saif ad-Din, Zengid ruler of Mosul.

Aleppo was besieged in the winter of 1174–1175, with Saladin's forces besieging Aleppo when the first assassination attempt against him occurred. Aleppo's capture is dated variously. One account says Saladin managed to impose his influence and authority on them in 1176, while the more common date is 1183, when he then turned in May 1183 against Aleppo and besieged the city. Saladin's capture of Aleppo in 1183 ended the struggle that had occupied him for most of the decade. It was a crucial breakthrough in his war with the Zengids, and it allowed him to turn toward the Crusader states.

Mosul was the harder target. In November 1182, Saladin, seeking to unify Muslim Syria under his rule, laid siege to Mosul, but the Muslim princes, concerned about Saladin's ambitions, formed a coalition that forced him to lift the siege. Mosul's ruler, Izz al-Din Mas'ud, had already moved to protect his position. He reached an agreement with his brother Imad al-Din Zengi II the governor of Sinjar to exchange Sinjar with Aleppo, which gave up Aleppo to Saladin. Hostilities with the Zengid power in northern Syria and Upper Mesopotamia continued until 1186, when peace was made upon the submission of Izz al-Din Mas'ud, who agreed to become Saladin's vassal.

Assassination attempts and the peace with the Nizaris

Saladin also faced the Nizari Ismailis, whose leader Sinan was associated with the Assassins. The first attempt came early in his Syrian campaign. In 1175 CE, a group of 13 failed to get close to their victim and the second time, in 1176 CE, four assassins only managed to pierce Saladin's cuirass and slash a cheek before they were butchered by the sultan's bodyguard. The details vary between accounts. One describes the second attempt as occurring while he was besieging 'Azaz, while another places it in the north-western Syria region. The motive is also debated. The Sunni chronicler Ibn al-Jawzi suggests that the attempts on Saladin's life were the result of his aggression against Nizari villages in 1174-5. Other accounts point to Aleppo's governor, Gumushtigin, as a possible instigator, and it is not clear from the sources who instigated this attack.

Saladin's response was a campaign against the Nizari stronghold. In 1176 he laid siege to Masyaf but he lifted the siege after two notable events that reputedly transpired between him and the Old Man of the Mountain. The best-known of these stories describes a warning left in his tent, which may have been a message from the Nizari leader. Such accounts are generally read as legend rather than documented fact. The settlement that followed is also presented differently across sources. Saladin decided to make peace with Sinan, but the peace was tense and did not end the hostility between the two sides.

Military organization, iqta and finance

Saladin's army was a multi-ethnic force whose exact makeup is debated. Its political core was Kurdish, since Kurdish tribal networks from Saladin's own family and allies supplied many of its senior commanders. Historians disagree about the balance of the rest. One common account describes the Ayyubid armies as drawn from Kurds and Turks, with the Turks predominating. Ayyubid sources and modern studies also point to Arab infantry and Bedouin auxiliaries, as well as Druze and other local contingents. David Ayalon's argument, as summarized in a secondary blog, holds that Turkic horse archers formed the bulk of the combat power and that Kurds were a smaller share, a view other scholars contest. Turkic cavalry used composite bows and light sabres, and the Kurdish tribal contingents of the Hakkariyya, Humaydiyya and related groups had already become prominent under Saladin.

The most professional element was the Mamluk bodyguard. These were slave soldiers, bought as boys and trained for years, who were formally freed on completing training but stayed bound to their patron. One account describes them as mostly of Turkish-Kurdish origin, and they were the personal guard around Saladin's own tent. Beyond them, Saladin could draw on troops conscripted from Ayyubid lands and on mercenary mounted archers. Volunteers were also important. Saladin's reputation for piety and his jihad propaganda drew scholars, soldiers and ordinary men to his banners, especially before major campaigns against the Crusader states. For the 1187 campaign, the forces were reportedly mustered over several months south of Damascus, under the supervision of his eldest son al-Afdal, with a large share of cavalry.

The iqta system was the financial backbone of this army. Under it, a commander or soldier received the right to collect tax revenue from a designated territory in exchange for providing a set number of troops and equipment for military service. Saladin did not invent the system, which he inherited from earlier eastern traditions, but he expanded it, and the Ayyubids later extended it further to reward kinsmen and senior officers. In Egypt, the fiscal base was the country's agricultural revenue, which Saladin used to pay and equip his own contingents, known as askars, as well as iqta holders and vassals. In Egypt, he also redistributed iqta from Fatimid commanders to his Syrian troops, which provoked opposition from the Fatimid elite. Iqta holders had a strong interest in keeping their assignments, which tied local loyalty to the sultan's campaigns but also made the army dependent on the productivity of the land.

Logistics and fortification shaped how long campaigns could be sustained. Saladin's strategy relied on mobility and endurance: his cavalry harassed enemies, retreated before counterattacks and avoided pitched battles unless the odds were clearly in his favour. Supply lines between Egypt and Syria, which allowed grain and money to reach the front, were essential to keeping large forces in the field for months. Unlike the Crusaders, the Ayyubids generally did not build castles in the Frankish style. They preferred to strengthen city walls and to erect citadels, such as those in Cairo and Aleppo. Saladin's attempt to build a navy was short-lived, and the Ayyubids did not make the sea a major theatre of war against the Crusaders. Siege warfare therefore depended on the capture of urban fortifications and on the weakening of enemy garrisons through raids, the destruction of crops and the cutting off of water and food.

Battle of Hattin and the conquest of Jerusalem (1187)

Prelude: the caravan raid and the muster

The war was set off by Reynald of Châtillon, lord of Oultrejordain, who attacked a caravan travelling from Egypt to Syria in late 1186 or early 1187, claiming that the truce between Saladin and the Kingdom of Jerusalem did not bind him. The victims included members of Saladin's own family, and Reynald took the merchants, their families and all their possessions to his castle of Kerak. The sultan's response was to insist on the captives' release and on compensation for their losses. Reynald refused to pay, and when King Guy pressed him to do so, Reynald refused the King's request, claiming he was absolute sovereign of his lands and had no truce with Saladin. Saladin then swore once more that he would kill Reynald, this time with his own hands.

Saladin drew on a broad base of support. To wage war on the Crusaders, he summoned Arabs, Turks, Kurds, and Egyptians to his banner. In late June 1187 his main camp moved toward Saffuriya, and Saladin besieged Tiberias on 2–3 July, while a contingent blocked the town's approaches.

Guy's response divided the Frankish leadership. Guy assembled the High Court in Jerusalem, where Count Raymond III of Tripoli advised waiting for Saladin in the well-watered position near Tiberias, since the enemy would have to cross a dry plain to reach them. Gérard de Ridefort opposed this, persuaded Guy to continue the march, and was supported by Reynald, a fellow enemy of Raymond. Saladin also had a rival rumour in circulation: it was rumoured by the Franks that Raymond III of Tripoli had made an agreement with Saladin under which Saladin would make him King of Jerusalem in return for peace. The rumour's truth is unclear.

