Editing Abbasid Caliphate (section)

===Mongol invasion and end===
{{Main|Siege of Baghdad|Mongol invasions of the Levant}}In 1206, [[Genghis Khan]] established a powerful dynasty among the [[Mongols]] of Central Asia. During the 13th century, this [[Mongol Empire]] conquered most of the Eurasian land mass, including both China in the east and much of the old Islamic caliphate and the [[Kievan Rus']] in the west. In 1252, [[Hulagu Khan]], a grandson of Genghis Khan and brother of the new Mongol ruler, [[Möngke Khan]], was placed in charge of a new western campaign to the Middle East that would culminate in the [[Siege of Baghdad|conquest of Baghdad]] in 1258.{{Sfn|Jackson|2017|p=|pp=125–128}}

In the years leading up the Mongol invasion, Baghdad's strength was sapped by political rivalries, sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Shias, and damaging floods.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=|pp=259–260}} In 1257, after [[Mongol campaign against the Nizaris|destroying the Assassins]] in Iran, Hulagu wrote to the Abbasid caliph, [[al-Musta'sim]], demanding his submission. The caliph refused, with Hulagu's status as a non-Muslim (unlike the earlier Buyids and Seljuks) likely a factor.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=|pp=263–264}} There followed months of diplomacy, during which the Mongols may have been informed of Baghdad's weakness by correspondence with the caliph's vizier, [[Muhammad ibn al-Alqami|Ibn al-Alqami]], a Shia who was later accused of colluding with them.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=|pp=263–265, 268}}<ref name=":10">{{Cite book |last=Lane |first=George |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FlCBAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA29 |title=Early Mongol Rule in Thirteenth-Century Iran: A Persian Renaissance |publisher=Routledge |year=2003 |isbn=978-1-134-43103-8 |pages=29–35 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Osman |first=Khalil |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jhPEBAAAQBAJ&dq=alqami+1258&pg=PA64 |title=Sectarianism in Iraq: The Making of State and Nation Since 1920 |publisher=Routledge |year=2014 |isbn=978-1-317-67487-0 |pages=64 |language=en}}</ref>

[[File:DiezAlbumsFallOfBaghdad a.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Siege of Baghdad]] by the Mongols led by [[Hulagu Khan]] in 1258, as illustrated in a copy of the 14th-century ''[[Jami' al-tawarikh]]'']]
The Mongols began their siege of the city on 29 January 1258. On 10 February, al-Musta'sim agreed to meet with Hulagu, who demanded that the caliph order the defenders to stand down and come out of the city in exchange for mercy. The caliph complied, but the Mongols slaughtered the population and then began the sack of the city on 13 February.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=|pp=266–267}} Contemporary accounts describe destruction, looting, rape, and killing on a massive scale over many days, with hundreds of thousands killed and the city reduced to near-empty ruins,{{Sfn|Marozzi|2014|pp=142–148}} though some, like the Christian and Shia communities, were spared.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=268}}<ref name=":10" /> The Mongols feared rumours that a supernatural disaster would strike if the blood of al-Musta'sim, a direct descendant of Muhammad's uncle and part of a dynasty that had reigned for five centuries, was spilled. As a precaution and in accordance with a Mongol taboo against spilling royal blood, Hulagu had al-Musta'sim wrapped in a carpet and trampled to death by horses on 20 February 1258.<ref name=":9" />{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=|pp=267–268}}{{Sfn|Jackson|2017|p=|pp=128–129}}<ref>{{Cite book |last=DeVries |first=Kelly |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tQcGDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA208 |title=Crusading and Warfare in the Middle Ages: Realities and Representations. Essays in Honour of John France |publisher=Routledge |year=2016 |isbn=978-1-317-15676-5 |editor-last=John |editor-first=Simon |pages=208–209 |language=en |chapter=Meet the Mongols: Dealing with Mamluk Victory and Mongol Defeat in the Middle East in 1260 |editor-last2=Morton |editor-first2=Nicholas}}</ref> The caliph's immediate family was also executed, with the lone exceptions of his youngest son who was sent to Mongolia and a daughter who became a slave in the [[harem]] of Hulagu.<ref name=":9">{{harvnb|Frazier|2005}}</ref>

