Before the influence of the Karamanid dynasty, Henry II of Jerusalem made an unsuccessful attempt to invade the city in 1291. Karamanids influence then began in 1293, with the capture of the beylik by Majd ad-Din Mahmud ().
In 1427, the Mamluk Sultan Al-Ashraf Sayf Addin Barsbay acquired the beylik from the Karamanid Sultan Damad II İbrahim Bey in exchange of 5,000 gold coins. In 1366, an attempt to occupy the beylik by Peter I of Cyprus was unsuccessful.