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## Introduction [00:00] hi everyone welcome back to the history and 20 podcast hope you're all keeping well this week we are discussing saladin and that wasn't his full name his full name was actually al-nasir salah al-din yusuf ibn ayab which was then westernized to salah al-din or saladin so i'm sure you can understand for purposes of this podcast why i'm just going to refer to him as saladin so a bit about his personal profile he was born in circa 11 37-38 in tikrit which was part of upper mesopotamia part of the abbasid caliphate which is in modern day iraq and he died on the 4th of march 1193 aged between 55 to 56 and he died in damascus in syria which was part of the ayurbid sultanate at that time it rained from 1174 to 1193 as sultan of egypt and syria he married a woman called ismat adin cartoon and he had about 13 children three of which i'll name here there was al-afdal even salah ad-din al-aziz uthman and al-zahir ghazi and that's because they went on to have distinguished military careers although famous for other reasons so that's why i just mentioned those three rather than listing all 13 of his children he was a member of the ayurved dynasty in fact he was the founder and he belonged to the sunni sect of islam he was a sunni uh muslim so a bit of his early life so i said earlier i'll refer to him as saladin so that's just what we'll call him in this episode but he was born in circa 1137 in the modern day iraqi city of tikrit his father was a kurdish soldier and politician but unfortunately nothing conclusive is known about his mother his father was called ayub whom the ibid dynasty was named after and he was also a skilled military leader as was his uncle he was a guy called shirker and both ayub and sirka served under the islamic leader imadel din zangi who was a skilled military commander who had more than one skirmish against european crusaders and we'll come back to zengi in a minute but as is usually the case with these medieval rulers who end up rising to prominence very little is actually known about saladin's early life what we do know is that he grew up in damascus in syria and that he received a good education so contemporaries of saladin commented that he was more interested in religious studies than in joining the military and another factor which may have sparked his interest in both religion and the military was that during the first crusade jerusalem was taken by the christians and this uh sort of combines with his knowledge as well in his upbringing because he was very into his history and on top of his knowledge of islam he was actually reportedly knowledgeable knowledgeable about histories of the arab people and he also had a natural talent for languages it's actually reported that he spoke arabic kurdish and he understood both turkish and persian so saladin's military career began under the direction of his uncle shirker when he was in his early 20s because so saladin and shirka were sent on campaign to egypt under the instruction of a guy called nurel din who was zengi's son and the first battle which saladin took part in was also on this expedition so the city of bilbas was besieged by a force of crusader armies from the kingdom of jerusalem and they engaged shurka's army in battle at the battle of alba bayne on the 18th of march 11 67. so both king amalric the first of jerusalem and i'll come back to him in just a minute and shurka's forces wanted to take control of the fatimid caliphate in egypt for their own benefits saladin played a major role in the battle and he led the right wing of the zengud army but one of the crusader leaders a guy called hugh of caesarea cesaria he was captured by saladin's forces in the ensuing battle and the battle ended in a zinged victory and with just a bit of poetic license and a certain level of over-exaggeration saladin was credited by the kurdish historian ibn al-afia as winning one of the quote most remarkable victories in recorded history end quote and that um again sort of sums up you know it was a good victory but wasn't that great but each to their own that's what we have these different sources for isn't it so following the battle saladin and shurka moved their forces onto alexandria in egypt where they were welcomed and rewarded for their efforts at alba burn and it was at this point that shurka split his army so he and the majority of his force withdrew from alexandria while he left saladin and a smaller force uh in alexandria with the task of guarding the city so this is when saladin begins to rise as a military leader so in 1169 shirkah died and saladin was chosen to succeed him in command of nuraldin's forces in egypt and in addition saladin was also appointed as vizier of egypt imadin who was a persian historian he claimed that saladin was chosen as vizier because of his role in the egyptian expedition which would make sense and in 1171 the last fatimid caliph died and as a result saladin was appointed governor of egypt and during his tenure as governor he set about reducing the influence of shia islam instead wishing to establish the sultanate of egypt as a sunni state and he succeeded and with the support of neural din saladin strengthened egypt as a sunni islam power base so this is when we get to see a bit of inter-muslim rivalry here so as with modern islam and religion as a whole really today it wasn't playing sailing converting a whole territory from one branch of islam to another and a prime example of a european state doing this is look at the reformation in 16th century europe and especially in tudor england with like henry viii trying