Upon overthrowing the Fatimid imamate in 567/1171, Saladin reestablished Sunni dominion over Cairo. A host of changes were introduced: the name of the Fatimid imam-caliph was eliminated from Friday sermons; the preachers who delivered the khuṭba once again donned the black garb of the Abbasids; the Shiʿi formula for the call to prayer was replaced by the Sunni version and the names of the first three Rightly Guided Caliphs, whom the Shiʿis loathed, were re-introduced into the liturgy. Patently Ismaʿili decorations, such as heavy silver plates inscribed with the names of the imamcaliphs that typically hung above the mihrab, were removed from mosque walls. The institution most closely associated with the Fatimids, al-Azhar, lost much of its prestige, as it ceased to function as a Friday mosque and Ismaʿili missionary centre. The Fatimid palaces were gradually replaced with a Sufi khānqāh, commercial space and artisan workshops. Ismaʿili judges gave way to Sunni judges, Ismaʿili daʿwa sessions were discontinued, and madrasas for teaching Islamic law according to the four Sunni schools were established. The Ayyubids built twenty-three madrasas in Cairo and Fustat alone.

The Husayni shrine remained popular and continued to attract local devotees, as well as pilgrims from afar. Such continuity should not surprise us. In her survey of forty medieval shrines in Greater Syria and Egypt, many of which commemorate ʿAlid figures, Stephennie Mulder has found that nearly all of them were venerated and maintained by both Shiʿis and Sunnis alike, at different times and simultaneously. The Sunni rulers who initiated the construction and reconstruction of ʿAlid monuments and saw to their upkeep must have found these undertakings religiously plausible and politically advantageous. Some of them may have endeavoured to assert Sunni ‘rights’ at ahl al-bayt shrines, others to co-opt local Shiʿis and promote rapprochement or, at least, coexistence with the other denomination. Saladin's conduct in Aleppo may have been a case in point. Upon taking the city, which was known for its considerable Shiʿi population, he visited the local Shrine of the Rock (which was also dedicated to the head of al-Husayn) and contributed 10,000 dirhams towards its upkeep. His son al-Malik al-Zahir, ruler of Aleppo (1186–1217), was also a generous benefactor of this monument.