Ottoman Egypt
Ottoman Egypt was an administrative division of the Ottoman Empire after the conquest of Mamluk Egypt by the Ottomans in 1517.[1] The Ottomans administered Egypt as a province (eyalet) of their empire (Ottoman Turkish: ایالت مصر, romanized: Eyālet-i Mıṣr).[2] It remained formally an Ottoman province until 1914, though in practice it became increasingly autonomous during the 19th century and was under de facto British control from 1882.[3]
Ottoman Egyptإيالة مصر (Arabic)
Iyalat Misr
ایالت مصر (Ottoman Turkish)
Eyālet-i Mıṣr
Iyalat Misr
ایالت مصر (Ottoman Turkish)
Eyālet-i Mıṣr
2,335,000
6,076,000
Zulfiqar Pasha (first)
Sherif Pasha (last)
1517
1798–1801
1801–1805
1820–1822
1831–1833
1867
1882
1914
Egypt always proved a difficult province for the Ottoman Sultans to control, due in part to the continuing power and influence of the Mamluks, the Egyptian military caste who had ruled the country for centuries. As such, Egypt remained semi-autonomous under the Mamluks until Napoleon Bonaparte's French forces invaded in 1798. After Anglo-Turkish forces expelled the French in 1801, Muhammad Ali Pasha, an Albanian military commander of the Ottoman army in Egypt, seized power in 1805, and established a quasi-independent state.
Egypt under the Muhammad Ali dynasty remained nominally an Ottoman province. In reality, it was practically independent and went to war twice with the empire—in 1831–33 and 1839–41. The Ottoman sultan granted Egypt the status of an autonomous vassal state or Khedivate in 1867. Isma'il Pasha (Khedive from 1867 to 1879) and Tewfik Pasha (Khedive from 1879 to 1892) governed Egypt as a quasi-independent state under Ottoman suzerainty until the British occupation of 1882. Nevertheless, the Khedivate of Egypt (1867–1914) remained a de jure Ottoman province until 5 November 1914,[4] when the Sultanate of Egypt was declared a British protectorate in reaction to the Young Turks of the Ottoman Empire joining the First World War on the side of the Central Powers (October–November 1914).
Historiography[edit]
There are six surviving manuscripts of the Turkish version of the 18th century history Tarih-i Misr by Mehmed B. Yusuf. Critical studies of the different versions of the manuscripts are incomplete or have not been done. The only known surviving Arabic version is said to be in the collection of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg. The Turkish version, covering the period up to around 1717, was probably more widely circulated given the number of surviving manuscripts. Austrian orientalist J. von Hammer refers to the text in his history of the Ottoman Empire, calling it "the most detailed and estimable of all Ottoman histories of Egypt". Despite the fact that a full critical study was never completed, historians and Orientalists continued to cite the history following Hammer.[22]