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6 ARAB NAVIGATION THE NAVIGATORS AND THEIR WORKS 7
plural of Laith) only compiled works and had no practical experience father and is quoted referring to the variation in sailing seasons in
at all for they had only once sailed from Siraf to Mekran. Not only the previous generation. Muhammad b. Mar‘i al-Iskandarani
does he continue to doubt their information, he says their works occurs twice as a captain (or owner) of a ship. He is used by Ibn
were merely scrappy with no rajaz verse and other information one Majid as an example of faulty navigation in both instances. Other
would expect in a well-composed book. One can only wonder after navigators mentioned are Sheikh ‘Abd al-Rahman b. Sh. ‘All al-
reading Ibn Majid’s “well-composed” book whether their works Hamawi, and presumably his father Sheikh ‘All, indicating that Ibn
were not far easier to read than his. He is well aware of his own Majid’s family was not the only one in which the profession of
superiority as a navigational writer and always completes his notes mu'allim was hereditary. §idqa Qelebi al-Mahmudi, probably a
on the “three lions” by stating that he is “the fourth of the three”. slave with a Turkish name, was also sailing in the Indian Ocean;
Reading between the lines, one comes to the conclusion that Arab while in the Red Sea the local captains or rubban mentioned are
navigational practice was written down at least from a.h. 400. ‘Uthman al-Jazani and Ka’in b. Mahmud al-Tha‘alibi. Hasan al- ;
Some pilots wrote treatises like Khawashir and Ahmad b. Tabruya Maha’iml is also mentioned in the Red Sea but as a mu'allim; he
but other pilots, although they were recognised authorities, were was probably a native of Maha’im (Bombay) in India. Ka’in is a
content to be mentioned in the works of others. In addition there poet for Ibn Majid quotes one of his poems glorifying Ibn Majid
were writers like the “three lions” who wrote navigational works or his father; whether he wrote navigational works as well as his
without actually being ma'alimah. There was in a way a profession poetry we shall never know.
of Rahmani publishers who produced works for navigators to
purchase and take to sea with them. The works of three of these (or 2. Ahmad ibn Majid and his works \
perhaps only Ismael’s manuscript) survived until the 15th century
when Ibn Majid could read them, and if we are to believe Sidi (a) Ibn Majid's life and reputation
(Jelebi, they were still extant for him to use as sources in the middle Ahmad ibn Majid who wrote the treatise translated here was a -
of the 16th century. However I am inclined to think that he ex mu'allim sailing mainly in tfie Red Sea and the Arabian Sea. He
tracted their names from Ibn Majid’s work, perhaps as Ibn Majid had a reputation apart from the works of his which have survived,
had extracted them before him from Ismael’s manuscript. although this reputation may be due to his abundant production or
Of the contents of their works we are told little, but they covered because so much of it did survive. His name was on the lips of 19th
the coasts as far afield as “Beyond the wind”7 and China and century navigators in the Indian Ocean. He was named by a Meccan
Isma’il’s manuscript is quoted about islands in the Persian Gulf. writer some time after his death as the culprit who brought the
With regard to navigational technique, Isma’il is said to have hated Portuguese and has received unwarranted recognition from
written on tirfa variations which is just about the most complicated European scholars because of this suspected connexion with Vasco
process found in Arab navigational theory. If his results were faulty da Gama. In spite of this, everything that we know of him has to be
as Ibn Majid states, we can only pass the same judgement on Ibn gleaned from the books which he left to posterity.
Majid’s efforts in the same field. In the beginning of the Fawa'id he mentions his ancestry of which
After this group of writers there is a gap of two hundred years he seems to have been proud. He appears as Shihab al-Din Ahmad
before we hear of another mu'allim and we only hear of this one b. Majid b. Muhammad b. ‘Umar b. Fa<Jl b. Duwaik b. Yusuf b.
because he was Ibn Majid’s grandfather, Muhammad ibn ‘Umar. Hasan b. Husain b. Abi Ma'laq al-Sa‘di b. Abi Raka’ib al-Najdl
He must have flourished in the early years of the fifteenth century. and in a verse later in the work he mentions that he is of the tribal
Then we have Ibn Majid’s father Majid b. Muhammad with Ahmad group of Qais ‘Ailan. This shows that his family regarded them
ibn Majid in the third generation, fl. 1460-1500. Contemporary selves as descended at some time from the Bedouin of the Central
with these there are several other navigators whose names are known, « Arabian highlands and later migrated to the sea-coast of Trucial
but who do not seem to have produced any work of note. ‘All Oman, for according to Sidi £elebi in the introduction to the Muhif,
al-Hubbi (?) seems to have been a contemporary of Ibn Majid’s Julfar in this area was the home of Ibn Majid.
In addition to Ibn Majid we have seen that his father and grand
7 East of Comorin, see pp. 465-466. father were also navigators and Ibn Majid often quotes from their
i
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