Shihab ad-Din Ahmad

Al-Nasir Shihab ad-Din Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Qalawun (131616July 1344), better known as al-Nasir Ahmad, was the Turkic Bahri Mamluk sultan of Egypt, ruling from January to June 1342. A son of Sultan al-Nasir Muhammad, he became embroiled in the volatile succession process following his father's death in 1341. Al-Nasir Ahmad lived much of his life in the desert fortress of al-Karak in Transjordan and was reluctant to assume the sultanate in Cairo, preferring al-Karak, where he was closely allied with the inhabitants of the city and the Bedouin tribes in its vicinity. His Syrian partisans, emirs Tashtamur and Qutlubugha al-Fakhri, successfully maneuvered to bring Syria under al-Nasir Ahmad's official control, while sympathetic emirs in Egypt were able to oust the Mamluk strongman Emir Qawsun and his puppet sultan, the five-year-old half-brother of al-Nasir Ahmad, al-Ashraf Kujuk. Al-Nasir Ahmad eventually assumed the sultanate after frequently delaying his departure to Egypt.

Al-Nasir Ahmad was known to be a seclusive sultan, surrounding himself with his coterie of supporters from al-Karak, rarely making direct contact with the Mamluk emirs of Egypt and avoiding the public view. Two months into his reign, he relocated to al-Karak with substantial sums from the treasury and several horses and senior administrative officials. He ruled from the desert fortress, leaving a deputy, Emir Aqsunqur al-Salari, to oversee affairs in Egypt on his behalf. His unorthodox rule, alleged frivolity, and his execution of loyal partisans, namely Tashtamur and Qutlubugha, led to al-Nasir Ahmad being deposed from the sultanate by his half-brother, al-Salih Isma'il. He remained in the fortress of al-Karak, which the Mamluks besieged at least seven times, until being captured in July 1344. He was killed later that month on the orders of al-Salih Isma'il.

Early life and career

Ahmad was born in 1316 or 1318. His father was Sultan al-Nasir Muhammad and his mother was Bayad, a singer and a slave girl freed by Emir Bahadur As and possibly given to al-Nasir Muhammad. He was sent again in April 1326. Nothing about Ahmad in the Mamluk-era sources is known between 1326 and 1331. Ahmad returned to al-Karak with his wife, who had been growing increasingly ill.

Relationship with Shuhayb Zumurrudi reported back to al-Nasir Muhammad that Ahmad was behaving poorly, dressing as a Bedouin and was spending much of his time drinking with a Bedouin boy, Shuhayb, whom Ahmad had fallen in love with. As a consequence for his behavior, Ahmad was ordered by al-Nasir Muhammad to return to Cairo with Shuhayb in March 1339. Ahmad was received without fanfare and Shuhayb was jailed. Ahmad also refused an offer from his father that would have transferred one hundred of al-Nasir Muhammad's mamluks to Ahmad's service in return for Ahmad's abandonment of Shuhayb. Shortly before his death, al-Nasir Muhammad discussed his succession with his two senior emirs, Qawsun and Bashtak. Following al-Nasir Muhammad's death, In May or June 1341, Abu Bakr was proclaimed sultan, but was virtually a ceremonial ruler, with Qawsun holding the reins of power as mudabbir al-dawla (organizer of the state), in effect the strongman of Egypt. He responded in September 1341 that he would not report to Cairo unless the leading emirs of the sultanate appeared before him in al-Karak and gave him their oaths of loyalty and on the condition that his other brothers imprisoned in Qus would be relocated to al-Karak. From then on, Ahmad gained the honorific prefix of al-Nasir, like his father. As Altunbugha left Damascus to lead an expedition against Tashtamur, pursuing the latter to southeastern Anatolia, Qutlubugha moved into Damascus where he proclaimed al-Nasir Ahmad sultan and began to reorganize the bureaucracy with the support of Damascene emirs opposed to Altunbugha.

