HISTORY OF ERITREA
OSMAN S. SABBE
The Habashite Abraha Rules Yemen
The Himyarites tended to harass the Christians
who lived in their midst. One of the most
important Christian strongholds was the city of
Najran. Thu Nawas stormed it, devastated its
people and mutilated the bodies of the dead.
According to one narrative, the number of the
casualties reached twenty thousands, and
according to another narrative, it reached two
thousands. This motivated the king of Aksum, El
Asbaha, to wage another war against Yemen to
destroy this rebellions Jewish king. However,
some historians deny that two wars took place
and speak only of the one waged by, El Asbaha.
Dus Thu Tha’alaban (and in another narrative,
Hayyan Ibn Fayd) went to the Roman king in
Constantinople and invoked his help against Thu
Nawas. Since the length of the distance
prevented the Roman king from intervening
directly, he sent with the Arab a request to the
king of Aksum. The negus, responded by sending
an army under the command of Aryat (a corruption
of the Habashite name Hawaryat) and provided him
with ships from Egypt and the gulf of llat.
Abraha Al Ashram was in the ranks of this army
which numbered twenty thousand soldiers.
The battle ended with the defeat of the
Himyarites and Thu Nawas rode his mare into the
sea. Aryat ruled Yemen and was succeeded by
Abraha. The latter became an independent ruler
of Yemen in the reign of Beit Israel, the king
of Aksum, and the reign of his son, Jabr Maskal
in 540 A.D. Initially, Abraha wrote in his
inscriptions that he was a vassal of the
Aksumite king, Negus Zabyemen (the one in
Yemen). It is related that he built a church in
Yemen which was known by the name Elklis, which
is derived from the Greek (Ekklesia) meaning
general assembly or church. He wanted it to be
the polestar of the Arabs instead of the
‘Qa’aba’ in Mecca.
It was a master-piece of architecture in its
splendour and immensity. Arab historians relate
that Abraha raided Mecca in the year known as
‘the year of the elephant’ to avenge the insult
which was inflicted on his church in Sana’a by
the pagan Nafeel Al Ja’athami, who smeared the
front of the church with his excreta and threw
rotten cadavers in it. Al-Tabari describes the
diseases which routed Abraha’s army at the gates
of Mecca by saying: “The first time measles and
small-pox were seen in Arabia was in that year”.
The Arabs date the invasion to the year 570 A.D.
and call it the “year of the elephants”. It is
probably the year in which the Prophet Muhammad,
peace be on him, was born. But researchers fix
the date at 540 A.D.
Some historians relate that Abraha was the last
to restore the famous Ma’areb dam in Yemen, and
that he recorded inscriptions on the stones
which he began by saying: “With the authority,
power and mercy of the compassionate, his Christ
and the holy spirit set down this writing ‘I,
Abraha, viceroy of the Geezite Ramhaz Ziman,
king of Saba, Thu Raidan, Hadramut and the Arabs
in Najada and Tahama..... etc..”. The text in
Geez is “/ya vil warda warahmanan ramhaz zabimen
warun quds sattiru than mazandan. an abrat azli
malikan ajlaziyyinrambaz zabiman malik Sabal th
radon wahadramut wayamnan walalrabuhum watudam
watahmat.
The restoration ceremony was attended by Roman
and Persian delegations. Also present was Al
Munther, the king of Hira Al Hareth Ibn Jabla
and Abu Karb Ibn Jabla. Dr. PDF Created with
Jawad Ali, in his book, “The Detailed history of
the Arabs - Vol. III”, points to the political
importance of the attendance of these
delegations and their strategic objectives in
the Red Sea: “The coming of the delegate of
negus Ramhiz Zebeimen, the delegate of the Roman
King, the delegate of the Persian king, the
emissaries of al Munther, the king of Hira, Al
Hareth lbn Jabla and Abi Karb lbn Jabla made a
great impression on the southern Arabs and on
the chieftains and their tribes.
The coming of these to Yemen and their crossing
vast distances is no easy thing and denotes
great political significance. It reflects esteem
for Abraha and his position in that vital area
which controls the Red Sea, Bab el Mandeb and
the Indian Ocean. These delegates did not come
merely for congratulations, amusement or out of
courtesy, but for more important things; namely
to draw Abraha into this camp or the other and
thus make the one outweigh the other and
suppress trade in the Red Sea or enhance it.
This could either spell disaster for the
institutions of the Romans and their trade or
reap them vast, inestimable profits.
The world was then, as now, divided between two
fronts, an eastern Persian front and a western
Persian front. Each had its own propagandists
among the small kingdoms and the tribal chiefs.
These followers punished and forgave, were
content or angry in their efforts to grafity and
flatter the side they supported. The Romans
devoted all their power to establish their
hegemony over the Arabian Peninsula, to isolate
it from the Persians or, at least, from their
supporters.
The Persians, on their part, tried to destroy
every party that took the side of the Romans or
supported their point of view and to prevent
their ships from entering the Indian Ocean and
trading with Arabia and Africa. The two camps
worked diligently on spreading propaganda and
winning the battle of intellect. The Romans
strove to spread Christianity in the Arabian
Peninsula; they sent and aided missionaries and
urged Habasha to support and spread
Christianity.
The Persians endeavoured to spread Christian
creeds opposed to the creed of Rome and Habasha
(Abyssinia) and to support Judaism also, since
it opposed the policy of the Romans. As we
know, the religion of the Persians was neither
Christian nor Jewish, but a religion contrary to
both religions. Thus, the purpose of the Romans
in spreading Christianity was not sincere or
blemishless”.
Abraha was succeeded by his son, Eksum, in 544
A.D. The latter ruled for nineteen years and was
succeeded by his brother, Masruk, who ruled for
twelve years. Finally, Hemyar could stand the
Habshites no more, so the Persians found that
the opportunity was ripe to invade Yemen in
their struggle with the Romans for the control
of the Red Sea and its lucrative trade.
Seif lbn Thee Yazen played an important role in
inviting the Persians who came on eight ships.
They were met by king Masruk at the head of a
hundred thousand soldiers, according to some
narratives. The Persian commander, Wahzar,
managed to kill Masruk on the back of his mute
with an arrow. When he fell, the Aksumite army
was defeated and they fled in every direction.
After the battle of Yemen, the Persians
continued invading the coasts of the Red Sea
until they subjugated Adulis and the Dahlak
Archipilago, where they built cisterns the
remains of which still stand.
However, the Persian reign in Yemen and their
control of the Red Sea did not last long.
Hardly fifty years had passed when the Arab
conquests, following the emergence of Islam in
Mecca, swept over the Middle and Near East,
putting an end to the Persian empire and
wresting from the Romans the Middle and Near
East, beginning with Palestine and Syria and
passing through Egypt till North Africa. The
entire Arabian Peninsula, including Yemen, came
under the hegemony of the new Arab state.
It was now the turn of the Arabs to extend their
influence over the Red Sea and its straits.
Between the years 630 and 640 A.D., Adulis ended
in ruins due to the raids of the Beja tribes,
which the Arab conquests had pushed into
migrating southward from their homeland in
Asswan, Egypt.
Its commercial role as a broker in the Red Sea
between the trade of Aksum, “Punt” land, the
eastern coasts of Africa, Yemen, India and
Persia, on the one hand and the kingdom of
Meroe, Egypt, Syria and the Romans on the other
hand, was over after it had thrived for about
nine centuries.
The Struggle in the Red Sea in the Middle Ages
The Arabs control the Red Sea
With the spread of Islam in the Arabian
Peninsula, Syria, Mesopotamia, Persia, Egypt and
North Africa, the Arabs controlled the northern
and southern entrances of the Red Sea and the
most important trade centres in the old world.
Of the Red Sea basin, only its African coasts
remained outside the Arab control.
These were mostly small in resources and
population, except for those racing the coasts
of Yemen known today as the coasts of Eritrea,
in which Adulis was famous as an entrance to
Habasha (Abyssinia) and as a trade link between
the east and the west. By then it had been
destroyed as a result of the Persian-Roman
struggle in addition to the Beja raids. The
relation of the Arabs after Islam with this
coast dates back to the early appearance of
Islam when the prophet advised some of his
comrades to emigrate to Habasha “because there
is a king who does not oppress anyone, and it is
a land of truth” (i) after they bad been
harassed by ‘Qureish’.
In the fifth year of the prophetic mission,
eleven men, and some say twelve, four of them
married and accompanied by their wives, left
Mecca. They found two trader ships that
transported them for half a ‘dinar’ to the town
of ‘Ma’adar’ on the Eritrean coast south of
Adulis. Then they travelled to Aksum, where the
negus offered them generous hospitality. These
fifteen were only the beginning of the
procession. The flow of Moslem-migrants,
escaping with their religion to Habasha,
continued until they numbered over one hundred.
Thus began the relation of the Arabs after Islam
with the African coasts of the Red Sea. Soon,
however, conditions changed; the adherents of
the new religion were no longer exiles seeking
refuge in a remote country, but rulers
controlling the reins of state in vast regions
in the world. The deterioration of the influence
of the two states, the Roman and the Persian, in
the Red Sea created a vacuum and gave thugs the
opportunity to go unchecked and to practice
piracy, especially since there were remains of
ships and a sizable number of unemployed living
in the ruins of Adulis in the absence of any
government. PDF Created with To punish these
and prevent them from threatening the trade
routes in the Red Sea, the Caliph Omar lbn
Al-Khattab sent a small expedition consisting of
three hundred men under the command of Alkama
lbn Mihrez Al-Alkami, according to Al Tabari and
Ibn Al-Athir. The expedition was to punish
these and spread Islam in the African land, but
they were killed and the expedition failed. Omar
took it upon himself never to send anyone by sea
again. The Caliph Omar, however, approved of
Amr lbn Al A’ss suggestion to dig a canal
connecting the Red Sea and the Mediterranean via
the Nile, though he had opposed it at first for
fear that the Romans use it in their military
operations against the Arabs. The reason for his
approval was that he remembered the importance
of reconnecting the Red Sea with the Nile,
especially for sending wheat to Hijaz. So he
ordered the re-opening of the old canal which
was known as the canal of the Prince of the
Faithful. The trade of the east started to move
across the Red Sea and Egypt to Alexandria, and
from there to the west and Syria. The pirates
carried on with their destructive activity,
coming out of the ruins of Adulis and the Dahlak
Archipelago, which they made a refuge for their
ships. They even raided Jeddah in 702 A.D. and
threatened to destroy Mecca. So the Omayyad
Caliphs took a decisive step to put an end to
this piracy.
They mobilized a naval campaign to establish a
naval centre on the western coast of the Red Sea
racing Yemen (the Eritrean Coast) and occupied
the whole of the Dahlak Archipelago racing
Massawa. The occupation of the Moslem Arabs of
this excellent position was the beginning of
their occupation of the rest of the naval
centres on the African coast and of the gradual
spread of Islam in east Africa.
In the first Islamic period, most of the western
coasts of the Red Sea remained under the power
of the pastoral Beja tribes after they had
destroyed the port of Adulis and crushed the
kingdom of Aksum with the migration of the Beja
tribes from southern Egypt. One of the Fatimide
Caliphs made a treaty with Maknun lbn Abdul
Aziz, the chief of the Beja, by which he
recognized his authority over the Beja regions
till the “Island of the Wind” or the present
port of Massawa.
Spencer Trimingham says in “Islam in Ethiopia”:
“The Beja tribes founded five independent
kingdoms west and north east of Eritrea. ‘Badey’
or ‘Massawa’ was a port which had commercial
contacts with the Sultans of Egypt”. Jasman
Jeslow says in “The Wonders of Ethiopia”:
“Massawa and the few ports on the Red Sea became
Islamic at an early time, and after the
destruction of Adulis, an Islamic civilisation
flourished on the Dahlak Island near Massawa at
the beginning of the eighteenth century”.
The western coasts of the Red Sea were known to
Arab historians under different names such as
“The Land of the Islamic Mode” (The African
coast acquired an Islamic character while the
interior kept a different character, says
Al-Masou’di in “The lexicon of Countries”), “The
Land of Zeila” and “The Land of Jabarta”, to
which is attributed the famous Egyptian
historian, Abdul Rahman Al-Jabarti”.
The Red Sea During the Crusades
With the coming of the crusaders and the
settling of the crusaders in Damascus, Europe
wanted to deprive Egypt of raw materials
necessary for war. The Pope and some European
governments issued laws and decrees for bidding
the export of these categories to Egypt.