The battle

Estimates of the two armies vary widely. Modern figures commonly put the Frankish force at 18,000–20,000 men, including about 1,200 knights, against a Muslim army that some accounts place at 20,000 to 40,000. The Frankish army was caught on the arid basalt plateau north of the Sea of Galilee instead of holding its well-watered camp. Near the Horns of Hattin and the village of Maskana, they were surrounded. Thirst weakened the foot soldiers, and many of Guy's soldiers were killed right there because they were so thirsty and wounded.

The battle was fought on 3–4 July 1187, and the Ayyubid side won decisively. The crusaders fought with grim determination before being overwhelmed on 4 July. All crusader leaders were captured, except Raymond of Tripoli. Raymond and a few nobles escaped, while Templar prisoners were executed. The rest of the Templar prisoners were executed.

The captive leaders were taken to Saladin's tent. The account of the eyewitness Imad al-Din al-Isfahani describes Saladin rebuking Reynald for his treachery, after which Guy was offered water and passed the cup to Reynald; Saladin then declared that he was no longer obliged to spare Reynald, because Guy had not asked permission to give him water. Saladin personally beheaded him after he refused to convert to Islam. Later accounts differ on whether Saladin struck the blow himself or had it carried out in his presence, and Reynald was the only captive singled out for execution. Guy was spared.

The collapse of the Frankish cities

The loss of the field army left the kingdom's towns exposed. On July 5, Tiberias, despite being virtually impregnable, surrendered. Acre surrendered without a fight on July 10, and the surrender was negotiated by Joscelin III, who surrendered the town to Taqi ad-Din, Saladin's general, with the understanding that the population could depart freely. Toron, Sidon and Beirut followed within weeks. Nablus, Nazareth, Haifa, Hebron, Caesarea, Arsur, Lydda, Ramla, Mirabel, Ibelin and Bethlehem all fell bloodlessly to the Saracens in the months immediately following the Battle of Hattin, although the exact dates are not recorded.

Jaffa and Ascalon offered harder resistance. The fight at Jaffa was so bitter that al-Adil allowed his troops to plunder and enslaved all the surviving inhabitants. By mid-September, Saladin had taken Acre, Nablus, Jaffa, Toron, Sidon, Beirut, and Ascalon. Tyre was the main exception. The survivors of the battle and other refugees fled to Tyre, the only city able to hold out against Saladin, due to the fortuitous arrival of Conrad of Montferrat. Saladin's failure to take Tyre in the winter of 1187–1188 showed the limits of his army in long sieges, and it proved the incapacity of his army to sustain long sieges. Jerusalem fell after this period, on 2 October, as the next section describes.

Surrender of Jerusalem and treatment of its inhabitants

After the Frankish field army was destroyed at Hattin, refugees crowded into Jerusalem, which had few trained fighters. The city was besieged from 20 September to 2 October 1187, and Balian of Ibelin was charged with organizing its defence. Balian had first secured safe conduct to Jerusalem to collect his wife, Maria Comnena, on condition that he take no part in fighting and stay for no more than a day. On arrival, Patriarch Heraclius, Queen Sibylla and the other inhabitants urged him to lead the defence, and Heraclius released him from his oath. Balian then mobilised the population, and he raised every able-bodied man over fourteen and knighted sixty squires and burgesses on the spot. Saladin's sappers later brought down a section of the northern wall near the Gate of Jehoshaphat, and sources differ on the exact date of the breach, which is usually given as late September.

The terms were negotiated through intermediaries, and the sources disagree on the figures. One account gives ransoms of 10 dinars for men, 5 for women, and 1 for children, while another reports a ransom of twenty bezants for men, ten for women, and five for children, with those unable to pay to be sold into slavery. The payment window is also uncertain: every inhabitant was given about a month to pay, with estimates ranging from 30 to 50 days depending on the source. Balian reportedly arranged a 30,000-dinar payment that freed about 7,000 people, and Saladin freed some of those who had been enslaved, his brother Saphadin did the same, and both Balian and Heraclius freed many others with their own money. Estimates of those left in bondage vary considerably, from 11,000 Christian citizens in one reference to some 15,000 Christians in another. Balian's own family was taken out under escort to Tripoli, and the ransomed inhabitants left in three columns, with the Templars and Hospitallers leading the first two and Balian and the Patriarch leading the third. Ten Hospitaller friars were permitted to stay behind to care for the sick and wounded.

The sources say comparatively little about the Eastern Christian communities and about pilgrims as distinct groups. One account notes that negotiations were carried out through the mediation of Yusuf Batit, one of the Eastern Orthodox clergy, who had been largely suppressed under Latin Christian rule. The surviving narratives otherwise treat the population mainly as a single group of ransom payers, and the protection of pilgrims is not described in detail.

The comparison with 1099 became central to later accounts. Jerusalem had been conquered by the armies of the First Crusade in 1099. Historians describe a slaughter of the Muslim and the Jewish defenders in the city at the time, but the image of crusaders riding through blood is harder to verify; one chronicler's account is the usual source for it, and it is treated with caution. A further complication is that accounts differ on Saladin's earlier offers. One source says he met delegates outside Ascalon and offered generous terms, including safe departure under an Ayyubid escort, while another says burgesses rejected the sultan's proposals for a negotiated surrender. Some accounts also report that Saladin threatened to massacre the men and enslave the women, and Balian answered with a counter-threat to kill the Muslim prisoners and destroy the Dome of the Rock.

Modern historians tend to explain the restraint partly in practical terms. Saladin also had a practical reason: he did not want to create martyrs for the Christian cause to avenge. The episode has nonetheless become central to his reputation. His conduct at Jerusalem, or at least the popular narrative of it, is probably the most important element in establishing his popular legacy. Other popular accounts go in the opposite direction; one claims that Saladin had planned to kill all Christians in Jerusalem as revenge for 1099, but agreed to let them buy their freedom instead. Taken together, the evidence supports a picture of a negotiated and far less bloody transfer than the 1099 conquest, though it was still accompanied by enslavement and displacement.

Third Crusade: Acre, Arsuf and the campaigns of 1189–1192

The first major engagement of the Third Crusade was the siege of Acre. Guy of Lusignan, who had lost the Kingdom of Jerusalem's field army at Hattin, began the siege on 28 August 1189 and encircled the port with a double line of fortified positions. Saladin's relief force gathered in the hinterland and tried to break the ring from outside, while the besiegers kept their own trenches facing the city. Attacks on the Frankish lines in September 1189 failed, and in the following months the two sides were locked in a stalemate. Saladin's navy occasionally slipped supplies into the city, but he could not get allied fleets from North Africa to break the Christian blockade. In May 1190 the Franks' large siege towers were burned by the defenders' incendiary weapons, but the siege itself continued through the winter.

The balance changed in 1191, when Philip II of France arrived in April and Richard I of England reached Acre in June with ships from Cyprus. Richard took charge of the siege works, while Frankish sappers undermined the walls. Saladin's attempt to storm the trenches on 25 June 1191 was repulsed, and the garrison, short of food and unable to expect relief, negotiated a surrender in early July. The terms promised the lives of the garrison in exchange for a large ransom, the release of Christian captives and the return of the True Cross. Accounts differ on the figures: one popular source gives a ransom of 200,000 gold dinars and 1,500 Christian prisoners, while others describe the payment as tied to the release of some 2,700 hostages. The arrangement was never completed in full, and each side accused the other of delay.

