M EGYPT. 



of th caliphate, the capital of whioh wan Postal In 868 Ahmed 

 bn ' Tooloon, governor of Eirpyt for the Abbaside caliphu, usurped 

 the sovereignty of the country and founded the dynasty of the 

 Tooloonidrs, which lasted till 'JOrt, when the caliphs retook 

 In 936 El Akhshed Mohammed ebn Tughg. a Turkish chief in the 

 service of the caliph, usurped the government of Egypt, and began a 

 new dynasty which lasted till 970, when the Fatmieli, or Katemides, 

 the successors of Mahdee, who had continued to rule in Africa, took 

 possession of Egypt, which they retained till 1171. This wai the 

 period of the wan of the early Crusades, in which the Fatemi.l. - 

 acted a conspicuous part The Kurd Salah e' deen Yoosef Ebn Eyoob 

 succeeded to the Fatemides in 1171, and founded the dynasty of the 

 Eyoobitas, which luted till 1250, when El Moce, a Turkoman memlook 

 or slave, after murdering Touran Shah, usurped the throne, and founded 

 the dynasty of thv Baharito Sultana, who took possession of Syria 

 alia Baybers, likewise a memlook, assassinated nil matter in 1261 

 or 1262, made himself Sultan of Egypt, retook Syria from the Tartars, 

 took Damascus, and put an end to the caliphate of Asia, and extended 

 his conquests a* far as and over part of Armenia, His descendants 

 reigned till 1382, maintained possession of Syria as far as the Euphrates, 

 and encouraged agriculture and the arts. Their dynasty is known by 

 the name of Baharite Memlook Meleks, or Sultans. They did not 

 asimmc the title of caliphs, but allowed the deecendnuta of the Abba- 

 aides to retain that name, and to live in Egypt under their subjection, 

 as a sort of state prisoners. 



In 1882 Dowlet el Memeleek el Borgt<eh, a Circassian slave, took 

 possession of the throne and founded the dynasty of the Boru 

 Circassian Hemlooks, which lasted till 1517, when Selim I., the 

 Ottoman Rultar, advanced into Egypt, defeated the Memlooks at the 

 battle of Heliopolis, and caused Toman Bey, the last of their kings, 

 to be hanged at Cairo. Selim abolished the dynasty, but not the 

 aristocracy of the Hemlooks; he even made conditions with the 

 Memlooks by a regular treaty, in which he acknowledged Egypt as a 

 republic, governed by 24 beys tributary to him and his successors, 

 who appointed a pasha, or governor, to reside at Cairo. Under this 

 form of government Egypt remained nominally subject to the porte, 

 against whose authority the Memlooks often openly revolted, till the 

 v invasion of 1798, when Bonaparte under the pretence of 

 delivering Egypt from the yoke of the Memlooks, took possession of 

 the country. The English sent an expedition in 1801 to aid the porte, 

 which drove away the French, and restored the pasha appointed by 

 the sultan. The Memlooks and the pasha however could not agree ; 

 scenes of bloodshed and treachery Wok place, and at last the late 

 pasha Mehemet, or rather Mohhammed Ali, contrived to collect most 

 of the beys with their principal officers within the citadel of Cairo, 

 under pretence of an entertainment, where he hod them all massacred 

 in March 1811. Thus ended the Memlook power, which had ruled 

 over Egypt for more than four centuries. 



The government of Mehemet Ali, too extravagantly praised by some, 

 was certainly much more rational, orderly, and humane than that of 

 the Memlooks or that of the old pashas in the other dominions of the 

 Porte. He administered impartial justice to all his subjects, without 

 regard to race or religion ; established regular judicial courts and a 

 good police; abolished tortures and other barbarous punishments; 

