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Earliest Mentions of Mogadishu in written sources.
- Al Idrisi (1150) Unsure mention as Bedouna.
- Beyhaqi Nishabouri Kidari, Mohammad bin Hossein: Hadayiq al Haqayiq (The facts about the Garden) (1181)
- Umar Ibn Ali Ibn Samura : Tabaqat Fuqaha Al-Yaman (Generations of Jurists of Yemen) (1190)
- Yakut (or Jakut) al Hamawi (1220) Kitab Mu'jam al-buldan (geographical directory) Baghdad
- Ibn-al Mujawir(1232) (Tarikh al-Mustabsir) (Guide to Arabia) Iran.
- Ch'en Yuan-Ching (1200) mentions Da-shi-bi-pa-luo: Benadir but of which Mogadishu is the most important town.
Taken from: Exploring the Old Stone Town of Mogadishu By Nuredin Hagi Scikei(2017)
The evidence is plentiful and it is enough to mention that in the early 1900s Mogadishu had twenty-eight mosques, and perhaps many more that have subsequently disappeared. These mosques were crammed into barely 70 hectares of the historic centre of Shangani and Hamar Weyn and more than ten of these date from the medieval period. Most of the medieval mosques were stripped of their inscriptions and in some cases even permanently demolished; others have been pulled down and rebuilt with no respect for their history. It seems likely, therefore, that urban centres were planned around mosques (which were centres for study and prayer) rather than around the suuqs (markets), as was typical of many Islamic districts. In the picture left the main market is clearly not the centre of the town, but that is an early 1900s view.
The chronicle of Kilwa dates the foundation of Mogadishu to 900 AD (1). Other documents found in Mogadishu suggest that the Banaadiri settled the city between 766 CE and 767 CE (2). Chinese coins have also been found dating back to Emperor K’ai Yuan (713-742 CE) of the Tang dynasty (3) and among the ruins of Gezira, about 20 km south of Mogadishu, fragments of porcelain have been discovered along with Islamic earthenware from the ninth and tenth centuries.
(1) Cerulli, Enrico. 1957. Somalia: scritti vari editi ed inediti. Volume I, Storia della Somalia, L’Islam in Somalia, Il libro degli Zengi. Roma: Istituto Poligrafico dello Stato, 1957. Vol. I., p.20
(2) E. Cerulli, p. 25-27.
(3) T. Filesi, Testimonianza della presenza cinese in Africa, in Africa, maggio/giugno,1962, p.115; Teobaldo Filesi, Le relazioni della Cina con l’Africa nel Medio-Evo, Milano, Giuffrè, 1975.
Taken from: MEDIAEVAL MOGADISHU by NEVILLE CHITTICK in Paideuma: Mitteilungen zur Kulturkunde Bd. 28, FROM ZINJ TO ZANZIBAR: Studies in History, Trade and Society on the Eastern Coast of Africa (1982), pp. 45-62 (18 pages)
At the end of the 19th century ; Mogadishu consisted of two distinct settlements, west and south of the harbour, and the inhabitants of these constituted two moieties. The larger settlement, Hamar Weyne, is built on a promontory of coralline rock; the smaller, Shangani (or Shingani) on sandy soil. (see added map) Guillain put the population at 5,000 in the 1840’s, nearly three-quarters of whom were in Hamar Weyne. The space between Shangani and Hamar Weyne was formerly a market; a nice view showing it, from G. Révoil’s “Voyage Chez les Bénadirs”, is reprinted in Cerulli’s Somalia I. Despite the enormous expansion of Mogadishu, Hamar Weyne survives more or less intact. However, the ‘wall’ that surrounded it in Guillain’s day, has gone. To judge by the illustrations the fortifications were rather a connecting up of the outer houses than a wall in the normal sense. An arterial street was cut through Shangani under the Italian administration, and some other works were carried out in that area; perhaps half the original settlement survives as it was. There is no evidence that any of the existing buildings predate the eighteenth century, with the exception of the mosques in Hamar Weyne; most of the houses probably date from the 19th century.
It is evident that in medieval times the town was very much larger. One of the mosques, Arba‘ Rukn, meaning ‘of the four corners’, and now on the edge of Hamar Weyne, may have been so called because the corners pointed to four quarters of the town. Another mosque, Sheikh Sufi, is far outside the area of either settlement. So too is the Mnara of ‘Abd el-Aziz, far east of Shangani, towards the modern Lido; in this direction, past the present-day customs area, potsherds, notably Chinese celadons, were quite common on the beach; these also attest that the town extended far in this direction. Most indicative of all is the existence of areas still remembered as old quarters of the town. These are Hamar Jajab (smashed up Hamar) and ‘El Alauane’ as recorded by Caniglia (1917: 180 ff). According to that author Hamar Jajab extended some 4.km west of Hamar Weyne;, the ruins are said to have been destroyed during the Fascist era to make way for the airport. I have not been able to ascertain the position of ‘El Alauane’, but from Caniglia’s description it seems to have been somewhere in the region of Hamar Jajab, in an area recently covered with sand dunes. ……………… He describes the ruins as covering about 5 km, and, in extent and importance, as the most notable of Somalia; he estimates that the population must have run to tens of thousands.
