we find things that now seem rather un-Islamic. For instance, there is a great deal of wine drinking, which seems to be casually accepted, even while its irreligion, strictly speaking, is noted. Thus, in one story, a character swears off wine in order to purify himself for the Pilgrimage. In another story, a man discovers that his wife has been having sex with a gorilla. With a shocking touch of racism, this affair is said to have commenced after a previous black lover had died (which fits the surviving stereotype of black sexual prowess but betrays ignorance of the anatomy of gorillas, which actually have smaller genitals than humans). We might expect that the proper thing to do about this would be to kill the wife. However, the wife's unnatural lust is extraordinarily treated as a medical disorder, and a physician is employed to cure her, which he does. Besides the wine drinking, there seems to be considerable ease and interest in unsanctioned sexual activities. Even those eunuchs who have been deprived of their testicles but not their penises boast of their ability to have sex with their mistresses. One real world consequence of that was the custom of only using black eunuchs, who typically had amputated penises, in the harim.Although the story of the Mamluks is easily thought to end in 1517 with the Ottoman conquest, the amazing truth is that the Mamluk garrison was not abolished by the Turks and that, as Ottoman authority weakened, Egypt ended up again under the de facto rule of the same "peculiar institution." Thus, when Napoleon arrived in Egypt in 1798, it was the Mamluks with whom he had to contend. When he defeated them at the Battle of the Pyramids, he may not have stopped to think (so distracted by all the Egyptian stuff) that he had beaten victors over the Mongols. Nevertheless, this was still not the end of the Mamluk story. They retreated up the Nile from the French and were again contesting the rule of Egypt when Muh.ammad 'Ali deceived, trapped, and exterminated them in 1811.What did end in 1517 was the line of Abbasid Caliphs. The last was taken off to Constantinople. Ironically, this was al-Mutawakkil III -- the same title as the Caliph who was assassinated by his own Turkish guard in 861. It is not clear whether the Ottomans had any intention of continuing the line, as useful figureheads, as the Mamluks had, for the Caliph and any possible descendants simply disappear from history. Later, when the Sult.ans got to thinking about it, they claimed the Caliphate for themselves. The Hudids of MurciaMuh.ammad ibn Hudal-Mutawakkil1228-1238Conquest of Valenciaby Aragon, 1238Muh.ammad al-Wathiq1238-1239,1264-?al-'Aziz D.iya'ad-Dawla1239-1241Muh.ammad Abu Ja'farBaha'ad-Dawla1241-1262Muh.ammad ibn AbiJ'afar Muh.ammad1262-1264occupation by Granada, ?-1266Conquest by Aragon, 1266THE NAS.RID SULT.ANSOF GRANADAMuh.ammad I al-Ghalib,ibn al-Ah.mar1232-1273Muh.ammad II al-Faqih1273-1302Muh.ammad III al-Makhlu'1302-1309Nas.r1309-1314Isma'il I1314-1325Muh.ammad IV1325-1333Yusuf I al-Mu'ayyad1333-1354Muh.ammad V al-Ghani1354-1359,1362-1391Isma'il II1359-1360Muh.ammad VI al-Ghalib,el Bermejo1360-1362Yusuf II al-Mustahgni1391-1392Muh.ammad VIIal-Musta'in1392-1408Yusuf III an-Nas.ir1408-1417Muh.ammad VIIIal-Mustamassik,al-S.aghir, el Pequeno1417-1419,1427-1429Muh.ammad IX al-Ghalib,al-Aysar, el Zurdo1419-1427,1429-1432,1432-1445,1447-1453Yusuf IV, Abenalmao1432Muh.ammad X al-Ah.naf,el Cojo1445,1446-1447Yusuf V, Aben Ismael1445-1446,1462Muh.ammad XI,el Chiquito1451-1455Sa'd al-Musta'in,Ciriza, Muley Zad1454-1464'Ali, Muley Hacen1464-1482,1483-1485Muh.ammad XIIal-Zughubi,Boabdil el Chico1482-1483,1486-1492,d. 1533Mu.hammad ibn Sa'dal-Zaghal1485-1490Conquest by Castile