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Muscat Early History
Evidence of communal activity in the area around Muscat dates back to the 6th millennium BCE in Ras al-Hamra, where burial sites of fishermen have been found. The graves appear to be well formed and indicate the existence of burial rituals. South of Muscat, remnants of Harappan pottery indicate some level of contact with the Indus Valley Civilisation. Muscat's notability as a port was acknowledged as early as the 1st century CE by Greek geographers Ptolemy, who referred to it as Cryptus Portus (the Hidden Port), and by Pliny the Elder, who called it Amithoscuta. The port fell to a Sassanid invasion in the 3rd century CE, under the rule of Shapur I., while conversion to Islam occurred during the 7th century. Muscat's importance as a trading port continued to grow in the centuries that followed, under the influence of the Azd dynasty, a local tribe. The establishment of the First Imamate in the 9th century CE was the first step in consolidating disparate Omani tribal factions under the banner of an Ibadi state. However, tribal skirmishes continued, allowing the Abbasids of Baghdad to conquer Oman. The Abbasids occupied the region until the 11th century, when they were driven out by the local Yahmad tribe. Power over Oman shifted from the Yahmad tribe to the Azdi Nabahinah clan, during whose rule, the people of coastal ports such as Muscat prospered from maritime trade and close alliances with the Indian subcontinent, at the cost of the alienation of the people of the interior of Oman. The Portuguese conqueror Afonso de Albuquerque attacked Muscat in July, 1507. A bloody battle ensued between the Portuguese and forces loyal to the Persian governor of the city. After the fall of the town, Albuquerque massacred most of the remaining inhabitants – men, women and children, following which the town was occupied and pillaged. Wikipedia contributors."Muscat, Oman." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 28 May. 2012. Web. 31 May. 2012. |
From Kutch To QalhatTrading relations between Oman and India.
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S.B. Miles (Countries and tribes of the Persian gulf) reported the ruins of a Hindu temple at Qalhat, the principal Port of Oman in the 15thcentury. Albuquerque also reported that the Hindu merchants of Gujarat escaped from Khayr Fakkan, a port on the northern Oman coast before he sacked it in 1507. Portuguese occupied Muscat for a 140-year period, between 1508 and 1648. Portuguese colonists built up and fortified the city, where remnants of their colonial architectural style still remain. During the Portuguese domination of the Indian Ocean in the late15th century, traders from Sind especially the Bhatia’s of Thatta thrived and formed the majority of the trading community in Muscat.The Portuguese depended on the Indian traders in their attempt to gain monopoly of the trade in the region. Bhatia’s and other traders in Sind prospered and the city of Thatta became an important trading partner of Muscat. Among the goods imported from Thatta were clothes, silk, cotton yarn, opium, ghee, grains, sugar and sugar candy. It was with the help of Bhatia called Narutem who was the supplier to the Portuguese garrison that the Yariba rulers managed to expel the Portuguese. Narutem had a beautiful daughter whom the Portuguese commander wanted to marry. Narutem not happy at the proposal sabotaged the garrison and secretly invited the Imam who had besieged the city to attack. For this Narutem and his family were exempted from taxation. Permission was also granted to the community for the building of a temple. Read “History of the imâms and seyyids of ʼOmân.” |
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The Indian trading community was not much affected by the civil war that brought the Al busaid dynasty to power in 1740. In fact it continued to prosper and strong ties were forged with the rulers. In 1765 Carsten Niebuhr passed through Muscat and gave the following description of the Indian community:
“In no other Mahometan city are the Banians so numerous as in Maskat, their number in this city amounts to no fewer than twelve hundred. They are permitted to live agreeably to their own laws, to bring their wives hither, to set up idols in their chambers, and to burn their dead. If a Banian intrigues here with a Mussulman woman, government here does not treat him with the same severity as he would meet with elsewhere.” The freedom to practice their own religion, safety of their property and life and profitable trade encouraged more Hindus and Bhatia’s from Cutch and Sindh to come and settle with their families in Muscat. Sindhi Bhatia’s who had been dominant during the Portuguese reign faced stiff competition from the Kutchi Bhatia’s. At the same time the economy in Sindh collapsed partly due to misrule of the Talpur dynasty. Hindus were persecuted in Sindh. Also due to silting and change of course of the river Indus Thatta lost its transportation route. In Cutch the port of Mandvi was developing into busy commercial port. Between 1800 to 1820 conditions in Cutch like famine, plague, earthquakes, political instability motivated people to migrate to the Arabian and Swahili coast. Muscat and Zanzibar were favoured due to religious tolerance and hospitality of the rulers who encouraged trading. Lot of Hindus and Muslims migrated at the time from Cutch. Eventually Cutchi Bhatia’s with their network in India dominated the trade at Muscat. Most of the Sindhi Bhatia’s moved to Bahrain where they monopolised the pearl trade. Even today there is a big community of Sindhi Bhatia’s in Bahrain and Dubai. Visit http://www.bhatias.org/introduction.htm |
History of Seyd Said, Sultan of Muscat.....