However, the two sides could not afford to
sacrifice the sizable sums which they earned
from trade. So many overlooked the application
of the Papal decrees, and the trade across the
Red Sea remained so active that the emissary of
Frederick Barbarossa expressed surprise at
seeing the commercial activity in Alexandria in
1175 A.D. Dr. Jalal Yehya says in “The Red Sea
and Colonialism” that the Indians, the Arabs and
the Egyptians used to cooporate in transporting
the accumulated trade in Aden to the port of
‘Eithab’, where it was transported on camel back
to ‘Qaws’, where it was re-shipped on the Nile
to ‘Dumyat’ and ‘Rashid’. The Sultan of Egypt
prohibited western merchants from entering the
Red Sea for fear that they conspire with the
Habashites against his country. In the year 578
(Higri), Prince Ranuda, the ruler of Karak in
Syria, wanted to seize the land of Hijaz. So he
built ships and transported the wooden parts on
camels to the coast, where he put them together,
loaded them with men and war machines, and
divided them into two parts: one part sailed to
the Island of “Qala’a Ayla” (Sinai) and
prevented its people from coming to the water,
which caused them great duress, and put them
under great strain. The second part sailed
towards ‘Eithab’, wreaked havoc on the coasts,
took the Arab ships and the merchants on board,
and took the people by surprise, as they had not
known any European in that sea, whether merchant
or soldier. In Egypt, king Al-Adel Abu Bakr lbn
Ayyoub, acting for his brother, Saladdin, built
a fleet in the ‘Kalzam Sea’ (The Red Sea) under
the command of his aide-de-camp, Hussamiddin
LuLua, and loaded it with veteran sailors. They
sailed to ‘Ayla’ and captured the enemy ships
after burning them and took the soldiers
prisoners. Those who escaped inward were pursued
by the Arabs and brought back. Then they sailed
towards ‘Eithab’ in pursuit of the remaining
Crusader ships. On arrival, they found the
Crusaders had killed many of the people of
‘Eithab’, captured many others and robbed them.
lbn Jubier says that the Crusaders captured a
Beja ship bringing pilgrims from Jeddah and also
captured a big caravan which had come from
Jeddah to ‘Eithab’ and killed everybody. They
captured two ships bringing merchants from Yemen
and burnt many foodstuffs on that coast, which
had been destined for the granaries of Mecca and
Medina. They burnt another sixteen ships, and
their news and power spread on the coast of the
Red Sea.
Then they sailed to the land of Hijaz and Lulua
followed them there. He found that they had
obstructed the route of the merchants and
proceeded to kill and pillage. People were
appalled by this and the people of Medina and
Mecca were imperiled. LuLua caught up with them
at the port of ‘Rafink’ (the coast of Al Hawra’)
and put them to the sword. When they were faced
with annihilation, they came out on land and
took refuge in some montainous trails. Lulua
disembarked and fought them ferociously. He took
horses from the Arabs of that land, mounted his
soldiers on them, and fought them on horse back
and on foot until he defeated them and killed
most of them.
The letter sent by the Habashite Queen Helen to
the Portuguese King Immanuel in 1805 justified
these fears. She wrote him offering her
willingness to provide large land forces to
destroy and seize the port of Eithab, but she
says that she does not have a fleet and asks him
to help her by providing her with a fleet to
transport her armies to Jerusalem in Palestine
to participate in ‘liberating it from the
heretics’ and restoring it to the “dominion of
the Holy Cross”. In spite of the religious
guise applied to these arguments, the desire to
control the Red Sea is obvious in the contents
of this letter.
After the end of the Crusades, ‘Eithab’ lost its
commercial importance, especially after the port
of Al-Tour became a centre from which caravans
travelled towards Egypt and Syria. Moreover,
Aden also lost its former importance, because
the Prince of Yemen tried to stop trade from
passing to Egypt. The Indians, after appraising
the situation, found that the Sultan of Egypt
controlled the end of the route, and started
using Jeddah to unload their goods, after it had
been seized by the king Al-Ashraf ‘Barsbari’.
This trade was then transported by caravans by
way of Mecca and Hijaz northland to Egypt or
reshipped on warships to Al-Tour. As we have
already mentioned, Egypt and Venice reaped many
profits by trading with the cast across the Red
Sea. This was one of the most important reasons
which made the Portuguese attempt to find
another route to the fortunes of the east. The
movement of geographical explorations had
already picked up momentum, and Barthelomio Diaz
managed to reach the Cape of Good Hope. Then
Vasco de Gama reached Calcutta, and eventually
Capral reached India with his big fleet after
thirteen years of the arrival at the Cape.
The Portuguese clashed with the Egyptians in the
Indian waters, and tried to intercept Indian
trade with Egypt. Both Egypt and Venice realized
this new danger that threatened to wrest the
eastern trade from them and divert it to the
route of the Cape of Good Hope and the Atlantic
Ocean. Venice proposed a reduction of duties on
trans-Egyptian trade, the excavation of a canal
connecting the Red Sea and the Mediterranean,
the persuasion of the princes of India not to
deal with the Portuguese so that they would not
be forced to submit to them someday, but Venice
refused to play an active role in this new world
economic struggle, because it did not want to
make an enemy of Portugal. In 1508, the Egyptian
fleet defeated the Portuguese fleet under the
command of Almida near the Island of Dio in the
Indian Ocean after crossing the Red Sea but was
defeated at another battle in 1509. The
Portuguese managed to seize Jawa in India, but
failed to conquer Aden because of the resistance
of the Yemenites. Al-Ghouri, the Sultan of
Egypt, sent a naval expedition to Yemen to
reinforce Arab centres there. But this campaign
endeavoured to seize the cities of Yemen itself.
While thus occupied, it learnt of the defeat of
Al-Ghouri and his death and the Ottoman
occupation of Syria and Egypt. The activity of
Egypt and its schemes in the Red Sea were over,
and the Ottoman Empire, which occupied the whole
of the Arabian Peninsula, replaced it.
The Portuguese had controlled the ports of the
Red Sea situated on the western coast and the
Gulf of Aden, Sawaken, Massawa, Zeila’a and
Barbara, Alvarez, who headed the Portuguese
mission to Habasha, converted the mosque of
Massawa into a church in 1520. The Portuguese
army, which came to aid the king of Habasha
against the conquests of Imam Ahmad lbn
Ibraheem, the prince of Hara, landed at the
Eritrean port of Zula. Then it penetrated into
the Habasha plateau, where it contributed to the
defeat of the Imam. The Ottomans saw in the
Portuguese control of the strategic centers on
the trade routes in the Red Sea, which were
close to the Islamic holy places in Hijaz a
threat to their interests. The Portuguese
worked through their alliance with Habasha on
reinforcing their military and commercial
presence in the basin of the Red Sea and
securing European trade with the east around the
Cape of Good Hope and removing it from Egypt and
Syria. The Ottomans equipped a fleet under the
command of Sinan Pasha, who battled the
Portuguese fleet under the command of the Juan
de Castro before the coasts of Massawa in I554
and defeated it. Then they liquidated the
Portuguese positions along the coasts of the Red
Sea and built fortresses there. In I557, the
Ottoman Turks occupied the port of Massawa. The
natives cooperated with the Turks and with the
merchants of Katalan, the rivals of the Portuge,
who built trader ships in Zeila’a in Somaliland
for the purpose of expelling the Portuguese
whose rule was marked by savagery and
fanaticism. However, the control of the
Portuguese and the other European nations of the
trade of the east across the Cape of Good Hope
deprived the Red Sea of its economic importance
as an international waterway. Then the Ottoman
control became nominal and the movement of trade
and building on the barren coasts of the Red Sea
was reduced to the lowest level during the next
three centuries until it was revived with the
opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The French
campaign under Napoleon Bonaparate came to Egypt
at the end of the eighteenth century, and
thought of connecting the waters of the two
seas, the Red Sea and the Mediterranean by means
of a direct canal between them. France sought to
undermine England in India and subsequently
control the trade of the Far East with Europe.
At this point, Britain strove to expel France
from Egypt, and affirm its control over the
Indian Ocean and the Red Sea in Aden and Breem,
which are considered the southern keys of the
Red Sea. This factor remained a vital factor in
guiding British policy for a century and a half
into monopolizing and controlling the routes of
world trade and the people who live along these
routes, if need be.
The Colonist Struggle in the Basin of the Red
Sea after the Opening of the Suez Canal
The excavation of the Suez Canal was an
important turning point in the history of the
Red Sea, of world trade and of colonialism. All
the colonialist states, France, Italy, Britain
and others, tried to obtain naval posts for the
storage of coal, provisions and supplies to
cater to the needs of their ships on the new
transport route between East and West. These
stations developed into important bases. They
were the English Aden, the French Obock and the
Italian Asseb, and were the beginnings of
European Colonialism and its centres in the Red
Sea.
England occupied Aden in 1839 after an unequal
battle of its inhabitants. For it, Aden was a
citadel that controls the Indian Ocean and a
focal point on the naval route to the
Mediterranean in addition to its being an
important centre for expansion in the southern
Arabian Peninsula, in Somaliland and in east
Africa, especially since England was able to use
this base to deal with the leaders of Habasha as
their high country afforded it a position from
which it could supervise the Nile Valley in case
of trouble. This was what happened when it
waged its famous campaign under Lord Napier, who
made Aden his supply depot and marched through
the Eritrean port of Zula to the Habasha PDF
Created with plateau where he rescued the
imprisoned British consul after killing the king
of Habasha, Theodore, and defeating his army in
1869 A.D., the year in which the Suez canal was
opened. England sent an emissary from Aden to
the king of ‘Shoa, one of the provinces of
Habasha. He made a treaty with him stipulating
that no duties would be imposed on English goods
entering Habasha in excess of five percent of
their value, and in which the king of Shoa
undertook to keep the trade routes open and
facilitate the travel of Englishmen in the
region. In 1882, England gained control of the
Somali port of Berbera, in which there was an
Egyptian garrison and which was nominally under
the Ottoman state. This was accomplished after
the British authorities in Aden sent Major
Hunter with fifty soldiers as personal guards.
Turkey objected to the British occupation and
the Egyptian Pasha refused to evacuate his
garrison, but England turned down the Turkish
demands, evacuated the Egyptian garrisons from
Berbera and Zeila’a and saw to it that a British
colony was established under the name of “The
British Somaliland” in the part racing Aden.
The Somaliland people, led by the great fighter,
Mohamad Abdullah Hassan, revolted. The struggle
lasted for twenty years during which the British
tasted the bitterness of defeat more than once.
But the British Empire, in complicity with
Habasha and Italy, managed to field large forces
in this region, which caused the weakening of
the civil resistance and then the destruction of
its military forces.
Just as England expanded its territory using
Aden as a base, so did France, on its part,
expand by starting with Obok, on the coast
racing Aden, as a base for its future operations
in this region. So, it sent a warship with
orders to stay in that port, and landed some
troops as a garrison on the coast. Its commander
enjoyed the same power as a political resident,
that is, the same powers enjoyed by the British
representative in Aden. The French government
signed a deal with a company to build a coal
depot in Obok. Moreover, it issued orders to
French ships passing through the strait of Bab
el Mendeb to obtain coal from this new base.
France’s man in the region was Lagar who was
chosen for the post of “commandant” and who was
quite active. This official drew the attention
of his government to the necessity of occupying
that part of the coast which would allow for the
establishing of a French colony, and to the
necessity of contact with the interior and the
attempt to benefit from the trade of Harar and
Shoa.
It was only natural that he would first of all
eye ‘Tajura’; where the interior caraval trails
begin. He began contacting chiefs all along the
coast, but he was forced not to go to ‘Tajura’
before the Egyptians left it. So he sent a ship
to ‘Ras Ali’, the summer port of Tajura on April
27, 1884. The French manipulated Ibrahim
Muhammad; the Tajura minister who accompanied
them on this trip, who did not want to let the
English occupy his country after the departure
of the Egyptians.
The French hovered around the area, approached
the place on which the English flag was
fluttering, and informed the local chief that
the port of ‘Ras Ali’ had become theirs and they
would be back in a few days to occupy it.
Naturally, the Egyptian officials in the area
quickly informed their government and asked for
reinforcements. PDF Created with The French
manipulated the Sheikhs and the local chiefs.
Lagar made a treaty with Sultan Ahmad, the
Sultan of Tajura on 21/9/ 1884, which gave
France the right to protect the lands stretching
from ‘Ras Ali’ to ‘Qubbat al Kharab’. The Sultan
undertook not to make any treaty or agreement
with a foreign government without the consent of
the French commander of Obok, in return for
which France was to pay a hundred Riyals a month
to the Sultan and eighty Riyals to his minister.
British authorities in Cairo were apprehensive
about an armed clash with the French in Tajura,
so it councilled the withdrawal of the Egyptians
from it; the governor was informed of this as an
order issued by the Khedive’s government. The
Danakils succeeded in forcing the small garrison
out of Tajura into Zeila’. The Sultan gained
control of the city, the French came and
officially announced its annexation and greeted
it with a salvo of guns. England did not mind
the coming of Jibuti into the sphere of French
influence, since it was more occupied with
trading with inside the continent than with
supplying Aden. England left that France needed
Jibuti the way it needed Zeila and Berbera. The
French ambassador in London exchanged two
letters with the British foreign secretary on
February 2nd and February 8th,
1888, concerning the agreement drawn between the
two countries concerning their interests in
Somaliland.
Thus, both France and England succeeded in using
their naval bases for colonialist expansion on
the navigational route across the Red Sea.
Jibuti was declared capital of what was called
French Somalialand. At a time when the age of
colonialism has faded in the world, France still
holds on to this colony to preserve its
strategic and economic, interests and to tend
Ethiopian interests, as Jibuti is connected to
Addis Ababa by a railway which was built seventy
years ago, and carries half the flow of
Ethiopian trade, in spite of the rightful demand
of the Somaliland for national independence,
exploiting tribal dissension between the tribes
of Afar and Issa to the point that it changed
the name of the region into the province of
”Afar and Issa”.
