Egypt's History

The final century or so of Ptolemaic rule from Alexandria is a sad one, primarily because many of the later Ptolemies who, though Pharaohs they might have appeared, were mere puppets of the Roman Empire. With the death of Cleopatra VII, the last of the Ptolemies to rule, and the defeat of the once-mighty Ptolemaic navy at Actium, in 31 BC, Egypt became part of the Roman Empire under Augustus Caesar. But Rome was falling, and with it the Empire. An emperor was needed who could protect the Empire from outside invasion as well as repair the internal strife between the various factions, religions, and cliques, all of which were represented in Alexandria. Rome found what it needed, though perhaps not exactly what it wanted in Constantine.

It is with the ascension of the Roman emperor Constantine that a new era began for Alexandria, as well as for the Empire as a whole. By defeating his co-ruler Licinius (Rome had begun the practice of having two rulers, one for the eastern half of the Empire, and one for the western half), Constantine became sole emperor. He created an eastern capital for the Empire in the city of Byzantium, which he renamed Constantinople.

The Bedouin Arabs who toppled the Sassanid Empire were propelled not only by a desire for conquest but also by a new religion, Islam. The Prophet Muhammad, a member of the Hashimite clan of the powerful tribe of Quraysh, proclaimed his prophetic mission in Arabia in 612 and eventually won over the city of his birth, Mecca, to the new faith. Within one year of Muhammad's death in 632, Arabia itself was secure enough to allow his secular successor, Abu Bakr, the first caliph, to begin the campaign against the Byzantine and Sassanid empires.

The old Roman Empire crumbled under barbarian invasions and internal conflict, and the Byzantine Empire rose in its place. The center of the world moved to Constantinople, which under the Byzantines became a center for art, science, and religious and secular learning. In the early seventh century, the most successful Persian attack on the Byzantine Empire took both Jerusalem and Alexandria. The emperor Heraclius managed to beat back the Persians to the point of collapse but a new onslaught began, this time from the south. After battling the Persians, the Byzantine rulers had little hope of defeating the forces that came sweeping north from the deserts of Arabia. The final defeat of the Byzantine armies in 636 left Palestine and Syria open to conquest by the Arabs, and they spread like wildfire over northern Africa, eventually bringing Alexandria under their control in 642.

Under the rule of Kuaraweh, Egypt was soon engulfed in corruption while famine and the plague swept the nation. The Abbasids had once again gained strength and they sent a soldier named Mohammed Ibn Sulyman to regain control of the country, which he did in 905. The Abbasid's intermediate rule only lasted for thirty years, until the Fatimid conquest of 969. In the second half of the tenth century, Egypt in general suffered not only from a number of low Nile floods, which in turn caused famine, but also from poor leadership of these last few Abbasid rulers.

After the deaths of al Mustansir and Badrin in 1094, six Fatimid caliphs would rule for seventy-five years. Egypt became a rich prize for two rival outsiders who were much more powerful and aggressive than the Fatimids. The first Christian crusaders appeared in Palestine in 1096 and began fighting with the Seljuk Moslems over Egypt and the Holy Land as well. These two groups invaded Egypt at the same time and at that point the invasion of Egypt was inevitable.

Nur el Din, the Sultan of Damascus, appointed Shirkuh as vizier of Egypt, but he did not live long enough to make any serious decisions. His nephew Saladin inherited his position March 2, 1169 marking the beginning of the Ayyubid period. Saladin ousted the last of the Fatimids from the city of Kahira which was the beginning of the city of Cairo. Saladin gave his family name to the Egyptian dynasty that followed him, and his successors were able rulers. They expanded irrigation systems and secured travel and trading routes. The spice trade flourished, and in spite of a bout with famine caused by several low Niles, plague, and earthquakes, Egypt prospered. Saladin's brother, al Adil, succeeded Saladin and faced a terrible famine in the Middle Ages. Saladin did not remain in Egypt long, for as soon as the country was secure, he turned it over to his brother, al Adil and his vizier al Fadil, and left to drive the Crusaders from the Holy Land. He left in 1182 and never returned. He died in Damascus in 1193 after having liberated all Palestine from the English, French, Austrians, and Sicilians.

The next period was that of the Mamelukes. The white slaves imported by the Egyptian governors now ruled Egypt. As children, they were converted to Islam, educated and given military training. Many worked their way up through the army ranks, and when they reached a high enough rank, were freed by their masters, to whom they pledged their loyalty. Many were appointed to high governmental posts. Advancement was by individual ability and open only to those who had been indentured. To supply their private armies, the Mamelukes continued to import slaves, creating multiple power groups that dragged the native Egyptians into their fierce and frequent power struggles. In general, since Mameluke culture was based on slavery, neither wives nor sons had any claim on a Mameluke's political or military power. Mameluke sons, denied both hereditary claims and the slavery that would grant them entry into politics, filtered into the Egyptian population. Although Mamelukes controlled the court and the army, Egyptians continued to staff civil offices, financial agencies, the judiciary, and the professions.