The available documents of the Islamic period are almost all published by Cerulli in two articles which originally appeared in the Rivista di Studi Orientali 1926 and the Rendiconti of the Accademia dei Lincei for 1927, and were republished in the first volume of Somalia (Cerulli 1957a, b). Cerulli reviews these documents’, together with the Kitab al-Zuniij, and concludes that Mogadishu existed as a trading town (1) from around 900 to 1250. During this time the people of Mogadishu formed a federation of five tribes, of thirty-nine clans; of these tribes the dominant one in the religious and judicial field was the Qahtani (Magarri, who eventually became known by the Somali term Rer Faqi), who dispute with the Qudman (‘Afifi) the honour of being the first immigrants. The federation was governed by a council of elders of these five tribes. The council, apparently referred to also as the four seats, consists no doubt of the mutaqaddimun elders of Yaqut.
The federation was succeeded by a sultanate, of which the first ruler was a certain Abu Bakr b. Fakhr ad-Din. This must have occurred before the time of Ibn Battuta (1331) when the Sheikh was one Abu Bakr b. ‘Umar. The mosque of Fakhr ad-Din, referred to below, is reputed to have been founded under this dynasty, so that it was presumably established between the time of Yaqut (say 1230) and 1269, the date of the inscription in that mosque. This dynasty survived until the sixteenth century, when it was succeeded by the Muzaffar dynasty.
(1) he actually writes that it was an Arab trading colony; this was a mistake of his.
In this early picture (1906) of Mogadishu the Fakhr ad-Din Mosque has no other buildings around it and is close to the sea (see also map).
Taken from: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ajuran Sultanate:
In the early 13th century, Mogadishu along with other coastal and interior Somali cities in southern Somalia and eastern Abyissina came under the Ajuran Sultanate control (They became a vasal sultanate but kept their own government) and experienced another Golden Age. By the 1500s, Mogadishu was no longer a vassal state and became a full-fledged Ajuran city. An Ajuran family, Muzaffar, established a dynasty in the city, thus combining two entities together for the next 350 years, the fortunes of the urban cities in the interior and coast became the fortunes of the other.
Mosque of Abdul Aziz (and surrounding tombs)
The inscription of this picture is : 'The Mosque of Abdul Aziz and the Mnara tower in Mogadishu in 1882'.
The tower around independence .
And destroyed during the civil war.
And rebuild by the Turkish embassy.
In the dunes east of Shangani (where the mosque of Abdul Aziz is situated) is a gravestone of a man with the name: Abu Abdallah b. Razi b. Muhammad b. Ahmad al-Naysaburi al-Khurasani; meaning from the town of Nishapur in Khurasan (in Persia) dated AH 614 (AD 1217) and another tomb nearby is dated AH 660. There are five more dated tombs there; one more of the 13th century, three of the 14th century, and one of the 17th century.
Taken from: Somalia: Storia della Somalia. L'Islam in Somalia. Il Libro degli Zengi ; By Enrico Cerulli 1957
Chittick 1969: he described abraded sherds from a survey carried out in Lido, east of Shangani, (close to where the first group of medieval tombs are found) identifying Chinese porcelain remains, which consisted mainly of celadon of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, with some blue-and-white ware.
The Mnara of Abdul Aziz, dating from the fourteenth - fifteenth centuries. (found in: The Origin and Development of Mogadishu AD 1000 to 1850 by Ahmed Dualeh Jama). The building of the mosque itself is more recent.
In the same area some old tombs are found.
On the dunes surrounding Mogadishu there are groups of tombs scattered in all directions. Two groups are particularly interesting for historical research: one beyond the Shangani district, towards the North East (direction of Lido) just beyond the Warsheikh caravan route, and another in the area immediately outside the old walls at the edge of the Hamar wen district, at the current road of Afgoy. The first group is composed of some low, rectangular, unadorned and half-buried masonry tombs from the sand. Not far away is the small suburb of sailors known as Bulo Qalimay. The walls surrounding each burial ground are covered with a very thick lime plaster in which the inscriptions have been engraved. Some of these are still legible; but many have been obliterated by the action of sand and bad weather, while presumably others have been buried by the advance of shifting dunes.
The following inscription can be read around one of the tombs of this group in the upper part of the external low wall:
The weak servant, hoping in God's mercy, died, Abu 'Abdallah ibn Raya ibn Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad an - Naysaburi al - Hurasani. He died on Tuesday in the month rabi al-awwal; it had been six hundred and fourteen years 614 [since the Hegira] (1217AD).
The month of rabi 'al - awwal of Hegira 614 corresponds to the period June 8 - July 7, 1217. This is a Persian from Naysabur, the famous center of Islamic culture. The presence of people originating from Persia in Mogadishu since the beginning of the thirteenth century is therefore unquestionably confirmed. Note also that we further have as the founder of the Arba '- rukun mosque a man with nisba ‘Shirazi’.
Note: Most Swahili towns were for centuries (during medieval times) ruled by dynasties that called themselves ‘Shirazi’.
Of another inscription on an adjacent tomb we read only:
[an illegible name follows]
The weak servant died, hoping in the mercy of the Lord for him .......
… .. he died in the year six hundred and sixty.(1261-62) ......
(The rest is erased from the sand)
A third inscription on another tomb of the group says:
O God be gracious to the owner of this tomb Ḥagg Sa'id al-Haz-ragi. May God forgive him and all Muslims.
The lack of date does not allow us to establish when Ḥagg Said originally from Hazragi (al-Hajj Sa'id al-Khazraji) of the Hijaz, and therefore Arab, lived. However, this group of tombs is also locally important for its very location because it shows us how the Shangani district was inhabited since the 13th century and that ancient Mogadishu extended almost three times as much as the Somali Mogadishu of the 19th century, as it was at the time of the first Italian occupation.