The fall of Baghdad marked the effective end of the Abbasid Caliphate.{{Sfn|Bennison|2009|p=|pp=7, 47, 95, etc}}{{Sfn|Jackson|2017|p=|pp=128–129}} It made a deep impression on contemporary and later writers both inside and outside the Muslim world, some of whom created legendary stories about the last caliph's demise.{{Sfn|Jackson|2017|p=|pp=128–129}}{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=267}} It is also traditionally seen as the approximate end to the "classical age" or [[Islamic Golden Age|"golden age" of Islamic civilization]].<ref>{{harvnb|Cooper|Yue|2008|p=215}}</ref>{{Sfn|Bennison|2009|p=4}}<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Renima |first1=Ahmed |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f9f7CwAAQBAJ&pg=PA25 |title=The State of Social Progress of Islamic Societies: Social, Economic, Political, and Ideological Challenges |last2=Tiliouine |first2=Habib |last3=Estes |first3=Richard J. |publisher=Springer |year=2016 |isbn=978-3-319-24774-8 |editor-last=Tiliouine |editor-first=Habib |location=Estes |pages=25 |language=en |chapter=The Islamic Golden Age: A Story of the Triumph of the Islamic Civilization |editor-last2=Estes |editor-first2=Richard J.}}</ref> The events brought profound geopolitical changes to the traditional lands of the Islamic caliphate, with Iraq, Iran, and most of the eastern lands falling under Mongol control while other Muslim rulers retained the lands to the west.{{Sfn|Bennison|2009|p=4}} Mongol expansion further west was eventually halted by the [[Mamluks of Egypt]] at the [[Battle of Ain Jalut]] in 1260, followed by the conflict between the [[Ilkhanids]] (Hulagu and his successors) and their [[Golden Horde]] rivals, which diverted Mongol attention.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=269}} 

==== Abbasid caliphs in Cairo (1261–1517) ====
{{Main |Mamluk Sultanate}}
Prior to the Mongol invasion, the later Ayyubid sultans of Egypt had built up an army recruited from slaves, the [[Mamluks]]. During a political and military crisis in 1250, the Mamluks seized power and established what is now known as the Mamluk Sultanate.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|pp=258–259, 270}} Following the devastation of Baghdad in 1258 and in an effort to secure political legitimacy for the new regime in Egypt, the Mamluk ruler [[Baybars]] invited a surviving member of the Abbasid family to establish himself in Cairo in 1260–1261. The new caliph was [[al-Mustansir II]], a brother of the former caliph al-Mustansir.<ref name=":5">{{Cite book |last=Bosworth |first=Clifford Edmund |author-link=Clifford Edmund Bosworth |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=maQxEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA6 |title=The New Islamic Dynasties: A Chronological and Genealogical Manual |publisher=Edinburgh University Press |year=1996 |isbn=9780748696482 |location= |pages=6–10 |language=en |chapter=The 'Abbasid Caliphs}}</ref>{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=270}} In 1262, he disappeared while leading a small army in an attempt to recapture Baghdad from the Mongols. Baybars subsequently replaced him with [[al-Hakim I]], another Abbasid family member who had just been proclaimed in [[Aleppo]].<ref name=":5" />{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=271}} 

Thereafter, the Abbasid caliphs in Cairo continued to exist as a strictly ceremonial but nonetheless important institution within the Mamluk Sultanate, conferring significant prestige on the Mamluks.<ref name=":5" />{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=272}} It continued to be relevant even to other Muslim rulers until the 14th century; for example, the [[Delhi Sultanate|sultans of Delhi]], the [[Muzaffarids (Iran)|Muzaffarid]] sultan [[Mubariz al-Din Muhammad|Muhammad]], the [[Jalayirid Sultanate|Jalayirid]] sultan [[Ahmad Jalayir|Ahmad]], and the [[Ottoman Empire|Ottoman]] sultan [[Bayezid I]] all sought diplomas of investiture from the caliph or declared nominal allegiance to him.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=|pp=273–275}} Caliph [[Al-Musta'in (Mamluk Sultanate)|al-Musta'in]] even managed to reign as sultan in Cairo for a brief six months in 1412.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=275}}

During the 15th century, however, the institution of the caliph declined in significance.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=275}} The last Abbasid caliph in Cairo was [[al-Mutawakkil III]], who was in place when the Ottoman sultan Selim II [[Battle of Marj Dabiq|defeated the Mamluks]] in 1516 and [[Ottoman–Mamluk War (1516–1517)|conquered Egypt]] in 1517, ending the Mamluk Sultanate. Selim II met with al-Mutawakkil III in Aleppo in 1516, prior to marching into Egypt, and the caliph was then sent to the Ottoman capital of [[Constantinople]] (present-day [[Istanbul]]), ending the Abbasid caliphate definitively.<ref name=":5" />{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=|pp=275–276}} The idea of a "caliphate" subsequently became an ambiguous concept that was occasionally revisited by later Muslim rulers and intellectuals for political or religious reasons.{{Sfn|El-Hibri|2021|p=276}} The Ottoman sultans, who were thenceforth the most powerful Muslim rulers in western Asia and the Mediterranean, did not use the title of "caliph" at all before the mid-16th century and only did so vaguely and inconsistently afterwards.<ref name=":6">{{Cite book |last=Karateke |first=Hakan |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JoZSEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA25 |title=Legitimizing the Order: The Ottoman Rhetoric of State Power |publisher=Brill |year=2005 |isbn=978-90-474-0764-5 |editor-last=Hakan |editor-first=Maurus |pages=25–26 |language=en |chapter=Legitimizing the Ottoman Sultanate: A Framework for Historical Analysis |editor-last2=Reinkowski |editor-first2=Maurus}}</ref> The claim that al-Mutawakkil III "transferred" the office of the caliph to the Ottoman sultan during their meeting in Aleppo is a legend that was elaborated in the 19th century and is not corroborated by contemporary accounts.<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":6" />