[2] When Genghis Khan attacked the city during the war between the Khwarizmi shah and the Mongols, Sayyid Ajjal Shams al-Din Omar's family surrendered to him.
In the thirteenth century the influence of individual Muslims was immense, especially that of the Seyyid Edjell Shams ed-Din Omar, who served the Mongol Khans till his death in Yunnan AD 1279.
納速剌丁 Na-su-la-ding (Nasr-uddin), 哈散 Hasan (Hassan), 忽辛 Hu-sin (Hussein), 剌丁 兀默里 Shan-su-ding wu-mo-li and 馬速忽 Ma-su-hu.
伯顏察兒 Bo-yen ch'a-r, who had a high office, 烏馬兒 Wu-ma-r, 答法兒 Dje-fa-r (Djafar), 忽先 Hu-sien (Hussein) and 沙的 Sha-di (Saadi).
His son Nasruddin was appointed governor in Karadjang, and retained his position in Yunnan till his death, which Rashid, writing about A. D. 1300, says occurred five or six years before (according to the Yüan shi, Na-su-la ding died in 1292).
Nasr-uddin's son Abubeker, who had the surname Bayan Fenchan (evidently the Boyen ch'a-r of the Yüan shi), was governor in Zaitun at the time Bashid wrote.
[14][15][16] A Hui legend in Ningxia links four surnames common in the region - Na, Su, La, and Ding - with Nasr al-Din (Nasruddin), who "divided" their ancestor's name (Nasulading, in Chinese) among themselves.
[19] The Ding family has branches in Taiwan, the Philippines, and Malaysia among the diaspora Chinese communities there, no longer practicing Islam but still maintaining a Hui identity.
Na Zhong, a descendant of Nasr al-Din, was one of the students sent to Al-Azhar in 1931, along with Zhang Ziren, Ma Jian, and Lin Zhongming.