El- Bire/Birecik in the period of Bahri Memlûks (1250-1382)

The city of Bîre, located on the Euphrates River, has been a place of geo-strategic importance since ancient times. With this feature, it has been included in the domination areas of the Hittite, Assyrian, Persian, Macedonian, Roman, Eastern Roman (Byzantine), Umayyad, Abbasid, Great Seljuk State, Artuqid, Ayyubid and Mamluk Turkish States since ancient times. With the establishment of the Mamluk Turkish State, Bîre became a place where many attempts and conflicts took place to dominate the Syrian geography. Especially the incursions of the Mongols into the Middle East geography, which started with the Western campaigns, made Bîre even more important in this struggle for dominance. The reason for this is that they want to hold the crossing points located on the Euphrates River in order to reach Syria and Egypt and create a security corridor against incoming attacks while exercising dominance. In this context, Bîre was included in the Mamluk organization and became an observation point against attacks from the northern border of the state and at the same time a military base for expeditions to Anatolia. Although Bîre is considered to be far from Cairo, the center of the Mamluk Turkish State, it was a place of great importance as it was the first defense point.