FARAJ OF SYRIA (1417)

26th Mamluk ruler of Egypt ans Syria; his reign was marked by a loss of internal control of the Mamluk kingdom whose rulers were descendants of white slaves. Faraj was the victim of forces -including foreign invasion and domestic feuds- that he did not create and could not control.

Faraj´s father Barquq died in 1399. While he was a child two guardians -Aytimish al-Bajasi and Taghri Birdi al-Bash-bughawi, representing the rival Turkish and Circassian factions respectively- acted for him. As the result of feuds between their factions Faraj was deposed on Sept. 20, 1405 and his brother al-Malik al-Mansur replaced him; but Faraj was reinstated the following November.

During Barquq´s rule a defensive alliance between the Ottomans and the Mamluks had been formed against Timur (commonly Tamerlane, the renowned Turkic conqueror). Faraj´s guardians allowed this alliance to weaken a shortsighted policy that proved disastrous for Ottoman and Mamluks alike as Timur dealt individually with his enemies.

Followin the fall of Damascus and Aleppo in Syria to the Timurid armies in 1400, Faraj remained subservient to Timur for the next five years. The invasion of Syria was was a serious disability to Faraj because of the loss of revenue. As a consequence the coinage was debased and new fiscal taxation levies were imposed.

Faraj was never able to reconquer Syria although he led several expeditions against the Syrian Mamluks who were his nominal vassals. During one of these expeditions Faraj was defeated, captured and imprisoned in Damscus where he was killed in 1412.