title al-Malik al-Mu'izz, while she remained holding fast to the crown and the scepter, the voice of coun-sel and the wielder of influence.

It is worth mentioning that this Aybak had been the jashnagir in the kitchen of al-Malik al-Salih Najm al-Din Ayyub, her first husband, in the days when he was emir over the fortress of Kayfa on the borders of Turkestan. Jashnagir is a Turkish word of Persian origin, meaning the taster of food in the palace kitchen.

But Aybak became a comman-der among the emirs of the Mamluks, took part in several bat-tles, and acquitted himself well in the army of al-Malik al-Salih. Her choice fell upon him because he was of quiet temper, weak in opin-ion and in personality; so by mar-rying him and ceding the throne to him she secured herself against the talk of the people and the objection of the Abbasids, while at the same time guaranteeing to herself power and influence without a crown.

When she learned that her hus-band al-Mu'izz had sent to ask for the hand of an Ayyubid princess,

so that she might bear him an heir, and that he had resolved to remove her from the palace of the Citadel and lodge her in the house of the vizierate in Cairo, hoping to prepare the palace for a new era and a new life — he who had reached sixty — Shajarat al-Durr nearly lost her mind from the intensity of her rancor and jeal-ousy. Her fury blazed up; and then she realized, after her removal from the palace to the house of the vizierate, that he would hasten to rid himself of her so as to enjoy his peace of mind. Was this to be her reward for having brought this jashnagir to the throne — that the pride of the queen and the dignity of the woman in her should be wounded??

So she contrived for him a well-laid stratagem: she invited him to meet her, and no sooner had he come, recovered his ease of mind, and entered the bath, than five of her sturdy slave boys fell upon him and killed him. As for her, she took refuge in the Red Tower of the Citadel, after her last attempts had failed to set upon the

throne a Mamluk emir in whom she might find protection.

The son of al-Malik al-Mu'izz by his first wife had seized the throne after him, and then avenged his father by ordering her killed. Thus died Shajarat al-Durr in the year 657 A.H., corresponding to 1259 A.D., after having remained for long years the ornament of the court, the wielder of influence, and the most prominent personality in the state, ever since al-Malik al-Salih assumed the throne of Egypt. Her tomb remains to this day a resort for visitors, beside the shrine of Sayyida Nafisa in the Khalifa quarter of Cairo. She had built a great mosque in this quar-ter, which still stands today and in which the prayers are performed. And in the era of Shajarat al-Durr began the custom of dispatching the mahmal every year from Egypt to the Hejaz in the season of the pilgrimage, carrying the covering of the noble Kaaba and provisions and moneys for the people of God's Sacred House; and this custom continues in practice to our own day.