Al-Mutawakkil III

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Muhammad al-Mutawakkil III (d. 1543) (Arabic: محمد المتوكل على الله), reigned 1509 to 1516, and again in 1517, was the last caliph of the later, Egyptian-based period of the Abbasid dynasty. Since the Mongol sack of Baghdad and execution of the Caliph Al-Musta'sim in 1258, the Abbasid caliphs resided in Egypt from 1261, nominal rulers used to legitimize the actual rule of the Mamelukes, their former slave army.

Al-Mutawakkil III was deposed briefly towards the end of his reign in 1516 by his predecessor Al-Mustamsik, but was briefly restored in the next year. In 1517, the Ottoman Sultan Selim I defeated the Mamluk Sultanate and made Egypt part of the Ottoman Empire. Al Mutawakkil was captured and transported to Constantinople, where he agreed to formally surrender the title of caliph as soon as he died, as well as its outward emblems, the sword and the mantle of Muhammad, to the Ottoman sultan Selim I.

Al-Mutawakkil III
Born:  ? Died: 1543
Sunni Islam titles
Preceded by
Al-Mustamsik
Caliph of Islam
1509 – 1516
Succeeded by
Al-Mustamsik
Preceded by
Al-Mustamsik
Caliph of Islam
1517
Succeeded by
Selim I