The surrender led directly to the killing of Muslim captives. When the deadline for the handover of the cross and the payments passed, Richard concluded that Saladin was stalling. On 16 August he ordered the prisoners brought to a hill called Ayyadieh outside the city, and on 20 August around 2,700 of them were executed in view of Saladin's army. Saladin responded by killing Christian captives in his own hands. Historians have debated Richard's motives, and the massacre was controversial even among Christian contemporaries, some of whom did not mention non-combatants among the dead. The episode hardened the conflict for the rest of the war.

After Acre, Richard decided to take the port of Jaffa before attempting Jerusalem, since Jaffa could receive supplies and reinforcements by sea. He left Acre in August and marched south along the coast, with his fleet moving alongside to supply the army and protect its seaward flank. Saladin, whose priority was to prevent a Frankish advance on Jerusalem, shadowed the column with his mounted troops, harassing its flanks and attempting to break its formation. On 7 September 1191, near Arsuf, Saladin launched a sustained attack. Richard kept his infantry and cavalry in disciplined formation until the Hospitallers broke ranks and charged; Richard then committed his whole force, and the Franks won. Estimates of troop numbers vary widely, and the reported Ayyubid losses (some 7,000 men in one account) come from later reconstructions. The battle secured the central coast, including Jaffa, for the Crusaders.

Saladin's campaign of destruction followed the defeat. Jaffa's fortifications had already been slighted in 1190, and after Arsuf Saladin razed Ascalon's port and dismantled the chain of fortified sites between the coast and Jerusalem, including Lydda, Ramla and Latrun. This scorched-earth strategy denied Richard secure bases and forced him to rebuild forts inland slowly, so the Crusade stalled around Jaffa for roughly seven weeks. By the end of October 1191 Richard had begun to advance toward Jerusalem, but the approaching winter and the desolate road made the city's capture impossible, and the diplomatic contacts that followed produced the truce described below.

Diplomacy with Richard I and the Treaty of Jaffa

Contact between the two rulers began soon after Richard reached Acre. Richard sent a messenger to Saladin on 18 June 1191 requesting a face to face meeting. Saladin declined on the grounds of protocol, arguing that rulers met only once a peace had been agreed. Direct meetings never took place, but the courts exchanged gifts, and Richard had a number of meetings with Al-Adil, Saladin's brother. Baha al-Din preserves a message in which Richard, citing the custom among kings, asked to send Saladin a gift. Later, during the fighting around Jaffa in 1192, one account says that the English king wrote his rival asking for fresh fruit, and the chivalrous sultan generously obliged.

The most discussed proposals concerned dynastic marriage and the division of the country. Richard suggested a match between Al-Adil and his sister Joan, the former queen of Sicily. In a letter dated November 1191, Richard said that if the pope did not approve, he would offer one of his nieces instead, for whom I shall not need papal consent. Neither marriage was concluded; the talks over Al-Adil's union were failed, and Richard marched to Ascalon, which had been recently demolished by Saladin. On partition, the same correspondence records Richard stating that he would assign parts of Palestine to Al-Adil, while insisting that we must have a foothold in Jerusalem. The Frankish side thus sought a coastal and Jerusalemite presence that Saladin was unwilling to cede in full.

The treaty was concluded in early September 1192, after the Battle of Jaffa; sources give the date as 1 or 2 September. Its terms were limited. It established a three-year truce between the two armies. The Franks kept the coast, with the Christians would hold the coast from Tyre to Jaffa. Ascalon was the price of the settlement: its fortifications were to be demolished and the town returned to Saladin. On Jerusalem, the agreement left the city under Muslim authority while allowing Christians to visit it; unarmed Christian pilgrims were granted free access to holy sites. The negotiations were assisted by Balian of Ibelin. Richard left the Levant in October, and his departure from Acre on 9 October 1192 ended the Third Crusade.

The reliability of the accounts of these encounters is uneven. The letters between the rulers are known mainly through Arabic reporting, in particular Baha al-Din's narrative, which records an exchange in which Richard's messenger was received and the replies were witnessed. Modern historians have debated how far the marriage and partition proposals were sincere. One analysis argues that Richard initiated the proposal, directly to al-Adil, who passed the terms to Saladin. Other scholars, such as Thomas Asbridge, have examined the same episodes in detail, and a later study argues that these talks reveal serious possibilities for imagining a future for the Holy Land instead of being dismissed as tactical delay. Because the parties rarely left the same record of their intentions, the marriage and partition schemes are best read as attempts at a settlement, not as documented agreements.

Expansion beyond Egypt and Syria

Yemen

Saladin's first major expansion outside Egypt and Syria was into southern Arabia. In 1173 he dispatched his brother Turan-Shah to lead an expedition into southern Arabia. Later writers such as Ibn al-Athir and al-Maqrizi linked the venture to strategic fears: if Egypt were lost to Nur al-Din, the Ayyubids would need a distant, secure refuge. The campaign moved quickly. Ayyubid forces captured Zabid in May 1174, followed later that year by the seizure of the important port city of Aden. Aden then became the dynasty's principal maritime outlet in the Indian Ocean. Control of the highlands took longer. The Hamdanid sultans of Sanaa resisted the Ayyubids in 1175, and it was not until 1189 that the Ayyubids managed to definitely secure Sanaa.

Governance proved fragile. Following Turan-Shah's departure from Yemen in 1176, a series of local revolts broke out, destabilizing Ayyubid rule. Order was restored through a different kind of appointment: Saladin named another brother, Tughtakin, as governor in 1182, and Tughtakin successfully solidified Ayyubid rule throughout Yemen from Zabid.

The Hejaz and the pilgrimage routes

The Ayyubid state came to include the Hejaz, the region containing Mecca and Medina. Dynastic overviews list it among the territories encompass[ed] by Saladin's rule, alongside Yemen, northern Nubia, Tripolitania and Upper Mesopotamia. Control of the holy cities carried religious weight, because the security of the Hajj was a central obligation for any ruler claiming leadership of the Sunni world. Pilgrim traffic reached the Hejaz along three main routes, originated from Damascus in the north, Basra in the northeast and Sanaa and Aden in the south. Historians of the pilgrimage stress that many Muslim rulers, from Saladin in the 12th century to Suleiman the Magnificent in the 16th century, heavily invested in infrastructure and security for pilgrims. In general terms, such investment meant that rulers and wealthy patrons built caravanserais, supplied water and provided protection along these roads to Makkah and Madinah. Where Saladin's own role is concerned, the sources emphasize the security and provisioning of the routes rather than detailed administrative records of the holy cities.

The Maghreb and the Almohads

Pressure on the western Maghreb came through Ayyubid commanders rather than Saladin directly, and the extent of his responsibility is debated. Recent scholarship describes campaigns led by the Ayyubid mamluks Sharaf al-Din Qaraqush and Ibn Qaratikin in Libya and a war between the Almohads and the Ayyubids in Ifriqiya (Tunisia). One study examines to what extent Saladin was responsible for these military expeditions. Early gains were fragile: one Ayyubid force took a wide stretch of territory, from Algiers and Milyana in the west to Constantine in the east, but within less than a year he lost all of his new conquests in the face of a determined Almohad counterattack. The survivors withdrew east to Qaraqush's territory.

