troops to aid Saladin when he had been attacked by Amalric and the
Byzantines, and he must have known that nothing would have been more
to the Franks' advantage than a conflict between Syria and Egypt. Although
the situation was moving towards a breaking point, there was still room
for diplomacy. In the winter of 1173 Nur al-Din decided to despatch al-
Muwaffaq Ibn al-Qaisarani to carry out a full audit of Egypt's revenues.
What was clear was that he was looking to receive an annual tribute from
Egypt and he was also asserting his authority over Saladin. If the relation-
ship between the two men had reached breaking point, then one assumes
that Saladin would have resisted such a provocative move, but it appears that
Ibn al-Qaisarani faced no obstacles and Saladin allowed him access to all the
accounts. It is interesting to note that Saladin chose Isa al-Hakkari, who was
instrumental in his appointment as vizier, to accompany Ibn al-Qaisarani to
Egypt.
The death of Nur al-Din and Amalric
As things turned out Nur al-Din never received Ibn al-Qaisarani's audit, for
in May 1174 he fell ill and died suddenly. A few months earUer, Ayyub had
passed away so Saladin had, over a brief period of time, lost tlie two men
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who had the most influence over him. With Turan Shah campaigning in the
Yemen, Saladin effectively fomid himself the most senior member of his
family. Had Nur al-Din lived then it would be fair to say that Saladin would
have been relegated to a footnote in history and that this book would have
been Nur al-Din's biography. With Syria and Egypt under Nur al-Din's
control and with Mosul in his brother's hand, he would have undoubtedly
turned his attention towards Jerusalem. But on such fortuitous events as a
natural death, history turns, and so does the fate of men. From the moment
that Nur al-Din died, Saladin assumed the role of his protege and his
ideological heir. Without Nur al-Din, there would have been no Saladin,
and only two things differentiated them; the first obviously was that Saladin
conquered Jerusalem, and the second, less obvious but just as important, was
that Nur al-Din did not have the genius of al-Qadi al-Fadil to mould his
image. If Saladin had thought that the death of Nur al-Din would remove
the shadow of his master, then he was mistaken, for that cast by the house
of Zengi was even more ominous. What Nur al-Din had held together
through the force of personality now unravelled with bewildering pace, as
the members of his family, who shared his ambition but not his abilities,
began to jostle to fill the political vacuum. Nur al-Din had left behind an
11-year-old son, al-Salih, in whose youthful character and comportment
one could already detect characteristics of his father, but he also left behind
two nephews, Imad al-Din Zengi in Sinjar and Saif al-Din Ghazi in Mosul,
in whom one searched in vain for similar virtues. Little love was lost
between the two brothers: the venerable Kamal al-Din al-Shahrazuri had
once warned Nur al-Din that the house of Zengi would end at their hands.
When news broke in Mosul of Nur al-Din's death, Saif al-Din chose
not to mourn but to celebrate. He did so by declaring a public holiday,
allowing wine to be drunk openly in the city and reinstating the illegal taxes
which had been abolished by Nur al-Din. Freed of his guardian, Saif al-Din,
who clearly considered himself to be the senior member of the Zengi house-
hold, immediately captured Nasibin, Harran, al-Ruha, al-Raqqa and all the
territories of the Jazira (upper Mesopotamia) except for Sinjar. The temp-
tation was to cross the Euphrates, but prudence prevailed and the Mosuli
army withdrew to the east. Meanwhile Aleppo positioned itself accordingly
and, after much skulduggery, succeeded in seizing al-Salih, Nur al-Din's son
and heir apparent, who was too young to rule and too valuable to be left
uncontrolled from Damascus. With al-Salih under its control, Aleppo firmly
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meantime a number of Nur al-Din's officials, alarmed by developments in
Aleppo and fearful of the aggression of the Latin Kingdom, took an oath to
act together and appointed one of Nur al-Din's senior commanders, Ibn
al-Muqaddam, as army commander.
As for the Latin Kingdom, Nur al-Din's death removed from the polit-
ical map their most dangerous foe. Under him Syria had become united, and
with the addition of Egypt the possibility of an Islamic pincer movement
from the north and south had become an ominous reality. Amalric had
endeavoured to prevent Egypt falling to Nur al-Din, but he had failed in
that endeavour. Now he wasted no time in talcing advantage of the Syrian
fragmentation and attacked Banias, which controlled the main road from
Damascus to Upper Galilee. However, he had not accounted for the pres-
ence of Nur al-Din's wife, who was in Banias and who cajoled and rallied to
defend it until a truce was reached and Amalric called off the siege.
