course, hold that he should be one of the descendants of the Prophet's own family; but this is rejected by the Sunnis and Wahhábis. The condition that the Caliph should be of the Quraish, is very important; for thereby the present Ottoman Sultans fail to establish their claims to the Caliphate.
After the deaths of the first five Caliphs,—Abu Bakr, Omar, Osmán, Ali, and Hasan,—the Caliphate, which is allowed by all parties to be elective, and not hereditary, passed successively to the Ommiades and Abbasides. The temporal power of the Abbaside Caliphs was overthrown by Houlakon Khan, son of the celebrated Jengiz Khán, A.D. 1258; but, for three centuries, the descendants of the Abbaside, or Bagdad, Caliphs resided in Egypt, and asserted their claim to the spiritual power.
The founder of the present dynasty of Ottoman Sultans was Osman, the son of a tribe of Oghouz Turks, a powerful chief, whose descendant, Bazazet I., is said to have obtained the title of Sultán from one of the Abbaside Caliphs in Egypt, A.D. 1389. When Selim I. conquered Egypt (A.D. 1516), it is asserted that he obtained a transfer of the title
