The Moslem world was ostensibly partitioned between the
Syrian caliph of Bagdad and the Egyptian caliph of Cairo. Egypt was wretchedly administered.
The caliph of Cairo
was yet an animal of his viziers. Amaury, seeing the likelihood of extending
his spaces to the Nile, took arms against him.
In 1163 he sent an armed force which may have held the nation, had it not been
driven out by the adversary's flooding the valley of the Nile.
One gathering in Egypt
conjured the help of Nourredin, who sent as his general Shirkuh the Kurd, uncle
of Saladin. Amaury fulfilled against him the catch of Pelusium in 1164. In 1167 he took Alexandria,
instructed at the time by youthful Saladin. He later entered to Cairo and laid El Fostat
in fiery remains. In 11 68 Shirkuh recharged the war. Amaury, walking from Egypt to meet
his opponent in the abandon, was flanked by that general, who all of a sudden
possessed the land left undefended. Amaury, who had hitched a niece of the
Emperor Manuel, made with the Greeks an unsuccessful assault upon Damietta. Here the
Christians felt the hand of one who was ordained at last to topple all their
energy in the East. Saladin was in order. On the demise of Shirkuh he had been
selected vizier by the caliph of Cairo.
The caliph, wearied of being controlled by outlining and competent men who
assimilated to their greatest advantage the power they protected, chose
Saladin, suspecting that the young fellow's inability would be to a lesser
degree a threat to the caliphate.
Nourredin, but, divined the genius of the younger vizier and
assigned to him the preferrred command in egypt. he then deposed the caliph,
and with his reign delivered to an end the dynasty of the fatimites, which for
2 hundred years had held the land of the nile. therefore nourredin ruled
supreme from babylonia to the wilderness of libya. simplest the dominion of jerusalem marred the map
of his dominion. to reconquer this for islam become his incessant motive. along
with his personal hands he made a pulpit, from which he promised the faithful
at some point to preach within the mosque of omar at the temple web page.
But the Moslem world was already attached to one destined to
be greater than Nourredin. The youth of Saladin had been one of apparent
indolence and dissipation, but he veiled beneath his indifference the finest
genius and most unbounded ambition. As soon as he felt the possession of power
he assumed a corresponding dignity, and men recognized him as one appointed of
Heaven. Turbulent emirs, who had ignored him as a chance holder of position,
now sat reverently before him. Even the priests were struck with the sincere austerity
of his devotion. The caliph of Bagdad bestowed
upon him the distinguished dignity of the vest of honor. Poets began to mingle
his name with those of heroes as the rising star. The pious included it in
their prayers as the hope of Islam.
Knowing that experience is often wiser than genius, Saladin
judiciously guarded himself from the errors of youth by associating his father,
Ayoub, with him in the government of Egypt. Nourredin, whose successful
career had allowed him no jealousy of ordinary men, showed that he was restless
at the popularity and ability displayed by his young subaltern, and was
preparing to take Egypt under his own immediate government when death, his
first vanquisher, came upon the veteran (May, 1 1 74). Saladin immediately
proclaimed himself Sultan of Egypt, and hastened to secure the succession of
Nourredin's power as Sultan of Damascus.