Mamelukes Usurp Power In Egypt

This series has two easy 5 minute installments. This first installment: The Slaves Feel Their Power.

Introduction
The Mamelukes established a culture in Egypt that is weird to the Western world, especially in the United States. They were slaves who conquered and ruled. Imagine! In order to get into the ruling class, one had to become a slave! What?

First, some background.

From A.D. 969 to 1171 the Arabian dynasty of caliphs called Fatimites — because they professed to trace their descent from Fatima, the daughter of Mahomet — reigned in Egypt. Their downfall was due to their own decline into imbecility, through which they fell into the hands of Turkish viziers who, keeping their nominal masters in subserviency, themselves assumed the actual rule.

For several generations the caliphs of Bagdad, under whose sway the Fatimites were now reduced, had attracted to their capital slaves from Turcoman and Mongol hordes. These slaves they used both as bodyguards and as contingents to offset the dominating influence of the Arab soldiery in their affairs. In the end the slaves superseded the Arab soldiers altogether, and from bondmen became masters of the court. They stirred up riots and rebellion and hastened the fall of the effete caliphate.

Under the Eyyubite dynasty in Egypt, which Saladin founded about 1174, the same practice was followed with the same results. The Eyyubites were strangers in Egypt, and welcomed the support of foreign myrmidons. Slave dealers bought children of conquered tribes in Central Asia, promising them great fortunes in the West. These children, together with prisoners of war from the eastern hordes, streamed into Egypt, where they were again bought by the rulers, who thus unwittingly prepared the way for their own destruction. The military body created by Saladin, called mamelukes (“slaves;” literally “the possessed”), obtained ascendency in the manner here related by Muir.

This selection is from The Mamelukes or Slave Dynasty of Egypt, 1260–1517 AD by Sir William Muir published in 1896. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Sir William Muir (1819-1905) was Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Provinces of British India. He also wrote on Muslim history.

Time: 1250
Place: Egypt

The thousands who, with uncomely names and barbarous titles, began to crowd the streets of Cairo, occupied a position to which we have no parallel elsewhere. Finding a weak and subservient population, they lorded it over them. Like the children of Israel, they ever kept themselves distinct from the people of the land — but the oppressors, not, like them, the oppressed. Brought up to arms, the best favored and most able of the mamelukes when freed became, at the instance of the Sultan, emirs of ten, of fifty, of a hundred, and often, by rapid leaps, of a thousand. They continued to multiply by the purchase of fresh slaves who, like their masters, could rise to liberty and fortunes.

The sultans were naturally the largest purchasers, as they employed the revenues of the state in surrounding themselves with a host of slaves; we read, for example, of one who bought some six thousand. While the great mass pursued a low and servile life, the favorites of the emirs, and specially of the crown, were educated in the arts of peace and war, and, as pages and attendants, gradually rose to the position of their masters — the slave of to-day, the commander, and not infrequently the sultan of to-morrow.

From the first, insolent and overbearing, the mamelukes began, as time passed on, to feel their power, and grew more and more riotous and turbulent, oppressing the land by oft-repeated pillage and outrage. Broken up into parties, each with the name of some sultan or leader, their normal state was one of internal combat and antagonism; while, pampered and indulged, they often turned upon their masters. Some of the more powerful sultans were able to hold them in order, and there were not wanting occasional intervals of quiet; but trouble and uproar were ever liable to recur.

The Eyyubite princes settled their mamelukes, chiefly Turks and Mongols — so as to keep them out of the city — on an island in the Nile, whence they were called Baharites, and the first mameluke dynasty (1260-1382) was of this race, and called accordingly. The others, a later importation, were called Burjites, from living in the Citadel, or quarters in the town; they belonged more to the Circassian race. The second dynasty (1382-1517) was of these, and, like the Baharite dynasty, bore their name. The mamelukes were for the most part attached faithfully to their masters, and the emirs, with their support, enriched themselves by exactions from the people, with the unscrupulous gains of office, and with rich fiefs from the state. The mamelukes, as a body, thus occupied a prominent and powerful position, and often, especially in later times, forced the Sultan to bend to their will.

Such is the people which for two centuries and a half ruled Egypt with a rod of iron, and whose history we shall now attempt to give.

It was about the middle of the twelfth century that Nureddin and King Amalrich both turned a longing eye toward Egypt, where, in the decrepitude of the Fatimites, dissension and misrule prevailed. The Caliph, in alarm, sought aid first from one and then from the other; and each in turn entered Egypt ostensibly for its defence, but in reality for its possession. A friendly treaty was at last concluded with both; but it was broken by Amalrich, who invaded the country and demanded a heavy ransom. In this extremity, the Caliph again appealed to Nureddin, sending locks of his ladies’ hair in token of alarm.

Glad of the opportunity, Nureddin despatched his general, Shirkoh, to the rescue, before whom Amalrich, crestfallen, retired. Shirkoh, having thus delivered the Caliph, gained his favor, and, as vizier, assumed the administration. Soon after he died; and his nephew, Saladin, succeeded to the vizierate. The following year the Caliph also died; and now Saladin, who had by vigorous measures put down all opposition, himself as sultan took possession of the throne. Thus the Fatimite dynasty, which had for two centuries ruled over Egypt, came to an end.

Saladin was son of a Kurdish chief called Eyyub, and hence the dynasty is termed Eyyubite. His capital was Cairo. He fortified the city, using the little pyramid for material, and, abandoning the luxurious palace of the Fatimites, laid the foundations of the Citadel on the nearest crest of the Mokattam range, and to it transferred his residence. After a prosperous rule over Egypt and Syria of above twenty years he died, and his numerous family fell into dissension. At last his brother Adlil, gaining the ascendency, achieved a splendid reign not only at home, but also in the East, from Georgia to Aden. He died of grief at the taking of Damietta by the crusaders, and his grandson Eyyub succeeded to the throne.

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