The sixth Fatimid caliph, a brilliant and erratic ruler whose contradictory reign and mysterious disappearance made him one of history's most enigmatic sovereigns.
Life
Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah (985–1021) ruled Fatimid Egypt from the age of eleven. A patron of learning who founded the Dar al-Hikma (House of Knowledge), he was also famous for erratic and harsh decrees, and his destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem (1009) helped inflame later Crusader sentiment. He vanished without trace in the hills outside Cairo in 1021. As a political ruler he is assessed directly, and his reign is genuinely debated — reformer, tyrant, or unstable visionary. The Druze faith, which reveres him, arose from movements late in his reign; the sources record starkly conflicting portraits.