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Editorial of november 2001 |
"Ifi
we had a sovereign, who deserves the crown, Ahmedê Khanî - Mem et ZÎn, V : "The Kurdish question" |
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What we know about the family of its most famous prince, Salah ad-Din or Saladin, is that it was Kurdish, originated of Dvin (presently in Armenia). But his father Ayyub, and his uncle Shêrkoh, went to High-Mesopotamie and served some Turkish officers, the Zengids, who had started the reconquest of the Palestinian and Syrian territories occupied by the Crusaders. Ayyub, Salah ad-Din's father, seems to have been quite self-effacing next to his brother's character, Shêrkoh, a skillfull military and clever politician, who conquered Egypt, formerly ruled by the shiite Fatimids and stood in the way of Franks' expansionism. Physically, Shêrkoh had been described as a short man, quite fat and one-eyed. When he seized Cairo for the account of Nur ad-Din Zengi, Shêrkoh had brought with him his nephew in this expedition. However, as he told himself later, the young Yusuf (Saladin's usual name) was at this time a sensitive adolescent, attracted by religion and totally ignorant of politicy. Did Shêrloh detect in him some extraordinary capacities ? In any case, he did not took his nephew's refusal in account, and burst in his chamber, ordering without accepting any objection : «Yusuf, take your luggage !» Then Yusuf went to Egypt, with the Kurdish and Turkish troops and when Shêrkoh died in Cairo, he was elected by the Kurds at the head of the army of Egypt. Sultan Nur ad-Din finally suspected his popularity and tried to call back him, in Damascus, in the aim to keep him under his control. But Nur ad-Din died fortuitously and then, nothing could prevent Saladin to seize Damascus, and after Aleppo, by driving out the last successors of Nur ad-Din, and finally he took Jerusalem, in 1185, after the Crusaders' defeat in Hattin. But the Franks clang to Saint-Jean d’Âcre, and the sultan died of exhaustion in 1192, without could have to expell all the Franks from Palestine. Though Saladin let four sons, his younger brother, Malik al-Adil, imposed himself very quickly inside the Ayyubid clan and he led a policy radically different, making sometime alliance with Frank princes, (a marriage with Richard I's sister was even envisaged !), searching more a way of compromise than an absolute Jihad, profiting from many truces for restauring trade and economy that had been very dammaged by war. His reign (until 1217) was the apogee of the Ayyubid power. His sons or nephews were at the head of all the Near-East, from Jezireh to Yemen. His successors followed their father's ambiguous and skill policy, alterning military attacks and truces of peace. The Ayyubid Al-Malik al-Kamil gave back Jerusalem to the German emperor Frederic II against a free access by Muslims of their sacred places. The last great Ayyubid, sultan Nejm ad-Din, routed the armies commanded by Saint-Louis in 1250, in Damiette. But he died in the battle and let just a child of which the mother, a Turkish slave, had a nice name, Shajjarat-Dour (Tree of Pearls). She imposed herself like regent (female regencies were quite often with Ayyubids) and tried even to be recongnized as sultan of Egypt, that it would have been an incredible première in the Muslim world. But if the Kurdish emirs made no objection, the Caliph of Bagdad refused, and he was the one, alas, who was abilited to give this title. For keeping her power, she had to marry a Turkish captain, Aybak. But after a quarrel, Shajjarat-Dour made murder this encumbering and unfaithful husband. Then the other women of the harem wanted to revenge Aybak and the unfortunate Tree of Pearls was killed, beaten by wooden clogs in the hammam of the palace. These furious women threw then her corpse from the high of the walls. After the premature death of Nejm ad-Din's son, it was the end of the Ayyubid power on East, replaced by the Turkish Mamluks, even if Kurdish emirates remained in A,atolia, Jezireh and Syria. The great historian Abu-l-Fida was himself an Ayyubid, and the governor of Hama. Sandrine Alexie |
The
exhibition presented in the Institut du monde arabe of Paris gives an
outline of what was the splendour of the Ayyubid's reign, who lived in a
time of great political troubles (the apex of Cursades) and a great
artistic developpment, especially in decorative arts. Ceramic, brasses,
emailed glasses, reached a kind of apogee by their elegance and their
technical skill, with the benefit, in Syro-Egyptian workshops, of the
Fatimid and Jezirean masters' models.