The Egyptian Khedivate in Eritrea
When the Wahabite revolution arose and the
rights of Ottoman sovereignty over Hijaz were
imperilled, the Sublime Porte charged his ’Wali’
in Egypt with quelling the revolution. When
Ibrahim lbn Mohammad Ali triumphed over the
Wahabis, Sultan Mahmoud II appointed him Pasha
of Jeddah in July 1820 in recompense for his
services. It was thus that Egypt came to have a
kind of sovereignty over the western coast of
the Red Sea. But this sovereignty was indirect,
in addition to being nominal.
When the Syrian wars and the intervention of the
European states to settle the Egyptian-Ottoman
problem forced the Pasha of Egypt to evacuate
the Arabian Peninsula and recall his forces in
i840, the sublime Porte regained his direct
influence on the provinces overlooking both: the
African and Asian coasts of the Red Sea, which
had been occupied by the Egyptian forces. So,
the authority of the Sultan was consolidated
anew in the province of Hijaz, and Turkey
regained its direct sovereignty over Sawaken and
Massawa on the western coast of the Red Sea
through the Ottoman ’Wali’ in Hijaz.
Soon, the Khedival government resumed its claim
of the right of sovereignty over the western
coast of the Red Sea. After many efforts with
the Sublime Porte, the latter consented PDF
Created with on 3/5/1865 to remove the port of
Massawa from the jurisdictions of the Jeddah
government and place it directly under the reign
of the ‘Wali’ of Egypt. On 11/5/1865, Sawaken
was conceded to Egypt too. On 11/5/1865, the
Sublime Porte issued a decree (Firman) giving
Egypt townships of Massawa, Sawaken and their
dependencies. Ismail Sadek Pasha headed for
Massawa to assume control of them, and Hassan
Ra’fat Bey was appointed mayor. On 30/4/ 1866,
Massawa was taken over in a ceremony in which
the decree (Firman) of concession was read in
the presence of town officials and notables.
In March, 1866, the Egyptian government
purchased the ownership rights for the province
of ’Ad’ from the ”Bashtri Bros. Co.” for 5834
guineas so that Egypt would have a completely
free hand on the western coast of the Red Sea.
The Egyptian fleet in the Red Sea under Jamali
Bey consisted of eight ships. This fleet had
stations equipped to receive it and supply its
requirements along the African coast up to the
furthest point east of the gulf of Aden.
The Italian Landing at Asseb and the Founding of
the Colony of Eritrea
The Egyptians were controlling the western coast
of the Red Sea when the Italians started to
follow the example of the English and the
French; they purchased Asseb at the end of 1869
from Sultan Ibrahim through the missionary,
Father Sabito. The activity of the Italians
provoked protests from the Egyptian governments
against them. The Italian government was
entertaining the hope that, after the opening of
the Suez Canal for world navigation, it would
establish a commercial post on the coast of the
bay of Asseb to help increase Italian trade
between East and West across the Red Sea and the
Suez Canal.
Sherif Pasha, the Egyptian foreign secretary,
informed Di Martino, the Italian consul, on
May 27th, 1870, that the Khedive was extremely
hurt and surprised at the Italian occupation of
Asseb, and had ordered him to lodge protests
against that explicit aggression on the
integrity of Egyptian territory.
Besides the positive desire of Italian
capitalists to search for new regions in which
to invest their money, security reasons were
pushing the Italian government into searching
for new overseas colonies. The southern
provinces of Italy on account of the bad
clerical rule and despotism of landowners had
become a stamping ground for associations of
bandits and criminals, which motivated Italian
politicians in the sixties of the nineteenth
century into trying to seek overseas colonies to
utilize them as an exile for these criminals.
Italy negotiated with Portugal and then with
Denmark and Belgium and others to purchase some
islands in the Atlantic Ocean, the Indians Ocean
and others, but if it did not achieve any
noteworthy success. It also failed to obtain
colonies in North Africa. So Signior Manchini,
the Italian foreign secretary, started to focus
his attention on the western coast of the Red
Sea; it was then that he made his famous
statement: ”The keys of the Mediterranean are
found in the Red Sea”.
Father Juseppi Sabito talked Signior Raphaeli
Rubattino, the director of Rubattino Navigation
Company, one of the biggest navigation companies
in Italy at the time, into establishing a
navigation route between Venice and the ports of
India and China via the Suez Canal and the Red
Sea and establishing a fuel supply station in
the Red Sea. The Italian government approved of
charging Father Sabito with this mission and
sent Admiral Acton to accompany him in
accomplishing his mission.
On November 15th, 1869, the missionary Sabito
made an agreement with the two Sheikhs of the
’Ad Ali’ tribe, Sultan Hassan lbn Ahmad, and
Sultan Ibrahim Ibn Ahmad, under the terms of
which he bought an area on the western coast of
the Red Sea between Mt. Janja and Mt. Luma for
15000 Riyals (Maria Theresa) so as to use it as
a refuge for the ships of Rubatino company that
would provide them with coal.
In March 1870, he made another agreement with
Sultan Abdullah Sheheim, the viceroy of the
Sultan of Rahita in Asseb, Sheikh Burhan
Muhammad, Sultan Hassan Ibn Ahmad, and Sultan
Ibrahim Ahmad by which he got Janja. On the
third day following the signing of this
agreement, that is, on March I3th, 1870, Sabito
hoisted the Italian flag over this region of the
coast of Asseb. Thus, the Italian flag fluttered
for the first time on the western coast of the
Red Sea. Sabito seized the opportunity of his
presence in Asseb to build a small, simple,
wooden house to use it as an office for the
Rubatino Company. When Sultan Abu Bakr
Ibraheem, the ruler of Zeila’, knew of these
agreements made by the Italian ’Christians’ with
the Sultan of Asseb, he protested against this,
and he said that this region was under the
Islamic Ottoman government. The natives
conceived of Turkey as a state representing all
Moslems and did not feel hostile towards it.
The increase of European influence and its
permeation of the affairs of the Egyptian
administration entailed the setting up of a kind
of ”international guardianship” over Egypt.
Italy maintained its occupation of the Egyptian
centres in Beylul, Barassouli and Ad amid
Egyptian protests and crowned it with the
occupation of Massawa on February 5th 1885. It
was encouraged by Britain which was extremely
apprehensive of the Mahdis capturing the ports
of this coast. It saw in Italy’s expanding its
territories at the expense of Egyptian
territories on the coast of the Red Sea a
catalyst in the British attempt to crush the
Mahdi revolution on one hand, and checking the
desire of the French to extend their influence
over East Africa, on the other hand. Contact
between the two governments was established via
their consuls in Cairo, Signior di Martino and
Lord Cromer. The landing of the Italian forces
at Massawa lasted about four hours, from 3 P.m.
to 7 p.m. The Italian forces immediately
occupied the strategic positions on the island,
and the Italian flag was hoisted. General Jini
was determined to dispose of the Egyptian
garrison at Massawa under the command of Izzat
Bey so as to effect Italian military occupation
of the region. So, in December 1885, the remains
of the Egyptian garrison were forced to leave
Massawa for Egypt.
On April 10th, 1885, the ship ”Esploratori”
landed at Arafli. There, Italian soldiers
immediately disembarked into the port and
hoisted the Italian flag over ”Arafli” castle,
inspite of the protests of the Egyptian Officer
Bakhit Othman, the commander of the garrison,
who was expelled along with his garrison on the
following day. Land forces marched towards the
south of Massawa and occupied, in addition to
Arafli, Harkiko, Zula, Madar, Ad, and the
Hawakil islands.
On June 2nd, 1889, the Italian forces under
Major de Mayo occupied the city of Keren and
hosted the Italian flag over it. On August 3rd,
1889, Major de Mayo managed to occupy Asmara and
later Kara on August I7th, 1889. He also
occupied a large part of the provinces of Serae
and Akkele Guazi.
On January 1st, 1890, king Humbert I, king of
Italy, issued a royal Italian decree
establishing the Italian colony of Eritrea after
uniting the various provinces on the Red Sea and
the highlands occupied by the Italian Army. The
Italian government appointed general Oreiro as
the first governor general of Eritrea.
The sporadic popular resistance, which lasted
for fifteen years, was quelled with extreme
ruthlessness under a martial law known as the
law of ”Pacification and Security”. Italy filled
the jails of Nakhra islands with the leaders of
the national movement most of whom died of
Malaria and malnutrition.
As for the Sudanese ports, Sawaken and Port
Sudan, they fell under British occupation with
the defeat of the Mahdi.
The attempts made by the fanatical Ethiopian
emperor John IV to seize Massawa and Keren
failed after Britain had abandoned its promise
of these regions to him in return for his
participation in its colonialist war against
Mahdism in Sudan. John was killed at the hands
of the Mahdis at the battle of Matma on the
Sudanese borders in 1889 A.D.
The Beja Kingdoms in the Middle Ages
Who are the Beja?
Historically, the Beja are a subdivision of the
division of eastern Hamitic peoples who, more
than 4000 years before the birth of Christ,
settled in the region extending from Asswan in
the south of Egypt up to outskirts of the
Eritrean plateau and the plains of Massawa
parallel to the coasts of the Red Sea and into
the heart of the Sudan to Atbara parallel to the
Nile. The name of Beja was mentioned in Homer’s
”Iliad” as they were also mentioned by the
famous historian, Herodotus. The tablets of the
ancient Egyptians, the books of the Romans, and
the records of Ezana, the king of Aksum were not
devoid of the mention of the name Beja. This is
due to the wars and treaties that characterized
their relations with their neighbours.
PDF Created with Cush, which the ancient
Egyptians gave to the people that lived south of
the Nile, included them. The Hebrews mentioned
it in the Torah as Cush, one of the sons of Ham
lbn Noah. The Habashite inscriptions mentioned
it in the form Cassu. The Cushites are among the
elements which settled Habasha, and they speak
special, non Semitic languages which researchers
call Cushitic languages or Hamitic languages.
They are one of the three main elements that
make up the peoples of Habasha. Al Massoudi
defines them in his book, as follows:
”The Beja are a people who settled between the
Kalzam Sea (the Red Sea) and the Nile of Egypt
and proliferated into divisions. They placed a
king at their head, and there is gold metal and
emerald in their land. Many Arabs from Rabeea’
lbn Nizar lbn Ma’ad lbn Adnan settled in that
land.
They intermarried with the Beja and the Beja
were strengthened with this intermarrying with
Rabeea’, and the latter were augmented with the
Beja against enemies and neighbours from Khahtan
and other from Muiz lbn Nizar who inhabited
those parts. Their leader in our time, 332
Higri, is Abu Marwan Bishr lbn Ishaq, who is
from Rabeia’ and who rides at the head of three
thousands from Rabeia’ and its allies of Egypt
and Yemen and thirty thousand mounted Beja
lancers from the Hadariba, who, alone among the
Beja, are Moslems, while the remaining Beja are
pagans worshipping an idol of theirs”.
Why did the Beja Waves surge
towards the South?
It is a historical fact that the peoples of
North East Africa, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somaliland
and Kenya were formed by the continuous
migrations of the Hamitic peoples or those
Semitic peoples who followed them. Migration
from north to south continued for thousands of
years. This is basically due to the security
factor and the economic factor. Old ruins
indicate that the Beja tribes used to raid the
Nile Valley, pillage and loot and then return
with their booty to their desert habitat. The
Egyptians used to send detachments to that
desert. Sinfiro was the first Egyptian king to
subjugate the Beja tribes in 2720 B.C. He came
back from his incursions with seven thousand
captives of men and women and 200000 heads of
livestock. For thousands of years the Pharohs
ruthlessly exploited the Beja putting them to
work gold mines each time they managed to
subjugate them. The Roman historian Viveskus
describes how the Beja entered into an alliance
with Queen Zennobia, the famous queen of Palmyra
in Syria, against the Romans and invaded Egypt
until they approached Suhaj, but the Roman
commander, Bruce, defeated them and captured a
great many of them. Wars went on indecisively
between the Romans and the Beja until the Arabs
conquered Egypt in the seventh century A.D.
The Beja entered into an alliance with the
Romans against the Arabs. Their king, Masmasuh
sent fifty thousand soldiers who fought the
Arabs fiercely. But this southern Beja aid was
not a vital factor in deciding the outcome of
the battle; Amr lbn Al-Ass managed to defeat the
allied army on account of the reinforcements
sent him by the Caliph Omar lbn Al-Khattab, and
with that he accomplished the occupation of
Egypt. PDF Created with The Nubian Christian
kingdom had entered this alliance, which is why
relations were not good between the Arab state
of Egypt and the kingdoms of Nubia and Beja.
These relations were characterized by wars and
raids, which led to a surge of mass migrations
of pastoral tribes southward. These tribes
overran the cities of the Red Sea coasts, most
important among which was Adulis, and finally
settled on the Eritrean plateau and Habasha
(Abysinnia) where they were assimilated into the
Semitic cultural framework.
The Beja Kingdoms in Eritrea
In his discussions of the Beja invasion of
Eritrea, British historian Ullendorff says in
”The Ethiopians”, P. 59: ”In the eighth century
A.D., the Beja tribes invaded Barakah Valley and
the slopes of the Eritrean plateau. They
subjugated parts of the province of Hamasein and
the coastal plains at a time when the kingdom of
Aksum had descended to its nadir. The graves of
Beja tribes have been found in the heart of the
Eritrean plateau, which shows deep penetration.
