Al-Ashraf Khalil

Biography

Al-Ashraf Khalil was the Mamluk sultan of Egypt who delivered the final blow to the Crusader presence in the Holy Land. Continuing the campaign of his father Qalawun, who had died while preparing the assault, Khalil brought a vast army and a great siege train against Acre, the last major Crusader city and the capital of the rump Kingdom of Jerusalem. In the spring of 1291, after weeks of bombardment and mining, his forces stormed Acre's mighty walls and overwhelmed its defenders, including the knights of the military orders who fought to the last. With Acre's fall, the remaining Latin outposts — Tyre, Sidon, Beirut — were swiftly abandoned, and nearly two centuries of crusading in the Levant came to an end. Khalil's triumph was short-lived; he was assassinated by his own emirs in 1293, but his place in history as the man who ended the Crusader States was secure.

Key Battles