Al-Mustanjid

One of al-Muqtafi's wives, al-Mustanjid's stepmother, wanted her own son to succeed. She gained over many amirs to her side, and had their slave-girls armed with daggers to kill the new caliph. Al-Mustanjid discovered the plot and placed the rebel son and mother in prison.

Around this time, Fatimid dynasty was at last extinguished, having lasted for 260 years. Their conqueror, Saladin, though himself an orthodox Muslim, initially didn't proclaim the Sunni faith in the midst of a people still devoted to the tenets and practice of the Shi'a sect. But he soon found himself able to do so; and thus the spiritual supremacy of the Abbasids again prevailed, not only in Syria, but throughout Egypt and all its dependencies.

There is little else to say than that this caliph continued to occupy a more or less independent position, with a vizier and courtly surroundings, and supported by only a small force sufficient for an occasional local campaign.

• Ar-Rashid bi-llāh 30th Abbasid Caliph and Cousin of Al-Mustanjid.
• Awn al-Din ibn Hubayra a 12th-century Arab official and jurist, who served for sixteen years as Abbasid vizier under al-Mustanjid and his father al-Muqtafi.

• This text is adapted from William Muir's public domain, The Caliphate: Its Rise, Decline, and Fall.