The Beja managed to occupy the coats of the Red
Sea and settled in Massawa about 75o A.D. ”
The Arab historian, Al Yaa’coubi, describes
condition of the regions overrun by the Beja by
saying: ’It seems that there were many kingdoms
in the regions controlled by the Beja between
the Nile and the Red Sea, each with its own
king’. Al Yaa’coubi mentions the names of
places which were still standing, which proves
the wideness of Beja influence. We learn from
the Arab historian, Al Massoudi that the Beja
used to mine gold from sites close to Massawa.
The Beja control over the Eritrean highlands
only weakened after the migration of the Agau
tribes from Lasta in the heart of the Ethiopian
plateau, and after the rule of Habasha had
passed from the Zague dynasty to the Solomonid
dynasty in I270 A.D., when the Belin tribes
managed to impose their hegemony over the parts
formerly controlled by the Beja tribes on the
Eritrean plateau”.
When lbn Hawkal visited the lands of the Beja a
thousand years ago, he found it divided into
five kingdoms each with its own borders and
authority. Three of these kingdoms lay within
the present Eritrean borders, and two within the
Sudanese borders. The three were: i ) the
kingdom of Baklein, which lay between the
depression of Baraka and the coast of the Red
Sea adjacent to the kingdom of Jarein;
2)
the kingdom of Jarein on the southern coast up to Mt. Rora (Bakla) near
Nakfa, the capital of the coast province, and
3)
the kingdom of Kita which extends from Nakfa up to Samhar (Massawa).
As for the other two kingdoms, the kingdoms of
Nakes and Bazein, they extended beyond Asswan
southward to outskirts of the Eritrean
boundaries, though the region did not know the
partitions of the present borders which were
erected at the end of the nineteenth century by
the colonialist European powers.
Al Yaa’coubi mentioned around 891 A.D. that the
biggest city in the Beja kingdoms was called
Hagar. These kingdoms consisted of tribes and
subdivisions of these tribes as it was PDF
Created with with the Arabs; of these are the
Hadareb, the Hubab, Al-Amrar Mansa’ etc.... In
that land there was gold, jewels and emerald.
They were Moslems who worked in prospecting. Al
Ya’acoubi proceeded to say, ”The second kingdom
in the land of the Beja is called Baklein, which
includes many cities. Their religion is similar
to that of the Magi. They call God almighty (The
Highest Zabheer) and they call the devil (Hujaj
Haraka). They pluck their beards and practice
circumcision and their country is without rain.
The fourth kingdom is called Jarein and is ruled
by a formidable king, whose kingdom extends
between a place called Badei, which on the coast
of the greater sea up to Baraka in the kingdom
of Baklein and a place Al Dajaj. These people
extract their incisors. The fifth kingdom is
Kita’a or Kita extending from Badei to Feicon”.
In the same book, Al Yaa’coubi says that Hager,
which is a twenty five days’ march away from the
town of Alagi, is the Capital of the Beja
Hadareb. Al Ya’acoubi adds that it was a post
frequented by Moslem merchants. Al Makrizi
stated that Hager is the residence of the Beja
leader, and it is situated furthermost in the
island of the Beja. The Italian historian,
Count di Rossini, attempted to associate Hager
with Abai Najran. The Swiss explorer,
Munzinger, says that it lies on latitude 16, 37
North. If we compare what was said about this
city in different sources, we will find that
this is the city of Um Hager, which is situated
on the river Sitit in Eritrea. It is also noted
that on the far end of the Northern plateau of
Rura Habab there is a place which is today
called Hagar. What lbn Hawkal mentioned about
the Beja province can be summed up in that
cotton, wool and different kinds of livestock
merchants used to come there on their way to the
Nile or the Red Sea. He also described Kaa’lib
and Baraka valley. He indicated the presence of
animals such as elephants, giraffes, rhinoceros
and other wild elephants. He stated that the
waters of the Nile flowed to the land of
’Dakkan’ where corn and wheat were planted. The
Baraka rift was inhabited by many tribes such as
Bazein and Barey. He explained that Djin was a
series of connected villages. In the middle of
the valley there was Taflein, which also
consisted of desert villages ruled over by a
Moslem Arabic speaking king who was vassal of
the ruler of the Christian ’Alwa’. (P. 94 first
para) This survey of the works of Al Yaa’coubi
(end of the nineteenth century), lbn Hawkal (end
of the tenth century) and Al Dimashki (in the
thirteenth century A.D.) reveals to us that
though lbn Hawkal presented detailed information
of value and significance, all three concurred
in that the word ’Medinah’ (city actually means
’Mamlaka’ (Kingdom). The kingdom of Baklein,
mentioned by Al Yaacoubi as the second kingdom,
is actually the city of Taficin mentioned by the
Damascene lbn Hawkal. It is probable that this
mistake which changed the /t/ into a /b/ and the
/f/ into a /q/ is due to an error of
transcription. It is noteworthy that lbn Hawkal
explained that the land of Djin, which is
presently known as the depression of Al Gash,
consisted of a series of connected villages and
was a land of agriculture and livestock. He
stated that in the middle of the valley, that
is, the side which lay between Djin river and
the depression of Baraka, was the city of
Taflein which also consisted of villages, only
in these were desert villages. He added that
they had a Moslem king and that there were many
Moslems in region.
This means that the region also included the
basin of Djin and its inhabitants who worked in
agriculture, which shows that their life was
settled and related to the land. As for the
second part, it was inhabited by pastoral
communities that lived in the desert; their
animals were camels and cattle. The Djin basin
communities raised thoroughbreds. It is
necessary that we mention that the region needs
wide research, especially since this province
was exposed to internal wars, tribal invasions
of groups which came from Habasha, the north and
the Arabian Peninsula across the Red Sea to the
African coast, on which lies the region under
study.
The Treaty of the Beja Leader
with the Islamic State
The Beja kingdoms did not unite into a
centralized kingdom due to the pastoral nature
of the Beja, but the tribal bond was not
completely severed. This is attested to by the
pledge made by the Beja leader, Maknoun lbn
Abdul Aziz, in the name of all the Beja,
defining their lands from Asswan to Massawa, the
zone on which their kingdoms stood. Arabic
historical narratives relate that when the Beja
attack intensified on the countryside of Egypt
in the early third century (Higri), the ’Wali’
of Asswan reported the matter to the prince of
faithful, Al Mamum lbn Haroun Al Rashid. The
latter ordered Abdullah lbn Al Jahm in 216
Higri’ (831 A.D.) to fight them. The wars went
on inconclusively until they made a truce and
the second treaty with the Arab was drawn up.
Here is its text:
”This is the address of Abdulla Ibn Al Jahm, the
vassal of the prince of the Faithful, to Maknoun
lbn Abdul Aziz, the leader of the Beja in
Asswan. We have agreed on what you offered me
and the conditions in my address. That the plain
of your land and its mountain from the border of
Asswan in the land of Egypt, to the border
between Dahlak and Bade (Massawa) be the
property of Mamoun Abdullah ibn Haroun Al
Rasheed, the Prince of the Faithful, may God
give him greatness.
And that you and all the people of your land be
his slaves, but you will remain as you are,
king of the Beja, provided you pay him tribute
every rear, the same as your Beja forerunners
did, which will be a hundred camels and three
hundred dinars and this is up to the Prince of
the Faithful
96-97 missing
to the Arkouit region in the east of Sudan.
The mountains of Hager are inhabited by Bert
Awad Bani Amer, at it was there that the Bani
Muala tribe sought refuge when it was
discomfited by the attacks of the sons of Hasri,
who overcame Bani Muala in these mountains and
destroyed their power. The Beja, according to
established norm, used to take half the produce
from those Arabs who worked in metals. Of this
they paid four hundred ’mithkals’ of unprocessed
gold dust.
Resumption of the War Between the
Beja and the Abbasid State
In the history of Al Tabari, it is stated that
the Beja left their country for the land of gold
and jewels. There, they killed many Moslems who
used to work in gold and gemmining and captured
many of their women and children. They announced
that the precious metals in their country were
theirs and they would not allow Moslems into
their country. This astonished all those Moslems
who worked in the precious metal industry, so
they left for fear of their lives. Thus, the
Sultan was deprived of his fifth of the gold and
silver produce. The Abbasid Caliph, Al
Mutawakkel, decided to fight the Beja, so he
appointed one of his men, Mohammad lbn Abdullah
Al Kummi (from the Persian city of Al Khum) over
the mining region in that land.
He wrote Anbasa lbn Ishaq Alinbi, the commander
of his forces in Egypt ordering him to give Al
Kummi all the soldiers he needed. Anbasa marched
to the land of the Beja and he was joined by all
the people who worked in the precious metals
industry and numerous volunteers. Altogether he
had twenty thousand men of cavalry and infantry.
Then he sent via the Kalzam Sea (The Red Sea)
seven ships laden with flour, oil, dates, corn
and barley and ordered the captains of the ships
to meet him on the coast in the land of the
Beja. Al Kummi marched on till he passed the
gold mine region. He was met by the king of the
Beja, ‘Ali Baba’ or ‘Albab’ and his son. ‘Feyas’
at the head of a great army. The fighting went
on for several days in the form of skirmishes.
The Beja king kept the fighting on a small scale
so that the war would linger and consume the
enemy’s provisions and fodder until they would
starve enabling the Beja to capture them.
The provisions were exhausted, but the ships had
arrived at a port called Sanja, probably between
Sawaken and Massawa. The war went on
inconclusively until the men under Al Kummi
thought of attaching bells and chains to their
horses’ necks and attacked the camels which were
terrified by the din. They fled with their
riders into the mountain and the valleys until
nightfall. This at the beginning of year 241
(Higri). A few days later, the king’s delegate
came asking for a truce. Al Kummi, who had won
the king’s crown, vouched him safety and gave
him back the land which he had occupied,
provided he pay the tribute arrears. Al Kummi,
accompanied by King Ali Baba, who appointed his
son, Feyas, regent in his absence, returned to
the Caliph Al Mutawakkel in the city of ’Sirra
Man Ra’a’ in Iraq.
Al Mutawakkel bestowed on him silken robes,
recognized his complete control on the road
between Egypt and Mecca and appointed Sa’ad Al
Atiakhi as his representative in their land. He
also put a black turban (the emblem of the
Abbasids) on Ali Baba’s head instead of the
crown. Ali Baba was accompanied on his journey
by seventy Beja youths armed with pikes and
dressed in the costume which represented Beja
chivalry. They became the center of general
attention as they stood before the Caliph’s
palace. Ali Baba returned still adhering to his
religion; he carried with him an idol in the
likeness of a boy to which he prayed. It is
known that the Beja adhered to their paganism
until later ages - they resisted Christianity
while their neighbours in the kingdoms of Nubia,
Meroe and Habasha embraced it. They resisted
Islam until they embraced it through several
centuries and in a slow process that lasted
until the early fifteenth century A. D.
The Demoninance of the Balu Tribe Among the Beja
King Ali Baba belonged to the Bali tribe, which
was called in Beja language (Baluib) and in
Tigre (Balu). This tribe dominated the Beja for
a long time. It was mentioned synonymously with
the Beja in some old books and maps. The Balu
tribe claim an Abbasid origin, but Al
Kalkashandi says in ”Subh Al Aa’sha” that the
Balia tribe were the descendants of Bali lbn Al
Hafi lbn Quda ’Ibn Himyar. Quda’ had been a king
of Shahar land in Yemen and his people were
called Baluie. Georgy Zeidan says that Bali and
Juheina were the western part of the Quda
branches, and that they crossed the Red Sea and
settled between the Egyptian countryside and
Habasha where they propagated. When their reign
was displaced by the Bishari, Amarar, Hudondoa,
Abani Amer tribes, they established a kingdom in
Massawa on the coast of Eritrea in 965 Higri (I
557 A.D.).
Ibn Khaldoun says: ”They crossed to the western
coast of the Red Sea, and spread between the
Egyptian countryside and Habasha and dominated
the other nations. They overwhelmed Nubia,
undermined their unity and abolished their
reign. The fought Habash (Abassinia) and
defeated it and they also harassed the
Egyptians”. Actually, a great number of the
inhabitants of the Eritrean highlands and the
Habasha (Abyssinia) plateau claim kinship with
the ’Balu Kalu-Talu” tribes.
Probably, the last two names are those of two
small branches of the Balu tribes. According to
local tradition, these were brother tribes.
Local sources say that it was the Balu tribes
which led the Beja advance on the Ethiopian
plateau in the eighth century A.D.. Mr.
Mouhammad Saleh Darar says in ”The History of
Sudan - The Red Sea - The Beja Province” that
the Balu tribes were the first to bring Arabic
into Africa. When their linguistic Arabism was
lost with the passage of time, they adopted Beja
language. Shucair Beyk says in his history: ”If
you want to ask a Beja about his knowledge of
Arabic, you should relate it to Bali and say:
’/baluit tektin/’ which means ’Do you know the
language of Bali’ meaning the Arabic language.
Bishr lbn Marwan lbn Ishaq of the Balu tribe,
whose mother was from Rabeia, was one of a
number of Beja princes and kings who where
famous in the middle ages. The princes of this
house extended their influence over the Beja
tribes up to the boundaries of Egypt and Habasha
(Abyssinia), though they were formally appointed
by Egypt. The Prince of the Beja was surnamed
the ’Hadaribite’, which is the other name of the
Balu. Letters sent him by the Sultanic Cabinets
were addressed until the early nineteenth
century as follows: ”The Hadaribite Princely
High Council”.
