Muhammad Ali of Egypt

An Ottoman Albanian commander who ruled Egypt from 1805 to 1848, built a powerful centralized state, and founded the dynasty that governed Egypt until 1953.

Muhammad Ali dynasty: The ruling house founded by Muhammad Ali that governed Egypt from 1805 to 1953. His descendants continued the state-building project and ruled Egypt for nearly a century and a half.
Conscription: Compulsory military service imposed on a population by a state. Conscription supplied the soldiers for the large army he used to consolidate and extend his rule.
French invasion of Egypt: The French military expedition that occupied Egypt from 1798 to 1801 under Napoleon Bonaparte. The invasion destabilized Ottoman rule and created the conditions for Muhammad Ali’s rise.
Selim III: An Ottoman sultan who ruled from 1789 to 1807 and pursued military and administrative reforms. Both pursued military reform, but Muhammad Ali built a more durable hereditary power base in Egypt.
Wahhabi War: The conflict in Arabia from 1811 to 1818 in which Ottoman forces led by Muhammad Ali’s son Ibrahim defeated the First Saudi State. The campaign demonstrated the reach of Muhammad Ali’s forces beyond Egypt.
Modernization of Egypt: The nineteenth- and twentieth-century transformation of Egypt’s government, economy, military, and infrastructure. Muhammad Ali’s reforms became an early, influential phase of Egypt’s modernization.
State monopoly: Exclusive state control over the production or trade of particular goods and services. Monopolies over key crops and commodities directed revenue and commerce toward his government.
Mamluk: A member of a military class of enslaved soldiers that ruled Egypt before Ottoman conquest and retained influence afterward. Mamluk leaders were major rivals whose defeat strengthened Muhammad Ali’s authority.
Mahmud II: An Ottoman sultan who ruled from 1808 to 1839 and centralized the empire while reforming its institutions. His centralizing reforms paralleled Muhammad Ali’s, while their struggle exposed competing centers of authority.
Greek War of Independence: The Greek revolt against Ottoman rule from 1821 to 1829, in which Muhammad Ali’s forces intervened for the sultan. His intervention brought Egyptian forces into a major European-backed conflict.

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