village, the French routed the garrison. Trapped against the river, many of the Mamluks and infantry tried to swim to safety, and hundreds drowned. The French reported a loss of 29 killed and 260 wounded. Murad's losses were far heavier, perhaps as many as 10,000 including 3,000 of the elite Mamluk cavalry, and his defterdar Ayyub Bey was also killed in the battle. Murad Bey himself was also wounded in the cheek with a hit from a saber. Murad escaped to Upper Egypt with his 3,000 surviving cavalry, where he carried out an active guerrilla campaign before being defeated by Desaix in late 1799. Aftermath Upon hearing news of the defeat of their legendary cavalry, the waiting Mamluk armies in Cairo dispersed to Syria, Bonaparte entered the conquered capital of Egypt on 24 July. On 11 August French forces caught up with Ibrahim Bey inflicting on him a crushing defeat at Salalieh. After the Battle of the Pyramids, Napoleon instituted French administration in Cairo and suppressed the subsequent rebellions violently. Although Napoleon tried to co-opt the local Egyptian ulema, scholars like Al-Jabarti ignorant of the advances that had taken place in Europe and understanding little of France’s so-called Republic, poured scorn on the ideas and cultural ways of the French. Despite their cordial proclamations to the natives, with some French soldiers even converting to Islam in order to take Muslim wives, clerics like Abdullah al-Sharqawi, who headed Napoleon’s Cairo government or divan, later described the French as: "‘materialist, libertine philosophers … [who] deny the resurrection, and the afterlife, and … [the] prophets" while for the French, mathematician Joseph Fourier regretted that "the Muslim religion would on no account permit the development of the mind". There was an apocryphal story that the Sphinx's nose had apparently been shot off by accident by French cannon during the battle, or that it was blown off during target practice. The Battle of the Pyramids signalled the beginning of the end of seven centuries of Mamluk rule in Egypt. Despite this auspicious beginning, British Admiral Horatio Nelson's victory in the Battle of the Nile ten days later effectively ended Napoleon's ambitions in Egypt. Cultural depictions The battle was depicted by François-André Vincent in a sketch, and by various other artists. See also Military career of Napoleon Bonaparte Notes References Sources Further reading Cole, Juan, Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Herold, J.