To understand this we must turn for a while to the course of events in Egypt. The Ikhshid Muhammad b. Tughj had died in 335, and had been succeeded by his son Abu l-Qasim Unjur, a child of 15, who was kept in a state of pupilage by a black eunuch named Abu l-Misk Kafur, _i.e._, “Camphor, the father of musk.” This Kafur was an ungainly black slave, of ponderous bulk and mis-shapen legs, who had been purchased as a boy of ten in the year 310 and sent one day with a present to the Ikhshid; the present was returned, but the messenger was retained. Little by little he rose in the service, first of the Ikhshid’s household, then in that of the state, conciliating everyone by his pleasing manners and fair words, and was finally appointed by the Ikhshid _atatek_, or guardian, to his two sons. At the Ikhshid’s death a riot broke out, and this Kafur put down with such tact that he was regarded with even greater favour and consideration by all the public officials. Soon afterwards news arrived that the Hamdanid Sayf ad-Dawla ʿAli had taken Damascus, and was marching upon Ramla. At once Kafur set out at the head of the army and checked ʿAli, returning home with considerable booty. This greatly increased his reputation, and, although holding no constitutional authority he was able to get all the business of the state into his hands, and was generally conceded the title of _ustad_ or “tutor,” a word often used in the same sense as _patron_ in French, and under this title he was mentioned in the _khutba_ or Friday prayer. As his ward Unjur grew older, however, a more or less veiled hostility arose between them, each on his guard against the other, until the titular prince died in 349, not without suspicion of being poisoned by the ustad, although such suspicions were usual in every case where a death seemed to be timely: the oriental world has always had an obsession for poisoning.