The Fatimid dynastic colour was white, a colour associated with Shi'ism and in symbolic opposition to Abbasid black. Red and yellow banners were associated with the Fatimid caliph's person.[1]
Dates of operation
909–1171
Allegiance
Fatimid Caliphate
Active regions
Mediterranean Sea, Nile, Red Sea
Ideology
Isma'ilism, Jihad
Opponents
Byzantine Empire, Abbasid Caliphate, Caliphate of Córdoba, Qarmatians, Republic of Genoa, Republic of Venice
Battles and wars
Arab–Byzantine wars in Sicily and the Levant, wars of expansion of the Fatimid Caliphate in North Africa, Crusades
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The navy of the Fatimid Caliphate was one of the most developed early Muslim navies and a major force in the central and eastern Mediterranean in the 10th–12th centuries. As with the dynasty it served, its history is in two phases. The first was c. 909 to 969, when the Fatimids were based in Ifriqiya (modern Tunisia); the second lasted until the end of the dynasty in 1171, when they were based in Egypt. During the first period, the navy was employed mainly against the Byzantine Empire in Sicily and southern Italy, where it enjoyed mixed success. It was also in the initially unsuccessful attempts to conquer Egypt from the Abbasids and brief clashes with the Umayyad Caliphate of Córdoba.
During the first decades after the eventual Fatimid conquest of Egypt in 969, the main naval enemy remained the Byzantines, but the war was fought mostly on land over control of Syria, and naval operations were limited to maintaining Fatimid control over the coastal cities of the Levant. Warfare with the Byzantines ended after 1000 with a series of truces, and the navy became once more important with the arrival of the Crusaders in the Holy Land in the late 1090s.
Despite it being well funded and equipped, and one of the few standing navies of its time, a combination of technological and geographical factors prohibited the Fatimid navy from being able to secure supremacy at sea, or interdict the Crusaders' maritime lines of communication to Western Europe. The Fatimids retained a sizeable navy almost up to the end of the regime, but most of the fleet, and its great arsenal, went up in flames in the destruction of Fustat in 1169.
The navy of the Fatimid Caliphate was one of the most developed early Muslim navies and a major force in the central and eastern Mediterranean in the...
The Fatimid Caliphate or Fatimid Empire (/fætiːmɪd/; Arabic: ٱلْخِلَافَة ٱلْفَاطِمِيَّة, romanized: al-Khilāfa al-Fāṭimiyya) was a caliphate extant from...
Cromwellian Parliamentary Navy's own "general at sea". The position of ʾamīr al-baḥr was used for the commander of the Fatimidnavy. The multicultural Sicilian...
The Fatimid conquest of Egypt took place in 969 when the troops of the Fatimid Caliphate under the general Jawhar captured Egypt, then ruled by the autonomous...
The Fatimid architecture that developed in the Fatimid Caliphate (909–1167 CE) of North Africa combined elements of eastern and western architecture, drawing...
was one of the most impressive accomplishments of the Fatimidnavy. At the time, the Fatimids were based in North Africa, with their capital at Mahdia...
Egyptian Navy. Ancient Egyptian navy Ptolemaic navyFatimidnavy Battle of Navarino Egyptian Armed Forces List of ships of the Egyptian Navy International...
stormed by forces of the Fatimid Caliphate. A Byzantine squadron attempts to reinforce but is repulsed by the Fatimidnavy. The defenders are massacred...
Amīr al-Baḥr (أمير البحر, "commander of the sea"), a position in the Fatimidnavy, is frequently mistaken as the etymological origin of the English admiral...
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the Byzantine navy faced few challenges. The Muslim threat had receded, as their navies declined and relations between the Fatimids, especially, and...
counter the threat posed by the Fatimidnavy and saw some successes, with the fleet succeeding in trapping a Fatimid fleet in Beirut Harbor during the...
peasants revolt at the beginning of Richard's reign. May 15 – The new Fatimidnavy is destroyed by fire, resulting in anti-Christian pogroms in Cairo. October...
Arab Empire (including the Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid Caliphates and also Fatimids) as the world's leading economic power throughout the 8th–13th centuries...
(Greece) Roman navy Byzantine navy (Eastern Roman Empire) Fatimidnavy Ottoman Navy (Turkey) History of the Royal Navy History of the French Navy History of...
The Empire of the Mahdi : The Rise of the Fatimids. Leiden. pp. 405–406. Lev, Yaacov (1984). The FatimidNavy, Byzantium and the Mediterranean Sea, 909–1036...
period. The existence of trireme vessels is, however, attested in the Fatimidnavy in the 11th and 12th centuries, and references made by Leo VI to large...
Egyptian Navy Egyptian Air Force Egyptian Air Defense Forces Military of the Tulunid Emirate Military of the Mamluk Sultanate Ptolemaic army Fatimidnavy Ancient...
I (A.D. 802–867), London: Macmillan and Co. Lev, Yaacov (1984). "The FāṭimidNavy, Byzantium and the Mediterranean Sea, 909–1036 CE/297–427 AH". Byzantion...
stormed by forces of the Fatimid Caliphate. A Byzantine squadron attempts to reinforce but is repulsed by the Fatimidnavy. The defenders are massacred...
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