Sultan Abu Al-Nasr Sayf ad-Din Al-Ashraf Qaitbay (; 1416/14187 August 1496) ruled the Mamluk Sultanate from 1468 to 1496 (872 – 901 AH in the Islamic calendar).
As the eighteenth Sultan of Egypt of the Burji dynasty, Qaitbay stabilized the Mamluk state and economy. He consolidated the northern boundaries of the Sultanate with the Ottoman Empire and engaged in trade with other contemporaneous polities.
Qaitbay was Circassians by birth, and was purchased by sultan Barsbay (1422 – 1438) before being freed by Barsbay's successor Jaqmaq (1438 – 1453).
A veteran of sixteen campaigns, Qaitbay was also a great patron of architecture. He commissioned building projects in Mecca, Medina, Jerusalem, Damascus, Aleppo, Alexandria, and in every quarter of Cairo and endowed the religious works with . He was also known for his piety. [R. Marom, “ Sukayk and al-Summāqah: Mamluk Rural Geography in the Northern Jawlān/Golan Heights in the Light of Qāytbāy’s Endowment Deeds,” in K. Raphael and M. Abbasi (ed.s), The Golan in the Mamluk and Ottoman Periods: an Archaeological and Historical Study: Excavations at Naʿarān and Farj, In Honour of Moshe Hartal, Yigal Ben Ephraim and Shuqri ‘Arraf, Annual of the Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology Hebrew Union College—Jewish Institute of Religion Volume xiv (2024): 61-62]
Biography
Early life
Qaitbay was born between 1416 and 1418 in
Circassia in the
Caucasus. Skilled in archery and horsemanship, he was enslaved (see Black Sea slave trade) and taken to Cairo around 1440. He was quickly purchased by the reigning sultan Barsbay and assigned to the palace guard.
Barsbay's successor Jaqmaq emancipated Qaitbay after learning that he was a descendant of the Ayyubid Emir of Damascus Al-Ashraf Musa (d. 1237). Jaqmaq then appointed the freed Qaitmat third executive secretary.
Under the sultans Sayf ad-Din Inal, Khushqadam and Yilbay, Qaitbay was further promoted through the Mamluk military hierarchy. He eventually achieved the rank taqaddimat alf, commander of 1,000 Mamluks. Under the Sultan Timurbugha, finally, Qaitbay was appointed atabak, or field marshal, of the entire Mamluk army.[Petry, Twilight, 24–29.] Qaitbay amassed a considerable personal fortune with which as sultan he would use for charitable endowments.[Petry, Twilight, 33.]
Accession
The reign of Timurbugha lasted less than two months; he was deposed in a palace coup on 30 January 1468.
[Petry, Twilight, 22.] Qaitbay was proposed as a compromise candidate to replace Timurbugha who would acceptable to the various court factions. He was made Sultan on 31 January.
Qaitbay insisted that Timurburgha be granted an honorable retirement instead of the enforced exile usually imposed on the deposed. He did exile the leaders of the coup that had removed Timurburgha, and he created a new ruling council made up of his own supporters as well as experienced advisors who had fallen out of favor.[Petry, Twilight, 36–43.] Yashbak min Mahdi was appointed dawadar, or executive secretary, and Azbak min Tutkh was named atabak; the two men would remain Qaitbay's closest advisors until the ends of their careers despite their profound dislike for each other. Qaitbay would typically appoint rivals to posts of equivalent authority, thus preventing any single subordinate from acquiring too much power while he held the authority to settle any disputes himself.[Petry, Twilight, 43–50.]
Early reign
Qaitbay's first major challenge was the insurrection of Shah Suwar, leader of a small
Oghuz Turk dynasty, the Dhu'l-Qadrids, in eastern
Anatolia. The first expedition against the upstart was soundly defeated, and Suwar threatened to invade
Syria. A second Mamluk army under Azbak, was likewise defeated in 1469. Not until 1471 did a third expedition, this time commanded by Yashbak, succeed in routing Suwar's army. In 1473, Suwar was captured and led back to Cairo, together with his brothers; the prisoners were drawn and quartered and their remains were hung from
Bab Zuweila.
[Petry, Twilight, 57–72.]
Qaitbay's reign was also marked by trade with other contemporaneous polities. Excavations in the late 1800s and early 1900s at over fourteen sites in the vicinity of Borama in modern-day northwestern Somalia unearthed, among other things, coins identified as having been derived from Qaitbay.[Royal Geographical Society (Great Britain), The Geographical Journal, Volume 87, (Royal Geographical Society: 1936), p.301.] Most of these finds are associated with the medieval Adal Sultanate,[Bernard Samuel Myers, ed., Encyclopedia of World Art, Volume 13, (McGraw-Hill: 1959), p.xcii.] and were sent to the British Museum in London for preservation shortly after their discovery.[
]
Consolidation of power
Following the defeat of Suwar, Qaitbay set about purging his court of the remaining factions and installing his own purchased Mamluks in all positions of power. He frequently went on excursions, ostentatiously leaving the
Cairo Citadel with limited guards to display his trust of his subordinates and of the populace. He traveled throughout his reign, visiting
Alexandria,
Damascus, and
Aleppo, among other cities, and personally inspecting his many building projects. In 1472 he performed the
Hajj to
Mecca. He was struck by the poverty of the citizens of
Medina and devoted a substantial portion of his private fortune to the alleviation of their plight. Through such measures Qaitbay gained a reputation for piety, charity, and royal self-confidence.
[Petry, Twilight, 73–82.]
Ottoman-Mamluk war
In 1480 Yashbak led an army against the
Aq Qoyunlu dynasty in Northern Mesopotamia, but was soundly defeated while attacking
Urfa, taken prisoner, and executed.
