Ancient history of Yemen
History of Yemen |
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The ancient history of Yemen or South Arabia is especially important because it is one of the oldest centers of civilization in the Near East. Its relatively fertile land and adequate rainfall in a moister climate helped sustain a stable population, a feature recognized by the ancient Greek geographer Ptolemy, who described Yemen as Eudaimon Arabia (better known in its Latin translation, Arabia Felix) meaning Fortunate Arabia or Happy Arabia. Between the eighth century BCE and the sixth century CE, it was dominated by six main states which rivaled each other, or were allied with each other and controlled the lucrative spice trade: Saba', Ma'īn, Qatabān, Hadhramaut, Kingdom of Awsan, and the Himyarite Kingdom. Islam arrived in 630 CE and Yemen became part of the Muslim realm.
The centers of the Old South Arabian kingdoms of present-day Yemen lay around the desert area called Ramlat al-Sab'atayn, known to medieval Arab geographers as Ṣayhad. The southern and western Highlands and the coastal region were less influential politically. The coastal cities were however already very important from the beginning for trade. Apart from the territory of modern Yemen, the kingdoms extended into Oman, as far as the north Arabian oasis of Lihyan (also called Dedan), to Eritrea, and even along coastal East Africa to what is now Tanzania.
History of archaeological research in Yemen
Sabaean Studies, the study of the cultures of Ancient South Arabia, belong to the younger branches of archaeology since in Europe ancient South Arabia remained unknown for much longer than other regions of the Orient. In 1504 a European, namely the Italian Lodovico di Varthema, first managed to venture into the interior.[1] Two Danish expeditions contributed to by Johann David Michaelis (1717–1791) and Carsten Niebuhr (1733–1815) among others, contributed to scientific study, if only in a modest way.[2][3]
Written sources
The body of source material for Old South Arabia is sparse. Apart from a few mentions in Assyrian, Persian, Roman and Arabic sources, as well as in the Old Testament, which date back to the 8th century BCE right up to the Islamic period, the Old South Arabian inscriptions are the main source. These are however largely very short and as a result limited in the information they provide. The predominant part of the inscriptions originates from Saba' and from the Sabaeo-Himyaritic Kingdom which succeeded it, the least come from Awsān, which only existed as an independent state for a short time. Most of the extant texts are building inscriptions or dedications; it is rare for historical texts to be found.
Chronology
Although the Kingdom of
In 1955
Islamic accounts of pre-dynastic Qahṭān (3rd millennium BCE - 8th century BCE)
According to medieval Muslim Arab historians,
A trade route began to flourish along the Red Sea coasts of Tihāmah. This period witnessed the reign of the legendary Queen of Sheba mentioned in the Bible, called Bilqīs by Muslim scholars.[9]
At the end of this period, in the 9th century BCE, writing was introduced; this now meant that South Arabian history could be written down.
Archaeology and the prehistory of Yemen
The study of South Arabian prehistory is still at the beginning, although sites are known going back to the
Documented history
It is not yet possible to specify with any certainty when the great South Arabian Kingdoms appeared; estimates range (within the framework of the long chronology) from the 12th until the 8th century BCE.
