The Citadel is located east of the city centre around Islamic Cairo, which dates back to the Fatimid era and the foundation of Cairo.

In addition to being considered one of the most important Arab empires in the Islamic era, the Fatimid caliphate was also distinguished by the prominent role of Berbers in its initial establishment.

There appears to be some evidence for the presence of matrilineality in pre-Islamic Arabia, in a very limited number of the Arabian peoples ( first of all among the Amirites of Yemen, and among some strata of Nabateans in Northern Arabia ); on the other hand, there does not seem to be any reliable evidence for the presence of matrilineality in Islamic Arabia, although the Fatimid Caliphate claimed succession from the Islamic Prophet Mohammad via his daughter Fatima.

During the reign of Al-Muizz – who was the first Fatimid ruler of Egypt – the Islamic government was ambivalent in its treatment of the Copts, alternating sympathy and abuse with atrocity and brutality.

The town prevailed as an important trade center during the centuries of Islamic Arab rule under the Umayyad, Abbasid and Fatimid dynasties.

The region was somewhat unified as an independent political entity during the rule of the Berber kingdom of Numidia, which gave way to centuries of rule by the Roman Empire, followed by the brief domination of the Vandal Kingdom, the equally brief re-establishment of " Roman " rule by the Byzantine Empire, and later the more-enduring rule of the Islamic Caliphates and Emirates under Umayyad, Abbasid, Fatimid, Almoravid, Almohad, Hammadid, Zirid, and Marinid dynasties ( to name some of those among the most prominent ) during the 8th to 13th centuries, and that of the Ottomans, at least nominally, thereafter.

The emergence of the Fatimid Caliphate is a major event in Islamic history.

The Tabular Islamic calendar ( an example is the Fatimid or Misri calendar ) is a rule-based variation of the Islamic calendar.

Tughril relegated the Abbasid Caliphs to state figureheads and took command of the caliphate's armies in military offensives against the Byzantine Empire and the Fatimid Caliphate in an effort to expand his empire's borders and unite the Islamic world.

The year that he was born the Islamic world was very fragmented and divided between the Abbasid caliphate of Baghdad and the Fatimid caliphate based on Cairo.

Many Shia Muslims, who make up the largest minority of Islamic followers — including the Ismailis and especially Dawoodi Bohra's — observe Laylat al-Qadr on the night of the 23rd, in keeping with traditions received through Ali and his wife Fatimah, Muhammad's daughter and Fatimid Imams.

Prior to the rise of Saladin, Egypt was the center of the Shia Fatimid Caliphate, the only period in Islamic history when a caliphate was ruled by members of the Shia branch of Islam.

The above Fatimid era are based on the direct descendants of the Prophet and to reconcile Islamic religion, based on divine revelation.

Islamic Cairo was founded in 969 as the royal enclosure for the Fatimid caliphs, while the actual economic and administrative capital was in nearby Fustat.

The Kotamas were also the source of the first Islamic dynasty of indigenous Berbers in the Maghreb, the Zirids ( 972-1148 ), founded by the Kutama general Buluggin ibn Ziri ( also: Bologhine ibn Ziri, Bologhin ibn Ziri ), son of the Fatimid governor of the Maghreb, Ziri ibn Manad, who had been rewarded with his position after defeating the Kharijite rebellion of Abu Yazid ( 943-947 ).

The area is the historic home of the great Berber tribe Kutama, who played a considerable role in the Middle Ages and the Islamic Maghreb, mainly because it was behind the creation of the Fatimid empire in the tenth century the One of the greatest empires of Islamic history, which extended from Morocco to Saudi today.

* S. B. Dadoyan: The Fatimid Armenians: Cultural and Political Interaction in the Near East, Islamic History and Civilization, Studies and Texts 18.

It is one of the three dominant Islamic monuments clustered on the street Bayn al-Qasrayn in Fatimid Cairo.

There was one known instance in history that a calipha ruled a Caliphate: Sitt al-Mulk was regent of the Fatimid Caliphate from 1221 to 1223.

The Unitarian Druze movement, which existed in the Fatimid Caliphate, acknowledged az-Zahir as the Caliph, but followed Hamzah as its Imam.

Egypt and much of Palestine were controlled by the Arab Shi ' ite Fatimid Caliphate, which had extended further into Syria before the arrival of the Seljuqs.

During his reign, Otto II attempted to annex the whole of Italy into the Empire, bringing him into conflict with the Byzantine Empire and with the Saracens of the Fatimid Caliphate.

The tradition of lanterns as a decoration becoming associated with Ramadan is believed to have originated during the Fatimid Caliphate primarily centered in Egypt, where the Caliph Al-Muizz Lideenillah was greeted by people holding lanterns to celebrate his ruling.

* Hamid al-Din al-Kirmani, a Persian missionary da ' i to the Fatimid Caliphate

* c. 909: The Fatimid Caliphate arises in eastern Algeria.

* Sitt al-Mulk, regent of the Fatimid Caliphate ( 1021 to 1023 ) for ʻAlī az-Zāhir, the Seventh Caliph ( 1021 to 1036 )

His conquests brought him into conflict with both the Byzantine Empire and with the Muslims of the Fatimid Caliphate as both holding territories in southern Italy.

However, this policy necessarily meant war with not only the Byzantine Empire but the Muslim Fatimid Caliphate as well, who claimed southern Italy as within their sphere influence.

Since 960s the island had been under Muslim rule as the Emirate of Sicily, a state of the Fatimid Caliphate.

In the same period as the Norman conquest of England, they had taken Sicily, previously under the Arab Fatimid Caliphate.

To the southwest is the Fatimid Caliphate of Cairo.

Egypt had been invaded by King Baldwin I fifty years earlier, and the weak Fatimid Caliphate was forced to pay yearly tribute to Jerusalem.

The slaves were mostly captured by Venice from Dalmatia, the Holy Roman Empire from what is now Prussia and Poland, and the Byzantines from elsewhere in the Balkans, and were generally destined for other parts of the Byzantine Empire and ( most frequently ) the Muslim states surrounding the Mediterranean: the Abbasid Caliphate, the Umayyad Caliphate of Córdoba, the Emirate of Sicily, and the Fatimid Caliphate ( which relied on Slavs purchased at the Bari market for its legions of Sakalaba Mamluks ).

* January 16 – Emir Abd-ar-Rahman III of Cordoba creates the Caliphate of Cordoba to compete with his Fatimid rivals who had assumed the title in 910.

The caliphate also lost the Western provinces of al-Andalus, Maghreb and Ifriqiya to an Umayyad prince, the Aghlabids and the Fatimid Caliphate, respectively.

* Rebellion of the Kutama Berbers against the Fatimid Caliphate.

* Second rebellion of the Kutama tribesmen against the Fatimid Caliphate in two years.

* Failed attempt by the Fatimid dynasty to seize the Maghreb al-Aqsa ( nowadays Morocco ) from the local rulers allied to the Spain-based Umayyad Caliphate.

* Ubayd Allah, political and religious leader, founder of the Fatimid Caliphate.

The following part of text is a translation of the Arabic inscriptions, which is still preserved on the Fatimid minbar:

• Naseer Shamma now runs his school The Arabic House ofOud in Cairo, an ancient house in Fatimid Cairo " HrawiHouse ", a project to establish the specifications needed by the solo oud player.