The political conflict had a religious dimension. The Almohads had claimed the title of caliph for themselves and therefore did not accept the Abbasids' legitimacy, whereas the Ayyubids and the rival Almoravid-descended Banu Ghaniya both recognized the Abbasid caliphs of Baghdad. This shared ground produced a possible alliance against the Almohads. A later study describes the long struggle between the Almohad caliphs of the Maghrib, the Banū Ghāniya as a contest in which Saladin's power was limited by distance and by Almohad strength.

Relations with Baghdad and the limits of control

Saladin's relationship with the Abbasid caliphate was both symbolic and practical. After the Fatimid caliphate ended, Saladin declared his allegiance to the Abbasids. The Abbasid caliph al-Mustanjid had earlier encouraged the removal of the Fatimid caliph al-Adid, which aimed to pressure Saladin in deposing his rival caliph. In Baghdad's eyes, therefore, Saladin's Egyptian rule was a means of restoring Sunni legitimacy rather than a fully independent sovereignty.

The reach of his authority was nevertheless uneven. Yemen needed repeated military and administrative intervention, the Maghreb ventures were reversed within a year, and the Hejaz depended on pilgrimage security rather than direct rule over local society. Even so, Saladin's campaigns set the general borders and sphere of influence of the sultanate of Egypt for the almost 350 years of its existence.

Death, succession and Ayyubid partition

Saladin died in Damascus on 4 March 1193, at about 55 or 56 years of age, and was buried in a mausoleum beside the Umayyad Mosque. He had ruled Egypt and Syria for nearly two decades, but he had not established a settled system for passing power on. His authority rested on personal military leadership, iqta grants and the loyalty of relatives and emirs, and none of these survived him intact. Shortly before his death he distributed his lands among his close family. His son al-Aziz Uthman, who had already governed Egypt, received the Egyptian throne. Another son, al-Afdal, was given Damascus, and az-Zahir Ghazi received Aleppo. Saladin's brother al-Adil, who had earlier held Kerak and Transjordan and then governed in Mesopotamia, was the most experienced of the family's senior men. He was not given the central capital, but he kept a power base in the east and in the Transjordan region.

The arrangement lasted only a short time. Al-Afdal, the nominal head of the family, could not control his brothers. Al-Aziz marched on Damascus in 1194 and again in 1195, and rival emirs changed sides more than once. Al-Adil repeatedly mediated, and then allied with al-Aziz against al-Afdal. Damascus fell to the coalition in 1196. Al-Afdal was captured, and he was exiled to Salkhad, a town in the Hauran. The Egyptian sultan was then proclaimed the supreme overlord of the Ayyubid domains, but in practice al-Adil installed himself in Damascus and held the real power. Al-Aziz died in a hunting accident in 1198, and his young son al-Mansur Muhammad was proclaimed sultan in Egypt. Al-Adil overthrew this grand-nephew in 1200 and took the Egyptian throne himself.

Al-Adil's rule from 1200 to his death in 1218 restored a degree of unity. He moved the family's centres of power, placing his sons in key cities such as Damascus, Aleppo and Kerak, and extended the dynasty's reach into the Jazira and Armenian borderlands. He also arranged for his own sons to govern while he remained the senior ruler. This pattern, in which a senior ruler distributed governorships among his children, became the usual form of Ayyubid politics. Rivalries among the branches continued, and the family repeatedly fought over Damascus, Aleppo and Egypt. Several princes were deposed, and some were allied with Crusaders, Seljuk or Mongol-era rivals at different times.

Political fragmentation weakened the dynasty against the military slaves and officers that Saladin's successors had come to depend on. In Egypt, the Ayyubid sultan al-Salih Ayyub relied heavily on Turkic slave soldiers, the Bahri Mamluks, who had been garrisoned on the island of Roda. After his death in 1249, these soldiers seized control. In 1250 they overthrew the Ayyubid line in Cairo, and the Mamluk sultanate was established. Syria followed a decade later. In 1260 the Mongol invasion took Aleppo and briefly Damascus, but the Mamluk army under Baybars defeated the Mongols at Ayn Jalut that year and went on to take Damascus. The Ayyubid princes who survived were effectively absorbed into a Mamluk framework, though a branch ruling Hama continued as dependent rulers until 1341.

The Ayyubid partition therefore illustrates the central problem of Saladin's regime. His conquests created a large, multi-regional state, but it was held together by his personal prestige and by the loyalty of kin and commanders. Once that personal authority was removed, competing claims to Egypt, Damascus and Aleppo led to repeated civil war, and the armies on which the dynasty depended eventually passed to the Mamluks.

Family, personal life and character

Marriage and household

The best-attested personal tie is Saladin's marriage to Ismat al-Din Khatun, which dates to 1176. The union also tied him to his former overlord's household, since she was the widow of his former lord Nur al-Din Zengi. Beyond her, the record is thin: not much is known of Saladin's wives or slave-women. Ismat al-Din Khatun bore him no children, so his heirs came from other mothers.

Estimates of his progeny diverge. A list of sons compiled by Imad al-Din al-Isfahani, based on information provided by Saladin late in his reign, names fifteen, yet the same author elsewhere writes that Saladin was survived by seventeen sons and one daughter. Even the birth order is inconsistent: one son, al-Zahir Dawud, is placed eighth in one source and twelfth in another in a letter written by his minister.

Three sons came to dominate the succession. Al-Afdal was the eldest, and he was one of seventeen sons of Saladin, born around 1169 in Damascus. Al-Aziz held the second place in birth order, and az-Zahir the third and his lands included northern Syria and a small part of Mesopotamia. Saladin prepared them for rule early. In 1186 his father appointed him governor of Aleppo, Mosul and supporting areas which had recently been taken from the Zengids. In the same year his two older brothers were appointed, respectively, as governor of Syria and Egypt. The rivalries that followed, and the partition of his lands, are treated below.

Piety, generosity and way of life

Arabic biographical writing, including the work of Baha al-Din ibn Shaddad, presents Saladin as a devout Sunni ruler, and this image became the standard portrait of him in later Muslim historiography. His attention to religious institutions, including the madrasas and mausoleums he endowed in Egypt and Syria, is discussed in the sections on Sunni policy and architecture.

Generosity is the trait most often linked to his last days. Before his death he had given away all his money to the poor, leaving nothing to pay for his funeral. By one count, he kept only a lone gold coin along with forty-seven silver coins. The arrangements were reportedly so modest that they were described as a pauper's funeral. He was buried in a mausoleum adjacent to the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus.

His simplicity is reported in the same accounts. Even in his final illness, he reportedly eschewed the quilted tunic he always wore in public, even though the weather was cold and damp.

Final illness and the limits of the evidence

Accounts of his final months describe a gradual decline. He was feeling old then and complained of loss of appetite, weakness, lassitude, and indigestion. The fatal illness itself is described as a two-week series of sweating attacks of "bilious fever" with headaches. His physicians responded with bloodletting and enemas to no avail. He died on 4 March 1193, at about age 55 or 56.

The diagnosis remains uncertain. Some modern summaries name yellow fever, while others treat the illness as a generic fever. A review at a University of Maryland conference pointed toward typhoid, and reviewers believed his sweating fits and weakness were brought on by the bacterial infection. Other suggestions have included viral encephalitis and tuberculosis. These retrospective diagnoses rest on very little evidence: a medical investigator involved in the case observed that there are no tests and the historical accounts are a little questionable.

