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Dutch Travellers in Arabia in the Seventeenth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

C. F. Beckingham
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Extract

The attempt of the Dutch to develop trade with Arabia in the seventeenth century occasioned several journeys in the Yemen which are ignored in the histories of Arabian exploration. The earliest of the travellers, Pieter van den Broecke, wrote an account of his voyages, well known in his own century, which included a description of his visit to Ta'iz and San'a. For our knowledge of his successors we depend principally on the records of the Dutch East India Company and enough of these have now been published to show the nature and extent of Dutch enterprise.

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Articles
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Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 83 , Issue 1-2 , April 1951 , pp. 64 - 81
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1951

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References

page 64 note 1 Korte Historiael ende Journaelsche Aenteyckeninghe van al 'tgheen merckwaerdich voorgevallen is, in de langhduerighe Reysen, soo nae Cabo Verde, Angola, & als insonderheydt van Oost-Indien, etc., Haarlem, 1634. There were several other Dutch editions. A French version, which sometimes paraphrases and sometimes abridges the original, is included in C. de Renneville, Recueil des voyages gui ont servi à l'établissement et aux progrez de la Compagnie des Indes Orientates, tom. 7, 1725. V. d. Broecke is not mentioned in Hogarth's Penetration of Arabia or in R. H. Kiernan's Unveiling of Arabia. His account of his Arabian journey was used by Sir William Foster in editing the relevant parts of the Journal of John Jourdain (Hakluyt Society), 1905.

page 65 note 1 Catholics were usually excluded from appointments in the Indies. Maetsuycker came of a Catholic family and was certainly not a practising Calvinist.

page 66 note 1 Itinerario Voyage ofte Schipvaert van Jan Huygen van Linschoten (Linschoten Vereeniging), dl 1, 1910, p. 25; dl 2, p. 34.

page 66 note 2 V. d. Broecke, p. 39.

page 66 note 3 Ibid., pp. 40–6. The extracts are translated from the text of the Haarlem edition of 1634. The paragraphing of the original has been kept.

page 66 note 4 V. d. Broecke's mile is the German mile, i.e. about 5 English miles.

page 66 note 5 Onder-koopman.

page 67 note 1 The Pasha, Viceroy of Yemen. The correct title of his office was Vali; the Turks did not use any term corresponding to Viceroy.

page 67 note 2 In a letter of 26th October, 1615, Reynst stated that the Dutch had been forced to leave Aden because they had been taken for Englishmen, who came there only to plunder. Terpstra, H., De Opkomst der Westerkwartieren van de Oost-Indische Compagnie, 1918, p. 108 nGoogle Scholar.

page 68 note 1 Shihr.

page 68 note 2 This is precisely the definition of the Arabic word “jalba” given in Dozy's Supplément aux dictionnaires arabes.

page 68 note 8 Assistent, a grade below an Onder-koopman.

page 69 note 1 Qishn.

page 69 note 2 The correct latitude is 14° 45' N.

page 69 note 3 Hadramaut is, of course, the name not of a town, but of a wadi and, by extension, of the whole region. The place meant here is probably Hainin or Saiwun. In 1590 the Jesuits Páez and Montserrat found Sultan 'Umar of Shihr residing at Hainin. It is, however, much more than one day's journey from Shihr. Dr. R. B. Serjeant informs me that he considers it unlikely that the Sultans would have often resided at Shihr at this period as they were pursuing a policy of expansion westwards.

page 69 note 4 'Abdullah b. 'Umar Bū Ṭuwairiq, 1021–5 a.h. (1612/13–1635/36 a.d.) See Ṣalāḥ al Bakrī al Yāfi'i, Fī Janũb al Jazīrat al 'Arabiya, Cairo, 1949. I am indebted to Dr. Serjeant for this reference. According to a MS. journal of V. d. Broecke's preserved in Leyden University Library the Dutch were received at Shihr not by the Sultan but by his governor. Terpatra, p. 109, n. 3.

page 69 note 5 Landberg, , Dialectes de l'Arabie méridionale, vol. iii, Leiden, 1909, p. 908Google Scholar, remarks that almost all the Bedouin tribes of the high mountains between the Yemen and Hadramaut have the custom of offering the guest the use of a woman for the night. Dr. Serjeant tells me that this is the practice of the Humum tribe who would use Shihr as one of their principal markets, but remarks that it would be surprising if such a usage prevailed in a town like Shihr where there were Ulema to discourage it.

