Spatial negotiations in a commercial city: The Red Sea Port of Mocha, Yemen, during the first half of the eighteenth century

Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians

Volumn 62, Issue 2, 2003, Pages 178-193

  Um, Nancy ^a  

^a BINGHAMTON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 60950502095     PISSN: 00379808     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/3592476     Document Type: Review

References (46)

1. Mohamed Scharabi, Der Bazar. Das traditionelle Stadtzentrum im Nahen Osten und seine Handelseinrightungen (Tübingen, 1985).
2. In each case, Scharabi gives the terms for Turkish and Persian equivalents. For the purposes of this essay, I will refer to the relevant Arabic terms only. Aside from Scharabi's encyclopedic work, most of the other studies of Arab commercial sectors focus on Cairo, for instance, Kelly Hanna, An Urban History of Bulaq in the Mamluk and Ottoman Periods (Supplément aux Annales Islamologiques, Cahier no. 3) (Cairo, 1983)
3. and Sylvie Denoix, Jean-Charles Depaule, and Michel Tuchscherer, eds. , Le Khan al-Khalili et ses environs. Un Centre commercial et artisanal au Caire du XIIIe au XXe siècle, Études urbaines 4/1 (Cairo, 1999).
4. The term samsarah is used along with the term khan in Yemen. However, some samsarahs function like the urban khan, with lodging cells above, and others fulfill the role of the qaysarriyah, without lodging, although there is no distinction in terminology. Samsarah, from the word samsar, or broker, appears to be relatively new, perhaps coming into use during the first Ottoman occupation. Ronald Lewcock, "The Buildings of the Suq/Market," in Robert Bertram Serjeant and Ronald Lewcock, eds. , San'a: An Arabian Islamic City (London, 1983), 277.
5. Scharabi, Hanna, and the editors of Le Khan al-Khalili describe the subtleties of terminology for the various types.
6. See Robert Hillenbrand, Islamic Architecture: Form, Function, and Meaning (New York, 1994), 331-34, for a discussion of the terminology.
7. The exact date for Samsarat al-Nahhas is unknown, but Ronald Lewcock surmises that it is later than the Samsarat al-Majjah, which was built in the seventeenth century and is said to be linked to the endowment of the contemporary Ahmad b. al-Qasim Mosque in al-Rawdah. Lewcock, "Buildings of the Suq," 283.
8. André Raymond, Grandes Villes arabes à l'époque ottomane (Paris, 1985), 251.
9. Cees Brouwer, Al-Mukha: Profile of a Yemeni Seaport (Amsterdam, 1997), 140.
10. Volker Höhfeld noted this curious absence in Höhfeld, "Die gegenwärtige Situation Mochas als Kleinstadt," in Hans Becker, Volker Höhfeld, and Horst Kopp, eds. , Kaffee aus Arabien (Wiesbaden, 1979), 26.
11. Taking scholarly criticism of van Leur's peddler theory into account, Ashin Das Gupta confirms the presence of many small-scale merchants, or peddlers, who traveled the Indian Ocean trade routes. He distinguishes the peddlers from the major Gujarati merchants who dominated the trade. Das Gupta, "Indian Merchants and the Trade in the Indian Ocean, c. 1500-1750," in Tapan Raychaudhuri and Irfan Habib, eds. , The Cambridge Economic History of India (Cambridge, England, 1982), 419.
12. Louis de Grandpré, Voyage dans l'Inde et au Bengale fait dans les années 1789 et 1790; . . . contenant la description de Moka, et du commerce des Arabes de l'Yémen; des détails sur leur caractère et leurs mœurs, etc. , etc. (Paris, 1801), 148.
13. The caravanserai would not be the only place in the city where pilgrims would stay. In the early nineteenth century, an anonymous American observer noted how the newly arrived pilgrims in the city had built for themselves a small provisional settlement out of reed mats along the city walls. The same source also described Malay pilgrims taking shelter in the Mosque of al-Sandal, in the southern part of the city, where he was staying. Al-Sandal, one of Mocha's smaller mosques, probably was not the only one to house such pilgrims, but other local religious structures also must have served the same purpose. Anonymous, "Caroline" Journal, 1821, Phillips Library, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Mass. , Log 656 1821C.
14. 'Abdallah b. 'Ali al-Wazir, Tarikh al-yaman khilal al-qarn al-hadi 'ashar al-hijri, al-sabi' 'ashar al-miladi, ed. Muhammad 'Abd al-Rahim Jazim (Sanaa, 1985), 173, 228
15. and Husam al-Din Muhsin al-Hasan (Abu Talib), Tarikh al-yaman fi 'asr al-istiqlal 'an al-hukm al-'uthmani al-awwal, ed. 'Abdallah Muhammad al-Hibshi (Sanaa, 1990), 84.
16. Al-Wazir, Tarikh al-yaman, 250.
17. When Sayyid Qasim Amir al-Din and Sidi 'Ali came to the city in September 1727 (both representatives of the newly declared imam Muhammad b. Ishaq), they stayed at the house of the wealthy Gujarati merchant 'Abd al-Ghafur, as arranged by the governor of the city. Thirty soldiers were placed at the door of the residence to protect the important visitors; VOC 9122, 13 Sept. 1727. That these honored guests were lodged in 'Abd al-Ghafur's home confirms the practice of housing notables and important individuals in private residences rather than public structures. The historian known as Abu Talib describes the visit of the Safavid Shah Husayn's messenger and his retinue to the Zaydi imam's court in 1113/1701-2. At the end of their visit, they set up a temporary settlement of royal tents before they departed by sea from Mocha. Abu Talib, 'Asr al-istiqlal, 301.