Close to this group but further towards the sea, always to the North East of the Shangani district, is the tomb of 'Abd as-Samad which is now venerated by the Somali population. On this tomb is found the following inscription:
The needy of God's mercy, Muhammad ibn 'Abd as-Samad ibn Muhammad ibn 'Ali Hussain, died on Tuesday; six hundred and seventy years (1272AD) had passed since the Hegira of the Prophet. God's blessings upon him (Prophet)!
The year 670 of Hegira corresponds to 9 August 1271-28 July 1272. This inscription therefore confirms the local tradition, which tells of three missionaries who came together from Arabia: Fahr ad-din, Shams al-din, 'Ala' ad din, of which the first two settled in the Ḥamar-wen ward and the third in the Shangani ward. Fahr ad-din founded the mosque which still bears his name today (see under); Shams al-din was the progenitor of the present people of the ‘Rer Sams’ of Hamar-wen; and Ala al-din was the ancestor of the saint Abd as-Samad venerated by the Shangani district and therefore the progenitor of the present people of the ‘Rer Abdi Samad’. The deductions that the documents allow us for Abu Bakr ibn Fahr ad-din, the founder of the Sultanate of Mogadishu, and the date of the death of Muḥammad ibn Abd as - Samad of this inscription attest to the actual contemporaneity of the characters indicated by tradition, that is, in the first half of the fourteenth century.
Shangani : Sharif Ahmed Mosque.
Taken from: Anders Broberg: “New aspects of the medieval towns of Benadir in southern Somalia,” 1995 p118,120-21.
Exploring the Old Stone Town of Mogadishu By Nuredin Hagi Scikei (2017)
On the main street of Shangani we find the Sharif Ahmed mosque, which was restored a few years ago. …. in an almost inaccessible corner, there is a small archaeological treasure: the ruins of what may be the oldest mosque in Mogadishu. At Sharif Ahmed there are two earlier mosques, built one on top of the other on the same site; the earlier ones are completely buried, and hence the Sharif Ahmed mosque we see today is the third version, erected over and above earlier constructions. The discovery of the earlier phases of mosque building was made by accident in 1985 when an old mihrab was unearthed.
The rescue excavation following the find revealed extensive stone walls and other structures. On the northern wall several building phases could be seen in the ornaments of the mihrab and the plaster floors …..
This is the (underground) mihrab and niches of the old Masjid Sharif Ahmad in Shagani. It can be accessed by a staircase (left in the pictures) from the new mosque on top.
The fact that the (soil) layers under streets and alleys as well as in house foundations more or less have the nature of fillings (of rubble and sand etc.) causes problems . What does this mean to our possibilities to date the rebuilding phases, and can we at all use material of this kind to reflect the older history of Mogadishu ? ……
The ceramics found show, in some cases a very wide chronological span . A dating of the different rebuilding phases will be based on the youngest dateable sherds in the filling under the floor level. This means that the (oldest Shagani) mosque was erected …. after the year 1200 A.D. At the same time it can be noted that the oldest sherds of imported Arabic / Persian goods from (the Shagani) Mosque site seem to be dated to the eleventh century , and that these mainly appear in the fillings of the oldest layers. Furthermore it can be noted that there are few traces of stone buildings or demolition of stone houses in the oldest layers. In addition, the bottom layer is more of a pure sand layer, even though two major elements are bones and pottery. …..
The ceramics, from Egypt, Syria and possibly Iran, indicate that Shangani had widespread international contacts already during the eleventh century. … But the lack of building and demolishing material in the bottom layers at Mosque Site does not suggest stonehouse settlements by that time.
Taken from: Pottery from the 1986 Rescue Excavations at the Shangani Mosque in Mogadishu!
By Paul J. J, Sinclair.
In layer 6 some fragments identified by Prof R. Holthoer, are possible golden luster ware dated to ca 1200-1300 in Egypt. A single example of a thin walled Ottoman vessel is also represented in layer 6 as are fragments of green and brown monochrome glazed wares, Chinese imports appear to be lacking in layer 8 which is quite clearly characterized by a number of fragments of matt finished ‘black on yellow’ painted wares. In addition a single sherd of painted black on dark blue is similar to those known by Prof R. Holthoer from Fustat was found in layer 8. No scraffiato wares as illustrated by Chittick at Manda and Kilwa occurred in the mosque excavation.
Imported blue and white Chinese porcelain occurs widely on the east African coast and has been taken as indicative of occupation from the 5th century onwards (Horton 1984, p. 195) although some sherds do occur in Kilwa and Manda in 14th century deposits. The introduction of ‘black on yellow’ wares, supposedly from Aden is another important marker in east coast archaeology. It occurs from the 13th century levels at Gedi and Ungwana (Kirkman 1966, Horton 1984, p. 194) and is typical of period IIla at Kilwa and Period III at Manda dating from the late 13th and 14th centuries. (Chittick 1974; 1984). ‘Black on yellow’ pottery also occurs at Shanga and is considered by Horton to be introduced c. 1250 ap. Chittick (1982) reported ‘black on yellow’ in association with scraffiato from the lower levels at Hamar Weyne in Mogadishu and accordingly considered it earlier than the finds from other east African sites where scraffiato underlies the ‘black on yellow’, The lack of scraffiato in the Shangani mosque is perhaps significant in this regard and might be held, following Horton (1984, p. 194), to indicate a mid-13th century date for layer 8 in the Shangani sequence. In short ceramic collections from the excavations at the Shangani Mosque do not challenge the central assertion by Chittick that there is no evidence for the existence of a town at Mogadishu before the late 12th century. On the contrary the Shangani sequence as it now stands appears to extend back only to the 13th century. The deposits appear to have accumulated at a rate of c.1 m per century which is very considerable especially considering the compression of the lower levels.