Al Kalkashandi said in ”Subh Al A’asha” that
Prince Samra lbn Malek was the ruler of the Beja
in the reign of Al Nasser Kalawun in Egypt, and
that he was a great prince ruling over numerous
people, that he was of royal influence and used
to invade Habasha and the peoples of the Sudan.
The origin of Djin Kingdom and its borders
The western coast of Eritrea was known as Djin
provinces in the middle ages. This province
included the Zhaheir region on the coast of the
Red Sea and Al Gash basin. We do not know the
origin of this name for certain. Some historians
believe that it was the name of groups of people
which inhabited the valley of this river, the
proof of which is that the groups which migrated
from it southward kept this name in its original
form in Mali and Nigeria. Others say that it is
the word used to designate the stone on which
the vessel was placed to cook food. Still others
say that it is derived from ’Daggan’ which means
’hill’ in the old Cushitic language.
The last probability should not be ruled out,
since this word is still used to describe the
village of ‘Harkiko’ near Massawa in a somewhat
corrupted form, ’Daggan’. Local tradition
attributes it to the Saho language, one of the
languages belonging to the Cushitic (Hamitic)
family, as the Addah tribe, a branch of the
Hamitic tribes which controlled the Eritrean
coastal area in the Middle Ages after the
historical Beja sweep over the plains of Eritrea
and the plateau of Habasha in 750 A.D.
This name is seen as /Dakkan/ in king Ezana’s
inscriptions with ’k’ instead of a ’G’. These
inscriptions, written by the king around the
middle of the fourth century A.D. before
embracing Christianity, say, according to
Litman’s translation,: King Ezana has sent three
armies, one of which is the Daggan’ army, to
fight Saran, king of Afana, to punish him for
attacking a trade caravan, killing its men and
looting its goods”. According to the Aksumite
inscription, Daggan should be a kingdom
neighbouring Aksum in one of the Eritrean
provinces, which had entered into an alliance
with the king of Aksum against a common enemy.
It established cities and promoted building in
Al Gash basin. The upper part of the river was
known as ’Ma’reb’ at its source in the Tigre
plateau and the southern Eritrean highlands, an
indication of the historic relation between the
region and its originally Semitic people, who
had migrated from Yemen as the name goes back to
the valley of Mareb and its famous dam. Its
lower part was known as ’Djin’ river. The later
part is presently called Al Gash basin. The
waters of the river are seasonal for three
months annually when the waters reach the town
of Kasla in the Sudan in July.
The region was dominated by the leadership of Al
Kash, which started in the south at the entry of
Setit river including a large part of eastern
and western Eritrea. Because of the lack of
original sources, it is not easy to form a clear
picture of the eastern and western borders. The
fact which we can deduce from the course of
events in the region in the Islamic age is that
it was exposed to continuous raids on account of
the tribal advance which pushed the tribes from
Habasha (Abyssinia) and Eritrea towards the
basin of the middle Nile Valley as will be
detailed later.
The province included two different zones; the
first included Djin Valley, and the other
included a semi-desert zone in the east
extending from the river basin to the coast of
the Red Sea, which was used for grazing during
the rainy season, as is the case now. It is
clear that the human and natural environment of
this basis has gone through consecutive
developments, some of which are very remote in
time such as the movements of the crust of the
earth and the climatic changes that came upon
the heels of these developments. It is believed
that this river was in the relatively recent
past one of the tributaries of the river of
Atbara; the link between them was severed
because the waters of this river flow in a
certain season each year, which exposed the
course that connected them to the process of
sedimentation caused by seasonal winds.
The human environment of this zone also suffered
changes. The aboriginal inhabitants of AlGash
basin were Nilotic races which had settled the
region more than five thousand years before.
With the coming of the nomadic Beja, the Nilotic
inhabitants were pushed into the less fertile
mountains, while the former controlled the
plains and settled them. It is probable that the
current Barya and Baza tribes are related by
kinship to these ancient peoples. The tablet of
Ezana, king of Aksum, in the fourth century
A.D., which was found by the archeologist
Anoltam, mentions the Barya, the Beja the Hasa
and Makarto among the peoples who arose to
defend the kingdom against the aggression of the
Nubian kingdom. Ezana also mentions that after
his victory he made the seat of his kingdom
opposite ’Alhager’ city at the junction of the
Tekzi and Sirra rivers. Historians are inclined
to believe that it is the same Eritrean city of
‘Um Hager’ which lies on the river Sitit which
shows that civilization was very old in the
region.
By going back to what lbn Hawkal wrote about
Djin and comparing it with what was said in ’Al
Ya’acoub”s book, we find that lbn Hawkal
supported a lot of what was said by Al
Ya’acoubi, As for differences, lbn Hawkal
mentioned ’Tafl’ein’ instead of ’Baklein’, which
has near the Barakah depression basin. It also
seems that Djin basin described meticulously by
lbn Hawkal, was considered by Al Ya’acoubi to be
part of ’Bakiein’ or ’Taflein’. lbn Hawkal did
not refer to the kingdoms of Jarein, Kita’ and
Neteis. It seems that most or all of these
kingdoms did not survive long, disappeared or
were assimilated into more powerful tribal
groups.
It is clear from what is mentioned by lbn Hawkal
that Djin or Dign and Taflein were actually two
zones in one region under a Moslem king who was
a vassal of the Christian king of Alwa in the
Sudan. It is also clear that these zones, the
zone of Djin, for agriculture and horse
breeding, and Taflein, for grazing during the
rainfall. This reveals the social divisions; the
people of Djin were occupied with agriculture,
and those who lived in Taflein were occupied
with sheepherding in the rainy season.
This shows that leadership was in the hands of
the desert people in view of their military
superiority and their use of horses while the
people of Djin basin were on the level of
vassals. These social divisions were later
adopted by the Bani Amer tribe, but the vassal
system was on its way to extinction. The people
of the lower province of Djin basin were known
as the Matateans, according to Plinny.
It is worth mention that the Djin basin region,
currently Al Gash includes historical and
linguistic features which have not been studied
yet. Probably some of them indicate an extension
of the Meroe civilisation, as Dr. Naom Shucair
points out. As for the system of government, Ibn
Hawkal shows that the ruling house in Djin basin
developed into a hereditary sultanate, and this
dynasty was able to adjust to the course of
events. In one age we find it of vast influence
and domain, and in another we find it has
abandoned the field under pressure too strong to
be coped with. (P. 105)
What Was Stated in “The Picture of the Earth”
by Ibn Hawkal About the Kingdoms of the Djin
Basin.
After Al Kummi’s invasion, ordered by the
Caliph Al Mutwakkel, the power of the Al Alaki
kingdom weakened and their migrations headed
southward to the Baraka Valley. In his book,
”The Picture of the Earth, lbn Hwakal says:
(starting P- 50): ”After the year 245 (Higri),
the bordens of the Beja with Islam were clearly
defined. Their land is between the Nile and the
sea. Merchants trading in wool, cotton, slaves
and camels reach them. The furthest point they
can reach in their land and within which they
can conduct business is the vicinity of
’Ta’aleeb’. It is a place which has water in
valleys near a mountain known as Malaheeb, and
its biggest valley is ’Baraka valley’. Between
’Ta’aleeb’ and Baraka there are woods in which
the circumference of a tree possibly reaches 40
- 50 forty to fifty arm-lengths.
In the clearings between these trees live
elephants, giraffes, lions, rhinoceros, tigers,
leopards and other animals, moving about freely
in the jungle and avaiting themselves of its
water. Bordering on the eastern slopes of
Malaheeb is a valley known as Siwat which
abounds in water, trees and Zebras.
In the vicinity of Baraka are the Kedim tribal
families, known to the Beja as Bajat. Beyond
the sea coast there are many tribal families in
the plain and the mountain. The Nubians and
those of the Beja who are associated with them
had occupied the valleys of this mountain which
lay between the salty sea and Diggin (a
corruption of Djin as we illustrated above).
This is a land of agriculture to which flows the
water of the Nile (I), and where corn and’
millet are planted.
(I)
The Nile is used here to mean the river of Al Gash.
There are many tribes in the Baraka rift known
as Bazein and Barya (I). They are many nations
who fight hands, poisoned arrows and pikes.
Among Barya customs are the extraction of
incisors and the piercing of ears. They live in
mountains and valleys and raise cattle and sheep
and cultivate the land. The lands under the
dominion of Islam between Baraka Valley and its
mountain known as ’Malaheeb’ are Qali’b,
Anborit, the mountains of Drurit, with plentiful
water and thriving towns.
Of the Beja tribes, Livanihah is outside the
census and can not be counted because of their
penetration into the heart of the desert.
Barakah is close to Bade’ (currently Massawa)
and the name Bade’ with a light /d/ is an old
Beja name. Two thirds of Marahel are inhabited
by the Qasa’ tribal families, the greatest and
the richest of the Beja tribal families. Beneath
these are the Matites who are spread over Dahra,
Sitrab, Gurkai Dehnet up to the mountain known
as Mismar.
Next to Sawaken are tribal families known as
Rakbat (2) and Hendiba, who are Hadaribites and
their leader is Ishaq lbn Bisher, the chief of
Al Alaki, and some are under Kouk, the uncle of
Abil Kassam Hussein lbn Ali lbn Bisher. Ishaq
and Kouk are the leaders of all the Hadaribites.
(I)
These tribes still exist in the same region and have the same names.
Also the Barakah depression in western
Eritrea still bears the same name .
(2) This tribe still exists and is spread in
northern and western Eritrea. The Hadaribite
tribal families are Al Irlika, Al Sutbarwa, Al
Hutma, Al Ankira, Al Negrerwa, Al Gintika and Al
Wakhika. Each family is divided into a hundred
subdivisions PDF Created with and each
subdivision has one or two chiefs. All of these
are nomads who do not have a city. In winter,
they inhabit the coasts. In summer, they inhabit
valleys with water and pastures. In autumn,
they live close to the Nile , leaving their land
and heading westward to lands of few trees,
plentiful water and plants. Their diet is meat
and especially ’Laban’. The poor among them eat
meat of animals such as deer, ostriches and
zebras and they are nominally Moslems.
The rich among them abstain from eating game,
from mingling with those who do, and from using
the vessels of those who approve of it and
practice it, so that they won’t milk into them
or drink out of them. Their language is common
among the Beja and all of it is foreign. Some
of them have a language of their own”.
THE REVERSE MIGRATIONS FROM
DJIN BASIN TO THE SUDAN
The Expansion of the Djin Kingdom nto Walkite
Province in Habasha
Alvarez in the sixteenth century A.D. and Paez
in the seventeenth century A.D. relate almost
identical narratives. Paez said that he had
heard from an European monk that the Moslem
inhabitants of Djin kingdom have a dark
complexion, and mentioned that they were not
vassals of Habasha, but have friendly relations
with it. He added that the Djin people used to
sell horses to Al Habasha. These horses, which
were thoroughbreds, were raised in the Djin
basin.
Geovani Ayapero wrote in his diary, as quoted by
the Italian historian, Rossini, the following:
”common narratives agree to that the Balu state
ruled ’Mazja’ and a part of Walkite province in
Northern Habasha for a period of time that,
after king Baeda Meryam, lasted for about a
century. In the Waikite narratives we find a
queen of beauty, charm and wealth. She was an
invincible warrior and her name was ’Ja’wa”’.
This is a historical character about whom we
have a lot of information and documents relevant
to her age. Some of these documents are written
in Habashite, Arabic, and Portuguese. Suffices
to say that she was the sister of Sultan Mukther
and became regent on the throne after his death
and the succession of his son Mukhter junior.
Arab Fahih, in his book, “The conquest of
Habasha”, states that Imam Ahmed Ibn Ibrahim,
surnamed the ‘Gran’ or the conqueror, pushed the
negus who entered the province of Mazja and
Walkite. Sultan Mukther sent a message to the
Imam in which he said: ”Help me before the
infidels kill me”. The Imam marched on the day
he received the message to the land of Sultan
Mukther, where the infidels had laid siege and
had defeated the followers of Mukther. Then he
proceeded after the Negus accompanied by Hassan,
Mukther’s nephew, with twenty riders to show the
Imam and his army the way. Three days later,
Sultan Mukther died. His sister, Jawa,
concealed his death from the soldiers for three
days, and sent a message to the Imam informing
him of what had happened. Her messenger reached
the Imam while he was encamped beneath a
mountain at a time of rest. The Imam beat the
gongs, so the Moslems gathered and he informed
them of the message. Sultan Mukther’s son, Nafe,
succeeded on the throne. As he was only a child,
his aunt, Jawa, had been appointed regent in PDF
Created with her brother’s lifetime. The Imam
told Hassan Ibn Jawa to go back to Mazja to be
with his mother and her nephews. So he bade him
farewell and returned home. These were the
circumstances in which Iman Ahmad marched with
his army in pursuit of the negus, and in which
Sultan Mukther died in 1540 A.D.. This was also
the year in which the Al Fung house transferred
its seat of power from Lamul to its new capital,
the city of Sehar, which had been chosen before
that final move on account of its important
strategic position on the caravan routes and
river navigation.
It is noteworthy that Sultan Mukther had close
relations with the middle Nile basin as he had
many Nubians serving in his army.
Reverse Migrations
Migrations and reverse migrations of surging
human waves coming from various directions have
been a condition which has marked the land of
Eritrea throughout the ages. The dominant
direction was the north from which waves of Beja
surged whenever pressure was brought to bear on
it by Egypt’s rulers starting with the Pharohs,
then the Greeks, the Romans and lastly the
Arabs, or from the east from the Arabian
Peninsula across the Red Sea.