Named for their barracks on Roda Island, the Bahri Mamelukes defended the Islamic empire from the Mongols, who in 1258 swept through Persia and captured Baghdad, massacring the khalif and nearly all his family. In 1260, they took Aleppo and Damascus and were launching attacks into the rest of Syria. The Mamelukes were successful in keeping the Mongols out of Egypt. They were saved from the same fate that struck Damascus in the form of Houlagou, the grandson of Genghis Khan.

At the end of the year 1260, the Egyptian Mameluke General Emir Zahir Baybars halted the horde at Ayn Jalut (Goliath's Spring), handing the Asians their first defeat. When their Syrian possessions rebelled, the Mongols retreated to Anatolia. After his return to Cairo, the victorious General Baybars had the current sultan murdered. He had a strong voice, a violent temper, and had an insatiable vigor and energy. This is probably what drove him to finally become sultan. He ruled Cairo for seventeen years and, because Baybars was so successful abroad, Egypt prospered and so did its people. After Baybar's death, his sons were quickly deposed and one of Baybar's generals, Qalawun was elected as sultan.

Qalawun, who founded a dynasty that lasted a hundred years, continued Baybar's policies. He kept both the Mongols and Christians at bay and made treaties with Emperor Rudolph of Hapsburg as well as other European princes. Qalawun bought Circassian rather than Turkish Mamelukes and housed them in the great circular keep in the Citadel.

Qalawun was followed by his son Khalil in 1290, who captured the Christian port of Acre, razed the Crusaders' castles and drove them to Cyprus. Muhammad al Nasir succeeded his brother Khalil, but owing to his age (nine) and internal dissension, the Amir Lagim ruled Egypt in his name. Lagim took part in the murder of Sultan al Khalil, who was Qalawun's son. Lagim was murdered in 1299. Nasir regained control in 1298, only to flee in 1309 before the power of Baybars II. When Nasir returned in 1310, he had Baybars II put to death. He ruled absolutely and brutally and kept the rival Mamelukes under his thumb completely. Externally, his reign was marked by security and prosperity. He made treaties with the Mongols and strengthened ties with Europe. Trade flourished, and Egypt's borders remained unchallenged.

Cairo flourished during this time due to the trading that came through the port there. Trade with Venice had just begun as Venice was establishing itself on the mainland of Italy. Muhammad al Nasir, who succeeded his brother Kahlil, had a canal dug between Alexandria and the Nile in 1311 as an indication of the importance of the trade in the Mediterranean. This canal took one hundred thousand men to dig. Nasir taxed everything that was sold. The city seemed to thrive during his reign, but after his death it sank from civil wars, famine, and the same plague known in Europe as the Black Death. Nasir died in 1341. None of Nasir's sons reigned for long. The Mameluke emirs kept murdering the sultans as one faction would become more superior than another. Lacking strong sultans to control them, the Bahri (river) and Burgi (Tower) Mamelukes were continually at odds, using their local wars as excuses to plunder the civilian populations.

In 1382 a Circassian slave, Barkuq, took the throne and control of Egypt shifted to the Burgi Mamelukes. From the Citadel tower, the Burgi Mamelukes ruled Egypt for the next 135 years, but their reign proved even more bloody and unstable than that of the Bahris. They were also called the Circassian Mamelukes since most of them came from Caucasus. The period of their rule is said to have been the darkest points in Egyptian history. Even from the beginning of Barkuq, who was the first Burgi Mameluke, Cairo became an anarchy. The Mameluke soldiers from Greek, Turkish, Circassian, and Tartar killed each other every day in the streets of Cairo. By 1403, famine and plague had combined to undermine the economy. The Christians and Jews were heavily taxed. During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the Nile had shifted its course to the west of the city and receded almost a mile to its current position. After forty-nine years and twelve sultans, Qait Bey became sultan. He reigned for twenty-eight years and taxed all the land at 20% of its production.

But the Portuguese were coming from one side and the Ottoman Turks were coming from Constantinople, and on August 24, 1516 the Mamelukes were badly defeated north of Aleppo. Up to fourteen thousand Mamelukes and a huge army were defeated by treachery and artillery. The Egyptians almost welcomed the Turks; they had suffered from taxation and famine and had grown weary of the Mamelukes. They thought the Turks were possibly the deliverers from the Circassian brutality, but they were wrong. When the Turkish Sultan Selim came to Cairo, he started to reduce the city to nothing. In the year 1796, the Egyptians revolted against the Turks. They wanted something to be done about the unbearable taxes and the economic misery they had been suffering for so long. One of the Egyptian Mamelukes, Ali Bey, occupied Cairo and sent the Turkish pasha back to Porte. He then attacked Arabia and Syria and defeated the Turks soundly. He was called the caliph of Mecca, and his campaign made Egypt essentially an independent state within the Ottoman Empire.

