painting of: Umar Shaykh
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Mo’in al Din Natanzi, author of the Montakab al-tavarik a world history: from the time of Adam up to 1405, for this prince. He gives a small but significant anecdote about Zanzibar being awarded to Omar Sheikh, an overlordship that is otherwise unknown and can only have been theoretically but does show the great influence of Shiraz on East Africa.
Taken from: Transactions of the Historical Society of Ghana, Volume 7
By Historical Society of Ghana, Gold Coast & Togoland Historical Society
Taken from: http://irandanesh.febpco.com/Fill Essay/m445-sh15-1387-9-18-mm1.pdf
….the countries of Fars (6), Iraq, Ajam (7) and Khuzestan (8) and on the coast of the sea: Ethiopia and Zanzibar and the region of Aden up to the countries Khorasan (9) and Kandahar (10) were awarded to Omar Sheikh.
(1) Muzaffarids: They ruled the south western half of Iran in the 14th century.
(2) Shiraz: Shiraz is a city in south-central Iran, known for its literary history and many gardens. Because of many trade contacts between them and east Africa the Swahili kept calling themselves Shirazi till well into the 20th century.
(3) Timurids: dynasty (1370–1507) based in Persia and Central Asia.
(4) Umar Shaykh: Mu'iz-ud-din Umar Shaikh Mirza was a member of the Timurid dynasty and a son of its founder, the Central Asian conqueror Timur. (1356 – 1394)
(5) Timur: Timour Beg: (1336-1405) is also known as Tamerlane (Timur the Lame). He founded the Timurid dynasty and is one of Central Asia's most famous Mongol Conquerors.
(6) Fars: region in Iran.
(7) Ajam: foreigners, someone whose mother tongue is not Arabic.
(8) Khuzestan: In Iraq bordering the Persian Gulf and Kuwait.
(9) Khorasan: Afghanistan + Eastern Iran.
(10) Kandahar: south Afghanistan