18. The account says that the French captain was killed at the door of the store in Mocha ("fi bab dukkan bi'l-Mukha"). See Muhammad Zabarah, Nashr al-'arf li-nubla al-yaman ba'd al-alf, 3 vols. (Sanaa, 1985), 1: 304. The Dutch specify that the French captain, Monsieur "Rickekomme," was slain in front of the French house. VOC 2447, 30 June 1737.
19. VOC 9115.
20. VOC 9119, 23 Mar. 1725.
21. See Nancy Ajung Um, "A Red Sea Society in Yemen: Architecture, Urban Form, and Cultural Dynamics in the Eighteenth-Century Port City of Al-Mukha" (Ph. D. diss. , University of California, Los Angeles, 2001), 70-93, for a discussion on the identity of the merchants and other officials.
22. See VOC 9117, 18 Jan. 1723, for a meeting at the house of 'Abd al-Ghafur.
23. On lodging of foreign merchants, see Jean de la Roque, Voyage de l'Arabie Heureuse par l'Océan Oriental et le Détroit de la Mer Rouge (Paris, 1741)
24. On the storage of goods, see VOC 2202, 28 May 1730.
25. See also the incident when Baniyans were punished for storing goods directly in their homes without passing through the Customs House first; VOC 9115, 16 and 19 Apr. 1705.
26. See Um, "Red Sea Society," 360-76, for a detailed discussion of all the houses that were surveyed. Fewer than ten historic houses stood in 2000.
27. Although the courtyard house type exists on the Arabian peninsula, other styles are more prevalent, namely the tower house, but also the reed-and-mud house and the Zabid-style brick homes on the coastal Tihamah plain. Paul Bonnenfant presents these alternatives to the courtyard house in his summary of Arabian domestic architecture. He also notes that many Arabian domiciles have a great deal of ornamentation on their exteriors, unlike the traditional courtyard house, which is oriented toward the inside. Bonnenfant, "La Maison dans la péninsule Arabique," in Jean-Claude Garçin, ed. , L'Habitat traditionnel dans les pays musulmans autour de la Méditerranée, vol. 3 (Cairo, 1991), 715-99, 932-39.
28. Bonnenfant gives several examples from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf. Of these, see his discussion of Riyadh. Bonnenfant, "La Maison," 730.
29. Anthropologist Gabriele vom Bruck's study of gender and spatial relations in Sanaani houses provides a strong precedent for reexamining fixed notions of gendered spaces in Yemen. See vom Bruck, "A House Turned Inside Out: Inhabiting Space in a Yemeni City," Journal of Material Culture 2 July 1997), 139-72.
30. Following official Dutch policy, some of the Dutch merchants did bring their families to Mocha to live with them, as in the case of the Colombus family, whose young son died in Mocha. VOC 9115, 28 Apr. 1706.
31. See Alexander Hamilton's account of the time he invited a merchant who had not paid his debt to the upper stories of his home and threatened to throw him from the top of the house if he did not disburse funds. Alexander Hamilton, A New Account of the East Indies (London, 1930), 35-36.
32. This did not happen often, but when it did, Europeans enthusiastically documented it. See Grandpré, Voyage dans l'Inde, 172-73.
33. VOC 2202, 12 July 1730.
34. VOC 2252, 11 Dec. 1731.
35. Bonnenfant, "La Maison," 775.
36. For focused studies on the Cairene rab', see Jean-Charles Depaule, Actualité de l'habitat ancien au Caire. Le Rab' Qizlar (Cairo, 1985)
37. and Mona Zakariya, "Le Rab' de Tabbana," Annales Islamologiques 16 (1980), 275-97.
38. In the commercial zone of Cairo, of the fifty-five surveyed rab', 80 percent were situated above a wikalah. Muhammad 'Afifi, "Les Rab' à l'époque ottomane," in Le Khan al-Khalili, 101 (see n. 5).
39. James de Vere Allen, "The Swahili House: Cultural and Ritual Concepts Underlying Its Plan and Structures," Art and Archaeology Research Papers (Dec. 1979), 2.
40. See Jean-Pierre Greenlaw, The Coral Buildings of Suakin (Boston, 1976).
41. On the haveli house, see V. S. Pramar, Haveli: Wooden House and Mansions of Gujarat (Middletown, N. J. , 1989).
42. Legend attributes the coffee-drinking legacy to this famous Sufi shaykh. See Ralph Hattox, Coffee and Coffeehouses: The Origins of a Social Beverage in the Medieval Near East (Seattle, 1985), 20.
43. Al-Muhibbi, Khulasat al-athar fi 'ayyan al-qarn al-hadi 'ashar (Cairo, 1284/1867-68), 500.
44. In my dissertation, I describe the historical evolution of the city and the development of these two zones. Um, "Red Sea Society," 15-57 (see n. 30).
45. Samuel Lachmann, "The Ottoman Copper Coins Struck at Mocha," Spink Numismatic Circular 101 (Feb. 1993), 44.
46. La Roque, Voyage de l'Arabie, 91 (see n. 35).