Most of what is known about his private life comes from writers attached to his court, such as Baha al-Din ibn Shaddad and al-Qadi al-Fadil. Their accounts were shaped by loyalty to the sultan and by the conventions of courtly biography. Saladin's family life, his emotional world and his views on personal matters are therefore largely invisible in the surviving record, and reconstructions of his character should be read with that limit in mind.

Sources for his life and their reliability

Knowledge of Saladin rests on three broad groups of texts: Arabic biographies and chancery writings produced in or near his court, later Arabic chronicles, and Latin and vernacular accounts by Western Christians. Each tradition frames him differently, so historians usually compare them rather than rely on any single one.

Contemporary Arabic sources

The most authoritative text is the biography by Baha al-Din ibn Shaddad. Trained as a jurist and teacher in Baghdad and Mosul, he entered Saladin's service in 1188, after the sultan's interest in his writings led to an appointment as judge of the army (In 1188, returning from Hajj, ibn Shaddād was summoned by Saladin who had read and been impressed by his writings. He was "permanently enrolled" in the service of Saladin, who appointed him qadi al-'askar). Because he was present at the siege of Acre and the battle of Arsuf, his narrative of the Third Crusade is largely firsthand (he was an eye witness at the Siege of Acre and the Battle of Arsuf and provided "a vivid chronicle of the Third Crusade".). His book is also "based for the most part on personal observation" and provides a complete portrait as "Muslims saw him". Its closeness to the sultan gives the account of his final years a sympathetic tone, and it is generally treated as a corrective to the Latin narratives (his personal relationship with the sultan adds a sympathetic and moving element to the account of his final years).

Other Arabic material comes from the chancery. The letters and official writings of al-Qadi al-Fadil, Saladin's secretary, and the works of Imad al-Din al-Isfahani, who also served in the chancery, supply the official vocabulary of victory, jihad and legitimacy. Much of this survives in later anthologies, so its wording and dating require careful checking against other evidence.

Later Arabic chronicles

Ibn al-Athir (1160–1233) wrote the universal history "al-Kamil fi'l-Ta'rikh", is one of the outstanding sources for the history of the mediaeval world. For the Saladin period, however, his method poses problems. He routinely fails to specify his sources, and for events at Baghdad he relied greatly on the chronicle of Ibn al-Jawzî, which comes to an end in the year 574/1177. His evaluation of Saladin is also uneven. Translators have pointed to the historian's partiality for the House of the former, and his perceived hostility to Saladin. His account of the period is organized around the champions of the Jihad, sometimes called the 'counter-crusade'. Later Sunni writers used Saladin as an exemplar of the pious ruler, but Ibn al-Athir's text shows that this image was contested even among Muslim authors, who debated whether Saladin had been a legitimate successor to Zengid rule.

Latin and Frankish sources

Latin sources were written from within the Crusader states or from Western Europe, and they are shaped by the losses they describe. William of Tyre (c. 1130–1186), archbishop of Tyre, wrote a history of the Kingdom of Jerusalem that ends before Hattin, so it shows Saladin's rise only from the Frankish side and in its early stages. Western chroniclers of the 1190s, by contrast, wrote with the Third Crusade in view.

The most vivid of these is the Old French verse chronicle attributed to Ambroise. Its value lies in its perspective: it recounts the events of the crusade from the point of view of the Anglo-Norman contingent. Its authorship, however, has been questioned (the identification of Ambroise as author has recently been challenged.). Ambroise's portrait of Saladin is also not neutral. Ailes argues that the chronicler manipulated the perception of Saladin that was popular in the crusading army. Ambroise nonetheless presents Saladin and his brother Saphadin as honourable opponents, and the narrative also gives a personal perspective on the Islamic warriors and their leaders.

Differences between the traditions

Arabic writers tend to present Saladin's campaigns as a defence of Muslim territory and as part of a wider jihad, and they give considerable attention to the sultan's relations with the caliphate and rival Zengid princes. Latin writers emphasize the loss of Jerusalem, the relic and pilgrim dimension of the war, and the military failings of the Franks. Ambroise, writing for an audience that admired Richard, mixes admiration for Saladin with a clear hierarchy of heroes. Where Arabic and Latin accounts disagree on the number of troops, the course of a battle or the terms of a truce, historians usually weigh the eyewitness status and the political interests of each author.

Medieval European and literary reception

Within a generation of the Third Crusade, Saladin had become a figure of European literature. Some Latin writers first portrayed him stereotypically as a cruel scourge, sent by God to punish Christian sins. Over the course of the Middle Ages, however, European authors more often saw him as an embodiment of chivalric virtues, a model knight, and a just prince. The shift was driven by the chivalric values of the courts that consumed these texts. Among the works is the Old French poem Le Pas Saladin, in which the sultan calls off an attack because he admires the courage of twelve knights who hold their ground against him. Other narratives show him sparing captives and sending gifts or physicians to European rulers. This idealised Saladin, in harmony with the values of chivalry, appears in numerous Western narratives where he spares captives, admires the courage of his adversaries, and sends gifts or physicians to European rulers.

The legend also grew in less flattering directions. Some writers presented him as living proof that one need not be Christian or European to be a near-perfect knight and prince, while other writers forged bogus genealogies that made Saladin the direct descendant of French knights and affirmed that he secretly converted to Christianity. A further strand of romance from the thirteenth century linked him with European women, most notably Eleanor of Aquitaine, although the two never met. These stories were fiction, but they gave his image a lasting place in Western storytelling. Writers of the early modern period continued the pattern: Richard Knolles and Thomas Fuller, for example, presented him as a paragon of virtue set against the Crusaders.

Dante gave Saladin a more formal place in Christian thought. In the Inferno, Saladin appears in Limbo, the first circle of Hell, which holds souls who "never sinned" but whose "merit falls far short". Here Dante meets the souls of the unbaptised, of virtuous pagans and those who lived before the time of Christ, along with Islamic thinkers such as Avicenna and Averroes. In Canto IV Dante sees Saladin standing apart from the classical figures around him, a detail that sets him slightly outside the company of the ancient poets and philosophers. The placement mattered because it addressed a real theological problem for medieval Christian thinkers: how a virtuous non-Christian could be judged. Dante solves this problem by keeping the good Pagans and infidels in Hell, but giving them a painless and honorable fate. In effect, Dante recognised Saladin's moral excellence without granting him salvation, a compromise that reflected the wider medieval discomfort with the question. Dante's contemporaries and later readers therefore encountered Saladin as an honourable outsider rather than as a simple enemy.

Walter Scott's The Talisman (1825) carried this tradition into the nineteenth century. Published in 1825 as the second of his Tales of the Crusaders, it is set during the Third Crusade and centres on the relationship between Richard I of England and Saladin. In the novel, Saladin enters the camp of the crusaders in disguise and cures Richard. Scott's historical sources included David Hume, Edward Gibbon, and Mills, and his portrayal of the two rulers drew on their accounts of a chivalrous rivalry. Scott's romantic image of Saladin, coupled with the histories of Marin and Michaud, set a tone for the depictions of Saladin for over a hundred years. Gibbon and Scott both praised Saladin for generosity and magnanimity, which shows how far the Enlightenment and Romantic writers had adopted the chivalric portrait.

