This is something that's been bothering me for a while. Mogadishu waa the largest city in somali and probably the horn of africa and even the swahili coast for several centuries and it's also one of the oldest. So why are there no chronicles? You have chronicles from harar . You even have the kilwa and pate chronicles (even though they're mainly from oral traditions ) it makes no sense to me why there is none for mogadishu or barawe or merca. Is anybody aware of the possible existence of a chronicle ? @Shimbiris @The alchemist @Emir of Zayla @Three Moons @daljirkadahsoon
Where is the chronicles of mogadihsu
- Thread starter Midas
- Start date
The alchemist
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I speculate many documents are around on the personal holdings of individuals. This won't come to the surface until there is an organized effort and motivation to spread interest and digitize such information and also create a library where those people give their stuff up to the public to make such knowledge official.
The alchemist
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I imagine some of it was used as toilet paper during the civil war.
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If that actually happened that would be so fucked up. Imagine a random jahil using several centuries of somali history to wipe his ass.I imagine some of it was used as toilet paper during the civil war.
Step a side
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History is important. You learn from past mistakes.
Interesting, ill check it out ive seen a couple of videos in this podcast format. Is it worth it too watch?
Yeah the guy who owns this channel is interviewing mohamed artan. Who is probably the person who is the most familiar with arabic sources that talk about somali scholars. He even has his own publishing house called loohpress. They're translating the book length phd theis of this one somali guy who studied at al azhar in the 70s and researched somali scholars and somalia in arabic manuscripts.
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You know that actually probably happened right? The same fools in harar were found by Italians using an old map of the Horn to hold their corn.I imagine some of it was used as toilet paper during the civil war.
It's not speculation. You're spot-on. I touched upon it in my thread regarding that Leelkase oday whose text was from the 17th or 18th century. When the Italians and Brits showed up they noted that a lot of the oral traditions of Koonfur and Xamar being recounted to them by Gibil Madow and Gibil Cad tribes seemed to be written down. As in the individuals telling them these stories would literally stop to consult manuscripts they were holding (@Idilinaa knows this better than me). I haven't checked the source as I'm busy nowadays but I recall this touching on that:
A lot of these manuscripts got looted the hell out of when the civil war struck Xamar. I've encountered firsthand Somali odays who've told me about old manuscripts their family donated to the government/museum that were ultimately looted. You'll even sometimes rarely encounter some Indian dude or collector offering to sell them alongside Somali swords, daggers and so forth.
If you mean manuscripts, then all the available ones are either within possession of families either in xamar or abroad in Europe, North America or the Gulf or they're in private libraries like the library of Shaykh Abba in Xamarweyne, and only his family has access to it .
Likewise same case for Marka and Barawa .
Also in places like Barawa alot were destroyed by Alshabab, the remaining available ones nowadays are well preserved by families of qadhi's or scholars in general
The alchemist
VIP
I expect things to pick up over time. Manuscripts and old treasures in the West surface all the time. That is in an environment where things are largely mapped out with no obstructions. So I am somewhat optimistic that anything ancient as well eventually pop up through archeology as well.
I want all these sources gathered up and published like the monumenta Germaniae historica. But man these people must have been super protective of their manuscripts compared to the swahilis or ethiopians considering that even after several decades none of these somali studies scholars even got a whiff of anything valuable like that leeelkase manuscript.
I have seen mentiones of a few texts about Mogadishu and Southern-central of the ones that survived(it is mostly covers the 1600s rebellion against the Ajuran(The taxers) Sultan/Imam, the political and economic upheaval), similar to the surviving chronicles in Northern-Western area. Midas you posted a screen shot discussing a few of them in a different thread, Tarikh Al-Mulikh (History of kings), Tarikh Al-Walasma (History of Walashma Dynasty), Tarikh Al-Mujahidin(The history of the Mujahiduns against the Habesha) and the early Awsa texts .
What was left out from it is that there is also the chronicle Tarikh Al-Gadabursi (Mentions their patriarch Imam Ali Said's alliance with the Awdal sultans in their fight against Abyssinia and Ugas Malik resistance against Oromo invasion in year 1575) it was copied by I'M Lewis and Wagner from private hands and a few other manuscripts from Northern Somalia was brought to European Libraries.