By Vincenzo Maurizi 1819
The population of Mascat is considerable, though its exact amount is uncertain from the constant influx of foreigners, produced by its extensive trade; the merchants are numerous, some of them possessing capitals of a million of dollars; among the citizens are 4000 Banians, or Beniani, whose industry is particularly conspicuous; there are few Jews, and no Christians, except accidental travellers. .... page 23
The customs of Mascat are farmed to a rich Beniani at a rent of 180,000 dollars annually; 5,000 are paid for liberty to export salt from the mines at Ormuz, while Kesm, Larek and Bender Abasi, produce about an equal sum. ..... page 29
The foreigners on the shores of the Persian gulf are generally Sabaeans, Lotia, and Beniani: the first of these people are Christians of St. John the Baptist, who occasionally pass for Moslems, because they can repeat a few prayers from the Koran: the second are a wandering tribe, something resembling the gipsies of Europe, who are found in great multitudes about Matra: the Beniani are numerous everywhere, but particularly at Mascat, where the Sultan has granted them many privileges, and where their good conduct and wealth bring them universal esteem and respect. In this distant country they retain a zealous adherence, to the worship of Brama ; and the environs of Mascat are full of cows pampered with food, which the natives of Hindostan are at the expense of maintaining, because they declare that, after one of his incarnations, their divinity ascended to heaven upon this animal. They all, like the Jansenists, have a great veneration for other animals, and never on any account eat either flesh or fish. It would be considered a heinous affront to kill even a fly in their presence: and the Arabian fishermen sometimes bring them live fish in order to obtain money,- upon the promise of again throwing them into the sea; a circumstance which makes these careful merchants peculiarly anxious to avoid meetings which demand the exercise of so expensive a. dogma of their creed. One of these people was. a fellow-passenger with me in a voyage across the Persian gulf; and I observed that, before meals, he always threw some bread into the sea, in order, as he said, to please the divinity by giving food to some of his creatures.
Although the Beniani live entirely upon vegetables, rice, milk, and butter, yet they are generally fat, and possess strong constitutions, while the leprosy, so common among other classes in the East, is rarely to be met with among them. It is a remarkable circumstance, that asafoetida composes the seasoning of the greatest part of their ragouts When the conscience of .a Benian accuses him of the commission of a crime, he offers barley -or some other eatable to his cow, and the same ceremony is observed when he is particularly anxious about the success of an undertaking; in the first case this gift is considered an act of atonement to the creator ; -in the last a propitiatory sacrifice. The industry of the Beniani, places all money transactions in their hands; they are the great Bankers of Arabia, and so far resemble the Jews in Turkey. ..... page127-129
The population of Mascat is considerable, though its exact amount is uncertain from the constant influx of foreigners, produced by its extensive trade; the merchants are numerous, some of them possessing capitals of a million of dollars; among the citizens are 4000 Banians, or Beniani, whose industry is particularly conspicuous; there are few Jews, and no Christians, except accidental travellers. .... page 23
The customs of Mascat are farmed to a rich Beniani at a rent of 180,000 dollars annually; 5,000 are paid for liberty to export salt from the mines at Ormuz, while Kesm, Larek and Bender Abasi, produce about an equal sum. ..... page 29
The foreigners on the shores of the Persian gulf are generally Sabaeans, Lotia, and Beniani: the first of these people are Christians of St. John the Baptist, who occasionally pass for Moslems, because they can repeat a few prayers from the Koran: the second are a wandering tribe, something resembling the gipsies of Europe, who are found in great multitudes about Matra: the Beniani are numerous everywhere, but particularly at Mascat, where the Sultan has granted them many privileges, and where their good conduct and wealth bring them universal esteem and respect. In this distant country they retain a zealous adherence, to the worship of Brama ; and the environs of Mascat are full of cows pampered with food, which the natives of Hindostan are at the expense of maintaining, because they declare that, after one of his incarnations, their divinity ascended to heaven upon this animal. They all, like the Jansenists, have a great veneration for other animals, and never on any account eat either flesh or fish. It would be considered a heinous affront to kill even a fly in their presence: and the Arabian fishermen sometimes bring them live fish in order to obtain money,- upon the promise of again throwing them into the sea; a circumstance which makes these careful merchants peculiarly anxious to avoid meetings which demand the exercise of so expensive a. dogma of their creed. One of these people was. a fellow-passenger with me in a voyage across the Persian gulf; and I observed that, before meals, he always threw some bread into the sea, in order, as he said, to please the divinity by giving food to some of his creatures.