Taken from: Exploring the Old Stone Town of Mogadishu By Nuredin Hagi Scikei (2017).
Tombs close to Hamarweyn
The other group of tombs, the one which, as I said above, lies beyond the old walls of Hamar - wen, is about a century later than that of the Shangani tombs described above. The tombs are in masonry, more adorned than the previous ones, and are located around the qubbah built by the Government of Somalia for the Sheikh Muhyi ad - din Mukarram, formerly qadi of Mogadishu, who died in 1919. The tombs which are small rectangular constructions with a low door that leads into the inner chamber where the tumulus is located, they are adorned with stone tablets in which the inscriptions were carved. One says:
In the name of the gracious and merciful God. The weak servant died, hoping in the mercy of his gracious Lord, Abu Bakr ibn al - Hagg Yaqut al - Hadrami on the night of Tuesday after sunset, the thirteenth night of the solemn Ramadan of the year seven hundred and fifty-nine (1358).
13 Ramadan 759 corresponds to 19 August 1358.
The presence of an Arab from Hadramout in 14th century Mogadishu is easily explained and in accordance with tradition.
On another tomb we read:
Poor servant Abu Bakr ibn Muhammad ibn Hag Ahmad al - Madani died on 29 Safar of the year 766 (1364).
29 Safar corresponds to 25 November 1364. For the presence of people from Hagg (Hijaz in Saudi Arabia) in medieval Mogadishu see also above.
On another tomb of this group we read:
In the name of the gracious and merciful God, the humble servant, hoping for the forgiveness of his gracious Lord, the Ḥagg Yusuf ibn Abu Bakr ibn Ḥagg Da'ud, died on Monday, the fourth of the month of da al-Higgah (twelfth month of Islamic year) of the year Saturday after seven hundred and sixty-six years from the Prophet's Hijra (1365AD) . God's blessings be on the Prophet!
The 4 du al-Higgah 766 corresponds to 22 August 1365. The inscription is particularly important, as it contains the first mention of the Somali year in use alongside the Muslim year also in the coastal centers. With "the year Saturday" is in fact to be understood the first year of the Somali seven-year cycle.
On the same line of dunes, but a little further towards the North West near the tomb of the Mogadish saint Sheikh Sufi, there is a tomb on which we can only read:
He died on Tuesday in the month Rabi 'al-Awwal of the year 721 Hegira (1321AD)
corresponds to March 31 - April 29 1321.
Mosque Jami in Ḥamarweyn
Mogadishu's oldest mosque, the Gami, in the Ḥamar-wen district, is now located below street level. It has not preserved anything artistically interesting, probably due to the depredations of the successive invaders of Mogadishu and especially the great invasion of the Abgal Bedouins. It has a tower that was once used as a minaret but is now abandoned because the mu'addin calls to prayer going up on a large stone placed near the mosque, as is general use in Mogadishu. Around the entrance door of the tower we read:
In the name of a gracious and merciful God. The beginning of the construction of this tower [was) in the first of the month of muharram. of the year 636 of the Hegira of the Prophet, (1238AD) The blessings of God be on the Prophet and the peace of him! That. God forgive whoever built it and reward him and forgive him, his parents and all Muslims. The kingdom belongs to God the unique one, the victorious one .
The 1st muharram 636 corresponds to 14 August 1238.
Around the mihrab of the same mosque we read:
Al mihrab work Kululah son of Muhammad son of Abd al-aziz. May God forgive him and his parents.
The name - is vocalized - according to the local indigenous tradition that belongs to the Sheikh Sufi, who also collected various ancient legends and passed them on to his pupils. The Kululah, according to this tradition, would have been a Kabir, that is, a slave master builder.
Note: The writing on the mihrab of this mosque is in “Shiraazi” Arabic, while that on the entrance to the tower is in a different style, which may indicate two separate periods of construction.
Note: Chittick excavated two trenches near the Jami’ Mosque (Chittick 1982, p. 54). On the basis of a preliminary analysis of some of the finds, he claimed that Mogadishu was founded during the twelfth century.
Muhammad Taani Mosque
In the Masjid Muhammad Taani, close to Jaama’a; The difficult and unique style of written Kufic on the mihrab attests to its antiquity. (Nuredin Hagi Scikei 2017)
Sharif Aydurus (1954) received from one of his sources the following anecdote:
In (470 AH=1078AD) the ruler, Prince Muhammad Ali, left Egypt as governor of Maqdishuh.
He lived for eighty years and built many mosques in the year 551 AH (1176 AD). Among them is ….. and (Mohamed al-Taani = Muhammad the second) ……
These are the reasons why this mosque is added here among the Medieval Mosques.
On top: The outside of the Mosque.
Left: The mihrab of Muhammad Taani Mosque.
Mosque of Arba Rukun
The Arba Rukun mosque is located on the central avenue of Mogadishu, which divides the district of Hamar - wen from that of Shangani, on the side corresponding to Hamar - wen. In the mosque around the mihrab we read:
The weak servant in need of the mercy of God Most High Husraw son of Muḥammad as - Sirazi in the year 667 (1268-69).
The vocalization of the local tradition of the name would be: Hisarwa; The inscription has particular importance, because it documents the relations of Mogadishu with southern Persia and confirms the existence in Mogadishu of people from Shiraz, whose memory is still alive in the oral tradition, as we have seen above.
