When he appears in the court of the sultan, he stands in a corner of the ʾīwān,and when the khidma ends, he goes to his house, with the amirs, and he spreads the tableclothes for him, just like the sultan spreads, and he sits in a sitting which is public for the people/mamluks. The officers are present on it, the ḥājibs stand in front of him, and the petitions are read and the complaints are presented to him. And he decides on their cases. The sultan used to content himself with the nāʾib, and he does not occupy himself with the reading of the petitions to him and the hearing of the complaints, deciding that the nāʾib has to occupy himself with that. When the petitions are read to the nāʾib, he hears [it], and if his prescription is sufficient for it, he issues it, and when only the prescription of the sultan is sufficient, he orders to write it in name of the sultan and to issue it, and it is written and he confirms it by writing that it happened on the indication of the nāʾib. He is distinguished from the nāʾibs as-salṭana in Syria by the fact that he is called kāfil al-mamlaka ash-sharīfa al-ʾislāmīya. But as for cases, which he has to inform the sultan off, he informs him of them, sometimes during his meeting with him, sometimes by sending someone who informs him and takes his order on it. (cfr. al-ʿUmarī) The dīwān al-ʾiqṭāʿ / al-jaysh was in his service alone, and they only gathered with him, not with the sultan, on any case. (When the office of nāʾib was reconstituted after the death of MNM, the nāẓir al-jaysh kept gathering with the sultan alone) And as for the wazīr and the kātib as-sirr, they consulted him in some cases.
The office was abolished in the time of al-Nāṣir Muḥammad b. Qalāwūn.
In reality, the nāʾib is the second sultan, and all the nāʾibs of the Syrian mamālik correspond with him regarding everything on which they correspond with the sultan, and they ask his advice on it, as they ask the sultanʾs advice. He employs the soldiers, without consultation, and he appoints the amirs, however after consulting the sultan. and he is the independent administrator of everything concerning the army, the money and the news, i.e. the post (al-barīd). Every officer in a niyāba can only act freely on his command, and he can only take a decision regarding a clear case after consulting him. He employs the soldiers and appoints/promotes in the offices, except for the important offices (wazīr, quḍāt, kātib as-sirr, kātib al-jaysh), for he proposes to the sultan who is suitable, and it is insignificant that he [= the sultan] does not agree on something which is determined (distinctive title kāfil al-mamālik)