A Short History of the Fatimid Khalifate

by De Lacy O'Leary

Although Hakim had been, and still continued, devoted to the study of astrology, he now made a decree against the astrologers who are to be banished. Many of these astrologers went to the Qadi and entered into a solemn undertaking not to practise their art, and on the strength of this promise were allowed to remain. Maqrizi notes it as a strange thing that after this decree one could no longer see astrologers in the streets. Perquisition was made and any of these found were brought before the Qadi and expelled from the country. The same treatment was meted out to professional musicians (Maq. ii. 288, Ibn Khall. iii. 450).

A general report began to circulate in the course of this year that Hakim intended to have a great massacre of many people, and the report, though vague, was readily believed, with the result that multitudes fled from Cairo, so that the markets were suspended and all business came to an end for the time (Maq. ii. 288).

On the 12th of Rabiʿ I. ʿAbdu r-Rahim, who had killed the victims at the preceding Feast of Sacrifice and was a great grandson of the Mahdi who had been the first Fatimid Khalif, was publicly declared heir to the throne to the exclusion of the Khalif’s infant son. Orders were given that he was to be saluted in the form: “Hail to the cousin of the Commander of the faithful, the designated successor of the sovereign of the Muslims.” His name was placed on the coinage, he received apartments in the royal palace, his name was inserted in the khutba, and he acted as the Khalif’s deputy in all business of state. Business was at this time little regarded by Hakim, who spent much of his time riding about in the city and in the country round, sometimes by day, often also by night.

In the following month he cut off the hands of the Kaʾid’s secretary, Abu l-Kasim Jarjarai. This secretary had been in the service of the Princess Hakim’s sister, but fearing that this was a dangerous place had left her for the service of the Kaʾid. The Princess desired to know the reason of this change, and the secretary sent her a letter in which he made reference to a certain matter which he had discovered,—probably Hakim’s intention to change the succession—and this letter the Princess, fearing a trap, showed to the Khalif, at which he was very greatly annoyed. ʿAyn had been Kaʾid (Commander-in-Chief) since 402, and had had one of his hands cut off in 401, and now on the 3rd of Jumada I. Hakim cut off his remaining hand, after which he sent him a present of 5,000 pieces of gold and 25 horses; on the 13th of the same month he had his tongue cut out and then sent other gifts, but after this the Kaʾid died. Very many were put to death about this time, for the Khalif seemed to be suffering from an insane impulse to torture and slay; so great was the alarm that many fled from the city.

Since 400 the Khalif had been showing favour to the orthodox, but in the course of this year he changed his attitude, ceased to make gifts to the mosques, to the muezzins, doctors, etc., and disbanded the college which he had founded for teaching the Malikite canon law. More than this he treated the lecturers with great severity, and put to death Abu Bakr Antaki, the principal, and one of his assistants.

Either in this year or in 405 Hakim made very strict rules about women. He forbade them to go about the streets at all. The baths used by women were closed; boot-makers were forbidden to make outdoor boots for women, and so some of the boot-makers’ shops were closed entirely. Women were forbidden to look out of doors or windows, or to go out on terraces. These laws continued in force until the close of the reign. A case occurred in which some old women who lived by spinning and selling their work to the merchants were neither able to dispose of it to their customers nor go out to buy provisions, and remained inside until their bodies, which showed that they had died of starvation, were found by the neighbours. When this was reported to the Khalif he conceded that merchants who bought or sold with women might go to the doors of their houses and the women might pass out goods or money and receive its exchange, provided they did not show their faces or hands to the merchant or any passer-by in the street.

One day Hakim was passing the “Golden Baths” and heard a great deal of noise within. On making enquiry he found that there were women inside. He ordered the doors and windows to be walled up and left the inmates to perish of hunger. The pretext given for these new regulations was the libertinage of the Egyptian women. Hakim employed many harim spies, and by means of these old women he heard of various assignations and intrigues. On several occasions he sent a eunuch with a guard of soldiers to wait in concealment at the place of assignation, and when the woman appeared had her seized and thrown into the Nile. On other occasions he sent guards to private houses to demand by name women whose conduct had been unfavourably reported, and they were disposed of in the same manner. It seems almost impossible to excuse Hakim’s conduct at this period by the supposition that he was an earnest but fanatical puritan: the frequency of new regulations, the constant changes in so many details, and the capricious character of his conduct all tend to make the theory of so many contemporaries that he was insane the more plausible.

In Syria the prestige of Egypt increased. Mansur, the son of Luʿluʿ at Aleppo, had to ask Hakim’s help against Abu l-Hayja, the grandson of Sayf ad-Dawla, and this was given. In Ramadan of this year (404) Hakim issued a charter granting to Mansur Aleppo and its dependencies which were thus held as tributary to Egypt.

Early in 405 the Chief Qadi, Malik b. Saʿid al-Faraki, was put to death after holding office for six years, nine months and ten days. His income was estimated at 15,000 pieces of gold. In Jumada the chief minister, Husayn b. Taher, was put to death and replaced by the two brothers, ʿAbdu r-Rahim and Husayn, sons of Abu Saʿid. After holding office for sixty-two days they were put to death and replaced by Fadl b. Jaʿfar, who held office only five days and was put to death; then ʿAli b. Jaʿfar b. Fallah. Maqrizi mentions no other holder, but it does not follow that ʿAli held the post to the end of the reign as, for some reason, he omits all mention of Hakim’s later years: no doubt the reason is to be found in his unwillingness to treat the closing phase of Hakim’s strange career, and to these last years he makes no reference in any part of his work.

The Chief Qadi was replaced by Ahmad b. Muhammad ibn Abi l-Awwam, who retained his office until 413, the year following the close of Hakim’s reign.