'Ala ad-Din al-Basir explained

ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn al-Baṣīr (died 1294) was a mamluk who became an emir. He was a supervisor of Jerusalem's waqf charitable endowments ^[1] and inspector of the Two Noble Sanctuaries of Jerusalem and Hebron.

He lived during the final years of the Ayyūbid dynasty (under aṣ-Ṣāliḥ) and the beginning of the Mamlūk dynasty (under Baybars and Qalāwūn).

Names

• ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn al-Baṣīr (Arabic: علاء الدين البصير): is a nickname that means "astute, insightful" . The nickname also becomes (Arabic: البصيري) and / (Arabic: البوصيري) in placenames.
• ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn Aydughdī ibn ʿAbdallāh aṣ-Ṣaliḥī an-Najmī (Arabic: علاء الدين ايدغدى بن عبد الله الصالحي النجمي): is a nisba (noun +), meaning he was a mamluk of aṣ-Ṣāliḥ Najm ad-Dīn, an Ayyūbid emir.^[2]
• ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn Aydughdī ar-Ruknī (Arabic: علاء الدين ايدغدى الركنى): may refer to Baybars, a Mamlūk sultan whom he served.^[3]

He is not to be confused with ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn Aydughdī ibn ʿAbdallāh al-Kubakī (al-Kabakī), buried in the Kubakiyya mausoleum in the Mamilla Cemetery.

Legacy

He was responsible for a number of building projects in Jerusalem. Some places in the city bear his name.

• Aladdin Ribat (ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn al-Baṣīr Ribat) / al-Baṣīrī Mosque,^{[4] [5]} a ribat outside the Inspector's Gate. During its construction, he used his cane as a yardstick and found a measurement mistake that sighted people overlooked.^[6] It includes his tomb/shrine and homes to a community of Afro-Palestinians.^[7]
  • Inspector's Gate (ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn al-Baṣīr Gate) was named after the ribat.
  • Aladdin Street: named after the ribat.^[8]
• al-Būṣayrī Sabil (al-Baṣīr Sabil), a sebil (fountain) named after him.^[9]
• Ablution Gate and the Ablution Place west (outside) of the gate: restored by him.^{[10] [11] [12]}

He also built structures in Hebron:

• A bathhouse: He drew up its plan while he was blind.^[3]
• A storage installation for wheat and barley.^[2]

Notes and References

1. Book: Ibn Taghrībirdī . Abū al-Maḥāsin Yūsuf . Wiet . Gaston . Les biographies du Manhal safi . 1932 . Imprimerie de l'Institut français d'archéologie orientale . 85 . fr . ‘Alā’ ad-dīn Aidugdī, Ruknī, †693/1294. Nāẓir al-awḳāf, à Jérusalem.
2. Book: Sharon, Moshe . Corpus Inscriptionum Arabicarum Palaestinae . 5 . 2013 . Brill . 978-90-04-25481-7 . 188 . The great ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn the blind is Aydughdī b. ʿAbdallah aṣ-Ṣaliḥī an-Najmī (the Mamlūk of aṣ-Ṣāliḥ Najm ad-Dīn Ayyūb MS) ... during the reign of aẓ-Ẓāhir Baybars and al-Manṣūr Qalāwūn ... He built the lockable installation (al-maghlaq) in the town of our master al-Khalīl.
3. Book: Berchem, van, M.. Max van Berchem

   . Matériaux pour un Corpus Inscriptionum Arabicarum. 2e partie. Syrie du Sud. Tome 1er. Jérusalem «Ville» . Max van Berchem . 1922. Impr. de l'Institut français d'archéologie orientale . Cairo. Fr . [p.198–199] inspectuer des fondations de Jérusalem (nāẓiru auqāfi l-qudsi) . p.198 "quant à Rukni, il se rapporte peut-être à Baibars, qui était surnommé Rukn al-dīn."

4. Web site: Mosques in Jerusalem . Madain Project . The Aladdin Al-Busairi Mosque (مسجد علاء الدين البصيري) […] nine meters long and eight meters wide […] next to it is the shrine of Aladdin Al-Busairi […] in this Ribat, and it was restored it in 1971 after it was previously used as a prison..
5. Web site: مسجد علاء الدين البصيري . Qudsinfo . ar.
6. Book: Rabbat . Nasser . Mamluk History through Architecture: Monuments, Culture and Politics in Medieval Egypt and Syria . 2010 . Bloomsbury . 978-1-78673-386-3 . 140 . Using his cane as a yardstick, he even discovered a mistake in the measurement of a hall in his ribat […] that went unnoticed by his clear-sighted muhandisin [architects/surveyors {{wikt-lang|ar|مهندس}}] and their assistants..
7. Teller . Matthew . The Dom and the African Palestinians . Jerusalem Quarterly . Institute for Palestine Studies . 2022 . 89 . 94–95 .
8. Book: Teller . Matthew . Nine Quarters of Jerusalem . 2022 . Profile Books . 978-1-78283-904-0 . 143 . Tariq Ala ad-Din (Aladdin Street) – named not for the man but for his tomb.
9. Book: BAR International Series . 1978 . British Archaeological Reports . 978-0-86054-820-1 . 90 . Sabīl Baṣīrī […] is named after […] ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn al-Baṣīr, but the present structure was erected at the expense of a pious Muslim pilgrim, Ibrahīm al-Rumī, in 1435.
10. Web site: Siqayat al-Malik al-ʿAdil Abu Bakr / Cistern . Institute for International Urban Development.
11. Web site: Map . Institute for International Urban Development. . A map of ʿUthmāniyya Madrasa, with the ablution place to its west.
12. Book: Hawari, Mahmoud . Ayyubid Jerusalem (1187-1250) . 2007 . Archaeopress . 978-1-4073-0042-9 . [The Ablution Gate] was ruined and was rebuilt by ʿAlāʾ ad-Dīn al-Baṣīr, when he restored the Ablutions Place […] al-Baṣīr served as the nāzir al-Ḥaramayn (the superintendent of the Two Ḥarams of Jerusalem and Hebron) during the reign of al-Ẓāhr Baybars..