al-Muʿaẓẓam; yet that did not last, and al-Muẓaffar, the murdered ruler’s son, seized the throne.

109 – al-Mustaʿṣim billāh, Abū Aḥmad ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Mustanṣir billāh al-Hāshimī*

He was the caliph, the martyr, Abū Aḥmad ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Mustanṣir billāh Manṣūr ibn al-Ẓāhir Muḥammad ibn al-Nāṣir Aḥmad ibn al-Mustadīʾ, of the Hāshimite Abbasid line, a Baghdadi by birth.

He was born in 609 AH.

He assumed the caliphate in 640 AH, on the day his father died, the tenth of Jumādā al-Ākhirah (1). He was a man of virtue, constant in reciting the Qur’an, and possessed an elegant hand.

He completed a full Qur’anic recitation under Ibn al-Nayyār (2); on the day of the completion he honoured his teacher with six thousand dinars. The robes of honour distributed on the day of his investiture exceeded thirteen thousand in number.

Ibn al-Najjār, al-Muʾayyad al-Ṭūsī, and ʿAbd al-Muʿizz al-Harawī sought hadith authorisation from him. His own teacher, Abū al-Ḥasan Ibn al-Nayyār, heard hadiths from him by virtue of that ijāzah and transmitted them.

Those who narrated from him on the basis of this licence during his lifetime included al-Bādharaʾī and Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn al-Jawzī.