Kingdom of Saba (12th century BCE – 275 CE)
During Sabaean rule, trade and agriculture flourished generating much wealth and prosperity. The Sabaean kingdom was located in what is now the
, founded the city of Sana’a, which is also called the city of Sam, or also called Azal city, which means the ancient city.Sabaean hegemony (800 BCE – 400 BCE)
At the time of the earliest historical sources originating in South Arabia the territory was under the rule of the Kingdom of
The success of the Kingdom was based on the cultivation and trade of spices and aromatics including frankincense and myrrh. These were exported to the Mediterranean, India, and Abyssinia where they were greatly prized by many cultures, using camels on routes through Arabia, and to India by sea. Evidence of Sabaean influence is found in northern Ethiopia, where the South Arabian alphabet, religion and pantheon, and the South Arabian style of art and architecture were introduced.[12][13][14] The Sabaeans created a sense of identity through their religion. They worshipped El-Maqah and believed that they were his children.[15] For centuries, the Sabaeans controlled outbound trade across the Bab-el-Mandeb, a strait separating the Arabian Peninsula from the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea from the Indian Ocean.[16]
Agriculture in Yemen thrived during this time due to an advanced irrigation system which consisted of large water tunnels in mountains, and dams. The most impressive of these earthworks, known as the
The Sabaean kingdom, with its capital at
Kingdom of Ḥaḑramawt (8th century BCE – 300 CE)
The first known inscriptions of Ḥaḑramawt are known from the 8th century BCE. It was first referenced by an outside civilization in an
Kingdom of Awsan (800 BCE – 500 BCE)
The ancient Kingdom of Awsān in South Arabia with a capital at Ḥajar Yaḥirr in Wādī Markhah, to the south of the Wādī Bayḥān, is now marked by a
Between 700 and 680 BC, the Kingdom of Awsan dominated Aden and its surroundings and challenged the Sabaean supremacy in South Arabia. Sabaean Mukarrib Karib'il Watar I conquered Awsan,[19] and expanded Sabaean rule and territory to include much of South Arabia.[20] Lack of water in the Arabian Peninsula prevented the Sabaeans from unifying the entire peninsula. Instead, they established various colonies to control trade routes.[21]
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Kingdom of Qatabān (4th century BCE – 200 CE)
Qatabān was one of the ancient Yemeni kingdoms which thrived in the
Kingdom of Ma'in (8th century BCE – 100 BCE)
During Minaean rule, the capital was at
Kingdom of Ḥimyar (2nd century BCE – 525 CE)
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The Ḥimyarites eventually united Southwestern Arabia, controlling the Red Sea as well as the coasts of the Gulf of Aden. From their capital city, the Ḥimyarite kings launched successful military campaigns, and had stretched its domain at times as far east to the Persian Gulf and as far north as the Arabian Desert.
During the 3rd century CE, the South Arabian kingdoms were in continuous conflict with one another.
They established their capital at
Kingdom of Aksum (520 – 570 CE)
Around 517/8, a
Yusuf marched toward the port city of Mocha, killing 14,000 and capturing 11,000.
Christian sources portray Dhu Nuwas as a Jewish zealot, while Islamic traditions say that he marched around 20,000 Christians into trenches filled with flaming oil, burning them alive.[31][32] Himyarite inscriptions attributed to Dhu Nuwas show great pride in killing 27,000, enslaving 20,500 Christians in Ẓafār and Najran and killing 570,000 beasts of burden belonging to them as a matter of imperial policy.[33] It is reported that Byzantium Emperor Justin I sent a letter to the Aksumite King Kaleb, pressuring him to "...attack the abominable Hebrew."[29] A military alliance of Byzantine, Aksumite, and Arab Christians successfully defeated Dhu Nuwas around 525–527 and a client Christian king was installed on the Himyarite throne.[34]
Kaleb sent a fleet across the Red Sea and was able to defeat Dhū Nuwās, who was killed in battle according to an inscription from Ḥusn al-Ghurāb, while later Arab tradition has him riding his horse into the sea.
Procopius notes that Abrahah later submitted to Kaleb's successor, as supported by the former's inscription in 543 stating Aksum before the territories directly under his control. During his reign, Abrahah repaired the
Later Arabic sources also say that
Sassanid period (570–630 CE)
Emperor
This development was a consequence of the expansionary policy pursued by the Sassanian king Khosrow II (590–628), whose aim was to secure Persian border areas such as Yemen against Roman and Byzantine incursions. Following the death of Khosrau II in 628, then the Persian governor in Southern Arabia, Badhan, converted to Islam and Yemen followed the new religion.
See also
References
- ^ Jones 1863.
- ^ Michaelis 1762.
- ^ Niehbuhr 1772.
- ^ Halévy 1872.
- ^ Dostal 1990.
- ^ Phillips 1955.
- ^ Harding 1964.
- ^ [1] The Qahtanites in ancient times Archived September 28, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ [2] Queen Bilqis Archived September 29, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Görsdorf & Vogt 2001.
- ^ [3] Archived April 27, 2006, at the Wayback Machine
- ISBN 978-0-8147-6283-7.
- ISBN 1-56902-001-9.
- ISBN 0-7591-1415-3.
- ISBN 978-0-7614-7571-2.
- ISBN 978-1-4051-8988-0.
