Sack of Aleppo (1400) | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||
Belligerents | |||||||
Timurid Empire | Mamluk Sultanate | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Timur Miran Shah Shah Rukh Emirzade Sultan Huseyin Bahadir Ebubekir Bahadir Emir Süleymansah Emir Cihanshah Emir Shah Melik Sultan Mahmud Khan | Tamardash (POW) Sudun (POW) Al-Mu'ayyad Shaykh (POW) Altunbuga Osmani (POW) Omer b. Tahhani (POW) Sheikh Ali El Haseki (POW) Emir İzzeddin Ozdemir † Emir Uzbek Yasbek † | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
Unknown | 30,000–35,000 | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Small | Almost destroyed |
The sack of Aleppo was a major event in 1400 during the war between the Timurid Empire and Mamluk Sultanate.
In 1400, Timur's forces invaded Armenia and Georgia, then they took Sivas, Malatya and Aintab. Later on, Timur's forces advanced towards Aleppo with caution, where they tended to construct a fortified camp each night as they approach the city. According to 15th century Sufi historian Abd al-Rahman al-Bistami, Timur "gathered armies, bringing together every scoundrel and trickster, unleashing heresies and horrors, shedding blood and pillaging properties. Then, on the fifth of Rabi' I of 803 [24 October 1400] he descended upon the lands of Aleppo in its golden fields." [1]
The Mamluks assembled a formidable army of 30,000 to 35,000 soldiers and established their camp near Aleppo. [2] They waited for the arrival of the Timurid forces, which eventually appeared before the city. On the first day, minor skirmishes broke out between the two sides. After a brief standoff, the Syrian commanders resolved to engage the Timurid forces in a full-scale battle on the third day. [3]
After two days of skirmishing, Timur's cavalry moved swiftly in arc shapes to attack the flanks of their enemy lines, while his center including elephants from India held firm. [4] Al-Mu'ayyad Shaykh, regent of Tripoli counterattacked bravely, causing casualties, while Emir İzzeddin Özdemir and his son Emir Yasbek killed many Timurids before being surrounded and killed. [5] Fierce cavalry attacks forced the Mamluks led by Tamardash, governor of Aleppo, to break and flee towards the city gates. [6] Afterwards, Timur began his destruction of Aleppo, on October 30, 1400, [7] and the destruction was completed with the city's surrender by November 2. [8] Timur then massacred many of the inhabitants, ordering the building of a tower of 20,000 skulls outside the city. [6]
During Timur's invasion of Syria in the Siege of Aleppo, Ibn Taghribirdi wrote that Timur's Mongol soldiers committed mass rape on the native women of Aleppo, massacring their children and forcing the brothers and fathers of the women to watch the gang rapes which took place in the mosques. [9] Ibn Taghribirdi said the Mongols killed all children while tying the women with ropes in Aleppo's Great mosque after the children and women tried to take refuge in the mosque. Mongol soldiers openly raped gentlewomen and virgins in public in both the small mosques and the Great Mosque. The brothers and fathers of the women were being tortured while forced to watch their female relatives get raped. The corpses in the streets and mosques resulted in stink permeating Aleppo. The women were kept naked while being gang raped repeatedly by different men. [8] [10] [11] [12] Ibn Arabshah witnessed the slaughters and rapes Timur's Mongol soldiers carried out. [13]
Damascus regent Sudun, Aleppo regent Tamardash, Gaza regent Omer bin Tahhani, in addition to regent Altunboga Osmani and Sheikh Ali El Haseki were captured by the Timurids and put in chains. [14]
After the sack of Aleppo, Timur's forces went south where they took Hama, along with nearby Homs and Baalbek, [15] until they reached Damascus which was also sacked after defeating Mamluk forces led by Nasir-ad-Din Faraj. Damascus had capitulated without a battle to Timur in December 1400 since the Mamluk Sultan who led his army form Egypt only fought minor skirmishes before fleeing back to Cairo with the Sultan claiming he needed to stop a rival from taking power.
Sayf al-Din Qutuz, also romanized as Kutuz or Kotuz and fully al-Malik al-Muẓaffar Sayf ad-Dīn Quṭuz, was the Mamluk Sultan of Egypt. He reigned as Sultan for less than a year, from 1259 until his assassination in 1260, but served as the de facto ruler for two decades.