to convert uh england from catholicism to protestantism and vice versa with mary the first then back to elizabeth first and so on it's an absolute disaster but by 1174 neural dinner died and he was succeeded by his eleven-year-old son al saleh and this left saladin in a difficult position should he move his army against the crusaders from egypt or should he wait until he was invited by al sully in syria to come to his aid and launch a war from there so in the end saladin made the decision to launch a campaign to take control of the lands that he saw rightfully as his or islam's he wanted to take back control of the four crusader states which had been established by the crusaders during the first crusade from 1096 to 99 and you might have noticed i mentioned earlier king amalric the first of jerusalem if you're thinking i didn't know jerusalem had a king well that's because that was one of the crusader states and the four crusader states were the county of odessa the principality of antioch the county of tripoli and the kingdom of jerusalem there'll be a map on your screen now should be able to see where they are but they were basically the crusaders who came from europe in the first second third crusade and so on they established these states they were all established in the first crusade but they established them as power bases and military bases in the middle east that they could get suppliers to and from and attack other like islamic cities from there ## Wars against the Crusader [06:52] so anyway saladin moved up from egypt to syria with the force of about 700 horsemen and he took damascus and he also managed to capture aleppo and mosul from other muslim rulers thus expanding his and sunni islam's influence across the middle east and he also managed to capture yemen which gave him control of the entire red sea um and then we go on to the wars against the crusaders because this is like the main bit where we're getting really into like peak saladin territory here so in 1182 al adil who was saladin's brother he wrote to uh saladin from egypt stating that the crusader forces had struck at the heart of islam and here al adil was a reference in reynold de chattalon's crusader ships that he'd released in the gulf of acaba or the gulf of el at to raid towns and villages on the coast of the red sea now not only was this of very little significance or gain for the crusaders it was actually a shock to the muslims as well because word spread that reynold wanted to attack the muslim holy city of mecca and if you know anything about islam that is the holiest city in the islamic religion and then rumor also spread that the crusaders were going to attack medina which is the second holiest city in islam and remove the prophet muhammad's body as that's where he was buried now at this time saladin was still in the process of taking mosul in iraq but in response he promised that if he was given mosul and given leave to establish a military base uh it would lead to the muslim capture of jerusalem constantinople georgia the lands of the al-mahds in the maghreb and his quote was until the word of allah is supreme and the abbasid caliphate has wiped the world clean turning the churches into mosques so that's what saladin thought and how he felt he'd deal with the crusaders if they attacked medina and mecca so over the course of the next five years saladin fought various skirmishes against the franks who were the western crusader forces and these skirmishes ranged geographically from jordan to the red sea but little was achieved on either side there were largely skirmishes where either the christians or muslims simply harassed their counterparts rather than full-scale battles however by 1187 saladin prepared to launch a full-scale attack and this resulted in one of the most significant battles of the crusades and that's the battle of hattin which happened on the 4th of july 1187. so hattin was a technical master class from saladin and it showed not only his military prowess but also his knowledge on how to win on his own terrain so sullivan had recruited his troops which the numbers were estimated between twenty thousand to forty thousand from across his realm with a contingent being shipped over from alexandria and egypt and another arriving from damascus meanwhile the crusader army which numbered about twenty thousand featured the combined forces of guy of lesinian king consort of the kingdom of jerusalem and raymond iii of tripoli the force is met near lake tiberius which is in modern day israel which was a key factor in the battle so saladin instructed his troops to form an ark around lake tiberias which cut off the water supply for the crusaders but on the night before the battle the muslim forces also chanted prayers and beat drums which kept the crusaders awake and they also lit fires around the crusader camp making the throats even drier in the searing heat of summer and if you've ever been over there you'll know how hot it can get and get up to like 50 degrees celsius um over there so you can imagine how unbearable that would be so by the time morning came on the 4th of july 1187 the crusaders were blinded by the smoke from the muslim fighters which gave the muslims a perfect excuse to rain down arrows upon them and the crusaders were thoroughly demoralized and disorientated in the panicked and broke formation and they ran off for the springs of hutton however due to a combination of dehydration and injuries the vast majority of the crusader army were picked off by muslim soldiers and killed and this battle was a disaster for the crusaders but a huge victory for saladin and it gave him the right