Royal kin and queens · The Nizari Ismailis of Alamut · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Jalal al-Din Hasan

The imam's only named son, designated as his successor while a child.

Juvaini, writing from the Nizari chronicles, says that as he grew up he came to reject his father's teaching and that father and son came to distrust each other; how far this had gone by 1200, when he was a boy of about thirteen, is not known. He holds no land of his own.

Who he is

Name
Jalal al-Din Hasan ibn Muhammad (the later imam Hasan III)
Title
Designated heir (wali al-'ahd) of the Nizari imamate
Since
Designated in childhood (Juvaini)
Born
About 582 AH (1186-87): he was about twenty-five at his accession in 607 AH (1210); so about 13 in January 1200
Family
Son of the imam Muhammad II; mother not pinned. Unmarried in 1200 as far as the sources show; his marriages to daughters of Gilan's chiefs come after 1210.
Confidence
medium

Juvaini, via Daftary.

Overlord

His father the imam.

What it holds

  • No land of his own; lives at Alamut in his father's household (not pinned)

How things stand that morning

A boy of about thirteen at his father's court, the designated heir.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

  1. 607 AH (1210)Succeeds his father, proclaims adherence to Sunni Islam, makes peace with the caliph al-Nasir and marries daughters of Gilan's chiefs.Depends on: His father's death on its date and his own survival Stopped by: His death, or a change of designation

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: Birth year inferred from his age at accession as given in the Nizari tradition reported by Juvaini; the brief's 'born about 1187' agrees.

Primary sources for Nizaris of Alamut

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

  • The Complete History, Izz al-Din Ibn al-Athir (about 1200 to 1231, at Mosul). The widest Muslim narrative for the years 596 to 597 AH (1199 to 1201): al-Adil's entry into Cairo and his taking of the sultanate from his nephew al-Mansur Muhammad early in 1200, the quarrels of the Ayyubid princes at Damascus, Aleppo and Hama, the Nile failure and the great famine of Egypt, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah and the Jazira under Gokbori and the Artuqids, Baghdad under the caliph al-Nasir, the Khwarazmshah Tekish's death in 1200 and Muhammad's accession, the Ghurid wars in Khurasan, the Eldiguzids and Georgia, the Almohads in the west, and the Seljuks of Rum in passing. Read online
  • History of Tabaristan, Ibn Isfandiyar (Baha al-Din Muhammad ibn Hasan) (begun 1206, extended about 1216; continued anonymously to 1349). The local history of the Caspian province and the only account of the Bavandid kings of Tabaristan: Husam al-Dawla Ardashir (reigned 1173 to 1206) at Sari and Amul, his dealings with the Khwarazmshahs Tekish and Ala al-Din Muhammad, the Nizaris of Alamut, the Eldiguzids and the caliph, and the marriages, feuds and raids of the Daylamite and Gilaki lords. Read online
  • The History of the World Conqueror, Ata-Malik Juvayni (1252 to 1260). Written for the Mongols but with a long retrospective on the powers they destroyed. Read online
  • Compendium of Chronicles, Rashid al-Din Fadl Allah Hamadani (1300 to 1311, at Tabriz). The official Ilkhanid history, compiled from Mongol oral tradition and the lost Altan Debter. Read online
  • The Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela, Benjamin of Tudela (about 1173). A generation before 1200 but the only survey of its kind: the Jewish communities and their heads from Navarre through Provence, Italy, Constantinople and the Aegean, Antioch, Tyre, Jerusalem, Damascus, Mosul and Baghdad to the Persian Gulf, with notes on rulers, trades, the exilarch at Baghdad, the Assassins of Syria and Persia, and hearsay on India, Ceylon and China. Read online

Sources and studies

  1. F. Daftary, The Isma'ilis: Their History and Doctrines (2nd ed., 2007), ch. 6 (the Nizaris of the Alamut period)
  2. Juvaini, Ta'rikh-i Jahan-gusha, trans. J. A. Boyle, The History of the World-Conqueror (1958), on Tekish and on the Ismailis
  3. Wikipedia, 'Nur al-Din Muhammad II' (after Juvaini, Rashid al-Din, Daftary, Hodgson)

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.