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From the early ninth century to the first decades of the nineteenth, military slavery was typically the primary form of military organization in regions such as Egypt, India, and the edges of Central Asia. Military slaves—also called ghulāms or mamlūks—were often the predominant element of a Muslim army and occasionally exploited their prowess and importance to achieve political influence. This chapter examines the origins of military slavery in the Islamic world and its eventual disappearance within the framework of general histories of medieval and early modern Islam. In particular, it looks at the role often played by military slaves, mostly Turks, in the history of the Middle East spanning some 1,000 years. It also considers the origins of the institution in the 'Abbāsid Caliphate of the early ninth century as well as the so-called Mamlūk Sultanate that ruled Egypt and Syria from the mid-thirteenth century until the time of the Ottoman Empire in 1516–1517.

This chapter examines the transformations in the state structure and organization of power that occurred in Egypt and Syria in the late Mamluk period. It considers the various economic and political challenges that the Mamluk sultanate faced and the ways that the rulers dealt with them, including the recurrent waves of plague, gold shortage, and currency devaluation. It shows that the responses of the Mamluk sultans to these economic crises and challenges resulted in long-term transformations that changed the nature of the state and of the Mamluk institutions. Many of these responses have been viewed as deviations from the proper norm of rule and governance, as signs of the corruption and greed of the amirs and administrators, and as causes for the “decline” of the Mamluk state. In particular, the chapter looks at the policies adopted by Mamluk sultans and the Mamluk administration to address the economic challenges, such as trade monopolies and additional taxation.

This chapter examines the social transformations that arose in the Mamluk sultanate during the fifteenth century that allowed room for social mobility. It begins with a discussion of population and demographic changes across the landscape of Egypt in particular, and to some extent Syria. It then considers the rise of the Bedouins and Bedouinization during the Mamluk period, with particular emphasis on the Bedouin tribes' increasing authority in many areas of the countryside and their impact on both peasant communities and urban life. It also explores the move of different racial groups from the peripheries of society closer to the core, including the habashis. Finally, it explores other social changes during the period, such as the emergence of a new landowning class and a new type of social integration, the spread of Islam, and an increase in social mobility. The chapter shows that all of these changes caused social anxiety and tension throughout the Mamluk sultanate, acutely reflected in frequent protests, especially on the streets of important cities.

This book examines the economic, social, and political transformations that confronted the Mamluk sultanate over the fifteenth century, along with their impact on the Egyptian and Syrian societies. It argues that the multiple crises were simultaneously the outward manifestations of deeper changes and shows how they presented opportunities for various political and social groups. It also considers how the crises and political transformations led to changes and were themselves the outcome of changes in all of the domestic, regional, and international balances of power. Rather than narrate the history of this tumultuous fifteenth century solely from the point of view of the ruling dynasties, the book takes into account the perspectives of the common people, especially the urban non-elites. It considers how the transformations that rocked the Mamluk dynasty affected issues such as social mobility and concludes by discussing the development of the bourgeois trend as well as the various instances and reports of popular protest during the period.

This book has interpreted the history of late Mamluk Egypt and Syria “from below,” taking into account the historical experiences of the common people, especially the urban non-elites, in elucidating both the social history and political history of the time. It has identified the range of factors that combined to make Mamluk power more diffused in the late fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. It has described the broad transformations that affected the economic structure of the Mamluk sultanate, the Mamluk culture and society, and the relations between rulers and ruled. This chapter offers general conclusions on the transformations that occurred in Egypt and Syria during the fifteenth century and emphasizes the importance of studying urban protest in the premodern period. It shows that protest is very much alive on the streets of various Arab cities, including those of Egypt and Syria.