Left the mosque of Arba Rukun; before the civil war, on the left of the mihrab there were two inscription. The upper band of the wood was intricately carved with a circular floral pattern while the lower one in glazed tile, carries an inscription: The weak servant in need of the mercy of Allah Khusrau ibn Muhammad al-Shirazi A.H. 667/1269. This means that the man died in 1269 and that he most probably was the founder of the mosque. (This is the earliest mention of a Shirazi in east Africa).
Right: the by Turkey restored mosque in 2015. The historical inscriptions have disappeared and the interior is covered with Turkish tiles.
Taken from: Museo Della Garesa Catalogo by Regio Governo della Somalia 1934.
Mosque of Fakhr ad-Din
It is also located on the same boulevard also on the Hamar - wen side in the Sheikh Mumin quarter. The marbles with which it was adorned were largely removed by the wali of the Sultan of Zanzibar, who would have ordered its transport to his capital. In 1923 notable fragments of a marble arch that adorned the outside of the mihrab and had the "verse of the throne" inscribed on the lintel were still found. The same mihrab is adorned, in the interior of the niche, with colored marble with a tablet on which you can read the verse 116 of the eleventh sura of the Koran followed by the signature of the builder:
God - there is no God besides him, the living, the existing by virtue of his own; they have no hold on him neither drowsiness nor sleep; all that is in belongs to him heaven and what is on earth; who is he who can intercede with him, if not with his permission? He knows what was before them and what will be after them; men embrace of His science only what he wants; his throne extends over the heavens and the earth, nor does the custody of these tire him: he is the lofty, the magnificent. There is no compulsion for religion: the straight path is well distinguished from error; whoever does not believe in Taghut (idol or oracle) and instead believes in God, will have grasped the tight handle, not susceptible to breaking; and God hears everything and knows everything. In the name of the gracious and merciful God. He makes the prayer at the two ends of the day and night; verily good deeds drive away bad ones, this is a warning to those who reflect. His master: Hagi bin Mohammed bin Abdullahi. Date: in the last days of Sha'aban of the year 667 (1269 AD).
The last ten days of the month of Shaban 667 correspond to the days 27 April - 6 May 1269.
The upper part of the portal of the Fakr-ed-Din Mosque in Mogadishu: The three upper subdivisions of the upper door contain inscriptions in Kufic characters adorned with floral motifs. It is one of the most characteristic and valuable Islamic works of Somalia. (from the year 1372 AD).
Note: The masjid is partially (two meters) below ground level today.
Left the upper part of the portal of the Fakr-ed Din Mosque.
Right; Inside the mihrab of Fakr ad-Din mosque with original decorative elements and dated inscription.
Taken from: Exploring the Old Stone Town of Mogadishu By Nuredin Hagi Scikei (2017).
Masjid Sheikh Rumani Ba 'Alawi. (Hamar Weyn)
During the recent renovation an important artifact got lost: a piece of wood on which was engraved the date 822H / AD1419. Placed on the wall of the mihrab, almost invisible, this beautiful ceramic tile was found recently. The transliteration into Latin characters is "Z KH L D U". Several people agree that it is very likely that these letters are only a part of a longer text.
Hagi Musa Mosque or Masjid Haaji Muusa or 'Adayga Mosque (Hamar Weyn)
It is small mosque in the historical Hamar Weyne district in Mogadishu. Its name Adayga comes from the Salvadora persica tree that partly grows inside the mosque and which twigs is customarily used as a toothbrush, hence the name 'Adayga which in Somali means whitener or toothbrush.
In 1982 Maria Rosario La Lomia (Antiche Moschee di Mogadiscio) put forward the hypothesis that the mosque could have been built in the 13th century due to the similarities of the minaret of the 'Adayga to the minaret of Jama'a Xamar Weyne. Here pictures from the mosque date from 1973.
The minaret has a square plan with strongly rounded corners, so that it can be defined octagonal, it is divided into horizontal zones like the tower of the Jamia, but it has no battlements. The tower of Hagi Musa is not incorporated into the building of the mosque. You enter the tower and you find yourself in front of a spiral staircase very similar to that of the Jamia. You immediately notice the similarity of the structures in the two towers. (1)
(1) Garland 1966, p. 116: The design of the Tower of the Jamia of Mogadishu, and its contemporaries, is never repeated after the thirteenth century. The coursed, and even squared, rubble wall is characteristic of this period.
The Hagi Musa Minaret.
Taken from: Benardelli, 'Uno scavo compiuto nella zona archaeologica di Hamar Gergeb nel territoria di Meregh durante l'agosto 1932', Somalia d'Oggi 2.1 (1957), pp. 28-35.
P28
Hamar Gergeb is located on the caravan route of internal wells that leads from Libiosar to El Dere, in rocky terrain with thickets. The name simply means destroyed or ruined city. The ruins are notable and indicate in past times of a fairly large town, surrounded by solid walls and built at least partly in masonry.
The ancient city with the wall, with large stones held together by mortar is visible along the entire length of the perimeter; precisely oriented towards the north, it has three straight sides and the fourth arched: overall it has the shape of a squat rectangle with the arched north side. Almost in the middle of the arch, a little to the west, a long building with walls still high, around three meters, rises up against the wall but on the outside. Another similar but more ruined building is nestled inside the eastern wall near the north corner. Small buildings both inside and outside are arranged along all sides except the western one. Among these, the two buildings at the end of the eastern side are noteworthy. Overall one has the impression of a fortified wall, suitable for defending a town.