Although the Beniani live entirely upon vegetables, rice, milk, and butter, yet they are generally fat, and possess strong constitutions, while the leprosy, so common among other classes in the East, is rarely to be met with among them. It is a remarkable circumstance, that asafoetida composes the seasoning of the greatest part of their ragouts When the conscience of .a Benian accuses him of the commission of a crime, he offers barley -or some other eatable to his cow, and the same ceremony is observed when he is particularly anxious about the success of an undertaking; in the first case this gift is considered an act of atonement to the creator ; -in the last a propitiatory sacrifice. The industry of the Beniani, places all money transactions in their hands; they are the great Bankers of Arabia, and so far resemble the Jews in Turkey. ..... page127-129
Notes of travel: or, Recollections of Majunga, Zanzibar, Muscat, Aden, Mocha ... By Joseph Barlow Felt Osgood 1854
Muscat owes much of its importance and wealth to that portion of its people known as Banians, who monopolize the foreign trade here as in most other places where they have located themselves in this part of the world. Muscat is a favorite resort with them, inasmuch as the government is lenient, and not so much inclined as at Mocha to extort and borrow their money with no intention ever to repay them.
This singular people belong to one of the classes, or castes of Hindoos inhabiting Cutch, Guzerat, Surat and other places in India. Sojourners wherever a lucrative business may be followed, they remain fifteen or twenty years, visiting at long intervals their native homes and families. ..... page 95
As they never intermarry with those of other sects, their uniformly light complexions pronounce upon their genuine descent. Mustaches are worn by all the men, and being gracefully cultivated beautify the good features of their faces; they are shorn upon the death of a near relative. The prevalent custom is to shave the whole of the face but the upper lip, and also the head, leaving upon the crown of the latter only a small patch of hair, which is often allowed to grow and hang in a cue down the back.
The following is their singular costume. A robe of white calico striped with red, seven or eight feet long, is wound about the waist, passed between the legs and the end secured behind in the folds of the waist. In cool weather they wear a short white frock with long sleeves, which is fitted in gathers closely about the neck and wrists, a high crowned turban and red slippers with pointed turned up toes.Adhering strictly to the tenets of the religion of their country,—a metempsychosis,—they make total abstinence from eating the flesh of animals. .... page 97-98
They worship the cow as their chief support, and also the sea, to which they pay vows and offerings of rice, milk and fruits. They treat the bovine genus with the greatest respect, affection and kindness; bestowing a humble obeisance whenever and wherever they pass them, and always providing them with proper food and comfortable shelter. It is not an unusual thing for them to be allowed a room in their own dwelling houses, both the dreamful owner and his honored mute dreamers vising the front door in common. At Muscat, just prior to the Arab holidays, large numbers of cows and bullocks are purchased by their worshipers that they may be saved from slaughter. Near the beach at Zanzibar an extensive cow-yard is located, into which the cows are driven at sunset every evening for the purpose of being milked. At this hour it is ludicrously amusing to watch the numerous Banians who there assemble, bowing and salaaming to, and affectionately embracing each one of these unheeding quadrupeds who may pass by, and even carefully raising their caudal extremities to kiss them fervently and rub them piously over their foreheads.