Al-Malik Az-Zahir Sayf ad-Din Barquq was the first Sultan of the Circassian Mamluk Burji dynasty of Egypt ruling from 1382 to 1389 and 1390 to 1399. Born to a Christian father in Circassia, Barquq was enslaved and later arrived in Egypt. He deposed sultan al-Salih Hajji to claim the throne for himself. Once in power, he placed many of his family members in positions of power. Rebelling governors in 1389 restored Hajji to the throne but Barquq was able to reclaim the throne shortly after and ruled until his death in 1399 and was succeeded by his son. The name Barquq is of Circassian origin and is his birth name.
Starting in the 1240s, the Mongols made repeated invasions of Syria or attempts thereof. Most failed, but they did have some success in 1260 and 1300, capturing Aleppo and Damascus and destroying the Ayyubid dynasty. The Mongols were forced to retreat within months each time by other forces in the area, primarily the Egyptian Mamluks. The post-1260 conflict has been described as the Mamluk–Ilkhanid War.
Al-Malik al-Zahir Rukn al-Din Baybars al-Bunduqdari, commonly known as Baibars or Baybars and nicknamed Abu al-Futuh, was the fourth Mamluk sultan of Egypt and Syria, of Turkic Kipchak origin, in the Bahri dynasty, succeeding Qutuz. He was one of the commanders of the Egyptian forces that inflicted a defeat on the Seventh Crusade of King Louis IX of France. He also led the vanguard of the Egyptian army at the Battle of Ain Jalut in 1260, which marked the first substantial defeat of the Mongol army and is considered a turning point in history.
The Citadel of Damascus is a large medieval fortified palace and citadel in Damascus, Syria. It is part of the Ancient City of Damascus, which was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1979.
The Battle of Marj al-Saffar, also known as the Battle of Shaqhab, took place on April 20 through April 22, 1303 between the Mamluks and the Mongols and their Armenian allies near Kiswe, Syria, just south of Damascus. The battle has been influential in both Islamic history and contemporary time because of the controversial jihad against other Muslims and Ramadan related fatwas issued by Ibn Taymiyyah, who himself joined the battle. The battle, a disastrous defeat for the Mongols, put an end to Mongol invasions of the Levant.
The Battle of Marj Dābiq, a decisive military engagement in Middle Eastern history, was fought on 24 August 1516, near the town of Dabiq, 44 km north of Aleppo. The battle was part of the 1516–17 war between the Ottoman Empire and the Mamluk Sultanate, which ended in an Ottoman victory and conquest of much of the Middle East and brought about the destruction of the Mamluk Sultanate. The Ottoman victory in the battle gave Selim's armies control of the entire region of Syria and opened the door to the conquest of Egypt.
The Mamluk Sultanate, also known as MamlukEgypt or the Mamluk Empire, was a state that ruled Egypt, the Levant and the Hejaz from the mid-13th to early 16th centuries. It was ruled by a military caste of mamluks headed by a sultan. The sultanate was established with the overthrow of the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt in 1250 and was conquered by the Ottoman Empire in 1517. Mamluk history is generally divided into the Turkic or Bahri period (1250–1382) and the Circassian or Burji period (1382–1517), called after the predominant ethnicity or corps of the ruling Mamluks during these respective eras.
Timur, also known as Tamerlane, was a Turco-Mongol conqueror who founded the Timurid Empire in and around modern-day Afghanistan, Iran, and Central Asia, becoming the first ruler of the Timurid dynasty. An undefeated commander, he is widely regarded as one of the greatest military leaders and tacticians in history, as well as one of the most brutal and deadly. Timur is also considered a great patron of art and architecture, for he interacted with intellectuals such as Ibn Khaldun, Hafez, and Hafiz-i Abru and his reign introduced the Timurid Renaissance.
Abu Muhammad Shihab al-Din Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Abd Allah ibn Ibrahim also known as Muhammad ibn Arabshah, was an Arab writer and traveller who lived under the reign of Timur (1370–1405).
