Islam Saves Europe, but at a Price

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A Lustreware Plaque from an Iranian Ilkhanid mihrab c. 1300–1350. Vicious Mongol persecution of Islam had, by the turn of the century, been replaced by conversion

The Mongols conquered the land and there came to them

From Egypt a Turk, who sacrificed his life.

In Syria he destroyed and scattered them.

To everything there is a pest of its own kind.

Abu Shama writing c. 1260.

The Mongols threatened the extinguishing of Islam in its traditional lands, and if Egypt fell and gave access to the Mediterranean the conquest of southern Europe was the logical sequelae. The action of Sultan Qutuz, killing Hulegu’s envoys carrying Hulegu’s letter:

Say to Egypt, Hulegu has come, with swords unsheathed and sharp.

The mightiest of her children will become humble, He will send their children to join the aged …

by cutting them in half in the horse market, might seem reckless but the sultan really had no other option but resistance. Submission would mean exile to the bloodthirsty desert. Another factor in favour of making a stand was the reappearance of Baybars and his exiled Bahriyya in March 1260 under an oath of safety. Every man counted now; there were only 24,000 cavalrymen in Egypt and perhaps 30,000 more in Syria. More important than the return of Qutuz’s favourite enemy, however, was that Hulegu had retired from Syria with a very large part of his forces in August 1259 to watch more closely events further east. Mongke, the Great Khan, had died and Hulegu’s brothers Qubilai and Ariq Boke were prepared to undertake war on each other for the succession.

Ariq Boke was backed by the Genghisid family in Mongolia and by the Golden Horde’s khan, Berke, whilst Qubilai held the support of most of the generals of the Mongol army and China, the Mongols’ most prized possession. What really concerned Hulegu was that Berke’s forces lay directly to his north in the Caucasus. There was already antipathy between the two junior khans over rights of conquest in Persia but Berke had also converted to Islam whilst Hulegu had continued with persecutions. Hulegu therefore went to Maragha to meet any incursion by the Golden Horde. For the Mamluks he was far enough away to give them at least a chance against the remainder of his force that he had left behind under Kit Buqa, one of his most experienced and trusted lieutenants, to mop up Syria.

Kit Buqa’s move down towards Egypt effectively led to the surrounding of the Crusader state, and it became obvious to the Crusaders that the Mongols’ arrival in Syria would not herald any immediate change in their fortunes.

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Qutuz had his Mamluks, contingents of left-over Khwarazmians, Ayyubid soldiers, Kurds, Bedouins and Turcomen refugees from the Mongols, and decided to seize the moment but he and Baybars had to shame and to beat many of the men to get them to march.

Emirs of the Muslims! For a long time you have been eating the money of the treasury and now you don’t want to fight. I, myself will set out. He who chooses the Holy War will accompany me; he who does not can go home. God observes him, and the guilt of those who violate the women of the Muslims will be on the heads of the laggards!

It was only when Qutuz made his preparations to leave and said, ‘I am going to fight the Mongols alone’, that they followed him out of Cairo’s citadel on the march to Syria.

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