[3] 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.

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.

However, the sultan soon discovered that Yunus Pasha had created an extortion and bribery syndicate, and gave the office to Hayır Bey, the former Mamluk governor of Aleppo, who had contributed to the Ottoman victory at the Battle of Marj Dabiq.

The reason for these mutinies was the attempt made by successive pashas to put a stop to the extortion called the tulbah, a forced payment exacted by the troops from the inhabitants of the country by the fiction of debts requiring to be discharged, which led to grievous ill-usage.

They were defeated by the governor Kara Mehmed Pasha, who, on 5 February 1610, entered Cairo in triumph, executed the ringleaders, and banished others to Yemen, earning him the nickname Kul Kıran ("Slavebreaker").

[9] In 1630, Koca Musa Pasha was the newly appointed governor, when the army took it upon themselves to depose him, in indignation at his execution of Kits Bey, an officer who was to have commanded an Egyptian force required for service in Persia.

He spent eight years in purchasing Mamelukes and winning other adherents, exciting the suspicions of the Sheikh al-Balad Khalil Bey, who organised an attack upon him in the streets of Cairo—in consequence of which he fled to Upper Egypt.

[6] In 1766, after the death of his supporter, the grand vizier Raghib Pasha, he was again compelled to flee from Egypt to Yemen, but in the following year he was told that his party at Cairo was strong enough to permit his return.

Resuming his office, he raised 18 of his friends to the rank of bey—among them Ibrahim and Murad, who were afterwards at the head of affairs—as well as Muhammad Abu-'l-Dhahab, who was closely connected with the rest of Ali Bey's career.

[6] The Porte was not able to take active measures at the time for the suppression of Ali Bey, who endeavoured to consolidate his dominions by sending expeditions against marauding tribes in both north and south Egypt, reforming the finance, and improving the administration of justice.

Reinforced by Ali Bey's ally Zahir al-Umar, Abu-'l-Dahab easily took the chief cities of Palestine and Syria, ending with Damascus, but at this point he appears to have entered into secret negotiations with the Porte, by which he undertook to restore Egypt to Ottoman suzerainty.

On 1 February 1773, he received information from Cairo that Abu-'l-Dhahab had made himself Sheikh al-Balad, and in that capacity was practising unheard-of extortions, which were making Egyptians call for the return of Ali Bey.

The two were soon involved in quarrels, which at one time threatened to break out into open war, but this catastrophe was averted and the joint rule was maintained until 1786, when an expedition was sent by the Porte to restore Ottoman supremacy in Egypt.

In the future, all posts in Egypt were to be open to all classes of the inhabitants; the conduct of affairs was to be committed to the men of talent, virtue, and learning; and to prove that the French were sincere Muslims, the overthrow of the papal authority in Rome was suggested.

In consequence of a series of unwelcome innovations, the relations between conquerors and conquered grew more strained daily, until at last—on the occasion of the introduction of a house tax on 22 October 1798—an insurrection broke out in Cairo.

The prompt measures of Bonaparte, aided by the arrival from Alexandria of General Jean Baptiste Kléber, quickly suppressed this rising; but the stabling of French cavalry in the mosque of Azhar gave great and permanent offence.

A double expedition was sent by the Porte shortly after Bonaparte's departure for the recovery of Egypt: one force being dispatched by sea to Damietta, while another under Yousuf Pasha took the land route from Damascus by al-Arish.

These efforts failing, Husrev took the field and a Turkish detachment 7,000 strong was dispatched against the Mamluks to Damanhur—whence they had descended from Upper Egypt—and was defeated by a small force under either al-Alfi or his lieutenant al-Bardisi.

During Muhammad Ali's absence in Arabia his representative at Cairo had completed the confiscation, begun in 1808, of almost all the lands belonging to private individuals, who were forced to accept instead inadequate pensions.

Ali's intentions for Sudan was to extend his rule southward, to capture the valuable caravan trade bound for the Red Sea, disperse Mamluks who had fled south, and to secure the rich gold mines which he believed to exist in Sennar.

In the autumn of 1824 a fleet of 60 Egyptian warships carrying a large force of 17,000 disciplined troops concentrated in Suda Bay, and, in the following March, with Ibrahim as commander-in-chief landed in the Morea.

The withdrawal of the Egyptians from the Morea was ultimately due to the action of Admiral Sir Edward Codrington, who early in August 1828 appeared before Alexandria and induced the pasha to sign a convention undertaking to recall Ibrahim and his army.

[6] Ibrahim, who once more commanded in his father's name, launched another brilliant campaign beginning with the storming of Acre on 27 May 1832, and culminating in the rout and capture of Reşid Mehmed Pasha at Konya on 22 December.

As the result of endless discussions between the representatives of the powers, the Porte and the pasha, the Convention of Kütahya was signed on 14 May 1833, by which the sultan agreed to bestow on Muhammad Ali the pashaliks of Syria, Damascus, Aleppo and Itcheli, together with the district of Adana.

Scarcely a year from the signing of the Convention of Kütahya the application by Ibrahim of Egyptian methods of government, notably of the monopolies and conscription, had driven Syrian Druze and Sunni Arabs, who had welcomed him as a deliverer, into revolt.

The unrest was suppressed by Muhammad Ali in person, and the Syrians were terrorized, but their discontent encouraged Sultan Mahmud to hope for revenge, and a renewal of the conflict was only staved off by the anxious efforts of the European powers.

[6] He was succeeded by his uncle Sa'id Pasha, the favorite son of Muhammad Ali, who lacked the strength of mind or physical health needed to execute the beneficent projects which he conceived.

He attempted vast schemes of reform, but these coupled with his personal extravagance led to bankruptcy, and the later part of his reign is historically important simply for its leading to European intervention in,[6] and occupation of, Egypt.

In December 1875, Stephen Cave was sent out by the British government to inquire into the finances of Egypt, and in April 1876 his report was published, advising that in view of the waste and extravagance it was necessary for foreign Powers to interfere in order to restore credit.

The subdvisions were the following: Upper Egypt, Jirja, Ibrim, Al Wahat (The Oasis), Menfelut, Sharqiye, Gharbiye, Menufiye, Mansuriye, Kulubiye, Bahire and Dimyat.