The chivalric image proved durable. By the turn of the twentieth century, this romantic image had taken root in European popular and scholarly writing alike. Later academic biographies, beginning with A. S. Ehrenkreutz's Saladin (1975), challenged the romantic portrait by emphasising his ambition and political calculation. Even so, the image of the magnanimous Muslim ruler remains one of the most widely recognised versions of Saladin in European culture.

Modern commemoration and national symbolism

In the Islamic world his memory followed a more complicated path, neglected for long centuries and then revived with extraordinary intensity in the modern era. European romantic literature had already made him a celebrated figure before Arab writers took him up. In 1898, while Damascus was still under Ottoman rule, Wilhelm II visited his tomb, praised him as one of history's most chivalrous rulers, and financed restoration of the mausoleum (a striking episode of 1898 dramatized the process).

The Arab rediscovery began in literature. Saladin was actually rediscovered by Christian writers who were impressed by the chivalry and religious tolerance of the Muslim ruler as presented in the works of western authors. At the same time, Saladin continued to be ignored by the Muslim reformers of the time who were generally less involved in literary life than secular nationalists. Najib al-Haddad introduced him to the Arabic stage with a 1898 play (his 1898 play, Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi). In the popular version, his Kurdish origin faded from view and his campaign against the Crusaders was recast as a national struggle rather than a religious one (his original Kurdish ethnicity was neglected, as was his propaganda of jihad).

Political appropriation intensified in the twentieth century. The Eagle of Saladin, a heraldic eagle, serves as the coat of arms in some Arab countries: Egypt, Iraq, Palestine, and Yemen. After the 1952 revolution in Egypt, its leaders drew direct parallels between this conflict and the Crusades, presenting their own cause of Arab liberation as the continuation of Saladin's effort against the Crusaders. When Egypt and Syria merged in 1958, the Eagle of Saladin became the new state's coat of arms. Nasser cast himself as heir to Saladin's unity project, and in Syria state propaganda compared Hafez al-Assad to Saladin in official portraits, statues, literature, etc. Today Saladin is portrayed as a national hero in mass media, Arab TV shows, educational curricula, popular culture, and conservative Muslim circles.

Commemorative monuments and place names followed the same logic. The bronze equestrian statue in front of the Citadel of Damascus was designed by Abdallah al-Sayed and unveiled by the then Syrian president Hafez al-Assad in 1993, marking the 800th anniversary of Saladin's death. It represents Saladin's victory at the Battle of Hattin, with two captured Frankish lords walking behind his horse. Its pose resembles 19th-century Western depictions of the Crusades, a detail that shows how European imagery fed into the Arab monument. Names are widespread: the list of Saladin-named places includes Salaheddine District, in Aleppo, Syria, Saladin Governorate, in Iraq, and Salah al-Din Road, in the Gaza Strip, among others in Arab and Turkish-speaking contexts.

Film and television gave the image its widest popular reach. The 1963 Egyptian epic Saladin the Victorious, also known as Saladin and the Great Crusades, is a 1963 Egyptian epic film directed by Youssef Chahine. It was conceived as an ode to Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, and its production was so costly that it reportedly bankrupted the producer. Critics noted its historical inaccuracies that were widely condemned, and read its Ayyubid founder as a stand-in for Nasser. Later productions include a Turkish series, which Kudüs Fatihi Selahaddin Eyyubi, a TV series produced by Turkey's Akli Films and Pakistan's Ansari and Shah Films, made with co-production from Pakistan. Such works have carried the Saladin figure from political rhetoric into everyday memory across the Arab, Turkish, and South Asian audiences.

Architecture and surviving monuments

The Cairo Citadel

Saladin's principal architectural project was the Cairo Citadel on the Mokattam hills. Its construction was begun by Salah ad-Din (Saladin) in 1176 and continued by subsequent Egyptian rulers. Sources differ on when it was finished: one gives 1183–1184 for the citadel itself, while another dates completion to 1182. The fortress was meant to guard Cairo against Crusader attack after the end of Fatimid rule. Its site was chosen so that it would overlook the whole city of Cairo, which gave defenders a height advantage.

The walls follow the scale of a royal fortress. Surviving descriptions note that the walls of the citadel are 3 m thick and their height from within the citadel averages 10 m, and that the towers rise in places to over 20 m. The main walls, towers and two gates were built in a short period, which one account places at no more than seven years (AH 572–9 / AD 1176–83). Some builders' details, such as the claim that he destroyed some small pyramids in Giza for stone, are repeated in tourism literature but are not confirmed by scholarly sources and should be treated cautiously.

The Citadel remained central to Egyptian rule for centuries. It was the seat of government in Egypt and the residence of its rulers for nearly 700 years from the 13th century until the construction of Abdeen Palace in the 19th century. Later rulers changed it considerably: the Citadel underwent major development during the Mamluk Sultanate, and Muhammad Ali Pasha carried out further major work in the nineteenth century. The northern enclosure is generally credited to Saladin, while later additions belong to al-Nasir Muhammad.

Other works in Cairo

Saladin's fortification program extended beyond the Citadel. He restored the Fatimid walls and gates in 1170 or 1171, and in 1176 he embarked on a project to radically expand the city's fortifications. The plan was to link Cairo and Fustat with one circuit. The project included the construction of the Citadel of Cairo and a 20 kilometer-long wall to connect and protect both Cairo and Fustat. The circuit was never finished. Long stretches of the wall were built, including the section to the north of the Citadel and a section near Fustat in the south.

Religious building was another part of the Sunni program. Saladin built a turbah and madrasa for al-Shafi'i in 1176, marking the first establishment on his grave. This complex in the Cairo cemetery of al-Qarafa was one of the first madrasas associated with the Shafi'i school in Egypt. It was part of a wider effort to reinforce Sunnism following the fall of the Shi'i Fatimid Caliphate. A teak cenotaph was placed over the grave, carved by 'Ubayd al-Najjar ibn Ma'ali in 1178-9. The domed mausoleum that now stands there was added later. The mausoleum, with a wooden dome over the grave, was erected in 1211 by al-Malik al-Kamil, so the present structure is largely the work of his successors rather than of Saladin alone.

Surviving monuments in Syria and the Levant

Few buildings that can be firmly linked to Saladin survive in Syria and the rest of the Levant. His own burial place is the clearest example. Although Saladin died in AH 589 / AD 1193, he was initially interred at the Damascus Citadel until his son al-Malik al-Afdal Nur al-Din 'Ali, ruler of Damascus, completed the construction of the mausoleum. The tomb stands beside the Umayyad Mosque, and the tomb complex included Madrassah al-Aziziah, of which little remains, except a few columns and an internal arch adjacent to the renovated tomb. The architecture is a square chamber with a dome, a type common in Ayyubid Damascus, and the wooden cenotaph inside is an original piece of Ayyubid woodwork.