- ^ Culture of Yemen - History and ethnic relations, urbanism, architecture, and the use of space
- ^ Müller 2003, pp. 965–966.
- ISBN 3-7016-2292-2.
- ^ "The kingdoms of ancient South Arabia". British Museum. Archived from the original on 3 December 2013. Retrieved 7 February 2014.
- ^ Jawād ʻAlī (1968) [Digitized 17 February 2007]. الـمـفـصـّل في تـاريـخ العـرب قبـل الإسـلام [Detailed history of Arabs before Islam] (in Arabic). Vol. 2. Dār al-ʻIlm lil-Malāyīn. p. 19.
- ^ Nebes 2003, p. 334.
- ^ Sima 2003b, pp. 718–719.
- ^ Munro-Hay 1991, p. 72.
- ^ Munro-Hay 1991, p. 80.
- ^ Mentioned in an inscription dated to 633 of the Himyarite era, or 518 CE.
- ^ a b c Munro-Hay 1991, p. 81.
- ^ Munro-Hay 1991, p. 54.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-19-533693-1.
- ISBN 978-1-4422-0045-6.
- ^ ISBN 1-4616-2908-X.
Even more dramatic was the conversion of Abu-Kariba's grandson, Zar'a, who reigned from C.E. 518 to 525. Legend ascribes his conversion to his having witnessed a rabbi extinguish a fire worshipped by some Arab magi, merely by reading a passage from the Torah over it. 12 After changing his religion, he assumed the name Yusef Ash'ar, but gained notoriety in history by his cognomen Dhu Nuwas ("Lord of the Curls," possibly because he wore his peot long). For some years Dhu Nuwas was successful in staving off Ethiopian incursions and preserving Jewish Himyar's independence. Informed by some Jewish advisors in Tiberias of atrocities perpetrated against Jews in Roman lands, the overzealous proselyte decided on a course of revenge: He executed some Byzantine Christian merchants who were traveling through Himyar on their way to Ethio-pia. This outrage led to a rebellion among his Christian subjects in the city of Nejiran, which Dhu Nuwas suppressed with great cruelty. He is said to have cast twenty thousand Christians into pits filled with flaming oil. " The massacre and forced conversions of thousands of Christians at Nejiran infuriated Constantine, the Byzantine emperor. As he was occupied in a war with Persia, Constantine sent ambassadors to his Ethiopian Christian ally, King Caleb, entreating him to intervene on behalf of their Arabian coreligionists. With a formidable force of sixty thousand men (some say one hundred twenty thousand), Caleb crossed the Red Sea and attacked the Jewish king. In a fierce battle in 525 c.E. the invaders won a decisive victory. His queen captured and his capital laid waste, Dhu Nuwas chose to escape what was sure to be a cruel death by riding horseback off a cliff into the sea.
- ISBN 978-1-84467-623-1.
- ^ Ryckmans, Jacques (1956). La Persécution des Chrétiens Himyarites au Sixième Siècle (in French). Leiden/Istanbul: NEDERLANDS HISTORISCH-ARCHAEOLOGISCH INSTITUUT IN HET NABIJE OOSTEN.
Ry 508, le plus ancien des deux textes, termine ici, en mars~avril, le récit de la campagne par le bilan provisoire des opérations effectuées jusque là: 13.000 tués, 9.500 prisonniers, 280.000 têtes de bétail (Ry 508, 4 - 6). [...] Le texte termine là, à la date du mois de ḏū-Maḏraʾān (entre juillet et septembre) le récit des opérations effectuées, en mettant à jour le bilan global de la campagne (Ry 507, 8 ~ 9): on y relève 1.000 tués, 1.500 prisonniers et 10.000 têtes de bétail de plus que dans le bilan clôturé à la date de Ry 508.
- ISBN 978-1-84701-041-4.
- ^ ISBN 978-9004176881.
- ISBN 978-0-19-533693-1.
- ^ de Maigret 2002, p. 251.
- ^ a b Sima 2003a, p. 42.
- ^ a b c Munro-Hay 2003, pp. 297–298.
- ^ a b c Munro-Hay 1991, p. 82.
- ^ Munro-Hay 2003, p. 297.
Sources
- de Maigret, Alessandro (2002). Arabia Felix : an exploration of the archaeological history of Yemen. translated by Rebecca Thompson. London: Stacey International. ISBN 1-900988-07-0.