But all - Mosul, Aleppo, Damascus and Jerusalem - kept a wary eye on
Egypt and Saladin. So far he had not acted, but it was clear that the wealth
which Egypt afforded him meant that, when he did so, he would be a force
to be reckoned with. The wise counsellor to Zengi and Nur al-Din, Kamal
al-Din al-Shahrazuri, advised caution, for he knew Saladin well. 'Let us not
remove him from our allegiance', Kamal al-Din warned, 'he is stronger than
we are'. But the question which was asked by all was what were Saladin's
•intentions? Was he really the champion of the holy war or a warlord usurper?
These are questions that over the years have divided historians to such a
degree that it is difficult to think of another historical personality who
has attracted as much awe and opprobrium in equal measure. Was he the
Saladin of whom Gibb writes, 'For a brief and decisive moment, by sheer
goodness and firmness of character, he raised Islam out of the rut of polit-
ical demoralization'?^ Or, on the other hand, was he the Saladin whose most
significant historical accomplishments should be attributed, according to
Ehrenlcreutz 'to his ruthless persecution and execution of political opponents
and dissenters, to his vindictive belligerence and calculated opportunism,
and to his readiness to compromise religious ideals to political expediency'?
We do not know what is in the hearts of men, but the historian can
pass judgement on their actions. What is, above all, striking about Saladin
was the dogged tenacity and consistency of his claim to be the champion of
the holy war. Whether he believed in it or not, he followed this course
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unswervingly, with the kind of single-mindedness of purpose which is asso-
ciated with great figures down the ages.® He was, he claimed, the natural
political and ideological heir of Nur al-Din and, sincere or not, he never
deviated from this line. And yet, as Lyons and Jackson put it, 'The black and
white of the
Holy War, however fairly it may convey Saladin's own ideals,
was an oversimplification in respect of the need for an immediate, practical
and coherent policy'.^ To put it another way, Saladin may have believed in
the holy war but he had to contend with the politics of the holy war and
therein lay the jarring that has given birth to the divergent views. Above all
he, and the men who surrounded him, were realists - men with few illu-
sions. He himself would have seen no contradiction in being both a mujahid
(one who carried out jihad) and someone who played the game of power
politics; his father, after all, had been a consummate player. Saladin aspired
to build an empire, in the same way that Zengi and Nur al-Din had done.
The politics of Syria demanded constant expansion to satisfy the ambitions
of his amirs and to ensure their loyalty. Above all this aspiration reflected
personal and family territorial ambitions and the desire to establish a dynasty.
For Saladin it would have been madness to think otherwise. Personal virtue
had nothing to do with this matter; it was a question of survival. The polit-
ical vacuum of the age respected force more than ideology.
And yet as Saladin viewed the political developments in Syria it can fairly
be said that more than ambition was at stake. An ideology did exist and it
is with Nur al-Din and then with Saladin that we can finally speak of an
alliance being forged between the military leadership and the religious
classes. It is not a coincidence that both men were also the great champions
of the Sunni Revival in Syria and Egypt, and the patrons of many madrasas
and religious institutions. The call for jihad - initially uttered by voices in
the wilderness such as al-Sulami - was now being echoed throughout the
madrasas of Syria, Egypt and Mesopotamia, creating a momentum which
could be neither ignored nor resisted. We have spoken of an alliance earlier
in Baghdad between al-Ghalzali and Nizam ul-Mulk which laid the founda-
tions of the Sunni Revival, and now another alliance emerged between the
ulama/administrators who preached the message of spiritual renunciation
and jihad and the miUtary amirs who carried out this message. This alliance
fed off each other: the military patrons built madrasas which attracted pro-
fessors and students, who in turn vocally clamoured for jihad. The greater
the number of madrasas the greater was the clamour, and the greater the
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clamour the more the pressure became on the militaiy leadership to act,
until it became irresistible. In this alliance it was the religious scholars who
set the agenda. For them, whether Saladin privately was a sincere champion
of jihad or an opportunistic warlord eager to forther his career was a matter
that could be left to God to decide. Saladin could fight the jihad willingly
or reluctantly, what mattered was that he fought it. To an extent Saladin's
early success trapped him into a political course which he had to follow. In
the words of Jackson, he had as a young man travelled too far up the polit-
ical scale for him to be able to go back down it or even to stay where he
was.® And even if he had wanted to act otherwise, the ulama who needed
him would not have allowed him to do so.