A few rare tombs on the top of these hills, of the usual circular shape but with roughly squared stones; recent burials, made with stones taken from the surrounding ruins. Traces of foundations of ruined houses, some curious tiny round mounds, stones scattered almost everywhere denote the ancient existence of other constructions within the enclosure, now and forever disappeared; it is not even possible to argue its destination and location from these few remains. Towards the northern east corner a well opens in the rock, at the level of the surrounding ground; ………… The well has a diameter of three meters. The walls are limed, so it is to be believed that the ancient builders must have also used fire in the excavation.
The color of the ruins is generally ocher, while many stones are grey: it is all material found in the surrounding area.
P29
The surrounding wall measures 700 meters and has a thickness of 77 cm; originally, judging from the fallen stones, it must have measured about three meters in height. It is made up of stones of medium size, sometimes even enormous, with the flatter part on the outside held together by a mortar of fine sand and lime. The two southern towers stand out.
Two gates opened on the south side about 40 meters from the two turrets; this can be seen from two old tracks that pass beyond the wall in these points. Another entrance existed to the left of the building located in the center of the north side. The wall is also crossed by two slopes at the two northern corners of the eastern and western sides. The various types of buildings are all leaning against the surrounding wall on the external and internal sides
P34
This terrain is particularly rich in tombs, stone mounds, walls and foundations of mortared buildings. Characteristic, immediately north of the city, are about twenty circular tombs with a diameter of 11.20 m made of roughly squared stones arranged around each other so close together as to form a beehive-looking whole. The stones are of medium size and placed long, not crowded. Even later I observed burials of the kind that I had never seen before: they are attributed to the Agiuran, certainly the Abgal do not use them. About a kilometer north of Hamar Gergeb there are the foundations of four-square buildings on a slight rise, with very solid walls protruding no more than half a meter from the surrounding rubble and earth. They are arranged in a square, very close together and have the appearance of houses, but it could very well be that they were grandiose tombs. All around are piles of stones and boulders, cyclopean tombs of circular fixed stones, beehive burials, scattered stones, boulders on bare curly hills. These fields of ruins continue for about six kilometers.
Taken from: Museo Della Garesa Catalogo by Regio Governo della Somalia 1934.
The notes added come from the new readings of the inscriptions in: A PRELIMINARY HANDLIST ….. FREEMAN-GRENVILLE and B. G. MARTIN
Tomb inscriptions from Mogadishu
1) Plaster cast of a funerary inscription, the original of which is found in an Islamic cemetery in Mogadishu. The version of the Arabic text is: The needy of the exalted Lord died, Aisciah binti Ali bin Al-Hatam bin Habib, as Sabt (Saturday), on 16 Shawwal (tenth month of Islamic year) year 625 from the Hegira of the Prophet (1229 AD). May blessing and peace be upon her.
Note: a new reading is given in which the date becomes: 17 September, A.D. 1228
6) Plaster cast of epigraph, of Islamic burial in Mogadishu. Text translation: In the name of the gracious and merciful God. The deceased died, hoping in the mercy of God praised and exalted, Fatma binti Abdi as Samad bin Jaqut, mercy of God be on all, maximum extensible mercy to the needy Muslims and Muslims, dead or living, because You are the hearer of prayers. That is on the day of Saturday, hour of the morning prayer, after 22 days of the month of Jumada-ul-Awwal (fifth month of the Islamic calendar) year 101 (720 AD).
Note: a new reading is given in which Year 101 is changed by 7?? So: post A.D. 1300-1.
9) Plaster cast, of funerary inscription. Translation of the Arabic text: There is no God but God. The free guarded died, hoping in the forgiveness of her powerful Lord, Fatima binti Ali, on the night of al-jumu`a (Friday) ten of the month of Shawwal (the tenth month of the Islamic year) of the year seven hundred eighty-five - 785 - of the Hijra of the Prophet (1384 AD) The blessings of God be on the Prophet , complete blessings.
Note: a new reading is given in which the date is changed to: Thursday night, 10 Shawwal in the year seven hundred and fifty-two of the Hijra of the Prophet, the blessings of God on its leader and perfect peace.( A.H. 752/30 November, A.D. 1351).
10) Plaster cast of a funerary inscription from an Islamic burial in Mogadishu. Version of the Arabic text: Died the poor servant Abu Baker ibn Mohammed ibn Hagi Ahmed - al - Madani, on 29 Safar (second month of the Islamic year) of the year seven hundred and sixty-six - 766 - (1365 AD).
11) Plaster cast of funerary inscription of Islamic burial of Mogadishu. Version of the Arabic text:
In the name of the gracious and merciful God. Sheikh Ahmed bin Sheikh Mohammed Abo and his son Sheikh Abdul-mannan-al Gassari died .... on al-ithnayn (Monday) ..... 707 of the Prophet's Hegira (1308 AD).
Note: a new reading is given in which: probably of Shaykh'Uthman b - - and of his son (?) or a relative, Muhammad b. 'All b. Muhammad b.'Abd al-Mn, dated A.H. 700/A.D. 1300-1, or later.
12) Plaster cast of an epigraph from an Islamic burial in Mogadishu. Version of the Arabic text:
Verily, we have won for you a signal victory, so that God may forgive what preceded your sin and what followed it, and complete the favors of him over you and guide you in a straight path. The Lord proclaims to them from his mercy, forgiveness and paradise in which they will remain eternally: with God there is a great reward ..... 24 Shawwal (tenth month of the Islamic calendar) year 707 (1308 AD).
