468 Malta
The only extant manuscript on this “matter of
Britain” was discovered in Winchester in 1934. The sole
available version before that was edited and printed in
1485 by William CAXTON, who called it “The Book of
King Arthur and of his noble knights of the Round
Table” and “this noble and joyous book entitled Le
Morte Darthur.” This chronological narrative recounted
the whole of Arthur’s life, as well as his death. It was the
fullest, and perhaps the best, telling of the Arthurian
legend in English. It used contemporary common lan-
guage and has been described as fluent, self-confident in
language and style, and sensitive. It emphasized the
brotherhood of the knights and downplayed ideas of
COURTLY LOVE.
See alsoARTHUR,KING, ANDARTHURIAN LITERATURE;
ROUNDTABLE.
Further reading: Sir Thomas Malory, Works, ed.
Eugène Vinaver, 2d ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1971); Elizabeth Archibald and A. S. G. Edwards, eds., A
Companion to Malory,Arthurian Studies, 37 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1996); Larry D. Benson,
Malory’s Morte Darthur(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Uni-
versity Press, 1976); P. J. C. Field, The Life and Times of
Sir Thomas Malory(Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1993).
Malta Malta is an island and part of an archipelago
near SICILYbut outside the main navigation routes. The
VANDALSheld it from 435 to 533. It was taken from the
Byzantine by the AGHLABIDSin 870 was left a populated
colony until Malta repelled an attempted Byzantine
reconquest in 1053–54. In 1090, there was a brief occu-
pation of the island by the Normans of Sicily under
Count ROGER I, but the island remained Muslim. A
second conquest in 1127 led to the establishment of a
basically Christian political and religious government.
Immigration from Sicily began a slow process of Chris-
tianization. Two communities, Christian and Muslim,
were tolerated by the Sicilian court at PALERMO, until an
expulsion of the Muslims in 1249. The archipelago
remained an Arabic-speaking province of the kingdom of
Sicily. The Aragonese gained control of it in the late 13th
century.
The maritime republics of GENOA,PISA, and VENICE
and various great lords tried to take the archipelago from
the Aragonese kingdom of Sicily. From 1360, the rise of
the pirates produced HAFSIDretaliations from AFRICA.
The cost of guarding the islands led the Aragonese
monarchy, who had held it since 1282, to try to shift the
burden onto the MILITARY ORDERS. After the fall of RHODES
in 1522, the HOSPITALLERSobtained possession of Malta
and Gozo in 1530.
See alsoNORMANS INITALY; SICILIANVESPERS.
Further reading: Anthony Luttrell, ed., Medieval
Malta: Studies on Malta before the Knights (London:
British School at Rome, 1975); Anthony Luttrell, The
Making of Christian Malta: From the Early Middle Ages to
1530 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002).Mamluks (Mamelukes) The Arabic word mamlakas a
past participle meant “to be possessed.” Before becoming
a Turkish military aristocracy, the Mamluks started as
slaves abducted in infancy to make them servile and pro-
fessional military horsemen. They should not be con-
fused with black slaves, who remain so and had been
kidnapped as children or adults. It was a common prac-
tice in Islam to make up part or all of an army with mili-
tary slaves. In EGYPT, the AYYUBIDS, between 1171 and
1250, added to units composed of free Kurds, bought
Turkish slaves to fill out the ranks of their army. These
men received military instruction and accepted Muslim
religious teaching. When the Ayyubid dynasty failed to
defend Islam against the crusaders and then the MON-
GOLS, these Mamluk soldiers took power and held on to
it for the next three centuries. They even tried to legit-
imize their rule by moving an ABBASIDprince from BAGH-
DAD, who had been captured by the Mongols in 1258, to
CAIROand calling him the CALIPH. Their empire soon
extended over Egypt, SYRIA, and the holy cities of the
Hejaz, MECCAand MEDINA.RISE, DECLINE, AND FALL
The Mamluks were not really a dynasty, since a sultan’s
son did not necessarily succeed him. It was assumed
that another former ambitious, ruthless, and competent
slave after defeating all rivals would become the new
sultan. The Mamluk hierarchy was organized from the
top with the 100 emirs commanding 1,000 Mamluks,
then emirs commanding 40 Mamluks, and finally emirs
in charge of 10. Each was supported and rewarded by
revenue from land, that corresponded to his rank as an
administrator or soldier. These posts and incomes could
pass to descendants but were not inheritable FIEFSas
such. They had a strong military force based on CAVALRY
and a fleet that unsuccessfully attack CYPRUSon several
occasions.
Their court protocol, diplomacy, and administration
required numerous well-trained personnel, and certain
families, often Christian, occupied these positions and
ultimately formed dynasties of secretaries or bureaucrats.
The pious Mamluks supported large numbers of charita-
ble foundations, especially in Cairo. As were the Ayyu-
bids, the Mamluks were strictly orthodox SUNNI in
religion.
In 1260 they defeated the MONGOLSat the Battle of
AYN-JALUTin PALESTINE. The Mamluk sultan, BAYBARSI,
captured most of the Christian-held territory in Palestine
and Syria between 1263 and 1268, including ANTIOCH,
and made himself sultan of a united kingdom of Syria
and Egypt, which he ruled until his death in 1277. This