Other sites carry his name without clear evidence of his building activity. The fortress near Latakia known as Qal'at Salah al-Din is a partly-preserved fortress in Syria which is an interesting example of Crusader-era fortifications, so the name reflects later tradition rather than his patronage. Attribution is also complicated where earlier and later construction overlap. The Damascus Citadel is the 11th century Citadel of Damascus, predating his rule. At Aleppo, the upper walls are associated with al-Malik al-Zaher Ghazi, a son of Saladin, which shows that building activity in Ayyubid Syria was often carried out by his heirs. Scholars therefore usually treat attributions in Syria as provisional, and the surviving evidence for Saladin's own architectural program there is thin compared with Cairo.

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7. The rare and excellent history of Saladin, or, al-Nawādir al-Sultaniyya wa'l-Mahasin al-Yusufiyya : Ibn Shaddād, Bahāʼ al-Dīn Yūsuf ibn Rāfiʻ, 1145-1234 or 1235 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archivearchive.org
8. Baha’ al-Din ibn Shaddad on Saladin’s virtues - Muslims and Crusaders: Christianity's Wars in the Middle East, 1095-1382erenow.org
9. Baha ad-Din ibn Shaddaden.wikipedia.org
10. The role of the Saladin legend in European culture and identitycommons.lib.jmu.edu
11. Saladinmonarchies.fandom.com
12. Al-Adiden.wikipedia.org
13. Nur ad-Din's Wars in Egypt, 1164-1169historyofwar.org
14. Shawaren.wikipedia.org
15. Battle of al-Babeinen.wikipedia.org
16. Siege of Alexandria (1167)en.wikipedia.org
17. Crusader invasions of Egypt, 1163–1169en.wikipedia.org
18. Battle of the Blacksen.wikipedia.org
19. Saladin in Egypten.wikipedia.org
20. Crusader invasions of Egypten.wikipedia.org
21. Salah-Al-Deen Ayoubimilitary-history.fandom.com
22. Saladinbritannica.com
23. Al-Mustadien.wikipedia.org
24. 1169en.wikipedia.org
25. Pro-Fatimid conspiracy against Saladinen.wikipedia.org
26. Saladin & the Unification of the Muslim Front: 1169-1187 CE - World History Encyclopediaworldhistory.org
27. Fatimid Caliphateen.wikipedia.org
28. Islamic Period and Modern Egypt Monuments The Citadel of Cairoegyptianmuseum.org
29. Cairo Citadelen.wikipedia.org
30. Mausoleum of Imam al-Shafi%27ien.wikipedia.org
31. Mausoleum of Imam al-Shafi'ien.wikipedia.org
32. Cairo Citadel: History, Location, Mosques, Map & Museumsegypttoursportal.com
33. Daoud ibn al-Adiden.wikipedia.org
34. Qadi al-Fadilen.wikipedia.org
35. 1.4.5 Saladin’s Rise and Unification of Egypt and Syriatutorchase.com
36. Isma‘ili Da‘wa and Politics: The Fatimid Era in Egyptsimerg.com
37. The Great Saracen - First Thingsfirstthings.com
38. Salah al-Dīn Yusuf ibn Ayyubcrusades-history.fandom.com
39. The Assassins in Fact and Fiction - Medievalists.netmedievalists.net
40. Saladinencyclopedia.com
41. Zengid dynasty by AdnanWolverine106 on DeviantArtdeviantart.com
42. The Assassins: 4ismaili.net
43. Imad ad-Din Zengi IIen.wikipedia.org
44. Saladinhistorica.fandom.com
45. Izz al-Din Mas%27uden.wikipedia.org
46. The Assassins - World History Encyclopediaworldhistory.org
47. Ch. IV THE ISMACILITES AND THE ASSASSINS 123search.library.wisc.edu
48. Saladin defies the Hashshashin - Daily Frienddailyfriend.co.za
49. Rashid ad-Din Sinanen.wikipedia.org
50. Saladin - World History Encyclopediaworldhistory.org
51. Ismat ad-Din Khatunen.wikipedia.org
52. Nureddinencyclopedia.com
53. The Ayyubid Reconquest - The map as Historythe-map-as-history.com
54. Levantine Brotherhood of Assassinsassassinscreed.fandom.com
55. Battle of Hattin: Saladin's Greatest Victory - World History Encyclopediaworldhistory.org
56. Sultanates: Ayyubidencyclopedia.com
57. The Ayyubid Army and Saladin's Campaigns: Hattin, Jerusalem, and the Crusadeskurdish-history.com
58. Saladin’s Wars: From Egypt to Hattin to the Third Crusade (1164–1192)kurdish-history.com
59. The Ayyubid Dynasty - World History Eduworldhistoryedu.com
60. Fatimid armyen.wikipedia.org
61. Qaymariyya (tribe)en.wikipedia.org
62. Turkish Flight Archery: Saladin's armyTurkish Flight Archery Research And Practiceturkishflightarchery.blogspot.com
63. 1.2.4 The Rise of Saladin and the Crisis of 1187tutorchase.com
64. Raynald of Ch%C3%A2tillonen.wikipedia.org
65. 1187en.wikipedia.org
66. Battle of Cressonen.wikipedia.org
67. Crusader Crucible: The Horns of Hattin - Warfare History Networkwarfarehistorynetwork.com
68. Gerard of Rideforten.wikipedia.org
69. Battle of Hattinen.wikipedia.org
70. Battle of Hattin 1187themaparchive.com
71. Battle of Hattin facts for kidskids.kiddle.co
72. Defending the Crusader Kingdoms: Collapse of a Kingdom: Jerusalem 1187defendingcrusaderkingdoms.blogspot.com
73. Battle of Acreebsco.com
74. Joscelin IIIen.wikipedia.org
75. Siege of Jerusalem (1187)en.wikipedia.org
76. Siege of Tyre (1187)en.wikipedia.org
77. Battle of Hattin, 4 July 1187historyofwar.org
78. 1187: Raynald of Chatillon, by Saladinexecutedtoday.com
79. Raynald of Chatilloncrusades-history.fandom.com
80. Reynald de Chatillonageofempires.fandom.com
81. 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Raynald of Châtillon - Wikisource, the free online libraryen.wikisource.org
82. Siege of Jerusalem (1187) — Crusader Siege in Israelcrusaderatlas.com
83. Saladin's Conquest of Jerusalem (1187 CE) - World History Encyclopediaworldhistory.org
84. Siege of Jerusalem (1187)crusades-history.fandom.com
85. Today in Middle Eastern history: Saladin takes Jerusalem (1187)foreignexchanges.news
86. Surrender of Jerusalem 1187 - Crusader Kingdomscrusaderkingdoms.com
87. William Borrelen.wikipedia.org
88. Siege of Jerusalem (1187)military-history.fandom.com
89. Crusades, Saladin & Jerusalem 1187 (podcast)tttpodcast.com
90. Saladin’s Legacy: Some Thoughtsapholt.com
91. Jerusalem 2 october 1187 ⋆ ASH - Abrahamic Study Hallabrahamicstudyhall.org
92. Siege of Acre (1189%E2%80%931191)en.wikipedia.org
93. The Siege of Acre, 1189-91 CE - World History Encyclopediaworldhistory.org