Note: a new reading is given in which: ibn al-Sultan ... b. al-Sultan Ahmad ibn al-Faqih (or al-Haqir) Isma'il on Saturday night
…. in the month of Muharram in the year.... seven hundred (? nine hundred)
14) Plaster cast of an epigraph from an Islamic burial in Mogadishu. Version of the Arabic text: It is certain that death is the door of slaves. Mohammed Salah, the Lord's needy of him, died on al-ahad (Sunday) in the year 579 (1184 AD) for the forgiveness of the Lord of him, the Mighty One.
Note: a new reading is given in which no date is given and the name of the person is Muhammad sahib al-haqir.
18) Original piece of Islamic burial. Of the text whose writing is corroded, the words are legible: Sevenhundred after the Hegira of the Prophet (1301 AD).
Note: a new reading is given in which: (Muslim tomb, upper half missing, dated Dhu '1-Qa'da,A.H. 714/6 February-7 March, A.D. 1315.):
… the day of Tuesday in the month of Dhu '1-Qa'da in the year fourteen after seven hundred of the Hijra ….
20) Original stele of Islamic burial from Mogadishu. Version of the text from Arabic: The Universe belongs to one God, the Powerful. The Lord announces to them that mercy, forgiveness, paradise, which will remain eternally, are from him and that the great reward is found with him. There is no God than God and Muhammad is his apostle, In the name of the gracious and merciful God. The poor slave died, the one hoping in the forgiveness of his Lord the Good, Hagi Omar bin Hagi Scerifou bin Abibakar bin Hagi Daud, on al-jum`a (Friday) night, second hour of the month of Jumada al-Awwal (fifth month of the Islamic year) of the ‘Monday year’ (past years in Somalia are grouped in seven year cycles and each year in them has the name of a day in the week) 668 of the Hegira of the Prophet. The best mercy and health be upon him (1270 AD).
Note: The reading of the date is doubtful, for the individual commemorated might appear to be the nephew of the person mentioned as Ḥagg Yusuf ibn Abu Bakr ibn Ḥagg Da'ud; who died in A.H. 766/A.D. 1365.
Taken from: Catalogo; Mogadiscio : Museo della Garesa 1934
Original of Islamic burial tombstone from Mogadishu. Version of the Arabic text : « Sheikh Hagi bin Sheikh Osman bin Ismail died, on Sunday, before the noon prayer, of the month of rabi-el-aual, eleven years after seven hundred years of the Hijra of the Prophet (1312 AD. C). God's blessings be upon the Prophet.
Taken from: A PRELIMINARY HANDLIST OF THE ARABIC INSCRIPTIONSOF THE EASTERN AFRICAN COAST By G. S. P. FREEMAN-GRENVILLE and B. G. MARTIN (With the assistance of H. N. Chittick, J. S. Kirkman, and H. Sassoon)
19. Epitaph, name illegible, from Mogadishu, d. A.H. 712 or 722/A.D. 1312-3 or 1322-3,in Museum fur Volkerkunde, Berlin, III E 5052, reading by Weill.
39. ……… died the Shaykh, al-Hajj . . . . b. al-Shaykh 'Uthman b. Isma'il on Sunday before the afternoon prayers, in the month of Rabi' I in the year seventy after seven hundred . . . of the Hijra of the Prophet, (1368-69AD.) may God bless …..
Taken from: Taariikhda Banaadiriga (Benadir History).
Right:
In the name of the gracious and merciful God. The weak servant died, hoping in the mercy of his gracious Lord, Abu Bakr ibn al - Hagg Yaqut al - Hadrami on the night of Tuesday after sunset, the thirteenth night of the solemn Ramadan of the year seven hundred and fifty-nine.
13 Ramadan 759 corresponds to 19 August 1358.
The presence of an Arab from Hadramout in 14th century Mogadishu is easily explained and in accordance with tradition.
Left:
A sheikh son of a sheikh is buried in this grave... but his name and his father's name are not visible, only the word "Sheikh" is visible twice and the date of his death which is: a Sunday afternoon prayer before the month of Mowlid in the year 705 Hijri. (1306AD)
Rulers of Mogadishu as found in written sources.
(We do not include the chronicle of Mogadishu)
Ibn Battuta (1331) From Tangiers Rihala (Travels) (original title was : Tihfat an Nuzzar)
---------------------------------------------
the Sultan of Mogadishu is called Shaikh by his subjects. His name is Abu Bark ibn Shaikh Omar, and by race he is a Berber(huwa fi'l-asl min al-Barbara). He talks in the language of Mogadishu but knows Arabic.
Najm al-Din Umar ibn Fahd: Al Durr al-Kamin bi Dhayl al’iqd al Thamin fi Tarikh al Balad al-Amin (d1480) Mecca.
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In the year twenty-seven and seven hundred (1327AD)
(people who died)
And Sheikh Abu Bakr bin Omar bin Othman bin Al-Hajj Ismail, the Lord of Maqdishuh, for the three days remaining from Rabi` al-Akhir (=fourth month).
Al-Sakhawi: Al-Daw' al-lami li ahli al-Qarni al-Tasi: (The Light Shining upon the People of the Ninth Century) (d1497) Egypt
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Ali ibn Yusuf ibn 'Umar ibn Anwar, who the Sheikh mentioned in his sermon, the ruler of our time in Mekdhoh; is known as Muayad-bin-Muzaffar ibn Mansur. He died in the year (eight hundred) thirty-six (1433AD).
Al Maqrizi (1441): aleuqud alfaridat fi tarajum al'aeyan almufida (Unique Contracts in Useful Librarian Studies) Egypt.