In things comestible the Banians are most consistent vegetarians. Their food is principally rice, milk, fruits, vegetables, and a variety of dishes in the curious compound of which neither flesh nor fish is admitted. From among all these I could select nothing more palatable than pea soup and rice and milk. Spirituous liquors never have a place on their boards, for the Banians carry most punctiliously into practice, that which too many of the Arabs adopt as mere unpracticed theory regarding intoxicating drinks. Having partaken of the meal, each guest is furnished with a betel nut, cardamom seeds and cloves; he is then sprinkled with rose-water and finally smoked with frankincense, this last compliment being the signal for retiring, which on the whole is the most agreeable feature of the entertainment to one fond of substantial dinners. When his guest may not be of his own sect the Banian sustains the dignity of his caste by eating alone at a side table, waited upon by one of his own caste. To meet the necessity of eating only such food as may be prepared by one of their number, the art of cooking is made a branch of the education of all their boys, who are also early instructed in matters of business, and while yet young many of them afford remarkable evidences of precocity.
When travelling, every Banian carries his own bellmetal goblet or bowl to drink from, and should he chance to leave this article of personal property behind he would abstain altogether from the use of liquids. Should his supply of water be exhausted during a long passage, he would prefer death to life saved by drinking from a vessel polluted by persons of a different religion, and at an expense of his caste, to be deprived of which he considers is a loss of the comforts of his religion and all its supposed benefits after death. A cow is generally made a companion of his travels whether by sea or land.
Banians write their language from left to right, as we do, and instead of folding their letters, roll them up compactly and fasten the edges with paste.
When a Banian merchant becomes bankrupt he seats himself during the day-time behind a lighted candle, in his open counting-room, and in this way gives public notice of his failure. Yet bankruptcy does not absolve him from the life-long obligation to pay all his debts, a moral duty which is assumed by the children after their parent's death.I one day unintentionally intruded upon the privacy of a Banian merchant who had recently heard of the decease of a son at Cutch. He had closed his counting room for three days and, with a son and several clerks, was seated upon the floor in a darkened room. Each one of the party had his knees drawn up cramping tight to his chin, and was wholly covered with a white sheet, excepting his face. The business I had gone upon could not well be transacted with such a studiously sorrowing party, and I forthwith retreated. The Banians never bury, but always burn their dead.
Among the many anecdotes which I have heard related, illustrative of the manners of the Banians, I will mention only the following.
Each one of the sect wears a necklace of wooden beads supposed to possess a protective virtue which is destroyed on a separation of the string, unless a bishop of their order be summoned to join it on the spot. A sailor who had been cheated by one of them, being on shore with several shipmates, adopted the following summary mode of revenge. Having induced the trader to show his goods, at an opportune moment the potent charm was severed. Removing to a short distance the jolly tara reaped infinite amusement from the discomfiture of the woe-begone looking victim, who, brimful of wrath, had no opportunity to vent it on the jester unless his violation of those conditions of his religion which fixed him to the scene of the insult, until clerical aid should arrive. While I was at Muscat a total eclipse of the sun took place. The Banians having almanacs, were previously informed of its occurrence. They closed their places of business before it commenced, abstained from eating and passed the time of the sun's obscuration in devotional exercises. After the eclipse was ended they bathed and put on clean apparel. The Arabs, believing the earth to be flat, were stricken with terror and tried to appease their oflended Allah by prayer in the mosques and elsewhere. .... page 98-102
Muscat owes much of its importance and wealth to that portion of its people known as Banians, who monopolize the foreign trade here as in most other places where they have located themselves in this part of the world. Muscat is a favorite resort with them, inasmuch as the government is lenient, and not so much inclined as at Mocha to extort and borrow their money with no intention ever to repay them.
This singular people belong to one of the classes, or castes of Hindoos inhabiting Cutch, Guzerat, Surat and other places in India. Sojourners wherever a lucrative business may be followed, they remain fifteen or twenty years, visiting at long intervals their native homes and families. ..... page 95
As they never intermarry with those of other sects, their uniformly light complexions pronounce upon their genuine descent. Mustaches are worn by all the men, and being gracefully cultivated beautify the good features of their faces; they are shorn upon the death of a near relative. The prevalent custom is to shave the whole of the face but the upper lip, and also the head, leaving upon the crown of the latter only a small patch of hair, which is often allowed to grow and hang in a cue down the back.
