The Travels of Ludovico di Varthema: In Egypt, Syria, Arabia Deserta and Arabia Felix, in Persia, India, and Ethiopia, A.D. 1503 To 1508. Ludovico di Varthema
the day following, being sus- pected as a Christian spy in disguise, he was forth- with laden with irons, and placed in confinement together with another individual, apparently a fellow- passenger, whose name and country, however, do not transpire. Three days after, some refugees from a ship, which had been captured by the Portuguese, arriving at Aden, the suspicions of the inhabitants were confirmed, and it was only through the personal intervention of the deputy governor, who decided that the case should be referred to the Sultan, that they were saved from the vengeance of the infuriated inhabitants. Accordingly, after a delay of sixty-five
INTRODUCTION. xxxix
days, the two captives were mounted on one camel, still in chains, and sent under an escort to Radâä, eight days' journey from Aden, where they under- went a preliminary examination before the Sultan; but Varthema failing to pronounce the Muhamme- dan formula of faith, either through fear, or, as he says, "through the will of God," he and his com- panion were again cast into prison.
Leaving them there to chew the bitter cud of re- pentance, it will not be out of place to notice the coincidence connected with the proceedings of the Portuguese in the Indian seas at this period, and the misfortunes which they entailed on our enterprising traveller.
In a note on the text of this part of the narrative, I have adduced a passage from an Arabian historian, to the effect that in the year A.D. 1502, seven native vessels had been seized by the Franks between India and the island of Hormuz ; and most of the crews mur- dered. I am inclined to believe, however, that the case in which the refugees were concerned may be gathered more definitely, partly from Greene's Col~ lection, and partly from the journal of Thome Lopez. The former has the following: —
"Stephen de Garaa being arrived on the coast of India, near Mount Deli, to the north of Kananor, he met a ship of great bulk, called the Meri [probably Miri, i.e. state pro- perty,] belonging to the Sultan of Egypt, which was very richly laden, and full of Moors of quality, who were going to Mekka. The ship being taken after a vigorous resistance, the General went on board, and sending for the principal
xl INTRODUCTION.
Moors ordered them to produce such merchandizes as they had, threatening them, otherwise, to have them thrown into the sea. They pretended all their effects were at Kalekût; but one of them having been flung overboard, bound hand and foot, the rest, through fear, delivered their goods. All the children were carried into the General's ship, and the remainder of the plunder given to the sailors. After which, Stephen de Gama, by Don Vasco's order, set fire to the vessel ; but the Moors, having broken up the hatches under which they were confined, and quenched the flames with the water that was in the ship, Stephen was commanded to lay them aboard. The Moors, having been made desperate with the apprehension of their danger, received him with great resolution, and even attempted to burn the other ships.
" Night coming on, he was obliged to desist without doing his work ; but the General gave orders, that the vessel should be watched, that the passengers might not, by favour of the darkness, escape to land, which was near. All night long the poor unhappy Moors called on Muhammed to help them, but the dead can neither hear nor succour their vota- ries. In the morning, Stephen de Gama was sent to execute his former orders. He boarded the ship, and, setting fire to it, drove the Moors into the poop, who still defended them- selves ; for some of the sailors would not leave the vessel till it was half burnt. Many of the Moors, when they saw the flames approach them, leaped into the sea with hatchets in their hands, and, swimming, fought with their pursuers. Some even made up to, and attacked, the boats, doing much hurt ; however, most of them were at length slain, and all those drowned who remained in the ship, which soon after sunk. So that of three hundred persons, (among whom were thirty women,) not one escaped the fire, sword, or water." 1
