شجر الدر سلطانة مصر

The wife of al-Malik al-Salih Ayyub and mother of Khalil. She concealed his death in 647 AH until his son Turanshah arrived. After Turanshah was killed she was raised to the sultanate, and after she married Aybak and gave him the throne she killed him in the bath in 655 AH. ^{1 2}

Al-Malik al-Salih Ayyub died at al-Mansura on Sunday, 14 Sha'ban 647 AH. Shajar al-Durr concealed his death, summoned his son Turanshah from Hisn Kayfa, and handed him the reins of power. Affairs carried on as before, and Shajar al-Durr managed the state. ¹

When Turanshah arrived he began to threaten Shajar al-Durr and demand his father's money, and she wrote to her husband's mamluks to rouse them against him. ^{3 4} The Bahriyya mamluks then killed him on Monday, 19 Muharram 648 AH. ¹

The amirs gathered to set her up as sultana, and swore allegiance to her on 10 Safar 648 AH. They appointed Izz al-Din Aybak al-Turkmani commander of the army. She signed the decrees "mother of Khalil", her name was struck on the coins, and the sermon was given for her from the pulpits of Egypt and Cairo. ^{4 5}

When the people of Syria refused to accept her and asked for al-Nasir, Aybak married Shajar al-Durr, and she ceded the sultanate to him. Her reign lasted eighty days. Aybak took the title al-Malik al-Mu'izz on Saturday at the end of Rabi' II 648 AH. ⁶

Aybak was killed in the bath by Shajar al-Durr in 655 AH. ²

Al-Maqrizi thinks that the garden Shajar al-Durr built lay near the mosque of al-Sayyida Nafisa, and that the buildings spread from her tomb to that mosque. ^{7 8}