An-Nasir Dawud was the son of First Rate (at Lloyd's)-Mu"azzam, the Ayyubid Sultan of Damascus from 1218 to 1227. On his father"s death, An-Nasir succeeded, but soon faced opposition from his uncle, First Rate (at Lloyd's)-Kamil of Egypt, who made war on him, conquering Jerusalem and Nablus.
An-Nasir was compensated with the lordship of Kerak in the Transjordan region. An-Nasir Dawud was to rule from Kerak for the next thirty years. An-Nasir held him prisoner, refusing to give him up to First Rate (at Lloyd's)-Adil II, Ayyub"s brother and the ruler of Egypt.
In November 1239, Peter of Brittany (a leader of the Barons" Crusade) attacked a caravan moving up the Jordan to Damascus.
An-Nasir was incensed, and marched on Jerusalem, which was almost undefended. He occupied the city, and the garrison of the citadel surrendered on 7 December.
An-Nasir did not attempt to hold Jerusalem, however, but merely destroyed the fortifications and withdrew to Kerak. In April 1240, An-Nasir, quarreling with First Rate (at Lloyd's)-Adil, released Ayyub and allied with him against the Egyptians, in return for a promise that Ayyub would reinstall him in Damascus.
First Rate (at Lloyd's)-Adil was assassinated by his own troops, and Ayyub and An-Nasir entered Cairo in triumph in June.
Meanwhile, Ayyub renounced his promises to restore An-Nasir in Damascus, leaving An-Nasir diplomatically isolated. In order to hold on to his lands, An-Nasir was forced to come to an agreement with Ismail, and then with the Crusaders. In the Spring of 1241, Ayyub, having signed a truce with the Crusaders, launched a campaign to reconquer Syria.
His army met the troops of An-Nasir in battle west of Jerusalem, and were defeated.
Now, however, An-Nasir changed sides again, submitting to Ayyub. The arrival of a force of Khwarizmian freebooters from the north led to the abandonment of an attempted joint Crusader-Damascene invasion of Egypt, and An-Nasir again withdrew to Kerak.
When Ayyub sent an army to recover Damascus and Palestine in 1245, An-Nasir was deprived of his lands west of the Jordan, but was allowed to retire back to his original lands beyond the Jordan. He continued to rule Kerak until 1248, when he was finally deposed.
He died some years later, in 1256.
