This volume is dedicated to the circulation of the book as a commodity in the Mamluk sultanate. It discusses the impact of princely patronage on the production of books, the formation and management of libraries in religious institutions, their size and their physical setting.

This book is the first to date to be dedicated to the circulation of the book as a commodity in the Mamluk sultanate. It discusses the impact of princely patronage on the production of books, the formation and management of libraries in religious institutions, their size and their physical setting. It documents the significance of private collections and their interaction with institutional libraries and the role of charitable endowments (waqf ) in the life of libraries. The market as a venue of intellectual and commercial exchanges and a production centre is explored with references to prices and fees. The social and professional background of scribes and calligraphers occupies a major place in this study, which also documents the chain of master-calligraphers over the entire Mamluk period. For her study the author relies on biographical dictionaries, chronicles, waqf documents and manuscripts.

In Europe the Mamluks of Egypt are remembered as so-called 'Slave Kings' who drove out the Crusaders from the Holy Land; but they were far more than that. Though its frontiers barely changed, the Mamluk Sultanate remained a 'great power' for two and a half centuries. Its armies were the culmination of a military tradition stretching back to the 8th century, and provided a model for the early Ottoman Empire, whose own armies reached the gates of Vienna only twelve years after the Mamluks were overthrown. This absorbing text by David Nicolle explores the organisation and tactics of these fascinating people.

An engaging and accessible survey of the Mamluk Sultanate which positions the realm within the development of comparative political systems from a global perspective.

New archaeological material and research underpins this extensive, detailed and beautifully illustrated account of the famous Mamluk Askars who are credited with finally defeating and expelling the Crusaders, halting the Mongol invasion of the Islamic Middle East, and facing down Tamerlane. Probably the ultimate professional soldiers of the medieval period they were supposedly recruited as adolescent slaves, though recent research has begun to undermine this oversimplified interpretation of what has been called the "Mamluk phenomenon".

This history of Mamluk architecture spans three centuries and examines the monuments of the Mamluks in their social, political and urban context, during the period of their rule (1250-1517). This book displays the multiple facets of Mamluk patronage, and also provides a succinct discussion of the sixty key monuments built in Cairo by the Mamluk sultans. A richly illustrated volume with color photographs, plans and isometric drawings, this will be an essential reference work for scholars and students of the art and architecture of the Islamic world as well as art historians and historians of late medieval Islamic history.

This volume is a collection of studies by leading historians on central aspects of the Mamluk Empire of Egypt and Syria (1250-1517), and of Ottoman Egypt (16th-18th century) where the Mamluks survived under the Ottoman suzerainty.

In this book, distinguished scholars provide an accessible introduction to the structure of political power under the Mamluks and its economic foundations.

Mamluk Cairo, a Crossroads for Embassies offers an up-to-date insight into the diplomacy and diplomatics of the Mamluk sultanate with Muslim and non-Muslim powers. This rich volume covers the whole chronological span of the sultanate as well as the various areas of the diplomatic relations established by (or with) the Mamluk sultanate. Twenty-six essays are divided in geographical sections that broadly respect the political division of the world as the Mamluk chancery perceived it. In addition, two introductory essays provide the present stage of research in the fields of, respectively, diplomatics and diplomacy. With contributions by Frédéric Bauden, Lotfi Ben Miled, Michele Bernardini, Bárbara Boloix Gallardo, Anne F. Broadbridge, Mounira Chapoutot-Remadi, Stephan Conermann, Nicholas Coureas, Malika Dekkiche, Rémi Dewière, Kristof D’hulster, Marie Favereau, Gladys Frantz-Murphy, Yehoshua Frenkel, Hend Gilli-Elewy, Ludvik Kalus, Anna Kollatz, Julien Loiseau, Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros, John L. Meloy, Pierre Moukarzel, Lucian Reinfandt, Alessandro Rizzo, Éric Vallet, Valentina Vezzoli and Patrick Wing.

A Turning Point in Mamluk History deals with the process of decline of the Mamluk state (1250-1517). Its main thesis is that the origins of this process are to be found in the third reign of al-Nāsir Muḥammad Ibn Qalāwūn, more specifically in the changes he effected in the Mamluk system. The Mamluk army was the first to be confronted with these changes, whose impact on the social and political life of the Mamluk elite was already felt during al-Nāsir's own lifetime. The author follows their course of development to the end of autonomous Mamluk rule and reveals the transformation they wrought in the Mamluk code of values and political concepts. A final chapter deals with the overall economic decline of the Mamluk state and establishes the link of its various causes—demographic decline, monetary crises, the collapse of agriculture and industry—with Mamluk government misrule. Here it is al-Nāsir's expenditure policy and its repercussions on the economy which reveal his reign as a point of no return.