Ali Bey was eventually murdered and Ibrahim, who was another Mameluke along with Murad Bey took over the rule of Egypt. It was during this time that Napoleon arrived on the coast of Alexandria. The Mamelukes were not strong enough to fight both the French and the Turks at the same time. When the French started their advance on Cairo, Murad, ignorant of events in Europe with no knowledge of Napolean, sent out ten thousand Mamelukes and thirty thousand irregulars, who were mostly Albanians, Negroes, Bedouins, and Egyptians to fight Napoleon’s forty thousand veteran troops. In a suburb of Cairo called Imbaba, the French and the Mamelukes fought it out. The battle was very bloody on both sides. The veteran French soldiers maneuvered and eventually got the Mamelukes in a crossfire. At the end of it all, the Mamelukes were beaten and driven from the city.

Napoleon came to Egypt on his way to India. Egypt just happened to be in the way and he had to get past this barrier first. The English and the French had a rivalry for an empire. The trade war in Europe had been building for years and it had now come to the point where the East was the high stakes. Napoleon had been told that a conquest of Egypt would more than make up for the loss of the French West Indian colonies to the British. They were correct in thinking that the route across Egypt would be the fastest and maybe the best trade route to the East.

The citizens of Cairo never relented in their hatred and harassment of the French. In 1799, Napoleon Left Cairo and returned to France leaving Kleber in charge. For nearly two years, chaos reigned in a conditions of near civil war. In 1801, the city was completely surrounded by the British, Mamelukes, and Turks, and the people inside the city were beginning to starve. Sir John Hutchinson offered to allow the French to evacuate and Kleber agreed happily. The British, Mamelukes, and Turks took over Cairo. The Ottoman flag flew over the city because officially the Turks were in control of Cairo, but the British were in control of the Citadel. The British stayed in the city only long enough to reestablish the Turks and they were all too happy to leave the city.

One of the Turks that was left in charge was a young officer named Mohammed Ali. Mohammed Ali knew that eventually he would have to contend with the Mamelukes if he ever wanted to control Egypt. They were still the feudal owners of Egypt and the land was still the source of wealth and power in Egypt. In 1804 and 1805, Ali began to attack the Mamelukes. Ali's Albanians captured or killed most of the Mamelukes. During this clash, the city was pillaged so badly that the people revolted against the Turkish governor and elected Mohammed Ali as pasha. The British were still watching the happenings in Egypt and they attacked Egypt in 1807 with the intentions of overthrowing the Turks and reinstating the Mamelukes in authority. However, Ali’s five thousand Albanian troops defeated the British and sold the captured British soldiers into slavery.

Under Mohammed Ali, Europeans became the privileged class of Egypt. Ali created monopolies in the trading and manufacturing areas which he shared with the European consuls. In the 1840s and 1850s, Mohammed Ali greatly enjoyed the European attention afforded by growing interest in Egyptian archaeology and antiquities. He knew that it was a gold mine if he could figure out how to attach Egypt to the ever-expanding industrial and trading riches in Europe. There were two things that really made this possible. Ali introduced cotton to Egypt in 1822 and in 1845, Lieutenant Thomas Waghorn carried the mail from Bombay to London in a record-breaking thirty days by using an overland route through Egypt.

By the time the canal was opened, Ismail, Mohammed Ali's grandson was ruling Egypt. In 1876, a group of Europeans told Ismail that he owed them 91 million pounds. In 1879 the British and French did what Ismail had been expecting them to do for a long time. They told Ismail to abdicate, which he did because there was nothing else that he could do. He finally gave in and left the country for Europe and died in exile in 1895. Ismail's son, Tawfik, inherited what was left of Egypt.

Lord Cromer was the man responsible for the consolidation of the absolute rule in Cairo. He became the British agent in Egypt in 1883 and ruled Egypt for 24 years. The British occupation made no physical changes on Cairo since the British had been ruling Egypt indirectly for years. Tawfik remained the khedive, the consular courts dealt justice, the administration was foreign, and the British occupied the Citadel. They used foreigners to help rule Cairo simply because they did not want the commerce in Cairo to be controlled by the Egyptians.

