Saladin was famous for being a wise and just ruler, and part of being a wise and just ruler in the medieval Muslim world was military prowess. Does that mean he was actually literally a good swordsman and warrior? Maybe, but even if he wasn’t, everyone would have believed he was anyway!

The problem is that we really don’t know much about his childhood or education. He was born in Tikrit around 1137, to Najm ad-Din Ayyub and a mother whose name is unknown. His family was exiled shortly afterwards, because his uncle Shirkuh killed someone during a dispute (supposedly this occurred on the actual day of Saladin’s birth). Saladin grew up in Baalbek until 1146, when the family moved to Damascus.

Generally, a boy like Saladin, from a well-off (if not quite noble) family, would have been educated at home by his father or other relatives. He would have studied Arabic grammar and learned to memorize the Qur’an. Older students could study with a tutor or with teachers at the local mosque. As teenagers and adults they could study Hadith, and then jurisprudence and theology, also at the mosque (but when studying religion and law the school was generally known as a madrasa). Not everybody would go this far and become a religious scholar, of course, but that was the goal of higher education.

Saladin was certainly interested in literature and theology but he was not much of a religious scholar. Instead, he was destined for a military career. When he was about 14, around 1151 or 1152, he joined his uncle Shirkuh in the service of Sultan Nur ad-Din in Aleppo. Shirkuh was already known for his military prowess and had recently participated in the Battle of Inab with Nur ad-Din against the crusaders in 1149. Saladin presumably also took part in expeditions against the crusaders (he says so in one of his letters, at least, although we don’t know which battles).

Saladin also studied the genealogies of the major figures in Islamic history (and the genealogies of their horses too!). He apparently memorized the Hamasah of Abu Tammam, which is a collection of poetry about early Islamic military commanders and victories. We know his sons learned to ride horses, play polo and hunt, and to shoot a bow, so Saladin probably did too. Polo and hunting were not just leisure activities, but were meant to hone military and leadership skills. A contemporary 12th-century poet named al-Wahrani wrote about the characteristics of an ideal leader like Saladin, which included skill in “archery and the use of arms” - but it should also be noted that al-Wahrani was trying to flatter Saladin, so this doesn’t necessarily mean Saladin actually had these qualities.

We don’t really have any stories where he does some exaggerated deed that shows his overwhelming might. There are stories like that for Godfrey of Bouillon, for example, the first crusader king of Jerusalem. Godfrey supposedly killed a bear, and cut a Muslim soldier in half, among other things. Muslim warriors could also be the subject of similar exaggerated stories; another of Saladin’s contemporaries, Usama ibn Munqidh, wrote about the exploits of his family while hunting or in battle against the crusaders.

But there aren’t any stories like that about Saladin. He wasn’t a brutish warrior, he was better known for his skill as an administrator and bureaucrat. He was the shihnah of Damascus (sort of like a chief of police), and he later joined his uncle Shirkuh when Nur ad-Din sent him to Egypt. In Egypt he rose quickly through the ranks and ended up overthrowing the Fatimid dynasty, destroying the Shia Fatimid caliphate, and ruling all of Egypt himself as sultan. But he didn’t do this through military exploits, he did it through shrewd administration and good governance - and these skills also helped him take over Syria when Nur ad-Din died in 1174, and to conquer almost the entire crusader kingdom in 1187.

So, Saladin did fight occasionally when he was younger, he learned about the military history of Islam, he learned to ride a horse and to use a bow and sword, and later in life he was even described as a skilled warrior. But this was probably because that’s how everyone expected a good ruler to be described, regardless of his actual skill level. In reality, his leadership and administrative abilities were much more important than his military skill.

Sources:

M.C. Lyons and D. E. P. Jackson, Saladin: The Politics of the Holy War (Cambridge University Press, 1982)

Anne-Marie Eddé, Saladin, trans. Jane Marie Todd (Harvard University Press, 2011)

Jonathan Phillips, The Life and Legend of the Sultan Saladin (Yale University Press, 2019)