The next ruler, El-Amir, was the five-year-old son of Mustali, and El-Afdhal conducted the government until he became of age to govern.  His first act was to put El-Afdhal to death.  Under El-Amir the internal condition of Egypt continued unsatisfactory, and the Crusaders, who had been very successful in capturing the towns of Syria, were only deterred from an advance on Egypt by the death of their leader, Baldwin.  In a.h. 524, some of the surviving partisans of El-Afdhal, it is said, put El-Amir to death, and a son of El-Afdhal assumed the direction of affairs, and appointed El-Hafiz, a grandson of Mustanssir as caliph.  Afdual’s son, whose name was Abu Ali Ahmed, perished in a popular tumult.  The new caliph had great trouble with his next three viziers, and at length abolished the office altogether.  After reigning twenty years, he was succeeded by his licentious son, Dhafir, whose faults led to his death at the hand of his vizier, El-Abbas.

For the ensuing six years the supreme power in Egypt was mainly the bone of contention between rival viziers, although El-Faiz, a boy of five, was nominally elected caliph on the death of Dhafir.  El-Abbas was worsted by his rival, Tatae, and fled to Syria with a large sum of money; but he fell into the hands of the Crusaders, was returned to Tatae, and crucified.

[Illustration:  013.jpg enamelled glass cup from Arabia]

The last of the Fatimite caliphs, El-Adid, in 555 a.h., was raised to the throne by Tatae, but his power was merely the shadow of sovereignty.  Tatae’s tyranny, however, became so odious that the caliph had him assassinated a year after his accession, but he concealed the fact that he had instigated the murder.  The caliph appointed Tatae’s son, El-Adil, as vizier in his stead.  The governorship of Upper Egypt was at this time in the hands of the celebrated Shawir, whom El-Adil dispossessed, but in a test of battle, El-Adil was defeated and put to death.  In his turn, Shawir yielded to the more powerful Ed-Durghan, and fled to Damascus.  There he enlisted the aid of the Atabeg Sultan Nur ed-Din, who sent his army against Ed-Durghan, with the result that Shawir was reinstated in power in Egypt.  He thereupon threw off his promised allegiance to Nur ed-Din, whose general, Shirkuh (who had led the Damascenes to Egypt), took up a strategic position.  Shawir appealed for aid to the Crusaders, and with the help of Amaury, King of Jerusalem, Shawir besieged his friend Shirkuh.  Nur ed-Din was successfully attacking the Crusaders elsewhere, and in the end a peace was negotiated, and the Damascenes left Egypt.