A few words may be added to define more plainly the part taken by the Fatimid Khalifate in the general course of history. So long as the Fatimite movement merely took the form of a sectarian body in Asia it had hardly more than a local interest, and even the formation of a Fatimid Khalifate at Kairawan does no more than illustrate the disintegration of the empire of the Khalifs of Baghdad. But the conquest of Egypt brought the Fatimids into relation with a wider world and induced them, unwisely no doubt, to venture on the conquest of Syria. It is a question how far the power ruling in Egypt ever can be free from Syria: the ancient Pharaohs were drawn into Egyptian expeditions, and the two lands have been closely involved one with the other ever since: nearly always Syria has proved the grave in which the prospects and hopes of Egypt have been buried. In the days of the Fatimids Syria was the battle ground of the Near East, and every country from Byzantium to the Oxus was more or less drawn into the conflicts there, whilst in the later part of the period the whole of Christendom, except Spain, was involved: and every power of East or West found there either severe loss or total ruin. The whole course of the history of the 9-12th centuries of the Christian era shows the gradual sucking in of Muslim and Christian powers to this maelstrom, and in every case with disastrous results. The whole period of the Fatimid Khalifate, from the first formation of the parent sect or conspiracy to the final downfall before Salah ad-Din, may be divided conveniently into three periods; (i) the rise of the Ismaʿilian sect and the establishment of a Khalifate claiming Fatimid descent at Kairawan, (ii) the conquest of Egypt and the period of more or less prosperous rule over Egypt and Syria, and (iii) the period of decay under the attacks of the Saljuq Turks and the Crusaders to its final downfall. (i) _The Formation of the Fatimid Khalifate._ (A.H. 260-356 = A.D. 873-966.)