 encouraged instruction to a certain extent ; introduced European 

 manufactures and machinery ; established a printing office and a 

 journal ; and formed schools und colleges for the arts and sciences and 

 for military and naval tactics. But his ambition and the difficulties 

 of his situation obliged him to resort to an enormous taxation and 

 an oppressive conscription. His ambition led him to extend his 

 conquests until his sway stretched over at least as wide a tract of 

 country as any of his predecessors of the Fatimite, Ptolemaic, or 

 Pharaoh dynasties, including a considerable portion of Nubia, Abyssinia, 

 and Kordofan, Syria, Crete, and part of Arabia. Though still nominally 

 abject to the Porte, he had in fact rendered himself virtually inde- 

 pendent. But the sultan, Mahmoud II., himself a reformer and a 

 man of ambitious and energetic habits, had watched with increasing 

 jealousy the growing power of the pasha, and at length (1832) sent a 

 powerful army against him. Mehemet sent an equal force, under his 

 son Ibrahim Pasha, Into th* field, and the Turks suffered two severe 

 defeat*. Ibrahim marched towards Constantinople, but the European 

 powers interfered ; Russia sent an army to oppose the progress of the 

 Egyptians, and Mehemet was compelled to accept the terms proposed 

 by the mediating powers. A hollow peace followed for some years; 

 wit in 1840 the sultan deeming himself strong enough to resume 

 hostilities, again declared war. The Egyptians were again successful 

 so long at they were only opposed to the Turks. Ibrahim Pasha 

 almost annihilated the Turkish armies ; the Turkish fleet placed itself 

 at the di-posal of the Egyptians, and the ruin of Turkey appeared 

 imminent. But again p-an powers interfered. An allied 



army dispomnwed the Egyptians of various strongholds, and an Anglo- 

 Austrian fleet bombarded Acre. Mehemet Ali was once more com- 

 pelled to yield, and the European powers proposed terms, to which 

 both Turkey and Egypt eventually assented. By this treaty, nignod 

 in London July 15, 1841, Mehemet Ali was deprived of all his Asiatic 

 possessions, but the government f Egypt was ensured to him ss 

 tributary to Turkej, and made hereditary in his descendants. 



By geographers Egypt is commonly divided 



EGYPT. 8M 



into three regions, namely, Bahari, or Maritime, or Lower Egypt ; 

 Vostani, or Middle Egypt ; and Said, or Upper Egypt. But the 

 administrative division of the country in by districts, or prefectabips, 

 >f whieh there are IS in Lower Egypt, and 10 in Middle and Upper 

 Egypt together. The districts are 1. Maar, or Cairo, with the town 

 of that name, the capital of the whole country, and the town of 

 Boulak, the port of Cairo on the Nile, Old Cairo, or Fostat [KiHlR.\], 

 and Suez, on the Red Sea ; 2. K.-li-.uK. north of Cairo, with the towns 

 of Keliouh, in which are a huge government cotton factory and iron 

 foundry, Matoryeh, near the ruins of Heliopolis ; Artrib, Choubra, 

 where the pasha has a fine country residence, and Abouzabel, where 

 is the new college of medicine and surgery, with a considerable 

 number of pupils, and a large hospital attached to it ; 8. Belbeym, 

 east of Kelioub, on the borders of the Desert : the town of lielbeys 

 is an important station on the route to Syria, has 6000 inhabitants, 

 and contains several mosques; 4. Chibeh, north of Belbeys, with 

 the towns or villages of Chibeb, Tell Bastah, and Heydeh ; 5. Mil 

 Qhamer, north of Kelioub and near the Damietta branch of tho Nile ; 

 6. Mansurah, north of Mit Ghamer, likewise on the east bank of the 

 Damietta branch, with the town of Mansurah, containing a government 

 cotton factory, a public school, and five mosques, and the village of 

 Tmay el Emdid, which has a monolith of granite ; 7. Damietta, with 

 the towns of Damietta [DAMIETTA] and Menzalch (which lies on the 

 south bank of the Lake of Menxaleh, and has. a good fishing trade), 

 and the forts of El Arish and Tyneh, on the borders of the Syrian 

 Desert ; 8. Mehallet el Kebir, with the town of that name, within the 

 actual Delta, on the left bank of the Damietta branch, and the small 

 towns of Semennout (which contains a large manufactory of earthen- 

 ware, and some remains of antiquity), and Abousir [ABOUBIR]; 

