Aḥmad b. Ṭūlūn (220–70/835–84) was governor of ʿAbbāsid Egypt and founder of the short-lived Ṭūlūnid state (c. 254–92/868–905). The biographies of Ibn al-Dāya (d. 340/951) and al-Balawī (fl. late fourth/tenth century) date his birth to 220/834–5. Little is known about Ibn Ṭūlūn's mother, Qāsim, a slave woman (jāriya). His father, Ṭūlūn (d. 240/854–5)—whose name is likewise probably a slave name—is reported to have been sent by Nūḥ b. Asad (Sāmānid governor of Bukhara) to the caliph al-Maʾmūn in about 200/815. Ṭūlūn is identified as belonging…