page 70 note 1 The Comoros.

page 70 note 2 The term “Red Sea” as used by the Portuguese and Dutch often included the Gulf of Aden. Qishn is in latitude 15° 25' N.

page 70 note 3 Possibly Saiyid Ibn al Sa'īdī. I have not been able to identify him.

page 70 note 4 Colenbrander, H. T. (ed.), Jan Pietersz. Coen. Bescheiden omirent zijn Bedrijf in Indië, 5 dl, 1919–1923, dl 3, pp. 346, 7Google Scholar.

page 70 note 5 Ibid., dl 1, p. 130.

page 71 note 1 V. d. Broecke, pp. 54–68.

page 71 note 2 The third, Johan Jochumssen, had died. Terpstra, p. 110, n. 3.

page 71 note 3 Op 't avoyeren. Avoyer is the French equivalent of Voogd or Landvoogd, a term applied by the Dutch to the Vali of the Yemen and to the Governor of Mocha.

page 71 note 4 Terpstra quotes the Leiden MS. as saying 3 per cent, Terpstra, p. 110, n. 5. So does V. d. Broecke himself below on two occasions.

page 71 note 5 Arabic qafīla.

page 72 note 1 Sixteen, according to the Leiden MS., Terpstra, p. 111, n. 2.

page 72 note 2 Jan Adrianssen, according to the Leiden MS., ibid., p. 111, n. 3.

page 72 note 3 Mauza', . The distance is about 19 English miles. Admiralty Handbook of Arabia, 1917, vol. ii. p. 251Google Scholar.

page 72 note 4 Not identified. Sir Henry Middleton, whose account of his return journey from San'a to Mocha in 1611 is preserved by Purchas, pt. 1, bk. 3, ch. 2, calls this place Accomoth and describes it as a “censor”, i.e. simsara, a Yemeni word for a caravanserai, 17 miles from Mauza', “standing in a barren common with a few Cottages by it.” Benjamin Greene, who accompanied Middleton and whose MS. is in the India Office records, Marine Records, Journals, vol. xii, calls it Acma and gives the distance as 20 miles. He describes it as “an Inn or Sensor upon the topp of a little hill compassed rounde with hie rocky mountaines”, and as a “very barren place with only a few date trees”. The name may be derived from “akama”, a hillock. A wadi and a mountain of this name are shown near Mauza' on the 1/253,440 map of the Aden Protectorate, G.S.G.S. 3892.

page 72 note 5 Not identified. Middleton calls it Assambine and gives its distance from Accomoth as 13 miles. He describes it as a “censor” and remarks: “Here is no Towne but a few poore Cottages.” Greene gives the distance as 18 miles and says: it is an “Inn or Censor … with some 20 small cottages or shopps adjoyning to yt”, lying in a basin among high mountains, and adds: “heere is noe victualls norr water butt what is drawne owt of a pitt, wch is butt very little.”

page 73 note 5 This is the Yifrus of the 1/1,000,000 map. Middleton calls it Eufras and says it is 11 miles from Assambine. He writes: “The Towne little, scituate on the side of a hill. About the fift of January great multitude of people resorteth hither from farre, where they doe some foolish Ceremonies to one of their Saints and holy men, which lyeth buried there … The Governour of this Towne is a Turke.” The saint is Abu'l Ḥasan Aḥmad ibn 'Alwān, whose death is recorded by the historian Al Khazrajī, , The Pearl Strings; a History of the Resúliyy Dynasty of Yemen, vol. iv, 1913, p. 160Google Scholar. The modern route, taken by Niebuhr and, with a slight variation, by Manzoni, lies well to the west. D'Anville's map shows “Eufras” in a direct line with Mocha and Ta'iz. Niebuhr did not visit it. He calls it “eine ziemliche Stadt” and refers to the tomb of Alwān, Ibn', Beschreibung von Arabien, 1772, p. 243Google Scholar. His map places it too far north and east but, having himself travelled from Mocha to Ta'iz by the more direct route, he was less in error than D'Anville.