But the migration which concerns us here is the
migration from the Djin basin, i.e. the western
zone of Eritrea, to the east of the Sudan or
what we conventionally call reverse migration as
the migration of the Beja usually took place
from North to South and not the reverse.
This migration started at the time when the
Zague dynasty in Habasha, which had kept on good
terms with the Arab in general and the Moslems
in particular, was displaced by the Solomonid
dynasty, which was known for its hostility
towards the Arabs and the Islamic kingdoms in
Habasha since these were supporters of the Zague
dynasty, about the middle of the thirteenth
century.
The Djin basin, which was controlled by mixed
Arab Beja tribes under the leadership of the
Balu, was subjected by the new dynasty in
Habasha, the Solomonid dynasty, to military
pressures and raids that aimed at looting and
pillaging. The result of this was the migration
of sizable groups from the Djin basin in western
Eritrea to the Blue Nile basin, then the
spreading of these groups to other places in
West Africa. Some of these migrants from the
Djin basin settled in the provinces of Mali in
the region east of the Niger river-bend east of
the town of Paria Ejara. This name was corrupted
in Nigeria into Jicon; however these people
transplanted many of their customs and
traditions to the remote regions of West Africa.
Some historians are inclined to believe that the
Djin migration to the east ante-ceded the
thirteenth century. It is also believed that
they had taken a migration route before that,
and that advanced across the Savana to Chad and
from there to Niger river province. Some of them
had settled the basin of the Alikius River since
the early eleventh century A.D. It would not
be peculiar to hear about migrations which came
out of eastern Sudan and the Djin basin and
headed westward during the turbulent period
which the land of the kingdom of Meroe
experienced in the third and fourth centuries
A.D. this turbulence ended with the overthrow of
the ruling dynasty in the third century and the
ruin of the kingdom in the fourth century after
the invasion led by Ezana, king of Aksum.
The Ethiopian Raids and theIncorporation of Djin
into the Al Taka Province
However the Djin region, which comprises most of
the present Eritrea, was in most periods of
history exposed to invasions and conflicting
migrations, especially from the rulers of
Habasha, the kingdoms of Egypt or the Sudan. The
looting and pillaging raids by the rulers of
Ethiopia of the Djin basin continued for the
last seven centuries. Guzmatch Widbi, who was
the ruler of the Tigrai province and maintained
relations with France and Britain, was famous
for launching large-scale raids on the Djin
basin region. He made a large scale attack on
the region of Bukus (Keren) and Al Habab in
1844, overran the regions of Barya and Baza in
Al Kash basin, and returned with numerous spoils
and hundreds of captives whom he enslaved.
The inhabitants of the Djin basin had no
alternative but to appeal to the Khedieval
government, which they had formerly resisted
when it occupied Kassala in the Sudan, for aid.
The government mobilized great forces to fight
Widbi, defeated him and forced him back into his
mountainous kingdom. Then it incorporated the
Djin basin region into the Taka province in the
Sudan.
Languages and Religions in the Djin Basin Region
During the Middle Ages (from the seventh century
till the fifteenth century A.D.) Beja language
was the dominant language in the Beja kingdoms
in Eritrea and the Sudan. Naom Bashir, quoting
from Lipsius, says that the Beja language is the
language of the old Meroe kingdom. The German
Dr. Hess, who resided in Egypt to study the
Nubian language, confirms this statement. He
says that the Beja language is the old Meroe
language which is borne out by the fact that its
words for such things as water, fire and earth
are similar to such words in the history of
Meroe.
The Balu tribes attempted to preserve their
Arabic language among the Beja majority, but the
features of their Arabic were suppressed and the
only thing left of it was its attribution to
them in ’Baluiba’ which means Arabic.
The Beja is an unwritten language, but it is a
language of oral poetry and it is interested in
culture. Sometimes a poem reaches seventy
verses. The most wonderful of all its poetry is
the poetic competition which took place between
two poets from the Al Ujeilat and the Beit Muala
Hamasein tribes when they competed for the love
of a beautiful girl. The first praised her left
side beginning with the sole of her left foot
and ending with the left tress of her hair. The
Hamaseinean responded by beginning with her
right foot and ending with the right tress of
her hair. They were like two racehorses and
matched each other in choosing beautiful
descriptions.
The Arabic language remained the language of
culture among these people till the present day,
and they use it in correspondance and in
recorded matter. The Beja language or the
Hadaribite has shrunk within narrow limits and
is only used by part of the Bani Amer tribe in
the lower Baraka region close to the Sudan. It
has been replaced by Tigre, which is also
unwritten, of Semitic origin and similar to
Tigrinya, which is dominant in the Eritrean
highlands and written in old Habashite letters
of Himyaritic origin. Most of the inhabitants
of the western, northern and eastern regions of
Eritrea speak Tigre. This is due to the cultural
superiority of Semitic languages to Cushitic
(Hamitic) languages, including the Beja
language.
The Barya and Baza tribes have preserved until
the present their African dialects, which
resemble the dialects of some of the tribes of
southern Sudan, the original homeland of these
tribes.
The Beja were pagans. The Romans recognized
their priests and their temples in the treaty
which the former made with the Roman vice-consul
in Egypt in 284 A.D. The Beja tribes kept their
paganism and did not give it up as the Egyptians
and the Romans, who renounced idolatry in
submission to the will of Emperor Justinian in
556 A.D., who resorted to repression and
cruelty. The Egyptians were terrified by him
into giving up their pagan religions.
While the Beja, toughened by their hard pastoral
life, neither heeded his calls nor submitted to
his threats, and adhered to their paganism.
Christianity spread among them only within
narrow limits, and Islam spread very slowly
among them until it enveloped them. Many pagan
practices survived among the Beja peoples such
as abstention from fighting on Tuesdays, belief
in priests and magic.
The Beja kingdoms in Eritrea were Islamic during
the Middle Ages, though there were Christian and
Pagan minorities. For instance, the Barya and
Baza tribes were only converted to Islam after
the middle of the nineteenth century at the
hands of Sayyed Mohammad Othman Merghani the
founder of the Khitmi rite, who had come from
Higaz via Egypt. These tribes had been pagan
before him.
He also spread Islam among the Belin, Al Maria,
Albeit Juck on the Golan highlands. Merghani
also converted the Add Sheikh tribe and
Christian tribes in the north such as Al Miraym
(the gift of Miryam), Ad Hibbits (the gift of
Jesus) and Ad Tiklis (the plant of Jesus).
Islam was also embraced by the great majority of
the Mansa tribes in the early twentieth century.
They had professed Christianity till about the
middle of nineteenth century. The traditional
weapon of the Beja were seven lances, so called
because the blade was three arm-lengths long and
the shaft four arm-lengths. Their shields were
made of buffalo hide and, in the case of Dahlaki
spears (related to Dahlak island), of the skin
of sea animals. Their bows were Arab bows made
of Cedar wood. With these bows they shot
poisoned arrows. As for swords, the use of which
was widespread, especially among Bani Amer and
Al Habab, they did not appear in the hands of
the Beja until after the Crusades in 1182.
Arab Immigrations to the Land of the Beja:
Reasons and Consequences:
The Arabs have tended since ancient times to
immigrate to the coasts of Eastern Africa and to
trade with them. We can divide this African
coast from the point of view of local
environment into four main zones which are:
First, the region situated between Eithab in the
Sudan and the Bab el Mendeb strait, which
includes all the Eritrean coast. Second, the
Gulf of Aden zone, which was also known as Zeila
Gulf. Third, the coast of Somaliland, which was
known as the Banader coast or Al Ajam land.
Fourth, the coast of Negro land or the coast of
Azania which ends in the south in Souvala, in
current Mozambique.
It is known that these regions, large as they
were, were open to the passage of caravans and
the migration from the south of Egypt to the
borders of Kenya. Moreover, Arab ships linked
them to the remote part of Africa. Al Shater
Busayli Abdul Jalil in his work “The History and
Civilization of Eastern and Central Sudan”
excepts Habasha from this opening up and says; “
All these regions (he means North East Africa)
were open to the passage of traffic except
Habasha whose ’negi’ controlled a region
stretching from south of lake Tana to the
borders of Eritrea.
This kingdom the borders of which were not clear
or defined then included the coastal region
(Eritrea). Its counterpart in the areas linking
it with the middle basin of the Nile Valley
(northern and eastern Sudan) was a number of
local leaderships and chiefdoms of inhabitants
who differed from area to another. They were
also different in their social and economic
systems. The peculiar position of each group was
influenced to a certain extent by the piece of
land it inhabited”.
If we go back to developments in the economic
life in the Mediterranean basin and its western
coasts, we find that these developments started
in a very early age. This is borne out by the
fact that Babylonian sources that date back to
almost 2700 B.C. point to the trade of incense,
spices and other raw materials with the land of
’Punt’ which included, among others, the stretch
between Eithab and the Banader land (the African
horn). These sources mentioned that it was a
thriving trade which brought these goods to the
land of the Arabian Gulf and the southern
Peninsula. Moreover, the Egyptian Queen
Hatshepsut (1503 - 1482 B.C.) built a commercial
fleet and sailed with it to the land of ’Punt’
to bring incense, spices and other goods. What
intrigues one in the inscriptions left by
Hatshepsut is that they indicate that the land
of ’Punt’ had not been known before. Historians
are inclined to believe that trade had been
conducted before that time by means of middle
men who were probably those Beja who used to
cross the desert on their camels. Silver says
that Queen Hatshepsut took this trade away from
those middle men and put it in the hands of the
state which could afford to send ships to the
African horn. Hiram, the king of Tyre, sent his
ships to the land of ’Punt’ to bring him gold
and spices as Solomon the Wise did. If the
remote maritime nations sought this land in
search of fortunes, it was only befitting of the
inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula that they
enter the melee of immigration and commerce,
since it had been second nature to them to
adventure since the time when the civilisation
of Saba, Maeen and Himyar was prosperous, a fact
proven by history.
Arab migrations had followed one upon the
other since antiquity towards the neighbouring
African coasts. Mixed peoples were formed as a
result of these migrations, as we will detail
letter.
The region we are discussing now stretches from
the south of Asswan to the Mersa Bade, including
the ports of Eithab, Sawaken, Mersa Arus and
other such Red Sea inlets through which the Arab
migrations entered.
As we pointed out elsewhere, groups of Arabs
came to the land of Beja in the sixth century
A.D., i.e. before the emergence of Islam. These
groups included clans from Bani Himyar known as
the Bali or Balu tribe. It is believed that
these Beja tribes, amid which the Balu tribes
settled were in a state of chaos because they
had met with a crushing defeat inflicted upon
them by Silco, the Nubian king who had driven
them out of the Nile Valley basin south of the
first cataract. Those Beja entered the desert
and returned to be bedouin, pastoral way of
life. Their military prowess had been crushed
and they turned to tribal warfare.
The Balu came in this period of internal
turmoil, so the Beja did not do them any harm.
Rather, the newcomers were able to stay and
coexist peacefully with the Beja. By this means,
their offspring attained sovereignty as the
accession to power was matrilineal. With time, a
crossbred aristocratic class was formed whose
fathers were Arabs and whose mothers were Beja.
Of the Arabs groups that came to the land of the
Beja, Rabi’a was the most desirous of procuring
precious metals. They were accompanied by groups
of Kahtari and Guhaini tribes. The leader of
Rabi’a in the tenth century A. D., Abu Marwan
Bashir Ibn Ishaq, achieved considerable fame.
A group of Bani Younis had entered the Eithab
region them the region of Djin in western
Eritrea, where they had settled before the
arrival of the Rabia groups. It seems that the
Bani Younis group had come from the Arabian
Peninsula to the Beja coast across the Red Rea.
After a short time, they were engaged in
fighting on account of exploiting the land of
the metals. The Bani Rabia group were forced to
retrace their route to Hijaz. This was an event
which was repeated throughout history. The
Rashaida were, the last to migrate from the
coast of Hijaz to eastern Sudan and eastern
Eritrea.
The conspicuous phenomenon about Arab
immigration is that it was oriented towards
working the mines in the land of the Beja from
south of Asswan to the northern Eritrean
plateau. Few of them gave cultural and religious
affairs any attention. They used to enter into
conflicts and wars with the natives because of
their tendency for forceful exploitation of
labour. However, a number of scholars settled
and established educational centres which played
an important role in spreading Islamic religion
and the Arabic language among the Beja.
The reasons for Arab migration were not only
commercial or in quest of wealth; there were
other reasons for migration which were due to
political factors. The entry of the Arabs into
the Beja province was accentuated in the ninth
century A.D., especially after the Caliph Al
Mutassem (833 - 842 A.D.) employed numerous
mercenaries in his army, dispensed with the
services of the Arabs in his ’diwan’ (abinet)
and order the witholding of payment of bounty to
them.
Things got worse for the Arabs of Egypt after
the deposal of Aubasa lbn Ishaq, the last Arab
viceroy of Egypt, in the reign of the Caliph Al
Mutawakkel 847 – 861). The Arabs were forced to
leave northern and central Egypt for the
countryside, and some of them headed for the
basin of the Middle Nile Valley and the
provinces presently known as the Sudan, Eritrea,
and Habasha.
