sentences:  No imam was named publicly at Alamut until then, and Hassan-i Sabbah and his two immediate successors ruled instead as "dāʿı̄"s and "ḥujjas" ("seals, proofs"), representatives of the absent imam.However, the Nizaris soon came to believe that a son or grandson of Nizar had been smuggled out of Egypt and brought to Alamut.He and his two successors—, , and —are held to have been imams in occultation until 1162, when with Hassan II, the imams reappeared in public and took up the reins of the Nizari state.