First Fatimid Invasion of Egypt

Date: January 24, 914 • Location: Cairo, Egypt

This milestone marked the outbreak and beginning of this historic period, which spanned 914–915.

The Fatimid Caliphate began their first invasion of Egypt, against the Abbasids, which eventually ended in failure.

The Fatimid Caliphate, also known as the Fatimid Empire, was a caliphate that existed from the tenth to the twelfth centuries CE under the rule of the Fatimids, an Isma'ili Shi'a dynasty. Spanning a large area of North Africa and West Asia, it extended from the western Mediterranean in the west to the Red Sea in the east. The Fatimids traced their ancestry from the Islamic prophet Muhammad's daughter Fatima and her husband Ali, considered the first Imam of Shi'a Islam. The Fatimids were acknowledged as the rightful imams by different Isma'ili communities as well as by denominations in many other Muslim lands and adjacent regions. Starting in Ifriqiya under the Aghlabids, who were themselves nominally under the Abbasid Caliphate, the Fatimids eventually overthrew both, and extended their rule across the Mediterranean coast, ultimately making Egypt the centre of their caliphate. At its height, the caliphate included—in addition to Egypt—varying areas of the Maghreb, Sicily, the Levant, and the Hejaz.