az-Zahir Tatar

Az-Zahir Tatar ( Arabic الظاهر سيف الدين ططر, DMG aẓ-Ẓāhir Saif ad-Dīn Ṭaṭar ; born around 1390 ; died 1421 ) was Sultan of the Mamluks in Egypt in 1421.

Az-Zahir Tatar had been brought to Cairo as a slave boy around 1399 , where he soon made a career as Mamluk and eventually rose to become an emir. Even before the funeral of the late Sultan al-Mu'aiyad Shaykh, he consolidated his position within the Mamluk elite and very quickly took over the reign of the little Sultan al-Muzaffar Ahmad II.

Not all emirs of the empire agreed with Tatar's de facto seizure of power, and the viceroy of Damascus rose against him, but was defeated and Tatar entered Damascus as the victor. He had many of his opponents imprisoned or killed, married the mother of the little sultan, finally deposed him on August 29, 1421 and ascended the Mamluk throne himself. He then returned to Cairo. For fear of an attack by his opponents in the struggle for power, he had always worn chain mail under his clothes since he left for Damascus , which, however, caused him to contract a chronic cold. His health deteriorated noticeably and finally led to his death on November 30, 1421. Two days earlier he had his son as-Salih Muhammad III. appointed heir to the throne.

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• Jörg-Dieter Brandes: The Mameluks. The rise and fall of a slave despotism. Jan Thorbecke Verlag, Sigmaringen 1996, p. 221.
• William Popper: History of Egypt 1382–1469 AD Part III, 1412–1422 AD Translated from the Arabic Annals of Abu l-Maḥasin Ibn Taghrī Birdī. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press 1954, pp. 122f., 130, 136f., 142, 150.

predecessor	Office	successor
al-Muzaffar Ahmad II	Sultan of Egypt ( Burji Dynasty ) 1421	as-Salih Muhammad III.