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Rh physician and as an author. This ecclesiastic hoped great things from the victories of the Crusaders; but he was grievously disappointed. Unlike the neighbouring province of Syria, Egypt was never wrested from the Saracen power. The Fatimite caliphs were no friends to the Turkish rule, and when they heard of the approach of the first Crusade they tried to make terms with the invaders from the West. But the situation was complicated by the fact that in a period of temporary weakness among the Turks, after the reign of the three strong sultans who had established the Seleucid dynasty, the Fatimites had recovered Jerusalem. When they perceived that the Crusaders were enemies of all Islam, and not only foes of the Turks, they were unable to proceed with their negotiations. They, too, were put on the defensive, and the fall of Jerusalem was a great blow to them, while it brought no relief to their Christian subjects in Egypt. At the same time Cyril was alarmed for his ecclesiastical prestige, on learning that Baldwin had obtained a papal bull granting all new conquests from the infidels to the patriarchate of Jerusalem—now a schismatic Latin patriarchate. Since Egypt was never conquered by the Crusaders, however, this act of Roman usurpation did not really affect him. Meanwhile, although there were invasions of Egypt by the Crusaders, since they were not able to conquer the country, the native Christians gained nothing by them.

The feeble Fatimite dynasty, which had recovered its power temporarily at the end of the tenth century, declined in the second half of the next century. Aded, the last caliph of this line, saw his dominions ravaged, both by the Turks and by the Kurds under Shawer, who burnt Babylon—with what consequences to the Christians we do not know ( 1168), and overrun more than once by Amaric, the Christian King of Jerusalem. On the death of Aded in the year 1171, the famous Saladin succeeded to the government of Egypt, with the title of sultan, which he held under the caliph of Bagdad, and no Fatimite caliph was appointed. But