Arabia and the Gulf

2020 ◽  
pp. 191-215
Author(s):  
Andrew Petersen
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Red Sea ◽  
Arabian Peninsula ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Archaeological Research ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
Islamic Society ◽  
Exhaustive List

This chapter introduces the main ways in which archaeology has been used to investigate Arabia’s past during the Islamic era. While the potential for archaeology within the peninsula cannot be overstated, logistical obstacles and political difficulties have made field research difficult, with the result that it has lagged behind that of other areas in the Middle East. However, recent initiatives in most of the states within the Arabian Peninsula have meant that this is now one of the leading areas for archaeological research into Islamic society and culture. Although the chapter mentions some major recent archaeological projects, the aim is to highlight current trajectories of research rather than provide an exhaustive list of excavation and survey sites. Particular attention has been paid to settlement types, partly to counter ideas that the region was primarily inhabited by Bedouin nomads. The chapter emphasizes different regional traditions to reflect the geographical diversity of Arabia and its connections with other regions. The maritime cultures of the Gulf, the Red Sea, and the Indian Ocean are particularly important in this respect and have meant that Arabia is much less isolated than its often inhospitable interior would suggest.

The Archaeological Record of Indian Ocean Engagements in the Red Sea

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eivind Heldaas Seland
Keyword(s):  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Red Sea ◽  
Natural Environment ◽  
Western Indian Ocean ◽  
Archaeological Research ◽  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Islamic Period ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter reviews the evidence, nature, and development of maritime contacts in the Red Sea and from the Red Sea into the western Indian Ocean from the Neolithic until the start of the Islamic period, c. 4000 BCE–700 CE. In addition to summarizing and highlighting recent archaeological research and ongoing scholarly debates, emphasis is placed on identifying and explaining periods of intensified as well as reduced interaction, and on the relationship between internal Red Sea dynamics and contacts with the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean worlds in light of climate, natural environment, hinterland interest, and a changing geopolitical situation.

scholarly journals THE RECEPTION AND CONSUMPTION OF EASTERN GOODS IN ROMAN SOCIETY

2013 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 136-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Adam Cobb
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Red Sea ◽  
Arabian Peninsula ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Roman Society ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
Sea Ports ◽  
Late Roman Period ◽  
Monsoon Winds

The Roman Empire received goods from eastern lands through a variety of overland routes crossing the Arabian Peninsula and Mesopotamia, and through seaborne trade via the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. In particular, the sea routes that utilized the monsoon winds of the Indian Ocean enabled a significant volume of goods to be imported from the East on ships that may often have been of several hundred tons' capacity. The scale of the trade was significant enough for Pliny to claim that 100 million sesterces were being sent annually to India, China, and Arabia. The veracity of these figures has come in for some debate, especially with the publication of a document known as the Muziris Papyrus, which reveals that a shipment of nard, ivory, and textiles received at one of the Egyptian Red Sea ports in the second centuryadwas valued at the equivalent of roughly 7 million sesterces. It is nevertheless clear, particularly from the archaeological and numismatic evidence, that Roman trade with the East peaked in the first and second centuriesad,followed by subsequent decline and a limited revival in the Late Roman period.

scholarly journals Marine Shell Working at Harlaa, Ethiopia, and the Implications for Red Sea Trade

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-24
Author(s):  
Timothy Insoll
Keyword(s):  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Red Sea ◽  
North Africa ◽  
Persian Gulf ◽  
Arabian Peninsula ◽  
Gulf Of Aden ◽  
Horn Of Africa ◽  
Eastern Ethiopia ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
Marine Shell

Abstract Twelve species of marine shell were transported in significant quantities from the Red Sea to the trade centre of Harlaa in eastern Ethiopia between the eleventh and early fifteenth centuries AD. Initially, it was thought that species such as the cowries were imported from the Indian Ocean. Subsequent research has found that all were available from the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, c. 120 km east of Harlaa. This suggests that a hitherto largely unrecognised source of marine shells was available, and the Red Sea might have supplied not only the Horn of Africa, but other markets, potentially including Egypt, and from there, elsewhere in North Africa and ultimately West Africa via trans-Saharan routes, as well as Nubia and further south on the Nile in the Sudan, the Arabian Peninsula, and the Arabian/Persian Gulf. This is explored with reference to the shell assemblage from Harlaa, and selected shell assemblages from elsewhere in the Horn of Africa, and trading centres on the Red Sea.

