Page 11 - Arab Navigation in the Indian Ocean (before portuguese)_Neat

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7. 10 ARAD NAVIGATION
t THE NAVIGATORS AND THEIR WORKS 11
inconsistency. Ferrand’s article in the Encyclopaedia of Islam has
great enough to be worth inserting as a bogey in a history book; a
resulted in Ibn Majid, the author of the navigational treatises, being
personal hatred would be much more likely. He was certainly a
accepted as the same as Vasco da Gama’s pilot. Shumovsky, in
t. bogey who brought down the Portuguese who were in their turn
editing the poems of Ibn Majid found in a manuscript in Leningrad,
the cause for bringing down an even greater scourge on the Meccans
reiterates this statement stating confidently that Ibn Majid was the j
>- —the Ottomans. One thing more remains to be said and that is that
pilot and that the Leningrad poems show him lamenting his own
stupidity for introducing the Portuguese into the Indian Ocean. Sidi Qelebi, whose real reason for being in India was to drive out
the Portuguese, who was contemporary with Qutb al-Din and who
This theory needs a certain amount of revision. In the first place
mentions Ibn Majid as a nautical writer never mentions that the
the Portuguese texts with the exception of Vasco da Gama himself author of one of his most important sources was the originator of
who gives no nationality, all state that the pilot was a Gujerati I
the long chain of events which brought him to India—even though
Moor—and most of these texts were written some time after the ! he “never missed an opportunity of talking day and night on
event when the Portuguese might be expected to know the difference
! I between a Gujerati Moor, a Malibari Moor or an Arab Moor from nautical matters with the pilots of the coast and the sailors who
the south Arabian littoral. The fact that his name (or title) was partly were on board the ship”.10 It is much more likely that the pilot of
Arabic makes no difference, for we see from Mahmud Shah’s ship­ Vasco da Gama was an Indian stranded in Africa, hoping to earn
his passage back to his native land than an Arab of Ibn Majid’s
ping code8 that the word mu^allim (as malim) is the usual word for
5 knowledge who would have realised the consequences of introducing
pilot in Malay at this period so presumably it was used as such
V the cursed Franks into Indian Ocean trade. If the political con­
throughout the Indian Ocean. Admittedly Ibn Majid bewails the
sequences of this deed were ever thought of beforehand and I am
arrival of the Portuguese in his Leningrad poems, but in no case
i ¥ sure that Ibn Majid would have thought of them, it can only have
s does he place the blame on himself; the arrival of the Portuguese was
just part of God’s will, an event to bewail, not an event to curse been by some man from one of the continually warring Indian
states hoping to boost his own country’s fortunes at the expense of
himself for as Shumovsky would have us believe. We are left with a neighbour. The Arab who had everything to lose by introducing
$ Qutb al-Din’s mention of Ibn Majid by name, and the story of his more competition would never have done such a thing.
£ drunken spree with the Portuguese Admiral. “The story of the
M Apart from this comparatively recent reputation as Vasco da
intoxication”, says Ferrand, “seems to be a complete invention; it Gama’s pilot, Ahmad ibn Majid obtained a more lengthy and more
seems that it was a pious fiction intended to excuse an action which
worthy reputation among the sailors of the Indian Ocean. It is
the Muslims of Mecca where Qutb al-Dln lived must have regarded possible that he had obtained a great reputation as an efficient
as treachery”.9 He thinks it more likely that-Ibn Majid gave in­
navigator by the time of his death; certainly Sulaiman al-Mahri
formation in return for money given by the Portuguese or the King
writing less than ten years after his death mentions him by name,
of Malindi as the Portuguese accounts state. Intoxication to a
although he does not give him any highsounding epithets. On the
Muslim can hardly excuse a treachery; it is more likely to be a further
other hand Sidi Qelebi mentions him with respect, calling him
insult to the name of Ahmad ibn Majid. Qutb al-Dln is only a
f generation or so away from Ibn Majid’s time and one wonders if it “reliable among the sailors, the pilot (mu'allim) of the sea of India,
most worthy of belief among modern [navigational writers]”.11 Sidi
is not some personal or family reason which makes him place Ibn Qelebi used at least two of Ibn Majid’s works as sources. Con­
Majid’s name in this place of shame. Perhaps this is a deliberate piece
temporary with Sidi Qelebi is Qutb al-Dln who at least knew of him
of libel written out of spite. On the other hand Ibn Majid’s fame as by name in Mecca. So we see that his name was already well-known
a navigator may have already caused his name to be used generally
in the Ocean 50 years after his death. We have no further information
for the name of an unknown pilot much as Hippalus appears in :
about him until he is mentioned to James Princep in 1836 when
Greek times or “John Hamilton” in the 19th century. This latter interrogating a native navigator from the Maldives.12 The sailor,
- fact I feel unlikely—Ibn Majid’s fame was already great by this Syed Hosein Sidi offered to produce (although he did not) a treatise
time (1550) among navigators, but it is doubtful whether it was
10 Mu hit in Tomaschek and Bittner. Die topographischen Capitel, p. 53.
8 cf. Ferrand: Instructions nautiques v. 3, pp. 178-80, and below p. 62.
* End. Islam, Shiljab al-Dln, v. 4, p. 362. 11 Muhl( in Tomaschek and Bittner. Die topographischen Capitel, p. 57.
18 Notes on the nautical instruments of the Arabs. JBAS, Dec. 1836, v. 5, p. 788.
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