I asked Jama Muse Jama about this a few years back and he said they donated this chronicle to the Somali museum before the civil war in 1990. It was 1 of the thousands of historical manuscripts donated to the Somali Museum.
A lot of the chronicles/documents about that regions history do not always come from Harar, a big chunk of them were written on the northern coast or produced/survived elsewhere even as far as Yemen and then was brought there to Harar. There was widespread circulation of texts and Harar sometimes acted as a central collection place.
It's likely that the written historical production in Northern-Western Somalia took a different nature from South-Central(Mogadishu area) as it was mostly a state led enterprise concerned with documenting the struggle(Jihad) and political formation by central state actors as an extension of the political conflict and resistance to the Christian Abyssinia.
In all accounts, Zayla seem to have been the source and center of Somali Medieval civilization. It was the most important city in the Horn and East Africa before Mogadishu.
Keep in mind that most of the literature from the medieval period has been lost due to political fragmentation and economic/urban decline that happened between 1600-1800, we are only left with fractions (reminiscent of what happened to 90% of the literature Post-Roman collapse in Europe: How 90% of Ancient Literature was Lost ). Then you saw a reversal revival trend in the modern period between 1800s and early 1900s with a boom in written production and literacy. Tradition to Text: Writing Local Somali History in Mid 19th century. During this time you also a proliferation of Ulema.
Even though writings produced in the 19th-20th century is more than likely to be less historically reliable when talking about prior periods before them and are more rooted in the social-political context of their contemporary times as some of them go against older sources and established traditions and they mix/replace information only known to people who live in the contemporary(19th-20th century), and often undertaken under colonial request/commission.
What was left out from it is that there is also the chronicle Tarikh Al-Gadabursi (Mentions their patriarch Imam Ali Said's alliance with the Awdal sultans in their fight against Abyssinia and Ugas Malik resistance against Oromo invasion in year 1575) it was copied by I'M Lewis and Wagner from private hands and a few other manuscripts from Northern Somalia was brought to European Libraries.
I asked Jama Muse Jama about this a few years back and he said they donated this chronicle to the Somali museum before the civil war in 1990. It was 1 of the thousands of historical manuscripts donated to the Somali Museum.
A lot of the chronicles/documents about that regions history do not always come from Harar, a big chunk of them were written on the northern coast or produced/survived elsewhere even as far as Yemen and then was brought there to Harar. There was widespread circulation of texts and Harar sometimes acted as a central collection place.
It's likely that the written historical production in Northern-Western Somalia took a different nature from South-Central(Mogadishu area) as it was mostly a state led enterprise concerned with documenting the struggle(Jihad) and political formation by central state actors as an extension of the political conflict and resistance to the Christian Abyssinia.
In all accounts, Zayla seem to have been the source and center of Somali Medieval civilization. It was the most important city in the Horn and East Africa before Mogadishu.
Keep in mind that most of the literature from the medieval period has been lost due to political fragmentation and economic/urban decline that happened between 1600-1800, we are only left with fractions (reminiscent of what happened to 90% of the literature Post-Roman collapse in Europe: How 90% of Ancient Literature was Lost ). Then you saw a reversal revival trend in the modern period between 1800s and early 1900s with a boom in written production and literacy. Tradition to Text: Writing Local Somali History in Mid 19th century. During this time you also a proliferation of Ulema.
Even though writings produced in the 19th-20th century is more than likely to be less historically reliable when talking about prior periods before them and are more rooted in the social-political context of their contemporary times as some of them go against older sources and established traditions and they mix/replace information only known to people who live in the contemporary(19th-20th century), and often undertaken under colonial request/commission.
Yes this is very true and this is discussed by the the Tradition text piece by Cassaneli i linked above.
You see this also on the Northern-Eastern coast, visitors directly mention receiving genealogical lists and pieces of local history from record keeping Qadis on the coastal towns like Hafun.
About Southern Somalia and Mogadishu. Lee Cassaneli mentions few examples of these documents recording local histories on Southern/Benadiri area or about Ajuran(The Taxers) from families/individuals in the interior and on the coast
The Benaadir Past: Essays in Southern Somali History
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