Middleton passed through Yifrus on his way to and from San'a and this was evidently a usual route for travellers to take in his time. It may be identical with the “Buzeria” of Jourdain, who went from Aden to San'a and from San'a to Ta'iz and Mocha in 1609. He says: “Wee departed from Taies, and came to a towne called Buzeria; which towne standeth on a mountaine, and hath a castle neere belonginge to it, in the which are 200 soldiars of the Turks,” The Journal of John Jourdain, 1608–1617, Hakluyt Society, 1905, p. 97Google Scholar. Sir William Foster, the editor of the volume, left Buzeria unidentified. The particulars given agree with the descriptions of Middleton and V. d. Broecke but the name is unexplained. The night after leaving there Jourdain “laye in a sarraye which standeth in a plaine feild, where travellours use to lodge”. He does not mention the name The following day he reached Mauza'.

page 73 note 2 Not identified.

page 73 note 3 Ta'iz. Middleton says it is 16, Greene 12 miles from Yifrus. The “six high towers” cannot be precisely identified. The Sharifiya mosque has two minarets, the Jami’ Masjid has one. The other principal mosque has no minaret at all, but there are numerous smaller mosques, many of them now ruinous. Niebuhr's illustration shows seven towers or minarets within the walls. Reisebeschreibung, 1774, Tab. 67. The Pasha's tomb is the Qubba Husain, illustrated in Scott, Hugh, In the High Yemen, 1943, photograph 43Google Scholar.

page 74 note 1 Possibly Al Qa'ida, . It is about 21 miles from Ta'iz. Admiralty Handbook, vol. ii, p. 277Google Scholar.

page 74 note 2 Suq al Mahras.

page 74 note 3 Rihani, Ameen, Arabian Peak and Desert, 1930, p. 59Google Scholar, records having seen the spring crop in the ear growing around the threshing floor where the winter wheat was being threshed. He was told that the soil of the Ta'iz district yielded even four crops a year. Ibid., p. 60.

page 74 note 4 Ibb, 16 miles from Suq al Mahras. Admiralty, Handbook, vol. ii, p. 278Google Scholar.

page 74 note 5 Al Makhadir, 17 miles from Ibb. Ibid., loc. cit.

page 74 note 6 Naqil Sumara.

page 74 note 7 Yarim, 20 miles from Al Makhadir. Ibid., loc. cit.

page 74 note 8 Dhamar, 25 miles from Yarim. Ibid., vol. ii, p. 271. Niebuhr mentions the large castle, Beschreibung von Arabien, p. 235.

page 74 note 9 Arduyn-steen.

page 74 note 10 Ziraja, 22 miles from Dhamar. Admiralty, Handbook, vol. ii, p. 273Google Scholar.

page 75 note 1 San'a.

page 76 note 1 Ziraja is 25 miles from San'a, ibid., loc. cit. The distances given for the stages from Mocha to San'a in the Admiralty Handbook amount to 234 miles, but allowance must be made for the modern route from Mocha to Ta'iz which is more direct than the one taken by V. d. Broecke.

page 76 note 2 Luypaert. A cheetah must be meant. He uses the same word when describing hunting with cheetahs in Gujerat, , V. d. Broecke, pp. 127–8Google Scholar.

page 76 note 3 Legends connecting places in S.W. Arabia with the Flood and the family of Noah are very common. The building of the castle of Ghumdan at San'a is ascribed to Shem.

page 76 note 4 Federigo Spinola commanded eight galleys, five of which were captured by the English or Dutch, sent to assist his more famous brother Ambrogio at the siege of Ostend, 1602–3.

page 77 note 1 A very common mistake at this time.

page 77 note 2 The conduct of V. d. Broecke's crew and subordinate officers was often unsatisfactory during this voyage. There were discreditable quarrels with the inhabitants of Mocha and V. d. Broecke was fined two months' pay for keeping bad discipline. H. T. Colenbrander, dl 4, pp. 137–8 and 140–1.

page 77 note 3 Arabic rauḍa, a garden, the name given to a place about 5 miles north of San'a, famous for its vineyards.

page 77 note 4 A torrent bed traverses the western part of the old city of San'a.

page 78 note 1 These are the walls of the old or eastern part of the city. The western suburbs were still unwalled in Niebuhr's time. The gates meant are probably the Bab al Yaman, the Bab al Sabah, and the Bab al Sha'ub. The other important gate in the walls of the old city leads into the citadel.

page 78 note 2 There are semi-circular bastions at frequent intervals round the walls of the old city. The mosques now number forty-four, nearly all being in the old city and there are over twenty minarets; Niebuhr, however, counted only nine or ten. V. d. Broecke is probably referring to the twin minarets of the Jami' al Kabir and those of the Bakiliya and Mahdi 'Abbas mosques.

