WI: Mamluks become Ottoman-like empire?

What if the Mamluk sultanate's history is like the Ottomans? Once a scourge to Christendom but then lost a lot of land and ended up being called "The Sick Man of Europe" or "The Sick Man of Africa"?

Also, any good Mamluk TLs?
 
I don't know how much the mamelukes could expand beyond their borders at Egypt and the Hedjaz.
I could see them surviving against ottoman expansion for an extended period of time, but i don't think they can expand much into Europe beyond maybe Crete. They could take Arabia up to Syria and north africa up to Tunisia, but i don't think anything beyond is feasible for them.
 
I don't know how much the mamelukes could expand beyond their borders at Egypt and the Hedjaz.
I could see them surviving against ottoman expansion for an extended period of time, but i don't think they can expand much into Europe beyond maybe Crete. They could take Arabia up to Syria and north africa up to Tunisia, but i don't think anything beyond is feasible for them.

But why?
 
I don't know how much the mamelukes could expand beyond their borders at Egypt and the Hedjaz.
I could see them surviving against ottoman expansion for an extended period of time, but i don't think they can expand much into Europe beyond maybe Crete. They could take Arabia up to Syria and north africa up to Tunisia, but i don't think anything beyond is feasible for them.

Those seem like extremely arbitrary limitations.

Frankly I know about as much about the Mamluks as I do about quantum physics (that is to say, very, very little) but it feels sort of disingenous to say "Once they reach X they'll have to stop because of reasons." I doubt anyone thought that an Islamic Turkic dynasty could ever lay seige to Vienna, but they did. I doubt anyone ever thought a race of horse-archers from a land so far away it was still considered mythical to the average peasant could conquer Hungary, but they did. I doubt anyone would have considered a collection of uppity English colonies on the eastern edge of a distant continent would become a super-power after a brutal war, and yet...

My point is, without examining the facts on the ground, you can't really paint the Mamluks with such broad strokes. For all we know they might have conquered Greece, Iran, and made their way to Cordoba.
 
Those seem like extremely arbitrary limitations.

Frankly I know about as much about the Mamluks as I do about quantum physics (that is to say, very, very little) but it feels sort of disingenous to say "Once they reach X they'll have to stop because of reasons." I doubt anyone thought that an Islamic Turkic dynasty could ever lay seige to Vienna, but they did. I doubt anyone ever thought a race of horse-archers from a land so far away it was still considered mythical to the average peasant could conquer Hungary, but they did. I doubt anyone would have considered a collection of uppity English colonies on the eastern edge of a distant continent would become a super-power after a brutal war, and yet...

My point is, without examining the facts on the ground, you can't really paint the Mamluks with such broad strokes. For all we know they might have conquered Greece, Iran, and made their way to Cordoba.
Well, anything is possible when you have a badass leader and wank-fertile events. But i think that's the only way for the mamluks to expand towards what thr OP may have desired.
I don't think the mamluks could storm southern Spain, unless they come right on time for Granada not to be swallowed as a consolation prize for ending the reconquista. The problem with empires is overextension, and that requires a good string of pragmatic leaders to work.
I don't know if the mamelukes could hold Anatolia, unless they come right on time for the ottomans to not swallow all the other beyliks. Again, time is key here, and the mamluks have little.
One thing i could see them doing is expanding beyond their southern and southeastern borders, colonizing the Sudan and possibly coming into conflict with Ethiopia. They could do some small-scale colonization in the indian ocean if they get good borders, but even then they'll often come into conflict with certain european countries' interests.
 
The Burji Mamluks where technically the superiors to the Ottomans until the Ottomans rebelled against them. Make no mistake, the Burji were no pushovers and could have been even greater had the tumult of Cairo been quelled, better sanitation against disease, and weakening the Qara Qoyunlyu, which could allow the Burji to take advantage of the Timurids recession instead of the Qara Qoyunlyu, Aq Qoyunlyu and later the Safaviyya.
 
The problem is the power base of the Mamluk regime.
The core of the army (and of the state) was the slave warriors (preferably of the Turkic steppe origin); and their number was limited by definition.
Once the il-Khanid Iran tried to choke the supply of the military slaves to Egypt from their traditional sources and that provoked serious problems.
The Ottoman Turkey had much more extensive recruiting grounds close at hand - their Turkic tribes and even recruiting the jannicaries they did not depend on the far away places.
So building the Empire on the so narrow power base as Mamluks did is a disadvantage from the very beginning.
 
The problem is the power base of the Mamluk regime.
The core of the army (and of the state) was the slave warriors (preferably of the Turkic steppe origin); and their number was limited by definition.
Once the il-Khanid Iran tried to choke the supply of the military slaves to Egypt from their traditional sources and that provoked serious problems.
The Ottoman Turkey had much more extensive recruiting grounds close at hand - their Turkic tribes and even recruiting the jannicaries they did not depend on the far away places.
So building the Empire on the so narrow power base as Mamluks did is a disadvantage from the very beginning.

Well that is not the only powerbase of the Mamluks. Do not forget, they have the most important chess piece in the Mid East on their side. Namely, the Abbasid throne. They used this, to avoid and turn back Timur.

However, the true test of mettle and survival is might. The Mamluks lost that struggle to the Ottomans through force of arms and other situations, most pertinent, the huge amount of death due to pestilence in Egypt.
 

ben0628

Banned
Perhaps if early on the Mamluks centered their capital in Damascus instead of Cairo, they could control both Egypt and the rest of the Middle East.

Also as others said internal reforms are nessecary
 
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