platform to do what he'd wanted to do for years captured jerusalem so following the victory at hatton saladin marched his forces down to jerusalem but due to its status as air or the holy city saladin wanted to take the city without any bloodshed and he offered generous terms to the residents of the city but they refused to stand down stating that they'd rather die fighting for their city than see it in muslim hands however following a short siege from the 20th of september to the 2nd of october jerusalem capitulated to sullivan's forces and he walked in as the latest in a long line of conquerors of jerusalem and saladin gave the residents 40 days to pay their ransom to him or for those who could not afford it he offered them peaceful terms they could leave on peaceful terms but he also allowed the jews of jerusalem to resettle there if they wished to do so so finally after 88 years jerusalem was back in muslim hands but saladin didn't want to stop there because there was one crusader city that he'd not yet captured and that was tire ## The Third Crusade [11:45] so this kind of marks the beginning of the third crusade but strategically it would have made much more sense if salad and captured tyre first before jerusalem given its coastal location and its accessibility to ports in the mediterranean he could have expanded further west and had or easily had deliveries made up from egypt to taya however saladin chose to take jerusalem first due to its importance as a holy city in islam but nevertheless captain tyre was still on saladin's mind so upon here in the capture of jerusalem the pope who was gregory viii called for another crusade marking the beginning of the third crusade which was to last from 1189 to 1192 so in europe to promote the extent of saladin's influence over the third crusade it was financed by attacks known as the saladin tithe and this crusade was also known as the king's crusade due to the three important kings from europe who took the cross and they were richard the first who was the lionheart of england uh you might see my episode in him i'll put a card on the screen now or we can i'll link in the description uh there was philip ii or philip augustus of france and frederick the first barbarossa the holy roman emperor which also further highlighted the importance of the third crusade in the eyes of christian kings of europe that these actual kings were making were taking the cross and going on crusade so the siege of acro is one of the first pivotal battles of the third crusade this is where richard the lionheart supported guy of lasinion in the siege of the city which lasted from the 28th of august 11 1989 to the 12th of july 1191 and eventually fell to the crusaders but saladin and richard the first forces met together met again at the battle of arsenal on the 7th of september 1191 where sullen's forces suffered a huge defeat while the crusaders went on to retake jaffa which which was another coastal city on the port another key city for the crusaders but it was also during this period that saladin and richard begun corresponding with each other through letters and notes with richard proposing that his sister joan of england should marry saladin's brother al adil and that jerusalem could be their wedding gift but saladin rejected this when one of the terms was his brother should convert to christianity so in january 1192 richard's army occupied burt nuber which was just 12 miles from jerusalem but they did not attack the holy city in july saladin attempted to besiege jaffa but richard engaged his forces in the battle of jaffa which was on the 8th of august 1192 outside the city walls which proved to be a decisive victory for the crusaders and also the final battle of the third crusade and it was at this point that richard the first and saladin formally signed the treaty of jaffa on wednesday the 2nd of september 1192 thus formally ending the third crusade so the terms of the three-year truth stated that saladin could keep jerusalem but christian pilgrims would be safe enough to walk unarmed into jerusalem and visit the holy city and in addition sullivan recognized that the crusaders would control the palestinian coast from tyre to jaffa so following the treaty of jaffran september 1192 saladin traveled back to damascus and he died just six months later from a fever on the 4th of march 1193 and it was reported that at the time of his death he did not even have enough money to pay for his own funeral he reported he had one piece of gold and 40 pieces of silver and this was partly due to funding for the crusades but also because he'd given away much of his wealth to his poorer subjects something which is not often highlighted particularly from western perspective when discussing saladin he was actually quite pious to his subjects and as shot legacy he leaves behind well although he died relatively young he was only 55 or 56 his life was it was a life full of military expansion that clearly taken its toll on him so barely a year went by from the time he was in his early twenties to time his death where there was not some sort of military conflict that he either fought in organized or commanded and following his death although the muslim states he'd drawn together from syria to egypt would eventually disseminate the ayurbid dynasty which he founded would continue to rule in one form or another until 1341. so thanks for listening this time i hope you enjoyed it uh plenty more videos coming i may do one a month this year i've got some good plans coming up and some good guests planned to come on so i hope you'll tune in for those but until next time i'll see you later