Death of al-Mansur of Cordoba

August 11, 1002

The ruthless chamberlain who had reduced the Umayyad caliph to a puppet and led fifty campaigns against the Christian north died returning from a raid. His passing, a Christian chronicler gloated, sent him straight to hell. Within a decade the caliphate he had propped up would shatter into taifas. His military machine, built on Berber and Slavic mercenaries, collapsed almost overnight without his iron hand.