Al-Mansur Billah

Abu Tahir Isma'il (; January 914 – 18 March 953), better known by his regnal name al-Mansur Billah, was the third caliph of the Fatimid Caliphate in Ifriqiya, ruling from 946 until his death. He presided over a period of crisis, having to confront the large-scale Kharijite rebellion of Abu Yazid. He succeeded in suppressing the revolt and restoring the stability of the Fatimid regime. Early life and accession The future al-Mansur was born Isma'il, in early January 914, in the palace city of Raqqada near Kairouan. He was the son of the then heir-apparent and future second Fatimid imam–caliph, Muhammad al-Qa'im bi-Amr Allah, and a local slave concubine, Karima, who had once belonged to the last Aghlabid emir of Ifriqiya, Ziyadat Allah III. Isma'il was not the oldest son of al-Qa'im, but the firstborn, al-Qasim, reportedly predeceased his father. According to the official version of events, on 12 April 946, al-Qa'im publicly proclaimed Isma'il as his heir, with the regnal name of al-Mansur Billah, and when he died on 17 May, al-Mansur became imam and caliph. Modern historians of the Fatimid period, such as Heinz Halm and Michael Brett, suspect that al-Mansur's rise to power was the result of a palace intrigue headed by the influential slave chamberlain Jawdhar, with the participation of other figures from al-Qa'im's harem. His mother Karima his wet nurse Salaf are known to have aided him in his power struggle against his half-brothers, and are described as one of few women to have participated in political affairs. Several factors suggest this: given al-Qa'im's debilitating illness, it is unclear whether he was at all capable of proclaiming a successor; the first act of the new caliph was to confine his uncles and brothers to house arrest in the palace, under the supervision of Jawdhar; Jawdhar, in his memoirs, claims that Isma'il had been secretly nominated as father's heir already at the time of al-Qa'im's own accession in 934, with Jawdhar himself being the only one entrusted his secret; and al-Mansur himself was apparently obliged to compose a tract defending his succession, which points to the contested nature of his accession. Reign