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Under Barsbay, the Mamluk Sultanate reached its greatest territorial extent and was militarily dominant throughout the region, but his legacy was mixed in the eyes of contemporary commentators who criticized his fiscal methods and economic policies.
- Life on The Steppe
- A Mamluk’S Life For Me
- The Crusader-Mongol Alliance
- Slaves Without A Master
- Baibars in Command
- Death on The Nile
- War in Syria
- Showdown with The Mongols
- The Battle of Ain Jalut
- Baibars vs. Qutuz
Baibars was born in the Sea of Grass, the Great Eurasian Steppe that stretches from Korea to Hungary. Neither his date of birth nor his exact origin is known for sure. But he came into this world either in 1223 or 1228 CE, and he hailed from either southern Russia – between the Volga and Ural rivers – or northern Kazakhstan. Life on the steppe had ...
Befitting of the commodity he now was, Baibars changed hands a couple of times. He was sold by the Mongols at a slave market in the Sultanate of Rum, in modern Turkey. His buyer was a middleman who sold him for a higher price in Syria to a high-ranking Egyptian official. This dignitary brought Baibars to Cairo, the capital of the mighty Ayyubid Sul...
Crusaders were the main opponents of Egypt at the time. Although Saladin – the sultan’s great-uncle – had liberated the holy city of Jerusalem from christian occupation, there were still Crusader states in the Levant. On top of that, new crusades kept arriving in the Middle East, trying to shift the balance of power. In that vein, the Holy Roman Em...
The French offensive had great success at first. The sultan was away, campaigning in Syria, and had left only a mamluk garrison behind in Egypt – enough to control the local population but insufficient to withstand the fearsome French fleet, allegedlynumbering over 1,800 ships and boats. Like a lightning strike, Louis IX occupied the coastal city o...
Whilst the French scored a crucial tactical victory over the mamluks outside al-Mansurah, they still had to take the city itself. The French king wanted to reorganize his position and ordered his army to stay put. But his brother and the Templars wanted to defeat the Egyptians before the new sultan arrived at the scene. Meanwhile, Baibars had come ...
The new sultan was called Turanshah. He quickly managed to alienate the clan of mamluks that Baibars belonged to: the Bahris. Rather than rewarding Bahri mamluks for their sacrifices in the war against the Crusaders, he elevated others – who had done little fighting – to high positions such as Master of the Sultan’s Guard. Feeling their hold on pow...
Baibars spent the next few years campaigning in Syria, fighting Aybak’s wars. Ayyubid family members who were in control of emirates like Aleppo or Damascus refused to acknowledge Aybak’s de factoreign in Egypt. Baibars defeated most of them and brought Palestine and the Syrian coast back under Cairo’s rule. His position strengthened, Aybak now fel...
With his close associates, Baibars tried to damage Aybak’s interests in Syria while the sultan’s forces attempted to hunt him down. This went on for a few years. Aybak was eventually succeeded by sultan Qutuz, but he was just as hostile to Baibars. Just when it seemed like Baibars would never be able to safely return to Cairo, a gigantic threat to ...
Qutuz responded in a brutal manner. He had the emissaries sliced in half and put their heads on spikes atop Cairo’s gates. The sultan knew the Mongols would be furious, but he also knew that Hulagu had retreated to the Caucasusto spare his horses the Middle Eastern summer heat. The Mongols had left only a part of their army – still numbering 20,000...
The battle was a severe blow to the confidence of the Mongol hordes, who had seldom experienced such a stinging defeat. The mamluks, on the other hand, felt invincible. Qutuz, in particular, imagined himself unassailable and, swollen with pride, refused to give Baibars the emirate of Aleppo as he had promised. Their rivalry reinvigorated, Baibars d...
On the way back to Cairo after the victory at Ain Jalut, Qutuz was assassinated by several emirs in a conspiracy led by Baibars. Baibars became the new Sultan. Local Ayyubid emirs sworn to the Mamluk sultanate subsequently defeated another Mongol force of 6,000 at Homs, which ended the first Mongol
Baibars is one of Egypt’s most important Sultans, a Mamluk warrior, and an influential figure in the Middle East during the 13th century. Baibars’ rule was marked by constant warfare with the Christian Crusaders sent from Europe and Mongol invasions from the East.
Baybars I (born 1223, north of the Black Sea—died July 1, 1277, Damascus, Syria) was the most eminent of the Mamlūk sultans of Egypt and Syria, which he ruled from 1260 to 1277. He is noted both for his military campaigns against Mongols and crusaders and for his internal administrative reforms.
Baybars, who rose from slave to soldier to sultan (leader), fought the French during the later Crusades, or holy wars, against Islam, and the Mongols, raiders from the plains of Central Asia who tore through the Middle East and destroyed much of Islamic civilization.
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Mar 29, 2020 · At the time of his death, Baybars left a stable sultanate with a strong army that was ready for the next major Mongol invasion. He laid down the model for the organization and of the army and its training, which was followed for generations after his death.