- Dostal, Walter (1990). Eduard Glaser: Forschungen im Yemen: Eine quellenkritische Untersuchung in ethnologischer Sicht (in German). Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. ISBN 978-3-7001-1746-9.
- Görsdorf, Jochen; Vogt, Burkhardt (2001). "Excavations at Ma'layba and Sabir, Republic of Yemen: Radiocarbon datings in the period 1900 To 800 Cal BC". Radiocarbon. 43 (3): 1353–1361. .
- Halévy, Joseph (1872). Rapport sur une mission archéologique dans le Yémen (in French). Paris: Imprimerie Nationale.
- Harding, Gerald Lankester (1964). Archaeology in the Aden Protectorates. London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office. OCLC 5040761.
- Jones, John Winter, ed. and trans. (1863). The Travels of Ludovico di Varthema in Egypt, Syria, Arabia Deserta, and Arabia Felix, in Persia, India, and Ethiopia. AD 1503 to 1508. Translated from the Italian edition of 1510. London: Haylukt Society.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - Michaelis, Johann David (1762). Fragen an eine Gesellschaft Gelehrter Männer, die auf Befehl Ihro Majestät des Königes von Dännemark nach Arabien reisen [Questions put to a body of learned men who travelled to Arabia on the command of His Majesty the King of Denmark] (in German). Frankfurt am Main.
- Müller, Walter W. (2003). "Ḥaḍramawt". In Uhlig, Siegbert (ed.). Encyclopaedia Aethiopica. Volume 2: D-Ha. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. pp. 965–966. ISBN 978-3-447-05238-2.
- Munro-Hay, Stuart C. (1991). Aksum: An African Civilisation of Late Antiquity (PDF). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 978-0-7486-0209-4. Archived from the original(PDF) on 2013-01-23. Retrieved 2014-10-11. Link is to text lacking page numbers.
- ISBN 978-3-447-04746-3.
- Nebes, Norbert (2003). "Epigraphic South Arabian". In Uhlig, Siegbert (ed.). Encyclopaedia Aethiopica. Volume 2: D-Ha. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. pp. 334–336. ISBN 978-3-447-05238-2.
- Niehbuhr, Carsten (1772). Beschreibung von Arabien. Aus eigenen Beobachtungen und im Lande selbst gesammleten Nachrichten abgefasset (in German). Copenhagen: Möller.
- Phillips, Wendell (1955). Qataban and Sheba: exploring the ancient kingdoms on the Biblical spice routes of Arabia. New York: Harcourt Brace. OCLC 408743.
- Sima, Alexander (2003a). "Abraha". In Uhlig, Siegbert (ed.). Encyclopaedia Aethiopica. Volume 1: A-C. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. pp. 42–43. ISBN 978-3-447-04746-3.
- Sima, Alexander (2003b). "GDR(T)". In Uhlig, Siegbert (ed.). Encyclopaedia Aethiopica. Volume 2: D-Ha. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. pp. 718–719. ISBN 978-3-447-05238-2.
Further reading
- Daum, Werner, ed. (1987). Yemen: 3000 Years of Art and Civilisation in Arabia Felix. Innsbruck: Pinguin. ISBN 978-3-7016-2292-4.
- ISBN 3-447-03679-6.
- Korotayev, Andrey (1995). Ancient Yemen: some general trends of evolution of the Sabaic language and Sabaean culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-922237-1.
- ISBN 978-3-929290-35-6.
- Yule, Paul (2013). Late antique Arabia - Ẓafār, capital of Ḥimyar : rehabilitation of a 'decadent' society; excavations of the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg 1998–2010 in the highlands of Yemen. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. ISBN 978-3-447-06935-9.
External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- "Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History: Arabian Peninsula, 8000–2000 B.C." New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- "Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History: Arabian Peninsula, 2000–1000 B.C." New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- "Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History: Arabian Peninsula, 1000 B.C.–1 A.D." New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- "Arabia Antica: Pre-Islamic Arabian studies conducted by the University of Pisa". Università di Pisa. Archived from the original on 2006-02-16. Retrieved 2014-10-11.
- A Dam at Marib
- Corpus of South Arabian Inscriptions, Università degli studi di Pisa.