Page 103 - Arabian Studies (I)

Arabia in the Fifteenth-century Navigational Texts 89
Navigation along the south coast of Arabia is given no detailed
treatment. It is fundamentally the coast for setting out, i.e. the
Home coast and presumably most navigators knew enough about
it and there was no need to explain in written works what they
already knew by heart. The fact that navigators from the Red Sea
and Aden had to traverse part of this coast when setting out for India
and the whole of it when sailing for Maskat or Hormuz meant that
bearings and a general course along the coast were needed. North east
of Zafar where the India fleets needed no information the texts
become inaccurate and sketchy; it is only at Ra’s al-Hadd that
accuracy is resumed. This in spite of the fact that Ibn Majid was
mainly based on Maskat, the nearest large port to his home town of
Julfar, and one would have expected his descriptions of a route west
from Oman to have been covered with some detail and accuracy.
Ibn Majid’s poem known as al-Mu'arrabah deals with sailing in the
Gulf of Aden but specialises not on the home coast but on the coast
of Africa opposite with occasional bearings on to prominent ports in
Arabia. The sub-title of the poem mentions the fact that it is a
description of a route along the African coast from HafunT to Bab
al-Mandam, explaining the direct routes across to the Arab coast;
unlike the poem on the Persian Gulf, this one keeps to the title
literally - bearings and latitudes (both as Pole star altitudes and
altitudes of other prominent stars) are given for the route so that the
configuration of the African coast can be ascertained fairly well. The
Arab coast however can only be plotted by triangulation from
bearings given from various Somali ports. Thus there are courses
given for Aden from almost all the important points along the Somali
coast. There are two bearings at least for Bab al-Mandam (or Miyun,
i.e. Perim Island), for Jebel Kharaz, Darzrna, and Shamsan, and
bearings are given from Failak and HafunT to Zafar. In addition single
bearings are given due north from Ma’it for al-‘Ain, Hajarat for
Barum, Ba‘ad for Shihr and one N. by E. from Bandar Miisa to Sajar,
although it is doubtful whether the latter is direct. From other places
in the navigational texts additional bearings are given for the Gulf of
Aden i.e. Siyara to Aden due north, Quriyat al-Shaikh to the Bab,
Berbera to al-‘Ain and from Failak and Guardafui to Fartak, and
numerous courses are shown between both coasts and Soqotra. Thus
there are a large number of lines which can be drawn across the Gulf.
Aden itself is particularly well served in this matter and the
Mu'arrabah poem gives a quarter circle of bearings both from HafunT
to the north and east and from Ra’s Anf KhanzTrah to the north and
west. Thz Mu'arrabah poem, however, is difficult to follow and the
bearings given are much more inaccurate than those of Sulaiman
al-MahrT. An attempt to chart the information given in this poem is