Saladin heard the news of Nur al-Din's death from the Franks and he
immediately wrote to Damascus to make sure the news was not simply
rumour. When it was confirmed, he held a three-day mourning period, he
also wrote to al-Salih offering his condolences, and on the first Friday after
Nur al-Din's death the sermon was pronounced in al-Salih's name. As
Saladin surveyed the political scene in Syria from Cairo several issues played
on his mind. Certainly, the seizure of al-Salih by the Aleppans angered him:
'How have they dared do this.>' he wrote to Ibn al-Muqaddam. He wrote at
once to Aleppo, but it seems that the Aleppans did not think that he would
leave Egypt and advance on Syria.' But still Saladin bided his time, for he
was aware he could not overplay his hand; vexing anger at al-Salih's 'impris-
onment' was one thing, but too much protestation would simply inflame
the distrust that elements in Syria had of his intentions. At the same time,
Amalric's move on Banias alarmed him and, on hearing of the Prankish
advance, he had marched out with troops, only for news to reach him
that a truce had been agreed. In Saladin's opinion the truce signalled the
weakness of Damascus. Therein lay an opportunity, of course, but equally a
danger, for a weak Damascus could easily fall within the Mosul orbit, which
in turn would mean that Syria would be pulled away from Egypt - and that
could only be to the advantage of the Franks. If, however, Saladin were to
advance on Syria he would be seen as a usurper, for al-Salih had clearly been
appointed as Nur al-Din's successor and Saladin could not be seen to go
against his master's wishes. 'I am in one valley and those who think ill of me
are in another' he defended himself, but at the same time he was equally
adamant in a letter, addressed to Ibn al-Muqaddam, that had Nur al-Din
had a commander whom he trusted more than Saladin then he would have
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entrusted Egypt to him. He then, somewhat disingenuously, went on to
argue that had Nur al-Din lived he would have entrusted the upbringing of
al-Salih to him. Of all facts however, one was the most clear: until Saladin
acted, the situation in Syria would remain fragmented.
What was equally clear was that if the call to jihad was going to be the
bulwark of Saladin's legitimacy then Syria had to be the centre of his empire.
At what stage the idea of the transition from Egypt to Syria occurred to
Saladin is not obvious - certainly there were no such thoughts while Nur al-
Din was alive - but if he was going to style himself as the heir of Nur al-Din
then he had to move to Damascus in order to perpetuate the legacy of the
Zengid unifier of Syria. The move to Syria, both political and symbolic, was
not taken lightly, nor was it without its detractors - none more so than
al-Qadi al-Fadil himself, who believed that Egypt was being abandoned for
Syria. Saladin did not need to move into Syria; he could have remained in
Egypt, where he had successfully asserted his authority and where there
was more wealth and opportunity to be gained than the whole of Syria. He
was also under no pressure to move into Syria and was drawn there not by
outside political events but by the power vacuum. But once the decision to
move to Syria had been made, then the message could not deviate, and so
Imad al-Din al-Isfahani asks in a letter, 'What are the ancient pyramids in
comparison to the honoured precincts of Jerusalem.^' It was the emphasis of
Syria as the home to Jerusalem which played a central role in the arguments
of Saladin's scribes during this period.
While Saladin pondered this dilemma, even more dramatic news reached
him: Amalric was dead. He had returned from Banias feeling unwell, began
to suffer from dysentery and died on 14 July 1174. Within two months the
two giants of
Syria, Nur al-Din and Amalric, had died. Already in Saladin's
early career the opportune deaths of Shirkuh, then the Fatimid caliph al-
Adid had opened the doors of power in Egypt; now the deaths of Nur
al-Din and Amalric opened those of Syria. If luck needs to be considered as
a factor in a great man's rise to power, then Saladin was indeed lucky. One
more death would follow which would help ease his path to power, but of
that we shall write later. Saladin would certainly have been less confident
in his march on Damascus had Amalric still been alive, for Amalric might
have challenged the inevitability of the triumph of Islam.'" His son Baldwin
rV, who was 13 years of age, had been accepted as king by the barons, as he
was the only remaining prince of the royal house. Born in 1161, the young
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Icing was named after his father's elder brother King Baldwin III, who
became his godfather. The story is told that when asked what christening
present he would give the infant, Baldwin III replied 'The Kingdom of
Jerusalem'. It was, of course, said in jest, since Baldwin III was 31 years of
age, newly married and the prospect of his nephew assuming the throne was
a remote one. Yet less than two years later he died childless and Amalric
became king.
There was no disputing Baldwin IV's claim to the throne. His corona-
tion was held on the seventy-fifth anniversaiy of the capture of Jerusalem by
the First Crusade and he was crowned as the sixth Latin King of Jerusalem.
But though there was no disputing his claim, his accession had not been an
automatic one, and a few days passed before it took place; a fact noted by
Saladin. The reason for this delay was quite dramatic. One day, as Baldwin
and his friends were playing and wrestling, as was the nature of boys of his
age, his tutor William of Tyre noticed something quite peculiar about the
young Idng: he felt no pain. No matter how hard his friends dug their nails
into his arm, he did not flinch. At once William was troubled, for he feared
the worst, and his fear was later confirmed; Baldwin was a leper and his life
would be short. How long he would reign was not clear, and Raymond of