134 • 9 FIREARMS, SLAVES, AND EMPIRESThe Decline of the Mamluks
In time, however, favoritism replaced advancement by ability, the rigor of
the mamluks' training declined, and the quality of Mamluk rule (especially
under the fifteenth-century Circassian sultans) deteriorated. The system
caused the mamluks to crave wealth and power, and in fact, they amassed
huge estates. They also taxed free peasants and merchants so heavily that
many turned into nomads. The Black Death and other epidemics reduced
the population of Egypt and Syria by two-thirds. Mamluk attempts to mo¬
nopolize commerce in luxury goods so antagonized both European Chris¬
tians and Asian Muslims that the lucrative trade routes began shifting away
from Egypt during the fifteenth century. By the way, the Mamluks' killing of
the goose that laid their golden eggs led to Portugal's efforts to sail around
Africa and also to Columbus's voyages to the Americas. At a time when
other armies were adopting cannons and muskets, the Mamluks relegated
the use of firearms to minor corps of mercenary foot soldiers and continued
to fight on horseback, wielding their accustomed swords and spears, and
shooting with bows and arrows. This failure to keep up with developments
in military technology caused their dramatic defeat by the disciplined Ot¬
toman army in 1516 and 1517.
THE MONGOL IL-KHANIDSThe Mamluks' first rivals were the Il-Khanids, descendants of the Mongol
conquerors of Iraq and Persia. Their founder, Hulegu (d. 1265), established
his capital at Tabriz. He had good reasons for this choice: Tabriz was in the
Azerbaijan highlands, it was close to the Great Silk Route leading to China
and to southeast Europe, and it was also near large concentrations of
Christians then remaining in Anatolia and northern Iraq. This proximity to
other ethnic and religious groups raised an interesting issue.
The Religious Issue
The 64,000-dinar question for Hulegu and his successors was which reli¬
gion they would adopt, now that they were living among sedentarized
peoples. They might well have become Christian. Indeed, Europeans be¬
lieved that somewhere beyond the lands of Islam they might find a mighty
Christian ruler, whom they called "Prester John." They hoped that this
potentate—mythical, of course—would attack the Muslim menace from
the rear and save Western Christendom. In the late thirteenth century
Prester John was thought to be a Mongol; two centuries later, Europeans