Reign Qawsun's position in Egypt was precarious and he was ultimately arrested, along with Altunbugha, in Alexandria. Afterward, a delegation of Egypt-based emirs, namely Jankali ibn Baba, Baybars al-Ahmadi and Qimari Amir Shikar, arrived in al-Karak to inform al-Nasir Ahmad of Qawsun's ouster and to invite him to Cairo to assume the sultanate, to which al-Nasir Ahmad refused. On 21 January 1342, al-Ashraf Kujuk was dethroned and al-Nasir Ahmad declared sultan despite the latter's absence from Cairo. In Bedouin attire, he affirmed his title and declared "I was not yearning for royalty, and found that place [al-Karak] adequate. However, Tashtamur's arbitrary conduct in office and his selective approach to al-Nasir Ahmad's orders turned the latter against him, and with support from the leading Mamluk emirs who were also frustrated with Tashtamur, al-Nasir Ahmad had Tashtamur imprisoned in May 1342. In addition, al-Nasir Ahmad ordered Qutlubugha to be confined to Damascus, while Mamluk emirs in Egypt sought to eliminate Qutlubugha. The latter was able to leave Egypt unharmed, but before reaching Beisan from Jenin, he was arrested by the governor of Safad, Baybars al-Ahmadi, who extradited him to Egypt.

By the end of May, al-Nasir Ahmad decided to rule the sultanate from al-Karak, the only place he felt secure from Mamluk plots, real or perceived. He departed with large sums from the sultan's treasury, huge numbers of al-Nasir Muhammad's Arabian horses and livestock, and was accompanied by the arrested emirs, Tashtamur and Qutlubugha, along with Karaki supporters, the muhtasib (chief market inspector) of Cairo and the chief scribe. He also sought to relocate Caliph al-Hakim II to al-Karak, and managed to install him in Gaza, ostensibly as an interim headquarters. Al-Nasir Ahmad reached al-Karak relatively quickly (in six days). He had left Cairo in the care of his newly appointed deputy, the governor of Gaza, Aqsunqur al-Salari. From al-Karak, al-Nasir Ahmad issued decrees that reached Cairo through a mediator from al-Karak; al-Nasir Ahmad rarely communicated directly with the Mamluks of Egypt, preferring to use mediators instead. According to al-Maqrizi, Ahmad's "most important confidant among the people of al-Karak" was Baligh ibn Yusuf ibn Tayyi, the commander of Arab forces in the fortress. He was repeatedly asked to return to Cairo by the Mamluks of Egypt, but refused each time.

Deposition and death In Cairo, the senior Mamluk emirs resolved to depose al-Nasir Ahmad and replace him with his half-brother al-Salih Isma'il in June 1342. The decision was supported by the governors of the Syrian provinces, who defected from al-Nasir Ahmad after learning of the executions of Tashtamur and Qutlubugha and reports of al-Nasir Ahmad's decadent behavior in al-Karak. Despite being dethroned and not having apparent ambitions outside of al-Karak, al-Nasir Ahmad was still viewed as a threat by the sultan; al-Nasir Muhammad had been exiled in al-Karak when he marched to Cairo and seized the throne. Seven expeditions against al-Nasir Ahmad were launched between his deposition and 1344. Each siege was aborted. They often lasted for a few months, cost huge sums, and at times, ended with the dismissal of officers. The Mamluks had difficulty gaining the key support of the local Bedouin tribes, who were allies of al-Nasir Ahmad. The local defectors informed besieging Mamluks of a vulnerability in al-Karak's defenses. entered the fortress and captured al-Nasir Ahmad, who had been wounded and was treated with respect by his captors. Still suspicious of his Egyptian captors, he refused to eat meals provided by them, only agreeing to eat food handled by his al-Karak partisans. He was sent to Cairo, where al-Salih Isma'il secretly ordered to have him decapitated by a mercenary on 16 July. Al-Nasir Ahmad's head was brought to the Cairo Citadel where it was displayed. His body was buried at the foot of the fortress of al-Karak.

Legacy Al-Nasir Ahmad's four-month reign was judged to be a disappointment by Mamluk-era historians. Ibn Iyas wrote that expectations of al-Nasir Ahmad being a "victorious lion" upon his ascension to the sultanate ended with him receiving the appellation of the "crazy teacher", while Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani wrote that he was "truly a terrible administrator, a hedonist and a drunkard". Ibn Taghribirdi asserted that al-Nasir Ahmad was thoughtless, frivolous and the worst of al-Nasir Muhammad's sons. Al-Maqrizi repeated the alleged warning of al-Nasir Muhammad that al-Nasir Ahmad should never "enter Egypt ... for he will be a ground for the ruin of the monarchy".