1 GREENE'S Collection of Voyages and Travels, vol. i. pp. 51-2.
INTRODUCTION. li
If this is the same act of piracy recorded by Thome Lopez, which appears tolerably certain, it occurred on the 29th of September 1502. The main incidents are identical, and he dilates with admiration on the gallant defence made by the Arabs, and stigmatizes the conduct of the Portuguese admiral as cruel and barbarous. But as all the unfortunate Arabs perished on that occasion, the case alluded to in Varthema's narrative, wherein several ships are said to have been captured and some of the crews to have escaped, must be a different one, though perhaps both were connected. The desideratum is supplied by Thome Lopez, who, in continuation of his account of the pre- vious engagement, describes, the chase of four Moorish ships immediately after, of which three escaped, and one was stranded, and the capture of two others on the 22nd and 26th of* October following. 1 The six or seven months which elapsed between these out- rages and Varthema's arrival at Aden, would allow time for any of the surviving crews to reach that place, and the coincidence thus established is another striking example of the accuracy of our author's state- ments.
In order to illustrate this still further, it will not be irrelevant to the subject to give a general outline of the political condition of Yemen at that period, referring the reader to the annotations on the text for the corroboration of particular facts mentioned in the course of the original narrative.
During the reign of the more warlike Khalîfs, the
1 See RAMUSIO, vol. i. pp. 136-38.
xlii INTRODUCTION.
turbulent tribes of Yemen appear to have been kept in tolerable subjection; but towards the end of the tenth century the authority of the 'Abbasides became virtually extinct, and the country was divided into a number of petty sovereignties, each assuming differ- ent titles, and exercising various degrees of territorial jurisdiction. This state of things continued till the accession of Salâh ed-Dîn, the first of the Ayyubite Sultans, whose brother Tooran Shah captured Sanaa, the capital of the province, about A.D. 1173, and reduced many of the independent chiefs both in the interior and on the coast to submission. Successive princes of that family continued to exercise a limited supremacy over Yemen long after the dynasty had been superseded by the Báharite Mamlûks of Egypt ; but the country gradually relapsed into complete anarchy until about A.D. 1429, when the government was seized by two brothers of the Beni Tahir, named severally Shams ed-Dîn 'Ali and Salâh ed-Dîn 'Amir surnamed El-Melek edh-Dhâfir, claiming descent from the Koreish tribe, who eventually succeeded in taking possession of Sanaa, and in establishing their joint sway over the southern provinces of Yemen. The capital, however, was soon after retaken by its former governor Muhammed ibn Nasir, and in a fruitless attempt to recover it Salâh ed Din 'Amir lost his life. The surviving brother was succeeded in 1454 by Mansiir Taj ed-Dîn 'Abd el-Wahhâb, on whose death in 1488 the government fell into the hands of his nephew 'Amir ibn 'Abd el-Wahhâb, who was the ruling sovereign of southern Yemen during the time
INTRODUCTION. xliii
of Varthema's visit.1 On the accession of 'Amir ibn 'Abel el-Wahhab the government of the peninsula, according to the author of the Ruah er-Ruah, was divided as follows:— "The Tehama, and Zebid, and Aden, and Lahej, and Abyan, as far as Radaii, were under 'Amir. Sanaa and its districts were subject to Muhammed ibn el-Imam 2 en-Nasir. Kaukaban and its districts under El-Mutahhir ibn Muhammed ibn Suleiman. Esh-Shark, and Edh-Dhawahir, and Sii'a- dah, with their dependencies, were divided between El-Muweyyed, the Sherîfs of the Al el-Mansur, and the Imam el-Mansiir, Muhammed ibn 'Ali es-Seraji el-Washli."
1 He mentions him by name as " Sechamir" or Sheikh Amir. See p. 83.
In a religious sense, this title ordinarily designates the leader of the services in the Mosque, and as the Khalifs were recognized as spiritual as well as temporal presidents, they early adopted it. When the authority of the 'Abbasides declined in Yemen, it was assumed by the regents at Sanaa, who moreover usurped that of Amir el-Mu 'amanin, or Lord of the Faithful. In course of time, however, other rulers of Yemen seem to have called themselves "Imam ;" so that eventually it came to signify nothing more than a presiding prince, or one having authority over subordinate chiefs. At the present day,