After the struggle between the Omayyads and
Alawides for the Caliphate and for power, the
Arab tribes apposed to the Omayyads realized
that they had no chance for a free, dignified
life under the Omayyads. The Alawids also
realized that any further attempt after the
Battle of Karbala, at which the Imam Hussein lbn
Ali was martyred, would only bring more ruin up
on them. So they started spreading in the land
and resorting to concealment and escape. Some
of them went where the Omayyad Caliphs couldn’t
reach them, so they headed, individually and in
groups for the eastern coasts of Africa followed
by the soldiers of the Omayyad state whose sole
concern was to watch them closely, the which to
carry out effectively, they occupied the Dahlak
archipelago, racing Adulis on the Eritrean
coast. Yazeed lbn Muawiya had hardly been
relieved of the Shi’ite revolution when Hijaz
revolted. The violence with which he confronted
the new revolution was in no way less than the
violence with which he confronted the first one.
He sent them Aqaba lbn Nafe’, who did to Medina
what no Moslem would do he killed most of the
remaining ’Muhajireen’ (immigrants) and Al Ansar
(the supporters). The holiness of Al Medina was
violated; it was looted and, according to Al
Tabari, a thousand virgins were raped in it. The
enmity of Hijaz and Iraq was awash in blood.
Hijaz did not let oppression be; it revolted for
a second time and pledged allegiance to Abdullah
lbn Al Zubare. His revolt in Higaz lasted for
nine years, during which he fought the Omayyads
and beat them, until he was besieged, and later
killed in Mecca by Al Hajjag lbn Yousef Al
Thagafi. It is no wonder then that the people of
Hijaz fled for life to remote countries. Higaz
only got neglect from the Omayyads, who only
sent it tyrants who humiliated the people and
treated them brutally.
In the year I32 (Higri), it was the turn of the
Omayyads to get a taste of their own medicine.
Marwan 11 fled to Egypt, which he entered in
disguise. He found that the people of the
eastern basin had already joined the Abbasids.
So he reverted to Geeza accompanied by an
entourage of his princes and relatives. He was
met by Saleh lbn Ali, the Abbasid viceroy in
Egypt who fought him and defeated him. He and
those with him fled to the countryside and kept
on fleeing southward until they reached Nubia in
the Sudan, where some of them settled. Others
proceeded to Bade, (Massawa) the Dahlak islands,
Hawakel and Bahdur where the ruins of their
palaces and cemeteries still stand. The
struggle went on between the Abbasids and the
Alawids throughout the Abbasid age. Whenever an
Abbasid acceded to power, an Alawid would rival
him and claim it for himself; he would fight and
be killed. These successive revolutions which
occupied Islamic history until the fourth
century (Higri) were an inexhaustible source of
defeated groups and individuals who migrated to
remote countries. North East Africa, i.e. the
Sudan, Eritrea, Habasha and Somaliland, was,
in view of geographical position close to the
Arabian Peninsula, a refuge for these.
The Eritrean Tribes’ Claim of Arab Ancestry
The Arab element melted into the Beja
inhabitants and others, but it left behind a
phenomenon which still survives. In spite of the
fact that the Eritrean tribes have kept their
old Semitic, and Hamitic-Cushitic dialects,
Tigre, Tigrinya, Hadaribi, Sihawi, Danakili,
etc... etc... they have maintained their claim
of belonging to those Arab immigrant origins.
The Bani Amer and Balu tribes claim Abbasid
ancestry. The Al Habab tribes claim ancestry in
the differences clans of Qureish. Also, the Saho
in the east the Assawirta claim the ancestry of
Ali Ibn Abi Taleb. The Menfri claim the ancestry
of Omar Ibn Al Khattab. The Maria tribe,
together with the Sna’d Kili in the Eritrean
highlands, the Tarua, Hazu and Manza’ tribes
claim Omayyad ancestry.
Their local traditions relate that their
immigrant ancestor married several girls from a
number of tribes, and their aforementioned clans
were born of these girls. The name is derived
from his two sons, Mario and Maicho, who were
born of a Christian mother on the plateau of
Eritrea.
Whatever may be said of the authenticity of
these claims, they confirm the wide Arab
migrations, the reasons for which we have
indicated, and the historical inter-marriages
which occured through successive generations.
Spencer Trimingham says in ”Islam in Ethiopia”
that the mere residence of an Arab merchant or
religious scholar among a tribe and the spread
of Islam among them through him was enough to
make the tribe with the passage of time claim
the ancestry of this Arab, out of their belief
that this enhanced their position. This
phenomenon is common in many Moslem countries.
This is especially the case in East Africa,
where historic intermarried between Arab
immigrants and their Hamitic cousins are the
dominant factor in the region.
The Relation of Al Fung House with Eritrea The
Original Homeland of Al Fung House
The subject of the origins of Al Fung House
which assumed power in the Blue Nile Basin in
the sixteenth century is still open to
controversy and argument. Some say that the
Sultanic house goes back in origin to Al Shalk
tribe or that they came from the west, from
western Sudan.
But the Egyptian historian, Al Shater Bussayli
Abdul Jalil farours the probability that the Al
Fung came from Eritrea, and says that the ruling
house exercised its authority for a while on the
south western part of Eritrea, which was before
it moved to the Blue Nile basin and made the
town of Senar its capital. It is believed that
the transfer of the Sultanate to the Blue Nile
basin is due to the pressure of war and
turbulence which were dominant in Habasha at the
time and which began to spread to the northern
region. Thus, these circumstances were
threatening the region occupied by the Sultanate
in south western Eritrea. We should not fail to
mention also the Gala raids on the region
between Ghojam and the province of Harar and the
presence of the Ottomans on the coast which they
occupied Massawa. They maintained relations with
the Tigre ruler and provided him with aid in his
revolt against the King of Habasha until 1580
A.D. It seems that the sultanate established by
Al Fung house arose in Eritrea at a time which
was probably in the fourteenth century A.D. or a
little before. They made an agreement with the
leader of the Al Abidlab who controlled the
commercial routes between the Nile valley and
the adjacent provinces. He made the town of Qura
between Al Khartoum and Shindi, his capital.
It seems that according to this agreement the
Sultan extended his influence over the region
from the Blue Nile basin, which begins south of
Suba, and it includes ’Al Bitana’ land, the land
around it, and the southern basin of the Blue
Nile. It is assumed that this was accomplished
with the westward migration of the king of Alwa
after Al Fung overthrew his kingdom and
devastated his capital, Suba, the destruction of
which became proverbial. The capital of this
house in Eritrea was known as Lamul or, locally,
as Lamlam. Some sources refer to it as Loul. If
we take into consideration the contents of the
inscriptions on the Sultan’s gong, which was in
his acquisition when be exercised his authority
in Lamul, we find an indication that his great
grandfather had come from ’Loul’ to Lamul which
lies in Eritrea about the fourteenth century
A.D. These inscriptions affected a widening of
the study and research of the province which
comprises the Nile Valley basin. Research
stopped at the Lamu region, which lies on the
Indian Ocean south of the Kenyan. Somaliland
borders. Historians, of whom Sir Hery Welcome in
one, supported by the contents of the ‘Negroes’
manuscript as explicated by Chiroli in 1957,
that the contents of the inscription’s on the
Sultan Amara’s gong about his grandfather, who
came from Loul, applies to this site, and
indicates the arrival of the Al Fung house in
the region of the eastern African coast, having
come from their first homeland in the Shamayel
valley in Oman, in the south eastern Arabian
Peninsula. This manuscript indicates that Al
Fung house used to fight wars between Berbera
and Sawaken (The Eritrean coast). War, in this
context, according to some historians, was
piracy operations in this region. Some sources
also indicate that a woman divorced by her
husband can get married forthwith without going
through the wait imposed by Islamic law. This
was a controversial subject in Eritrea and the
Sudan in the Middle Ages. It was discovered that
custom and tradition permitted a divorced woman
to marry another man right away. Dispensing with
the wait is due to the fact that the Lamu
people, who were seafaring people, couldn’t
afford to wait because of their travel.
Thus, customs, traditions and social systems
indicate the presence of relations and links
among the two societies on the Negro coast and
Lamu and the society in which Al Fung Sultanate
arose in Eritrea and the Sudan. Some sources
point out that the relation between Al Fung
Sultanic house and the Omayyads was through
inter-marriage between Al Fung and the Omayyads
who controlled the Lamu region and the eastern
coast of Africa.
The Transfer of Al Fung House to Dankali and
Barakah in Eritrea
We have discussed the first stage of Al Fung
history, which lasted from their coming from the
Arabian Peninsula and their settling the Lamu
region in East Africa in the eighth century A.D.
till the tenth century A.D. As for the second
stage which starts about 951 A.D. and ends
about 1250 A.D. it is wrapped in mystery. It is
the stage in which the migration of Al Fung
house from ‘Lamu’ to Eritrea was accomplished.
Researchers have not been able to define the
form assumed by this migration, which was
preceded by seasonal journeys towards the north
for one purpose or another. This is confirmed by
the ‘Negroes’ manuscript published by Chiroli,
who says that the Arabs who inhabited the land
of the ‘negroes’ coast used to come during war
from Sawaken to Dahlak island by sea and by
land.
If we tie these journeys undertaken by the
Arabs, among whom were naturally groups of Al
Fung, to the cubical graves of Al Fung kings in
Danakil treated by Mary Edith Potoy, and copied
from whom by Camarair in his book about the Red
Sea and Habasha, we find that Al Fung had come
to the northern Danakil region. We can assume
that they had landed at one of the ports north
of Assab.
Furthermore, it is probable that they had landed
at one of two ports, Ad or Ma’dar. This
assumption is based on the presence of numerous
cubical graves in the depression of Baraka in
Eritrea which resemble those found in the
Dankalia region. It seems that Al Fung moved
from their homeland in Lamua on commercial
journeys or to escape local troubles caused by
the incursions of African tribes from time to
time. An alternative reason for this migration
was the fall of the Omayyad house and the
accession of the Abbasids, because Al Fung were
kins of the Omayyads.
It is believed that the relations between Al
Fung house and the Sultanic house of Djin which
existed in the south and west of Eritrea and
stretched to north of Kassala in the Republic of
the Sudan started after the arrival of Al Fung
on the coast of Northern Dankalia, in the south
of Eritrea.
Conditions in Eritrea and northern Habasha were
in a state of turmoil because of the tribal
advance from various directions. Because of the
scarcity of historical sources, researchers can
not pin down the moves of Al Fung house from
Dankalia to western Eritrea, and the relation of
this house with the Djin Sultanate which the
former represented in the sixteenth century. It
is known that the expanse of the Djin Sultanate
shrank under the pressure of the Hodondua, a
branch of the Beja, and it was forced to recede
in the Baraka basin in the west of Eritrea. We
should not fail to mention that during the
second stage an important event took place in
Habasha, namely the usurpation of power by the
Zague dynasty. The Solomonid house did not
manage to regain power until the beginning of
the third stage of Al Fung history, which begins
in 1251 A.D. and ends in 1550 A.D. It is the
period in which Al Fung lived in Eritrea. This
development increased commotion and turbulence.
The Solomonid house claimed that the Arabs had
supported the Zague dynasty in achieving power
as we mentioned in our discussion of reverse
migrations.
The Relation Between Al Fung and The Sultanate
of A’nsaba
The relation of Al Fung house with the house of
Djin or the A’nasiba’s sultanate, (in relation
to Wadi A’nsaba, which forms a tributary of
Baraka river and passes through the region of
Keren), which is corrupted by Arab historians
into Ansab, was augmented with what local
sources mention of the inevitability of the
marriage of the Sultan of Al Fung into this
house.
It is clear from this tie between the two houses
that the Djin house was in power and exercising
its authority when the house of Al Fung arrived
in Eritrea. There is a statement in “Historica
Aethiopica” by H. Ludelf, Frankfort 1681, that
the house of Al Fung owed alliance to the negus.
What we know is that the negus occasionally
claimed the subordination of the Sultan of Al
Fung. However, such a statement needs evidence
from historical sources. It is known the source
of Ludelf statement was Ethiopian. The period
of ambiguity which started from the last period
of the first stage and lasted throughout the
second period to the end of the first two
hundred years of the third stage, that is, 1450
A.D., when we find a thread of light which
reveals that there was a Sultan from the house
of Al Fung, the father of Sultan Amara. This
shows that sultan ruled in the region situated
in south western Eritrea. His capital was
‘Lamoul’, to which an ‘l’ had been added at the
end.
Sometimes, the initial ‘l’ and ‘a’ are dropped
making it Moul. This view is supported by the
inscription found on the gong of Sultan Amara,
the son of Sultan Adlan. In the light of the
information contained in the inscriptions on
Sultan Amara’s gong, which is considered the
strongest material evidence for the fact that
Sultan Adlan, and his son, Amara, after him were
in power, since this gong is one of the emblems
of authority, and in the light of the contents
of the journal of David Rubini, who visited
Sultan Amara at his capital, Lamoul, in 1521
A.D., in addition to what was recorded in the
diary of Luigi Telimenti, published by the
Italian historian, Count Rossini, together with
a verification and a perusal of the contents of
local manuscripts, we can build a structure of
the history of this third stage period which
began around the middle of the fifteenth
century.
