Muslim Fortresses in the Levant: Between Crusaders and Mongols (73 page)

The number of fortresses the Sultanate could efficiently maintain was restricted by military and economic considerations. The lack of a large navy meant that almost all the Frankish fortresses along the coast had to be destroyed. This, as Ayalon observed, was the only way to guarantee that the Franks would not reconquer the coastal towns.

One of the most interesting aspects of the Mamluk fortifications is the influence of the organization of Mamluk government and military society on the spatial distribution of fortifications. Though the Mamluk army grew considerably between the days of Baybars and the end of the reign of al-Ashraf Khalīl, the army remained stationed in Cairo and the large Syrian cities. The number of Mamluks the sultan could allocate
to garrisons outside the urban citadels was rather limited. Even when amirs were given large agricultural estates and villages as an
,
all of them chose to remain close to the center of government, in Cairo or Damascus.
²⁰⁶
Thus no fortresses or fortified manor houses were built in the rural areas by high-ranking Mamluk officers. In contrast, both the Frankish and the Ayyubid landed aristocracy lived on their estates and were responsible for the foundation of fortresses and strongholds in rich agricultural areas. In later decades some of those fortified sites were handed over to the Military Orders and significantly enlarged. The Ayyubid nobility built consider ably less, though it seems the subject has not yet been thoroughly researched.

Another important factor determining the map of Mamluk fortresses and the Mamluk scale of construction is the centralization of the Mamluk regime. In comparison with Ayyubid rule, the Mamluk system gave the sultan substantial military and political power. He was an autocratic ruler.
²⁰⁷
The Ayyubid dynast, even at its height, was never unified under one central ruler for any length of time. The territories belonging to the Ayyubids were ruled by various members of the family and by a number of high-ranking amirs. Their sultanate more often resembled a family federation and, except for some military restrictions, each ruler within the federation had full autonomy. The Ayyubid rulers in Asia Minor often carried the title of sultan.
²⁰⁸
The internal dissension among the Ayyubids can be seen in the spatial distribution of their fortresses. A fair number of fortresses constructed by various princes simply ignored the military, economic and political policies of the Ayyubid sultan in Cairo.
²⁰⁹
Most of those strongholds answered immediate local interests and were intended to solve regional problems, such as tribal threats and internal family conflicts among Ayyubid princes. In contrast to the Mamluks, who during their first three decades had to face enemies on three different fronts, the only foreign enemies the Ayyubids faced were the Crusaders.

The case of
al-Dīn Aybak
, a Mamluk of
, provides further evidence of the liberty Ayyubid rulers had concerning the construction of fortifications. In 1214
al-Dīn Aybak received
and its surrounding region as an
from the Ayyubid sultan, and governed for the next forty years building mosques, irrigation systems, khans and fortifications.
²¹⁰

The change in the physical location and structure of royal and aristocratic quarters had an important influence on the development of Muslim military architecture. Starting from the eleventh century, fortresses served as the official living quarters of the ruling elite and their military entourage.
²¹¹
This trend continued into the twelfth century, during which the Ayyubids constructed large citadels.
al-Dīn initiated the building of the Cairo citadel, which remained the center of government throughout the Mamluk period and long afterwards. During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries citadels were built in Damascus, Aleppo and Homs and in their vicinity. In contrast to the city fortifications, the spatial distribution in the rural areas lacked an overall plan. This is not surprising since thee was no one authority that commanded, planned and organized construction throughout the Ayyubid sultanate. The four fortresses built on the Euphrates fords clearly show this lack of central governmental planning. Each stronghold was ruled by a different Ayyubid prince and reflected his own local interests and the regional family disputes. During the early
Ayyubid period both
and
Najm were ruled from Aleppo. The latter was considered a key fortress in the defense of the territories that belonged to the city.
²¹²
later changed hands and during
reign (d. 615/1217) it was annexed to the Jazīra. The entire area was known as the eastern territories and was in fact an independent Ayyubid province governed by
from his capital in the
.
²¹³
According to Maqrīzī,
built and enlarged the fortress,
²¹⁴
and kept his treasury in it.
²¹⁵
was given by Nūr al-Dīn as an
to Asad al-Dīn Shirkūh (d. 564/1166),
al-Dīn’s uncle, and the fortress remained in the family’s hands until the Mongol invasion. The history of al-Bīra is more complicated. From 1099 to 1150 the fortress belonged to the Crusader county of Edessa. It was briefly ruled by the Byzantines and eventually fell to the Urtuqid governor of Mārdīn.
²¹⁶
By the mid thirteenth century it was part of the kingdom of
Yūsuf (d. 658/1260), before it was besieged and taken by Hülegü in 1260.