page 78 note 3 The text reads: “als Divisores, uyt Portugael,” which is nonsense but is found in all the Dutch editions. Benneville keeps the word Divisores. I have assumed in translating that the correct reading is “als de Visoreys”. Three years was, in fact, the normal term of office of the Portuguese governors, only a few of whom were given the title of Viceroy.

page 78 note 4 He arrived in the Yemen in the late summer of 1607. Tritton, A. S., The Rise of the Imams of Sanaa, 1925, pp. 4, 50Google Scholar. Ibrahim Pasha arrived to replace him in 1613 but died before Ja'far had left the country and the latter resumed his authority. Ibid., p. 55.

page 79 note 1 The Turkish historian Na'ima mentions a Bey of Rhodes named who was prominent in naval fighting in the Mediterranean about 1611, Tarikh-i-Na'ima, 1147 a.h., vol. i, pp. 282, 296. A Bey of Damietta of the same name was killed in 1614. Ibid., p. 298.

page 79 note 2 Bateson, William, Materials for the Study of Variation, 1894, p. 285Google Scholar, refers to the occurrence of sheep with three pairs of horns as individual freaks. Mr. T. C. S. Morrison-Scott of the Dept of Zoology, British Museum (Natural History), who has kindly allowed me to consult him on this question, writes: “There is a breed of four-horned sheep which was fairly commonly kept in this country some years ago and which appears to have originated in Africa.”

page 79 note 3 Prester John's country, i.e. Ethiopia.

page 79 note 4 For the occurrence of fat-tailed sheep in Abyssinia see Blanford, W. T., Observations on the Geology and Zoology of Abyssinia, 1870, p. 273Google Scholar, but they are also common in Arabia. H. Scott, p. 163.

page 79 note 5 The latitute of Mocha ia 13° 19' N.

page 79 note 6 It had been walled before Niebuhr visited it. The “little round castle” is presumably the Qal'a Taiyar, on a promontory to the north; it is marked on Niebuhr's map. He also remarked upon the variety of types of houses, Reisebeschreibung, p. 438.

page 80 note 1 Chaul.

page 80 note 2 Atjeh.

page 80 note 3 Cadts is Cutch; when used as the name of a town Cutch or Cutchnagore is identified by Hobson-Jobson with Mandvi. Neggena and Promiens must presumably be places in Kathiawar, or at least in Gujerat, since the three are linked together. Neggena may be derived from Nagnah, about 2 miles from Navanagar. It was taken from its owners by a rival Rajput clan in 1535–7 and in 1540 the newcomers founded Navangar, which may therefore be the place actually meant here although the old name is used. See Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, vol. viii, Kathiawar, 1884, pp. 566, 626Google Scholar. Promiens is probably the Furmian of the Arabs, the Miane or Pormiane of the Portuguese, which MrOldham, C. E. A. W. has identified as Miani, Indian Antiquary, vol. 59, p. 219Google Scholar. Miani is a small port 18 miles N.W. of Porbandar; in medieval times it was also called Manipur, , Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, vol. viii, p. 547Google Scholar. Alexander Hamilton mentions Poremain as a port between Diu and Mangrol. Sir William Poster in his edition of Hamilton's voyage, vol. i, p. 82, suggested that this might be Verawal or Patan Somnath, Porbandar, which might seem a more likely identification, being north of Mangrol. Sir William, to whom I am indebted for much assistance in compiling this note, informs me that on reconsideration, he thinks that Hamilton did mean Porbandar but made a mistake about its exact position, and adds: “He mentions no other place with a name anything like Porbandar, yet he could hardly have been ignorant of the existence of that port … I fancy that practically nothing was known by Europeans of the ports between the Indus mouth and Diu until 1800 at least. They were not commercially attractive, offering mainly coarse calicoes obtainable elsewhere, and the coast had an unsavoury reputation as the home of cut-throat pirates.”

page 81 note 1 Holwortel.

page 81 note 2 This is said to be the first Dutch reference to coffee. Stapel, F. W., Geschiedenis van Nederlandsch-Indië, dl 3, 1939, p. 195Google Scholar. The earliest European reference that has been traced is Rauwolf, L., Aigentliche beschreibung der Eaisz, 1582, pp. 102–3Google Scholar.