On April 20, 1919 following WWI, the United States recognized the British protection of Egypt. This all but ended Egypt’s hopes for independence. The politics between the British and the Egyptians were getting worse. In 1922 Egypt was allowed sovereignty and Fuad became king. In the next 18 months, seventeen British officials were killed and twenty more were attacked in broad daylight. In 1936 the Anglo-Egyptian treaty was signed which gave Egypt a little bit of independence although superficially. The reason that the British would not give up its hold completely was the cotton, the land, and the link to India, but conditions were right for Egypt to finally seek national independence.

British control of the Sudan remained in place until 1950, despite growing demands by the Egyptians for British withdrawal. Support for the demands were fueled by political groups which favored an attempt to give the Sudanese people an opportunity for self-government. In 1953, the two governments signed an agreement allowing a three-year transitional period leading to total Sudanese independence. The first Sudanese elections were held late in 1953 and the first all-Sudanese government took office in 1954.

Gamal Abd-Al Nasser (ruled 1956-1970) was a charismatic, ruthless, and brilliant political leader who transformed pan-Arab politics and left a troubled legacy to Egypt and the Arab world. A totalitarian pall fell over Egypt during the Nasser years. Industry and then private property was nationalized. Ironically, as he was rounding up the opposition, Abd-Al Nasser achieved unprecedented popularity throughout the Arab world. He was admired for his rousing support of Arab nationalism and his domestic social programs (which, for the first time in Egypt's history, sought to better the lot of the peasant majority).

The most dramatic display of Pan-Arabism took place in 1958 when Egypt united with Syria to form a single country, the United Arab Republic. But Nasser, for all his oratory, was essentially an Egyptian nationalist. The practical interests of the two countries never meshed and the union came to nothing. But Nasser's revolutionary pan-Arabism was not all talk. Egypt entered the Yemeni civil war against the monarchy on the side of leftist guerrillas, further alienating the west and Saudi Arabia. At the same time Nasser strengthened Egypt's ties to the Soviet Union, relying on the communist bloc for technical and military assistance to build an army to fight the US supported Israeli army. Nasser also supported the formation of the Palestine Liberation Organization, further alienating him from the West.

The Six Day War in 1967 marked the end of Nasser's Pan-Arab dream. The Arab world's ignominious defeat by Israel ended in the Israeli occupation of Syria's Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank in Palestine and, most painfully for Egypt, the Sinai. However, the greatest symbolic humiliation for the Arabs was the fall of Jerusalem. The bombastic rhetoric of Arab leaders now seemed like so much hot air. Hatred of Israel and its chief supporter, the United States, reached a pinnacle.

Anwar Sadat had been one of the original Free Officers and served as Nasser's vice-president and chosen successor, but he had never been taken seriously until he assumed control of the government. Sadat began to systematically reverse the failed socialist policies of his predecessor, ultimately expelling the Soviets and reforming the economy. But it was Sadat's surprise attack against Israeli forces in the Sinai on the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on October 6, 1973 which gave Sadat the credibility which earned the respect of his countrymen. Sadat's peace initiative when he traveled to Israel in 1977, outraged the Arab world and alienated the president from many of his people. Never as charismatic as his predecessor, Sadat was perceived as a traitor, toadying to Western interests. Egypt was the first Arab state to recognize Israel's right to exist and the subsequent Camp David agreements, which won Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin the Nobel Peace Prize, further isolated Egypt from the rest of the Arab world. The Arab League relocated from Cairo to Tunis and many Arab countries severed diplomatic and trade relations. Sadat was assassinated in 1981.

Hosni Mubarak had been Sadat's vice-president since 1974. At first he continued Sadat's policies but with less flamboyance and more domestic sensitivity. He allowed the publication of Islamic newspapers and downplayed the Israeli connection. At the same time, he accelerated the process of privatization and developed Egypt's tourist infrastructure which enhanced its lucrative tourist industry. More impressively, he managed to resume diplomatic and trade relations with moderate Arab countries while maintaining the treaty with Israel. By the end of the 1980s Egypt was once again playing a leading role in Arab politics. Egypt's vital role in support of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait in the Gulf War combined with death of socialist-communist influence in the Arab world returned the country to the center of Middle Eastern politics. However, Egypt's domestic situation is far from stable. The country's economic reforms and infrastructure development cannot keep pace with the population explosion and inflation. Extremist Muslim groups launched a campaign of terrorism against foreigners which paralyzed the government and damaged tourism between 1992 and the beginning of 1994. But security forces broke the main terrorist groups in Cairo and Upper Egypt and the summer of 1994 experienced a spectacular revival of tourism, particularly from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. Although most terrorist cadres have been imprisoned and many have been sentenced to death, the threat to Egypt's stability remains as Islamic fundamentalism becomes more deeply rooted in Arab societies. President Hosni Mubarak was sworn in for a further six year term in office on 5 October 1999.