Egypt Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! === Early modern period: Ottoman Egypt (1517–1867) === {{Main|Egypt Eyalet}} [[File:Louis-François Baron Lejeune 001.jpg|thumb|Napoleon defeated the [[Mamluk]] troops in the [[Battle of the Pyramids]], 21 July 1798, painted by [[Louis-François, Baron Lejeune|Lejeune]].]] Egypt was conquered by the [[Ottoman Turks]] in 1517, after which it became a province of the [[Ottoman Empire]]. The defensive militarisation damaged its civil society and economic institutions.<ref name="Abu-Lughod" /> The weakening of the economic system combined with the effects of plague left Egypt vulnerable to foreign invasion. Portuguese traders took over their trade.<ref name="Abu-Lughod" /> Between 1687 and 1731, Egypt experienced six famines.<ref>{{cite book|author=Donald Quataert|title=The Ottoman Empire, 1700–1922|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T1jR39OM_hsC&pg=PA115|access-date=21 June 2013|year=2005|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-139-44591-7|page=115|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140213015351/http://books.google.com/books?id=T1jR39OM_hsC&pg=PA115|archive-date=13 February 2014|url-status=live}}</ref> The 1784 [[famine]] cost it roughly one-sixth of its population.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061121232204.htm |title=Icelandic Volcano Caused Historic Famine In Egypt, Study Shows |website=ScienceDaily |date=22 November 2006 |access-date=8 February 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130117013900/http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061121232204.htm |archive-date=17 January 2013 |url-status=live }}</ref> Egypt was always 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. Egypt remained semi-autonomous under the [[Mamluks]] until it was [[French campaign in Egypt and Syria|invaded]] by the [[First French Republic|French]] forces of [[Napoleon]] Bonaparte in 1798. After the French were defeated by the British, a three-way power struggle ensued between the [[Ottoman Turks]], Egyptian [[Mamluk]]s who had ruled Egypt for centuries, and [[Arnauts|Albanian mercenaries]] in the service of the Ottomans. ==== Muhammad Ali dynasty ==== {{Main|History of Egypt under the Muhammad Ali dynasty}} [[File:Egypt under Muhammad Ali Dynasty map en.png|thumb|Egypt under Muhammad Ali dynasty]] [[File:ModernEgypt, Muhammad Ali by Auguste Couder, BAP 17996.jpg|thumb|upright=0.75|[[Muhammad Ali of Egypt|Muhammad Ali]] was the founder of the [[Muhammad Ali dynasty]] and the first [[Khedive]] of Egypt and [[Sudan]].]] After the French were expelled, power was seized in 1805 by [[Muhammad Ali of Egypt|Muhammad Ali Pasha]], an [[Albanians in Egypt|Albanian]] military commander of the Ottoman army in Egypt. Muhammad Ali [[Muhammad Ali's seizure of power|massacred]] the Mamluks and established a [[Muhammad Ali dynasty|dynasty]] that was to rule Egypt until the revolution of 1952. The introduction in 1820 of long-staple [[cotton]] transformed its agriculture into a cash-crop [[monoculture]] before the end of the century, concentrating land ownership and shifting production towards international markets.<ref name="Nejla M. Abu Izzeddin 1973, p 2">{{cite book|title=Nasser of the Arabs: an Arab assessment|last=Izzeddin|first=Nejla M. Abu|publisher=Third World Centre for Research and Publishing|year=1981|isbn=978-0-86199-012-2|page=2}}</ref> Muhammad Ali annexed [[Northern Sudan]] (1820–1824), [[Syria]] (1833), and parts of [[Arabian Peninsula|Arabia]] and [[Anatolia]]; but in 1841 the European powers, fearful lest he topple the Ottoman Empire itself, forced him to return most of his conquests to the Ottomans. His military ambition required him to modernise the country: he built industries, a system of canals for irrigation and transport, and reformed the [[civil service]].<ref name="Nejla M. Abu Izzeddin 1973, p 2" /> He constructed a military state with around four percent of the populace serving the army to raise Egypt to a powerful positioning in the Ottoman Empire in a way showing various similarities to the Soviet strategies (without communism) conducted in the 20th century.<ref name="auto">{{cite book|author=Baten, Jörg |title=A History of the Global Economy. From 1500 to the Present.|date=2016|publisher=Cambridge University Press|page=217|isbn=978-1-107-50718-0}}</ref> Muhammad Ali Pasha evolved the military from one that convened under the tradition of the [[corvée]] to a great modernised army. He introduced conscription of the male peasantry in 19th century Egypt, and took a novel approach to create his great army, strengthening it with numbers and in skill. Education and training of the new soldiers became mandatory; the new concepts were furthermore enforced by isolation. The men were held in barracks to avoid distraction of their growth as a military unit to be reckoned with. The resentment for the military way of life eventually faded from the men and a new ideology took hold, one of nationalism and pride. It was with the help of this newly reborn martial unit that Muhammad Ali imposed his rule over Egypt.<ref>{{cite book |last=Fahmy |first=Khaled |title=All the Pasha's Men: Mehmed Ali, his army and the making of modern Egypt |series=Cambridge Middle East Studies |volume=8 |year=1997 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-56007-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IlQsbY3REP4C |pages=119–147}}</ref> The policy that Mohammad Ali Pasha followed during his reign explains partly why the numeracy in Egypt compared to other North-African and Middle-Eastern countries increased only at a remarkably small rate, as investment in further education only took place in the military and industrial sector.<ref>{{cite book|author=Baten, Jörg |title=A History of the Global Economy. From 1500 to the Present|date=2016|publisher=Cambridge University Press|page=220, Figure 7.4 "Numeracy in selected Middle Eastern countries", based on Prayon and Baten (2013)|isbn=978-1-107-50718-0}}</ref> Muhammad Ali was succeeded briefly by his son [[Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt|Ibrahim]] (in September 1848), then by a grandson [[Abbas I of Egypt|Abbas I]] (in November 1848), then by [[Sa'id of Egypt|Said]] (in 1854), and [[Isma'il Pasha|Isma'il]] (in 1863) who encouraged science and agriculture and banned slavery in Egypt.<ref name="auto" /> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! 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