Al-Ashraf Musa (1229–1263), fully Al-Ashraf Musa ibn al-Mansur Ibrahim ibn Shirkuh, was the last Ayyubid Kurdish prince (emir) of Homs, a city located in the central region of modern-day Syria. His rule began in June 1246, but was temporarily cut short in 1248 after he was forced to surrender Homs and then given Tall Bashir by his cousin an-Nasir Yusuf, the Emir of Aleppo. For a short period of time during Mongol rule in 1260, al-Ashraf served as Viceroy of Syria, although the position was largely nominal. He helped achieve the Mongols' defeat at the hands of the Egypt-based Mamluks by withdrawing his troops from the Mongol coalition during the Battle of Ain Jalut as part of a secret agreement with the Mamluk sultan Qutuz. Following the Mamluk victory, al-Ashraf was reinstated as Emir of Homs as a Mamluk vassal, but was stripped of his viceroy position. Since he left no heirs, after his death, Homs was incorporated into the Mamluk Sultanate.
Sanjar ibn Abdullah Alam al-Din Abu Sa'id al-Jawli was a powerful Mamluk emir and the Governor of Gaza and much of Palestine between 1311–20 during the sultanate of an-Nasir Muhammad and then again for a brief time in 1342 during the reign of the latter's son as-Salih Ismail. Prior to his first term as governor, al-Jawli briefly served as the Emir of Shawbak in Transjordan and before his second term as Gaza's governor, he was appointed Governor of Hama for three months.
Al-Nasir Faraj or Nasir-ad-Din Faraj also Faraj ibn Barquq was born in 1386 and succeeded his father Sayf-ad-Din Barquq as the second Sultan of the Burji dynasty of the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt in July 1399 with the title Al-Nasir. He was only thirteen years old when he became Sultan on the sudden death of his father. His reign was marked by anarchy, pandemonium and chaos with invasions of Tamerlane, including the sack of Damascus in 1400, incessant rebellions in Cairo, endless conflicts with the Emirs of Syria, along with plague and famine which reduced the population of the kingdom to one-third.
The siege of Damascus was a major event in 1400–01 during the war between the Timurid Empire and Mamluk Egypt.
The Timurid conquests and invasions started in the seventh decade of the 14th century with Timur's control over Chagatai Khanate and ended at the start of the 15th century with the death of Timur. Due to the sheer scale of Timur's wars, and the fact that he was generally undefeated in battle, he has been regarded as one of the most successful military commanders of all time. These wars resulted in the supremacy of Timur over Central Asia, Persia, the Caucasus, the Levant, and parts of South Asia and Eastern Europe, and also the formation of the short-lived Timurid Empire.
Sultan Husayn Tayichiud was a noble of the Timurid Empire and a maternal grandson of its founder, the Central Asian conqueror Timur. Sultan Husayn held prominent positions in the Imperial army and accompanied his grandfather on several of his military campaigns. He was executed by his uncle Shah Rukh during the war of succession following Timur's death.
Al-Mu'ayyad Shaykh was a Mamluk sultan of Egypt from 6 November 1412 to 13 January 1421.
Shams al-Din Sunqur al-Ashqar al-Salihi was the Mamluk viceroy of Damascus in 1279–1280, who attempted to rule Syria independently, in a rebellion against the Egypt-based sultan Qalawun. While the rebellion in Damascus was quashed in 1280, Sunqur ensconced himself in the Sahyun Castle in the coastal mountains of northern Syria. He joined Qalawun in the successful defense of Syria against the Ilkhanid Mongols at the Battle of Homs in 1281. He remained in a state of peaceful relations with the sultan, despite ruling his coastal principality independently.
The siege of Rumkale or the fall of Rumkale took place in 691 AH/1292 AD and resulted in the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia losing the castle of Rumkale to the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt.
The battle of al-Jassora took place on 18 June 1280 in the al-Jassora region in Syria between the Egyptian army led by Emir Alam al-Din Sanjar and a Levantine army led by Sunqur al-Ashqar, the ruler in the name of al-Malik al-Kamil, supported by the Arab princes Shihab al-Din ibn Hajji and Sharaf al-Din ibn Muhanna.