 9. Tantah, south of Mehallet, with the town of Tantah, situated 

 near the middle of the Delta, one of the principal towns of Low. r 

 Egypt, remarkable for iU fine mosque, and the fair which takes place 

 three times a year, and is much frequented by pilgrims who come to 

 visit the tomb of Seyd Ahmed el Bedaouy, a celebrated Mohammedan 

 saint ; 10. Melig, south of Tantah, with tho towns of Melig and l.'liil-n 

 el Koum; 11. Menouf, south of Melig, and within the angle 1' 

 by the bifurcation of the Nile; 12. Negileh, with the town of that 

 name, on the left or west bank of the Hosetta branch, mxl tin 

 of Terraneh and Wardan ; 18. Kouah, north-west of Mehallet, with 

 the town of Rashid, or Rosetta [ROBOT*], and the towns of I 

 and Deiru ; 14. Damanhour, on the left bonk of the Rosetta branch, 

 north of Negileh, with the towns of Damanhour (in which are some 

 factories of coarse woollens) and Rnhmanych ; 15. Alexandria, with 

 the city of that name. 



On entering the valley of the Nile from the Delta side wo find 

 1. Jizeh, on the left bank of the river, opposite Cairo, a small town, 

 the head of the prefectship of that name, near the great pyramids 

 und not far from the ruins of Memphis, upon which are built 

 modern villages, Bedreshin, Mit Rahyneh, and Memf; '2. Hen, 

 south of Jizeh, on the same side of the Nile, a considerable and 

 industrious town, in one of the most fertile districts of the valley of 

 the Nile, with nearly 5000 inhabitants, extensive cotton-mills, 

 alabaster quarries, and large cavalry barracks : in this province are 

 the towns of Abou Girgeh and Samallout, farther smith ; 3. On the 

 opposite or right bank of the Nile is Atfih, a town and prefectship 

 with 4000 inhabitants ; 4. West of Benisouef is the 

 Fai'oum, with the town of Medinet el Fniouin, which contains 5000 

 inhabitants, several mosques, Coptic churches, a manufactory of 

 woollen goods, and some trade in rose-water; 5. South of Hi -n 

 but extending on both banks of the Nile, is the district <if Mmv. h. 

 with the towns of Minyeh, which has some manufactures of earthen- 

 ware; Melaoui, and Eshmounein (which occupies the nitenf Hnniopolis 

 Magna) on the left, and those of Sheyk Abadeh and El Berahel on the 

 right bank ; 6. Manfalout, south of Minyeh, with the town of that 

 name on the left bank, and several villages on both banks of the Nile ; 

 7. Si.. nt, with the town of that name, the capital of Upper Egypt, 

 and the residence of a governor : it is situated on the left bank, was 

 a great slave-market, and the entrepot of tho caravan trade with 

 Dar-fur and Sennaar, has a spacious bazaar and 12,000 inhabitants; 

 it also contain* a fine palace built by Ibrahim Pasha, pnLli.- Imthn, and 

 barracks : Siout is an important military station : in it- vicinity are 

 .us antiquities; 8. Qirgeh, south of Siout, with the towns of 

 Girgeh, 7000 inhabitants, on the left bank, containing & government 

 cotton-factory, several mosques, and tho oldest Latin convent in 

 Egypt ; and Ekhmym, 8000 inhabitants, on the right bank ; . Kenlh, 

 with the town of that name, on the right bank, which has 5000 

 inhabitant*, and carries on a considerable intercourse with Cosseir 

 and the opposite coast of Arabia, and is known for its manufactory 

 of porous earthen vessels used for keeping water cool ; it also con- 

 tains a government cotton-factory : Kous, near the ruins of < 

 Denderah on the left bank, and the ruins of THEBES and of Ai 

 are in the prefectship of Kein<h; 10. Esneh, the most southern pro- 

 vince of Egypt, contains the town of that name, on the left bank, with 

 about 4000 inhabitants, manufactories of cottons and shawl 

 pottery ; it is a great market for camels, and tho emporium of the 

 Abyssinian trade : the great temple is now used as a cotton ware- 

 house. The other towns are Enru ; Assouan, or Syene, which con- 

 tains many remains of ancient Syene, carries on a considerable trade 



