Baybars did not live to see the long-expected Mongol invasion of Syria, which led to the confrontation north of Homs in Rajab 680/October 1281. Professor Ayalon has written: “Though this battle was won by Ḳalāwūn, the real architect of the victory was undoubtedly Sultan Baybars, who, in the seventeen years of his rule … built a war-machine which, in spite of the decline it underwent during the four years following his death, proved to be strong enough to beat one of the mightiest armies which the Mongol Īlkhāns ever put into the field.”

The Mamluks after Baybars's death

The Mamluk-Īlkhānid front was relatively quiet in the first years after Baybars's death. The lack of an external danger meant that the Mamluk elite could indulge in factional squabbling and jockeying for power with relative impunity. When the Mongol threat again became a reality in 679/1280, the Mamluk factions were able, if not to reconcile their differences, at least to find a modus vivendi. Those members of the military society who persisted in plotting against Qalawun were eliminated.

Baybars's son al-Malik al-Saʿīd Berke Khan succeeded his father without any problems. Once on the throne, al-Saʿīd set about limiting the power of the Ṣāliḥī amirs, that is, his father's khushdāshiyya, and other senior amirs, including those of the Ẓāhiriyya (the mamluks of Baybars).