Arabic Sources on Somalia

1987 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 141-172 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamed Haji Mukhtar
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Red Sea ◽  
Arabian Peninsula ◽  
Sources Of Information ◽  
Horn Of Africa ◽  
The North ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
Islam And Christianity ◽  
Written Sources

In recent years scholars of different nationalities (including Somalis) have devoted much time and effort to acquiring information about the Somali past using different means and through the available sources on the region. However, the Arabic written sources of information on Somalia have long been neglected and remain so. The purpose of this paper is to call attention to the need for a more comprehensive reading of Arabic sources, and to show that Arabic sources have much to contribute to knowledge about Somalia. I will try to trace these sources and list them in a chronological manner, starting with the early Arab sources, especially from the period which followed the emergence of Islam on the Arabian peninsula when Islam made its way into the Horn of Africa.Secondly, I will look at sources from medieval Islam in Somalia, when Islam spread from the coastal centers on the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean into the hinterlands of the Horn, the period which marked the struggle between Islam and Christianity. Thirdly, I will look at the period after the collapse of Muslim power in the late sixteenth century, almost two centuries when the Muslims of the Horn (the Somalis) were surrounded by Ethio-Portuguese alliances both to the north and in the Indian Ocean to the south. This period marked a time when the condition of the Somali Muslims became similar to that formerly endured by the Ethiopians, who had been surrounded by Muslims on all sides.

Shipped but Not Sold

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nancy Um
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Arabian Peninsula ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
The West ◽  
Commercial Society ◽  
The Indian Ocean

In the early decades of the eighteenth century, Yemen hosted a lively community of merchants that came to the southern Arabian Peninsula from the east and the west, seeking, among other products, coffee, at a time when this new social habit was on the rise. Shipped but not Sold argues that many of the diverse goods that these merchants carried, bought, and sold at the port, also played ceremonial, social, and utilitarian roles in this intensely commercial society that was oriented toward the Indian Ocean. Including sumptuous foreign textiles and robes, Arabian horses, porcelain vessels, spices, aromatics, and Yemeni coffee, these items were offered, displayed, exchanged, consumed, or utilized by major merchants in a number of socially exclusive practices that affirmed their identity and status, but also sustained the livelihood of their business ventures. These traders invested these objects with layers of social meaning through a number of repetitive ceremonial exercises and observances, in addition to their everyday protocols of the trade. This study looks at what happened to these local and imported commodities that were diverted from the marketplace to be used for a set of directives that were seemingly quite non-transactional.

Indonesia and the Arab World, Then and Now

2021 ◽  
pp. 26-55
Author(s):  
Mirjam Lücking
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Seventh Century ◽  
Religious Leaders ◽  
Historical Overview ◽  
Islamic Culture ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter provides a historical overview of ambivalent encounters between Indonesia and the Arab world through findings that show the relationship between Indonesia and the Middle East. It recounts the Indonesians' earliest encounters with Arab traders in the seventh century, from confrontations with Indo Persian Sufi up to the current democratization process that have been marked by contradictory dynamics. It also explains how Arabs have been acknowledged as teachers of Islam and allies in the postcolonial nonbloc movement. The chapter describes the gloomy counterimage of the Arab world against which Indonesian officials and religious leaders drew the picture of a tolerant, pluralist Indonesian Islam. It mentions the key role of the mobility across the Indian Ocean in the formation of Islamic culture in Indonesia.

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