Fatimid Empire

The Fatimid Empire refers to an Ismaili Shia Muslim empire that covered most of North Africa and the Levant from 919 AD until 1931 AD.

The Fatimids were a powerful Arab family that arose in Mesopotamia early in the Islamic age. The family claimed to be descended from the prophet Muhammad by way of his daughter Fatima and her husband Ali. Due to being the descendants of Ali, the Fatimids were staunch Shia Muslims. This resulted in the marginalization of the family from politics for most of their history which resulted in Fatimid lands being seized in Mesopotamia and the family moving to the Levant.

Following the Blackening, the Fatimids were forced to flee, firsts from the Levant, and then from Egypt. Under the leadership of their legendary patriarch, Abdulazam al-Masri, the Fatimids were able to drive out the vampires and create a new state in Egypt, where they promoted their interpretation of Islam. The Fatimids would become increasingly powerful, peaking at the annexation of the Levant from the Latin Empire at the dying years of the Latin Crusades.

However, the glory would come to an end with the arrival of the Qizilbash, a powerful force of Persianized Turks who arrived in Iran and rapidly took control of the state, expanding into India and Mesopotamia, and engaging in violent warfare with the Fatimids. The end of the Qizilbash Wars saw the dying Fatimids, who had already lost much of their non-Egyptian North African land to wars with France and Italy, saw themselves dragged into the Great War, which they lost, being forced to concede all land outside of Egypt and revoke their claims to the Caliphate. The end of the Fatimids saw the rise of an increasingly liberal and secular movement, becoming the modern day Republic of Egypt.