The first of these points is what is stated in
local Eritrean manuscripts which mention that it
was inevitable that the sultan of Al Fung marry
into the house of Ansaba which ruled over the
region of Ansaba and was also known as the house
of ‘Ain Shams’. In what was related by narrators
we find that there was an Islamic kingdom at the
time in western Eritrea. It is probable its
origins go back to house which had been ruling
the Djin province since the second century
(Higri) or the ninth century A.D. approximately.
The dominion of the house of Al Fung to Eithab
in the north, which is situated north of the
current Port Sudan. As for the reference to the
house of ‘Ain Shams’ or the Sultanate of Ansaba,
it is clarified further by local tradition which
says that when the Sultan was elected to the
throne, he had to go into seclusion with his
wife for seven days during which food was served
them by an old man or a boy who was not of age.
This is one of the inherited Pharonic traditions
which sanctify kings and raise them to the level
of the gods. This custom was widespread in the
Nile basin in the Sudan. At the end of the seven
days in which care was taken that the king be
not exposed to moonlight, the sultan went out
to the river, immersed himself in its water and
then left accompanied by a soldier to perform
coronation rites. What information is available
to us is to the effect that the sultan of the
house of Djin in the first half of the sixteenth
century was Sultan Mukther, who died in the
fifth decade of that century. The sister of
Sultan Mukhter, Jawa, became regent over his
son. It is believed that Queen Jawa, who ruled
in 1609 A. D., and queen Fatima, who assumed the
reign in 1619 A.D., were from the region of the
Djin basin (Al Gash). It is probable that these
two queens were from the house of Sultan
Mukther, after the expanse under Al Fung
Dominion had shrunken.
Immanuel Di Almida, in his book on the history
of Ethiopia, which he wrote in the sixteenth
century, says that the River Takzi crosses the
Walkite province and flows to Djin kingdom
inhabited by Moslems known as the Balu.
The shrinking of this Sultanate was on account
of troubles and local wars which plagued the
province. They started with the ruin of Eithab
before the end of the first half of the
fifteenth century as a result of looting the
caravans which bore gifts from the Sultan of
Hijaz. The Balu Sultan of Djin in the west
clashed with the Hodondua who out-powered him,
so he withdrew to his base west of Eritrea. The
Hodondua then became the most powerful Beja
tribe.
The Transfer of the Sultanate to Senar
Later in the sixteenth century, the region of
Eritrea and Habasha witnessed struggles and
devastating wars. There was a huge tribal
advance, competition and a struggle between the
tribal groups, which ended in the early
sixteenth century with the emergence of the
Hodondua group and its expulsion of the Balu
group which controlled a large region which
extended North to Eithab and South to Walkite
inside Habasha.
Then the northern and western regions of Habasha
were affected with the wars of Imam Ahmad lbn
Ibraheem, surnamed the Gran, and the king of
Habasha, which reached its climax in the fifth
decade of the sixteenth century. The last stage
was in the northern region of Habasha and the
coast of the Red Sea with the entry of the
influence of both Portugal and the Turks and
their struggle for commerce and centers of
influence. In that period the vanguard of
European influence on the west coast of Africa
started to advance towards the east. It was
necessary in view of the nature of these
successive developments within a short period of
time, that the ruling house seek a refuge in
which to pursue its activity which basically
depended on commerce across the basin of the
Middle Nile. This trade was conducted at certain
centers and transported by means of river
navigation or caravans to the farthest north
east and various destinations.
There are no texts or local historic origins
which indicate clearly the date in which the
ruling house was transferred from its capital,
Lamoul, on the banks of river Setit near the
current city of Um Hagar to ’Senar’ on the banks
of the Blue Nile in the Sudan, except for local
narratives which have reached us by more than
one means, including the one known as the ’Katib
Al Shuna’ manuscript, which indicates the
founding of the sultanate after an alliance was
for-med between the Abidlab tribe and the house
of al Fung which put an end to the kingdom of
Alwa and destroyed its capital, Suba.
The well-known Jewish traveller, Rubin, who
visited AlFung in 1522, says that be spent a
period of time as a guest of Sultan Amara in his
capital, Lamoul, situated on the Nile, (what is
meant here is the river Sitit) and describes him
as a black king ruling over blacks and whites.
We gather from Rubin’s journey that the
sultanate covered the ’Bitana’ land and the Blue
Nile, as Rubin reached Senar, before its king’s
capital was moved there. Rubin reached Lamoul
with a caravan of three thousand camels laden
with goods, which moved from Massawa in the
south, which shows the flourishing of trade in
that period.
The Expansion of Al Fung Kingdom into Western
Eritrea to Massawa
Once, Sultan Amrarah Dankas, the founder of Al
Fung Kingdom, consolidated his kingdom in the
Sudan, he turned to extending the influence of
the kingdom on the leaderships of chiefdoms
which existed in Northern Sudan up to the third
cataract and also to eastern Sudan. Then the
leader of Al Fung, who was from the Abidlab,
proceeded towards western and northern Eritrea
until he subjugated the Beja provinces and its
kingdoms, the Djin kingdom and others, to the
’Blue Sultanate’. Al Fung conquests continued
towards the south until it reached Massawa.
However, the sultan of al Fung did not interfere
in the internal affairs of the Sheikhdoms which
were subordinate to him, but he settled for his
symbolic leadership which did not impel the
allied leaderships to send their soldiers or put
their resources under the disposal of the Sultan
in case of war. The Sultan settled for a share
of the duties which were levied on transit
trade.
The Sheikhdoms of Bani Amer and Al Habab
preserved autonomy besides nominal submission to
Al Fung Sultanate. The Sheikh of the Bani Amer
tribes, Sheikh Jama’ lbn Ujeil lbn Ali Muhammad
Darar, and the chief of the shiekhs of the Bani
Amer tribes, Sheikh Hamad Idriss Al Hasiri,
visited Senar to proffer obedience and to
undertake collection of the charity taxes from
the tribes which were under them. These taxes
were annually delivered to the delegate of the
king of Senar. The delegate also bore honorary
gifts of robes and swords from the king to the
Sheikhs, the headmen and the chiefs. The Sultan
of Senar used to inaugurate the tribal chiefs
and the leaders of le Provinces into authority
by placing on the chief’s head a cap with two
horns made of leather and stuffed with cotton
called (Um Al Karina) and a piece of brass
called ‘Al Nakkara’ (the gong). These remained
an emblem of the authority of ‘Daklal’, the
Sultan of Bani Amer in Eritrea until the time of
the British occupation when the British
authorities abolished the Sultan of Daklal and
the tribes were regrouped on the basis of their
own guardianships directly connected to the
authority of the state.
Al Nakkara is a brass drum which is beaten on
the declaration of war or other official
occasions. The old ruling families such as the
Daklal family in Baraka, the Cantibay family in
Al Habab and Al Naeb family in Massawa still
preserve this historical gong. The Sultan of Al
Fung maintained close relations with the Turkish
Pasha in the ports of the Red Sea (Sawaken and
Massawa), who was considered the commercial
representative of PDF Created with the
Sultanate. He also maintained foreign relations
with Yemen, from which the sultanate imported
swords and armour, and with India and other
countries in the Far East.
The System of Government in Al Fung Sultanate
It is clear from the history of Al Fung
Sultanate that absolute decentralisation was the
characteristic of government in various lands,
which was practiced according to local customs
and traditions. The union of the provincial
groups led by the Sultan of Senar was
characterized by the traditions of ”The
Mercantile Republic” of the mode -that was
conventional in the Arabian Peninsula with the
adjustments that were made on it which were
derived from the sources of the migrations,
before the transfer of the sultanic house to the
Blue Nile basin.
The traditions peculiar to the mercantile
republic linked the economically oriented groups
which devoted great attention to investing funds
in certain regions. It was natural that their
influence extend to the regions which comprised
the trade routes between the stock piles of
goods and the marketing centres to secure
transport, and later to caravans or ships.
Thus, relations were developed along the length
of the commercial route between Senar and
Massawa, Cities such as Agordat, Barentu and
Guluj had originally been caravan posts. Senar
was known throughout most of Eritrea on account
of what the commercial activity involved of
imports and exports. Many names such as the
‘Senar cap’ have survived as a symbol of that
relation between Eritrea and Senar.
In the Sheikdoms the leaders of which entered
into an alliance with Senar, whether in Eritrea
or Eastern and Northern Sudan, administrative
bodies were confined within the scope of
guaranteeing commercial interest only.
Everything else was left on its own to adopt
itself to external conditions. This is why we
find that the authorities of Senar, the leader
of the mercantile republic, did not attempt to
organize a government apparatus to cover all
aspects of activity. The Senar dynasty sufficed
itself with the application of the regulations
of the mercantile republic, which were so rigid
as to stifle individual activity. It is
noteworthy that the Senar dynasty did not
account for local considerations in applying its
commercial regulations, nor did it take into
consideration external competition which
acquired a clearer form with the Portuguese and
the European merchants before them, but kept a
monotony of regulations. Moreover, it did not
take into account the development of local
economic potentialities, agricultural and
otherwise, but left the country to its old way
of life.
The authority neglected the establishment of a
centralized body to coordinate the efforts of
the different groups in the sheikhdoms towards a
common objective. Anything that did not have a
bearing on economic interests was left in the
domain of the old traditions which governed the
distribution of land, making the leader owner of
the land. The relation between the beneficiary
and the leader was not based on allegiance. The
leader or the sultan relied on his army which
was made up of slaves and mercenaries. The
Sheikh had the fight to declare war on
neighbouring leaderships without consulting the
sultan. This made the people of the region live
in constant wars, especially between Bani Amer
and the Hodondua over pasture and water.
Thus, the tool of government was subject to
two conflicting systems vis a vis the society;
the first was the system of mercantile republic
aiming at exploiting commerce and caravan
routes, and the second the eastern feudal system
which allocated the land to the inhabitants to
work it while the leader had a portion of the
produce. So it was not easy to reconcile these
two systems in an affective rule, unless the
mercantile republic and eastern feudalism were
reorganized in such a way as to guarantee the
natural development of a nationalism in which
the various tribal groups met.
But as the leaderships neglected the
organisation of a government propitions to the
creation of a new general way life, supported by
free unhindered competition, the power of these
leaderships and their weakness, their decline
and fall were subject to external economic
factors, insofar as these factors were strong or
weak. This was one of the reasons of the decline
and disarray of the sultanate, because it
deprived society from exercising the least of
its rights.
In the first two centuries, the sultanate was
ruled by descendants of Sultan Amara, the
founder of the Senar dynasty in its Blue Nile
basin capital. After the end of King Awansa’s
reign about 1719 A.D., the house of ’Ain Shams’,
which ruled the region of Ansaba in Eritrea in
the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and
which was related by kinship and marriage to the
house of Al Fung, acceded to power. Then the
Hameg, who were a negro element from the Al
Ruseires region and who had assumed the
ministry, wrested power from them and kept it
until, in a condition of weakness and
deterioration, they were destroyed by Muhammad
Ah Pasha when he conquered the Sudan in 1820
A.D.
The War Between Al Fung House and the Djin House
It seems that Al Fung were only able to
subjugate the Djin kingdom after long wars,
Historians are inclined to believe that the
submission of Bani Amer and Al Habab to the
sultanate did not take place until a belated
time; possible, in the end of the seventeenth
century.
The proof of this is that Queen Eatimah, who was
known as the Negus of the Romans, fought the
Habasha army when it invaded her kingdom in 1619
A.D. and she was queen of the Djin kingdom.
Habashite sources say that she was captured and
lots of spoils were taken from her kingdom.
However, this Habashite attack came at the same
time as the attack on the Kingdom of Senar.
Local narratives point out a story to the effect
that a knight of the house of Al Fung was killed
at the hands of one of the Balu sultans in the
land of Djin in the Baraka basin, but he left a
son whose mother was a Balu. Children used to
call him in redicule ”Wid Ras Madd”. A
reference to the fact that the Balu, after
killing his father, made his skull into a
’Madda’ i.e. bowl for food. Once he came of
age, his mother told him the whole story of his
father’s death.
So he invoked the aid of his people, Al Fung,
who sent an army with him that destroyed the
Balu Sultanate, abolished. their reign and
scattered their people. This youth was appointed
ruler of the depression of Baraka regions by Al
Fung. His progeny, known as Al Nabitat and its
leader Al Daklal has ruled the Bani Amer tribes
and their neighbours for the last three
centuries.
Regardless of whether this narrative is true or
not, it indicates that the Balu and the Djin
kingdom did not lose their influence until after
an armed struggle with Al Fung Sultanate.
Another reference to the wars between Al Fung
and the Djin is what is said by local narratives
to the effect that the name Al Gaddein - an
agricultural group settled in Al Ghash basin
which originally belongs to Nubia in western
Sudan and have wide intermarrying with the Beja
and the Arabs – is derived from Gadd meaning
shreading. It is said that one of their leaders
said to another, after a ferocious battle with
Al Fung knights, “These people have inflicted on
us Gadda”, meaning rending and shreading. The
other replied by saying, “Rather, Gaddin”,
stressing the greatness of their losses. Thus,
they were called Gaddein. We are not interested
in the authenticity of the narrative as much as
we are interested in proving the truth of the
battles which were fought in the region before
its inhabitants surrendered to the new invaders.
The fortified castles which stand in the region
of the Gaddein mountains indicate the
correctness of this conclusion. The Gaddein
inhabitants were known for chivalry and they
reared Arabian thoroughbreds. The region was
known for centers of religious teaching where
the holy Quran was memorized.
|