Maudud, Prince of
Mosul, in the chief Mosque of Damascus. About 1114. Abul Muzafar 'Ali,
Wazir of Sanjar Shah, and Chakar Beg, grand-uncle of the latter. 1116.
Ahmed Yel, Prince of Maragha, at Baghdad, in the presence of Mahomed,
Sultan of Persia. 1121. The Amir Afdhal, the powerful Wazir of Egypt, at
Cairo. 1126. Kasim Aksonkor, Prince of Mosul and Aleppo, in the Great
Mosque at Mosul. 1127. Moyin-uddin, Wazir of Sanjar Shah of Persia. 1129.
Amir Billah, Khalif of Egypt. 1131. Taj-ul Muluk Buri, Prince of Damascus.
1134. Shams-ul-Muluk, son of the preceding. 1135-38. The Khalif
Mostarshid, the Khalif Rashid, and Daud, Seljukian Prince of Azerbaijan.
1149. Raymond, Count of Tripoli. 1191. Kizil Arzlan, Prince of Azerbaijan.
1192. Conrad of Montferrat, titular King of Jerusalem; a murder which King
Richard has been accused of instigating. 1217. Oghulmish, Prince of
Hamadan.
And in 1174 and 1176 attempts to murder the great Saladin. 1271. Attempt
to murder Ala'uddin Juwaini, Governor of Baghdad, and historian of the
Mongols. 1272. The attempt to murder Prince Edward of England at Acre.
In latter years the Fidawi or Ismailite adepts appear to have let out
their services simply as hired assassins. Bibars, in a letter to his court
at Cairo, boasts of using them when needful. A Mahomedan author ascribes
to Bibars the instigation of the attempt on Prince Edward. (Makrizi, II.
100; J. As. XI. 150.)
NOTE 2. - Hammer mentions as what he chooses to call "Grand Priors" under
the Shaikh or "Grand Master" at Alamut, the chief, in Syria, one in the
Kuhistan of E. Persia (Tun-o-Kain), one in Kumis (the country about
Damghan and Bostam), and one in Irak; he does not speak of any in
Kurdistan. Colonel Monteith, however, says, though without stating
authority or particulars, "There were several divisions of them (the
Assassins) scattered throughout Syria, Kurdistan (near the Lake of Wan),
and Asia Minor, but all acknowledging as Imaum or High Priest the Chief
residing at Alamut." And it may be noted that Odoric, a generation after
Polo, puts the Old Man at Millescorte, which looks like Malasgird,
north of Lake Van, (H. des Assass. p. 104; J. R. G. S. III. 16;
Cathay, p. ccxliii.)
[1] This story has been transferred to Peter the Great, who is alleged to
have exhibited the docility of his subjects in the same way to the
King of Denmark, by ordering a Cossack to jump from the Round Tower at
Copenhagen, on the summit of which they were standing.
CHAPTER XXV.
HOW THE OLD MAN CAME BY HIS END.
Now it came to pass, in the year of Christ's Incarnation, 1252, that Alaue,
Lord of the Tartars of the Levant, heard tell of these great crimes of the
Old Man, and resolved to make an end of him. So he took and sent one of
his Barons with a great Army to that Castle, and they besieged it for
three years, but they could not take it, so strong was it.