[Petry, Twilight, 82–88.] These events foreshadowed a longer military engagement with the far more powerful
Ottoman Empire in
Anatolia. In 1485 Ottoman armies began to campaign on the Mamluk frontier, and an expedition was dispatched from
Cairo to confront them. These Mamluk troops won a surprising victory in 1486 near
Adana. A temporary truce ensued, but in 1487 the Ottomans reoccupied Adana, only to be defeated once more by a massive Mamluk army. As the concomitant Ottoman expansion in the western Mediterranean represented an increased threat to the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, Ferdinand II of Aragon made a temporary alliance with the Mamluks against the Ottomans from 1488 until 1491, shipping wheat and offering a fleet of 50 caravels against the Ottomans.
In 1491 a final truce was signed that would last through the remaining reigns of Qaitbay and the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid II. Qaitbay's ability to enforce a peace with the greatest military power in the Muslim world further enhanced his prestige at home and abroad.[Petry, Twilight, 88-103.]
Final years
The end of Qaitbay's reign was marred by increasing unrest among his troops and a decline in his personal health, including a riding accident that left him comatose for days. Many of his most trusted officials died, and were replaced by far less scrupulous upstarts; a long period of palace intrigue ensued. In 1492 the
Black Death returned to Cairo, and was reported to have claimed 200,000 lives. Qaitbay's health became markedly poor in 1494, and his court, now lacking a figure of central authority, was wracked by infighting, factionalism, and purges.
He died on 8 August 1496 and was interred in the spectacular mausoleum attached to his mosque in Cairo's Northern Cemetery which he had built during his lifetime. He was succeeded by his son, an-Nasir Muhammad (not to be confused with the famed 14th-century sultan of the same name.)[Petry, Twilight, 103–118.]
Family
One of his wives was the daughter of Sultan Sayf ad-Din Inal.
Another consort was Khawand Aṣalbāy, a Circassian,
who was his slave concubine rather than his wife,
[Albrecht Fuess, “How to marry right: Searching for a royal spouse at the Mamluk court of Cairo in the fifteenth century”, DYNTRAN Working Papers, n° 21, online edition, February 2017, available at: http://dyntran.hypotheses.org/1761] and sister of Sultan Abu Sa'id Qansuh. She was the mother of his son, Sultan Sultan An-Nasir Muhammad. After Qaitbay's death, she married Sultan Al-Ashraf Janbalat.
[ Another wife was Khawand Fatima, the daughter of Ala al-Din Ali bin Ali bin Al-Khassbak.][ She was the mother of Ahmed (1462 – 1468) and Sitt al-Jarakisa (1464 – 1468).][ and Al-Ashraf Qansuh al-Ghuri.][ Another wife was Khawand Zaynab.]
Legacy
Qaitbay's reign has traditionally been seen as the "happy culmination" of the Burji Mamluk dynasty.[Garcin, "Regime," 295.] It was a period of unparalleled political stability, military success, and prosperity, and Qaitbay's contemporaries admired him as a defender of traditional Mamluk values. At the same time, he may be criticized for his conservatism, and for his failure to innovate in the face of new challenges.[Petry, Twilight, 233–34.] Following Qaitbay's death, the Mamluk state descended into a prolonged succession crisis lasting for five years until the accession of Al-Ashraf Qansuh al-Ghawri.[Garcin, "Regime," 297.]
Architectural patronage
Today Qaitbay is perhaps best known for his wide-ranging architectural patronage, which was second only to al-Nasir Muhammad ibn Qalawun.[Meinecke, Mamlukische Architektur, II.396-442.]
One of Qaytbay's largest building projects in Cairo was his funerary complex in the Northern Cemetery, which included his mausoleum, a mosque/madrasa, a maq'ad (reception hall), and various auxiliary structures and functions attached to it. It is considered a masterpiece of late Mamluk architecture and is featured today on Egyptian pound. His other contributions in Cairo include a Wikala at Bab al-Nasr, a Wikala-Sabil-Kuttab near al-Azhar Mosque, a Sabil-Kuttab on Saliba Street, a madrasa-mosque at Qal'at al-Kabsh, a mosque on Roda Island, and a palace that is now incorporated into the Bayt Al-Razzaz palace.[ Other amirs and patrons also built notable projects under his reign, such as the Mosque of Amir Qijmas al-Ishaqi, which feature the same refined architectural style of his time. In Alexandria he notably built a fortress on the site of the ruined Pharos, now known as the Citadel (or Fort) of Qaitbay.
]
Qaitbay In Ethiopic Sources
Qaitbay is mentioned in Ethiopic sources as አሽሪፍ (Ashrif) and እልአሽሪፍ (El-Ashrif) a cruel ruler who destroyed the famous church of Dayr al-Magtas (ደብረ ምጥማቅ). Hearing the news of the church's destruction the Ethiopian ruler Zara Yaqob built another church in Ethiopia to console the sorrow of the Egyptian bishop Michael who served in the church before he was sent to Ethiopia by the Coptic Patriarchate. The Ethiopic source accurately describes the political instability of Qaitbay's rule in the final days.
Notes
Sources
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Stefano Carboni, Venice and the Islamic World, 828–1797 (New Haven, 2007).
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J.-C. Garcin, "The regime of the Circassian Mamluks," in C.F. Petry, ed., The Cambridge History of Egypt I: Islamic Egypt, 640–1517 (Cambridge, 1998), 290–317.
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A. W. Newhall, The patronage of the Mamluk Sultan Qā’it Bay, 872–901/1468–1496 (Diss. Harvard, 1987).
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C.F. Petry, Twilight of majesty: the reigns of the Mamlūk Sultans al-Ashrāf Qāytbāy and Qānṣūh al-Ghawrī in Egypt (Seattle, 1993).
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