The following is their singular costume. A robe of white calico striped with red, seven or eight feet long, is wound about the waist, passed between the legs and the end secured behind in the folds of the waist. In cool weather they wear a short white frock with long sleeves, which is fitted in gathers closely about the neck and wrists, a high crowned turban and red slippers with pointed turned up toes.Adhering strictly to the tenets of the religion of their country,—a metempsychosis,—they make total abstinence from eating the flesh of animals. .... page 97-98
They worship the cow as their chief support, and also the sea, to which they pay vows and offerings of rice, milk and fruits. They treat the bovine genus with the greatest respect, affection and kindness; bestowing a humble obeisance whenever and wherever they pass them, and always providing them with proper food and comfortable shelter. It is not an unusual thing for them to be allowed a room in their own dwelling houses, both the dreamful owner and his honored mute dreamers vising the front door in common. At Muscat, just prior to the Arab holidays, large numbers of cows and bullocks are purchased by their worshipers that they may be saved from slaughter. Near the beach at Zanzibar an extensive cow-yard is located, into which the cows are driven at sunset every evening for the purpose of being milked. At this hour it is ludicrously amusing to watch the numerous Banians who there assemble, bowing and salaaming to, and affectionately embracing each one of these unheeding quadrupeds who may pass by, and even carefully raising their caudal extremities to kiss them fervently and rub them piously over their foreheads.
In things comestible the Banians are most consistent vegetarians. Their food is principally rice, milk, fruits, vegetables, and a variety of dishes in the curious compound of which neither flesh nor fish is admitted. From among all these I could select nothing more palatable than pea soup and rice and milk. Spirituous liquors never have a place on their boards, for the Banians carry most punctiliously into practice, that which too many of the Arabs adopt as mere unpracticed theory regarding intoxicating drinks. Having partaken of the meal, each guest is furnished with a betel nut, cardamom seeds and cloves; he is then sprinkled with rose-water and finally smoked with frankincense, this last compliment being the signal for retiring, which on the whole is the most agreeable feature of the entertainment to one fond of substantial dinners. When his guest may not be of his own sect the Banian sustains the dignity of his caste by eating alone at a side table, waited upon by one of his own caste. To meet the necessity of eating only such food as may be prepared by one of their number, the art of cooking is made a branch of the education of all their boys, who are also early instructed in matters of business, and while yet young many of them afford remarkable evidences of precocity.
When travelling, every Banian carries his own bellmetal goblet or bowl to drink from, and should he chance to leave this article of personal property behind he would abstain altogether from the use of liquids. Should his supply of water be exhausted during a long passage, he would prefer death to life saved by drinking from a vessel polluted by persons of a different religion, and at an expense of his caste, to be deprived of which he considers is a loss of the comforts of his religion and all its supposed benefits after death. A cow is generally made a companion of his travels whether by sea or land.
Banians write their language from left to right, as we do, and instead of folding their letters, roll them up compactly and fasten the edges with paste.
When a Banian merchant becomes bankrupt he seats himself during the day-time behind a lighted candle, in his open counting-room, and in this way gives public notice of his failure. Yet bankruptcy does not absolve him from the life-long obligation to pay all his debts, a moral duty which is assumed by the children after their parent's death.I one day unintentionally intruded upon the privacy of a Banian merchant who had recently heard of the decease of a son at Cutch. He had closed his counting room for three days and, with a son and several clerks, was seated upon the floor in a darkened room. Each one of the party had his knees drawn up cramping tight to his chin, and was wholly covered with a white sheet, excepting his face. The business I had gone upon could not well be transacted with such a studiously sorrowing party, and I forthwith retreated. The Banians never bury, but always burn their dead.
Among the many anecdotes which I have heard related, illustrative of the manners of the Banians, I will mention only the following.
Each one of the sect wears a necklace of wooden beads supposed to possess a protective virtue which is destroyed on a separation of the string, unless a bishop of their order be summoned to join it on the spot. A sailor who had been cheated by one of them, being on shore with several shipmates, adopted the following summary mode of revenge. Having induced the trader to show his goods, at an opportune moment the potent charm was severed. Removing to a short distance the jolly tara reaped infinite amusement from the discomfiture of the woe-begone looking victim, who, brimful of wrath, had no opportunity to vent it on the jester unless his violation of those conditions of his religion which fixed him to the scene of the insult, until clerical aid should arrive. While I was at Muscat a total eclipse of the sun took place. The Banians having almanacs, were previously informed of its occurrence. They closed their places of business before it commenced, abstained from eating and passed the time of the sun's obscuration in devotional exercises. After the eclipse was ended they bathed and put on clean apparel. The Arabs, believing the earth to be flat, were stricken with terror and tried to appease their oflended Allah by prayer in the mosques and elsewhere. .... page 98-102