Classic Ships of Islam: From Mesopotamia to the Indian Ocean [HdO Section 1, #92]
Dionisius A. Agius
Preface (excerpt):
During one of my field trips in the Gulf, in April 1992, I met a Qatari, Muhammed Saeed al-Balushi, who completely changed the way I looked at the maritime culture of the Western Indian Ocean. Muhammed was then head of research and documentation at the Arab Gulf States Folklore Centre in Doha and it was thanks to him that I began searching the history of sailing ships through early Arabic sources. One day, he introduced me to Yousef Al Majid, a master builder in Doha, who was building a replica of a 90-foot long battîl. In the days of sail the battil was a trading and pearling vessel, but also a pirate and warship in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. She was a double-ended craft, with a fiddle-headed bow, a high sternpost and double forward-leaning masts. I was trans transfixed by the sheer beauty and craftsmanship of the vessel and resolved there and then to find out more about these relics of the distant past and how they might relate to the modern vessels I had previously observed. Yousef told me: “If you want to know all about the past, go to the coasts of Oman; there you shall see how our ancestors build our ships and sailed them”. He was absolutely right, and furthermore, I found that traditional dhow-building, though in decline, still exists in places dotted around the coasts of the Indian Ocean. (...)
During one of my field trips in the Gulf, in April 1992, I met a Qatari, Muhammed Saeed al-Balushi, who completely changed the way I looked at the maritime culture of the Western Indian Ocean. Muhammed was then head of research and documentation at the Arab Gulf States Folklore Centre in Doha and it was thanks to him that I began searching the history of sailing ships through early Arabic sources. One day, he introduced me to Yousef Al Majid, a master builder in Doha, who was building a replica of a 90-foot long battîl. In the days of sail the battil was a trading and pearling vessel, but also a pirate and warship in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. She was a double-ended craft, with a fiddle-headed bow, a high sternpost and double forward-leaning masts. I was trans transfixed by the sheer beauty and craftsmanship of the vessel and resolved there and then to find out more about these relics of the distant past and how they might relate to the modern vessels I had previously observed. Yousef told me: “If you want to know all about the past, go to the coasts of Oman; there you shall see how our ancestors build our ships and sailed them”. He was absolutely right, and furthermore, I found that traditional dhow-building, though in decline, still exists in places dotted around the coasts of the Indian Ocean. (...)
Categorías:
Volumen:
HdO, Section1 #92
Año:
2007
Editorial:
Brill Academic Publishers
Idioma:
english
Páginas:
530
ISBN 10:
9004158634
ISBN 13:
9789004158634
Serie:
Handbook of Oriental Studies/Handbuch Der Orientalistik
Archivo:
PDF, 6.21 MB
IPFS:
,
english, 2007
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