Baybars

Baybars was born into a Kipchak family in the Black Sea steppe. Captured as a child, he was sold in Syria and joined the Mamluk guard of the sultan of Egypt. He took part in the defeat of Louis IX's crusade at Mansura in 1250 and was one of the commanders who fought the Mongols at Ain Jalut in 1260.

That same year he became sultan. He re-established the Abbasid caliphate in Cairo, set up a postal relay (barid) from Cairo to Damascus and took many crusader castles. He allied with Berke, khan of the Golden Horde, against the Ilkhanate. He died in Damascus in 1277; his life became the subject of the Arabic folk epic Sirat al-Zahir Baybars.