94. Third Crusade: Siege of Acrehistorynet.com
95. 1191en.wikipedia.org
96. Massacre at Ayyadiehen.wikipedia.org
97. The Siege of Acre: Where Richard the Lionheart Executed 2,700 Prisonersmissedhistory.com
98. The Capture of Acre Concluded the Crusadeshistoryng.com
99. Battle of Arsufen.wikipedia.org
100. Battle of Arsufebsco.com
101. JERUSALEM 1191 Part I - WarHistory.orgwarhistory.org
102. Battle of Jaffa (1192)en.wikipedia.org
103. Third Crusadeen.wikipedia.org
104. Battle of Jaffa: Lionheart's Greatest Victoryhistorynet.com
105. The letters of Richard and Saladin - by Mark Watkinsmedieval.substack.com
106. Treaty of Jaffamilitary-history.fandom.com
107. 16.4.4 Negotiations Saladin & Consequences Third Crusade Westtutorchase.com
108. Treaty of Jaffa (1192)en.wikipedia.org
109. A bit of historythewanderingmedievalist.blog
110. The One Kingdom Solution?: Diplomacy, Marriage, and Sovereignty in the Third Crusadelink.springer.com
111. Battle of Jaffa (1192)britannica.com
112. Ayyubid conquest of Yemensimple.wikipedia.org
113. Tughtakin ibn Ayyuben.wikipedia.org
114. Ayyubid dynastyen.wikipedia.org
115. From Mecca to Jizan: Exploring the forgotten heritage of Saudi Arabia's Hijaz provincemiddleeasteye.net
116. Syrian Hajj Road - UNESCO World Heritage Centrewhc.unesco.org
117. (PDF) Saladino y las campañas ayyubíes en el Magrebresearchgate.net
118. Saladin, the Almohads and the Banū Ghāniya: The Contest for North Africa (12th and 13th centuries) (Studies in the History and Society of the Maghrib, 7) - Baadj, Amar S.: 9789004296206 - AbeBooksabebooks.com
119. Ayyubid Conquest of Arabiaen.wikipedia.org
120. Al-Afdal ibn Salah ad-Dinen.wikipedia.org
121. Al-Zahir Ghazien.wikipedia.org
122. List of Ayyubid rulersen.wikipedia.org
123. Al-Aziz Uthmanen.wikipedia.org
124. Al-Mansur I Muhammaden.wikipedia.org
125. Al-Adil I - Wikidatawikidata.org
126. Explore Saladin Facts, Triumphs, History, Origin, & Legacyegypttoursportal.com
127. Saladin dies 1193professor-moriarty.com
128. Saladin and the Second and Third Crusades, 1147 to 1193fsmitha.com
129. The Mysterious Death of Saladin the Great - HubPagesdiscover.hubpages.com
130. The Legendary Sultan Saladin Was Likely Killed by Typhoid — History News Networkhistorynewsnetwork.org
131. Baha ad-Din ibn Shaddadmilitary-history.fandom.com
132. The Chronicle of Ibn al-Athir for the Crusading Period from al-Kamil fi'l-Ta'rikh. Part 2: The Years 541–589/1146–1193: The Age of Nur al-Din and Saladinroutledge.com
133. The Chronicle of Ibn al-Athīr for the Crusading Period from al-Kāmil fī'l-ta'rīkh. Part 2 - The Years 541-589/1146-1193: The Age of Nur al-Din and Saladin [2, Reprint ed.] 9780754640783, 9780754669517 - DOKUMEN.PUBdokumen.pub
134. The Chronicle of Ibn al-Athir for the Crusading Period from al-Kamil fi'l-ta'rikh: The Years 541 589/1146 1193, The Age of Nur Al-Din and Saladin (Crusade Texts in Translation): Richards, D. S.: 9780754640783: Amazon.com: Booksamazon.com
135. The Chronicle of Ibn al-Athir for the Crusading Period from al-Kamil fi'l-Ta'rikh - Medievalists.netmedievalists.net
136. Untitled 2myweb.ttu.edu
137. The Estoire de la Guerre Saintefrenchofoutremer.ace.fordham.edu
138. The Honourable Enemy: Saladin and Saphadin in Ambroise’s Estoire de la Guerre sainte - University of Bristolresearch-information.bris.ac.uk
139. The History of the Holy War: Ambroise's <I>Estoire de la Guerre Sainte</I> by Marianne Ailes, Paperbackbarnesandnoble.com
140. Bahāʾ al-Dīnbritannica.com
141. Ambroise's Estoire de la Guerre Sainte and the development of a genre Articlecentaur.reading.ac.uk
142. Ambroiseen.wikipedia.org
143. Mirror of Chivalry: Saladin in the Medieval European Imagination - Florida Scholarshipflorida.universitypressscholarship.com
144. The Changing Image of Saladin: From Crusader Villain to Chivalric Hero - Medievalists.netmedievalists.net
145. First circle of hellen.wikipedia.org
146. Canto IVinfernobydante.wordpress.com
147. The Talisman (Scott novel)en.wikipedia.org
148. The Talisman: Sir Walter Scott, Robert Whitfield: 9780786193684: Amazon.com: Booksamazon.com
149. The Talisman: 9781636371900: Scott, Walter: Booksamazon.com
150. Dante’s Infernodantecomedy.com
151. The Talisman, by Sir Walter Scottgutenberg.org
152. A Most Honourable Heathen: How Depictions of Saladin in England Transformed from Villain to Herojosephbutlerhistory.wordpress.com
153. Saladin: Sultan of Egypt and Syria and the Liberator ...countryreports.org
154. (PDF) From Kurdish Sultan to Pan‐Arab Champion and Muslim Hero: The Evolution of the Saladin Myth in Popular Arab Cultureresearchgate.net
155. Eagle of Saladin - Wikiwandwikiwand.com
156. Syrian nationalismen.wikipedia.org
157. Statue of Saladinen.wikipedia.org
158. Statue of Saladin, Damascusgpsmycity.com
159. Saladin (disambiguation)en.wikipedia.org
160. Saladin the Victorious - Movies on Google Playplay.google.com
161. Saladin the Victorious - The Criterion Channelcriterionchannel.com
162. In the Realm of the Senses: The Egyptian Stories of Youssef Chahine on Notebookmubi.com
163. Saladin the Victoriousen.wikipedia.org
164. Why Saladin Continues to Captivate the Arab World — History News Networkhistorynewsnetwork.org
165. Cairo Citadelmilitary-history.fandom.com
166. Salah El Din Citadel in Cairoluxorandaswan.com
167. Citadel of Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi - Discover Islamic Art - Virtual Museumislamicart.museumwnf.org
168. Fortifications of Cairoen.wikipedia.org
169. Bab al-Barqiyyaen.wikipedia.org
170. Mausoleum of Imam al-Shafi’iislamicheritage.co.za
171. Qubba al-Imam al-Shafi'i Cairo, Egyptarchnet.org
172. Mausoleum of Saladin (Salah al-Din) - Discover Islamic Art - Virtual Museumislamicart.museumwnf.org
173. Mausoleum of Saladinen.wikipedia.org
174. Citadel of Salah Ed-Din - History and Factshistoryhit.com
175. About: Statue of Saladindbpedia.org
176. The Monuments of Syria: A Guide 9780755612468, 9781850434962, 9781845119478 - DOKUMEN.PUBdokumen.pub
177. Salah El Din Citadel Cairoegypttoursportal.com