dinars, and before his death he abolished all arbitrary taxes; he also sent an expedition that opened Egypt, and he was ever inclined to humility and to loving the scholars and the righteous. He corresponded with me on many occasions and had firmly resolved to take Jerusalem, but he died in Shawwal of the year 569 AH.

Al-Muwaffaq ʿAbd al-Laṭīf said: “The felt of Nūr al-Dīn’s saddle never had time to dry from jihad. He lived on the work of his own hands—at times copying manuscripts, at other times making book-covers. He wore wool, kept close to his prayer-rug and to the Qur’an, and though he was a Ḥanafī he showed respect for the schools of al-Shāfiʿī and Mālik. His righteous son Ismāʿīl was the finest man of his generation.”

Ibn Khallikān (1) said: “His name was struck on the coinage and proclaimed in the Friday sermon in Egypt. He was an ascetic worshipper, strictly adhering to the Sacred Law, a warrior in Allah’s cause, lavish in charity and endowments. His merits exhaust description.”

He died on the eleventh of Shawwal, in the Citadel of Damascus at al-Khawāniq. The physicians advised blood-letting, but he refused, and so awesome was he that none pressed him. He was brown-skinned, tall, handsome, with no facial hair save on his chin, and he bequeathed the kingdom to his son, who was but eleven years old.

Ibn al-Athīr (2) said: “He was brown in complexion, with a beard only on his chin, broad-foreheaded, comely, with pleasant eyes. I have pored over the biographies and, after the Rightly Guided Caliphs and ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, I have not seen a life finer than his, nor anyone more conscientious in pursuing justice. He would neither eat nor clothe himself nor dispose of anything except from property he personally owned, having purchased it with his share of the booty. His wife once asked him for something, so he gave her three small shops; she found them insufficient, and he said, ‘I have nothing but this, and everything else in my possession I hold only as a trustee.’”