Egypt belonged for three centuries to the Fatimite caliphs; but
this race degenerated: divided among themselves for the possession
of power, one of its two branches had the imprudence to call in the
sultan of Damascus to its aid. After several battles, the latter was
the conqueror, but he kept his conquest for himself. Saladin, his
son, became, in 1171, sultan of Egypt. The descendants of this great
man were, in their turn, displaced by the Mamelukes and their beys, a
singular kind of militia, continually recruited by slaves from Mount
Caucasus; themselves choosing their sultans, as the prætorian guards
had done, and, like them, disposing of power. Egypt was conquered by
the Ottomans. Selim I. contented himself with weakening, for the time,
the influence of the Mamelukes; but, always ambitious, they resumed,
by degrees, their authority under his weak successors, and only left
the Ottoman Porte a shadow of power in the provinces over which they
tyrannized.