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Ali ibn Yusuf ibn Umar ibn Abi Bakr ibn Abur, the king the son of King Muzaffar the son of King Mansour, lord of Makdashu. (1433AD)
Abd al Basit ibn Khalil: Nayl al amal fi dhayl al-duwal (The hope of the tail of states) (1490) Egypt
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In the year 1433
Things that happened without a precise date
……
For the death of the Lord of Mogadishu
-in which died the Lord of Mogadishu, Ali bin Yusuf bin Omar bin Ahmed Al-Moayad bin Muzaffar bin Mansour Shahab.
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Taken from : Revoil G., Voyage chez les Bénadirs, les Somalis et les Bayouns, en 1882 et 1883 ; Le Tour du Monde, 1885, Paris, premier semestre pp. 1-80 et 2ieme semestre p129-208.
P28
…………………… then finally Moguedouchou appears. .......
We find our bearings on a hillock crowned by a small stone tumulus, and, when we have marked this point, the city appears before us in a foreshortening. In our joy of disembarking, we skim the ground at a distance of ten meters on foot. Armed with oil crates, pots, trays and all the objects likely to make a racket, our crew shows its satisfaction in the loudest way. In the absence of salvos of blunderbusses, we fire rifle shots which attract the population in crowds as we pass. Then it is no longer joy, it is delirium. We bombard the curious with oranges and coconuts brought back from Zanzibar; the crowd responds with frenzied cheers. Thanks to this great enthusiasm, we almost crash into the coast, surprised by a strong wave.
Finally, we paraded in front of Hamarhouine and Chingani, the two large districts that form the current Moguedouchou, and we reached the anchorage, sheltered from the waves and the bar, called by the natives khori (the channel), located to the northeast of Chingani and opposite the minaret of Abdul-Aziz. ……… We first went to greet the governor, for whom Salem had very urgent requests, and, for a few moments Later, I was installed in the latter's house. As in Meurka, I found good food, good lodging and the pleasure of feeling on dry land for a long time. ………
P30
…………… We therefore set about looking for lodging: the thing was not easy, and my visits had given me a general idea of the slums in which entire families decimated by smallpox were languishing. …………………
P31
Moguedouchou could almost rival Meurka for the filth of its two neighborhoods of Hamarhouine and Chingani. The streets are strewn with rubbish, and one can come across cows wandering there with complete freedom at any time. The houses, square and topped with a terrace, are uniform. Only the wooden windows have a few sculptures, and one sometimes comes across, in the middle of the construction, stones covered with arabesques or Shirazi and Persian inscriptions. The ensemble of blackish hovels, sections of ruined walls, among which rise up clumps of palm trees, contrasting with the whitewashed houses and the minarets of the mosques, evokes memories of the Holy Land.
Sometimes, in the vicinity of stone houses or even in their courtyards, there are grouped huts inhabited by the abeuches or descendants of former slaves.
A mosque commands each district, and it is in these monuments, which I will describe later, that the very confused history of the past times of Moguedouchou still survives. Since the most distant ages, the most diverse civilized peoples have passed through this land. All the dead cities of the coast, which we will have to talk about, and of these monuments still standing, are testimony to this.
P34
The etymology of the name (Mogadishu) is Megaadel-chata (the port of the sheep), whose origin is explained by the following legend:
Aouès el-Garni, a highly venerated sheikh who gave his name to the oldest mosque in the city, was one day praying on the seaside, when a sheep appeared to him surrounded by a halo of fire.
From then on, the place of the miracle was considered holy; the tomb of the sheikh was placed there, then a mosque was built there, which still bears the name of Megaad el-châta, in memory of the miraculous apparition. Little by little this name was applied to the entire city, called by the Arabs Mogdichou, then Moguedouchou, by the Portuguese later Mogadoxo and Mogadixo. In reality we must keep the Arabic pronunciation Moguedouchou, and we will apply it to all the cities of the countries that we will travel through in the following. In Moguedouchou, including slaves, there is a population of four thousand inhabitants, composed of Somalis, some Arab families whose origins date back to the third century of the Hegira, and Hindu and Arab traffickers passing through the city.
The prosperity of Moguedouchou, whose ruins and numerous debris of monuments attest to its ancient splendor, had once become a proverb. Thus this city was commonly referred to as the "head of Medina" (Ras el-Medina), and Moguedouchou, which then had one hundred and one mosques, occupied a site ten times larger than that on which the current city is built, "Koul'ioum daoua ou fitna" (every day dispute or battle), added the proverb, and this was the cause of the rapid decline of this rich and prosperous city.
P35
The division into two districts, Chingani and Hamarhouine, took place when the intermediate buildings, on the site of which today stands the great fort that commands the two districts, had collapsed under the weight of the years.
It was in this same fort, then under construction, that I had received so strangely in 1878, with my companions of the Adonis, the governor Souleyman ben Raschid, who, taking us for Turks because of a recent demonstration of the Egyptian fleet among the Benadirs, had refused us any stay in his residence.
The split of the two districts of Moguedouchou became complete the day when the population no longer celebrated with the same unanimity the feast of Sheikh Aouès el-Garni. Hamarhouine resembles a vast necropolis, over which nature and barbarism have reclaimed their rights. Its tall terraced houses, the minarets and domes of its mosques collapse one by one, and the sand silently buries this dead city, where one can only find miserable straw huts.
Moguedouchou belongs to the territory of the Haouïas (Hawiya). The Abgals are the main inhabitants of the coast as far as M’routi and Obbia in the northeast, and the Ouadans, the Ibis, the Daouts, the Mursoudés, neighboring tribes, are, with the natives of Guélidi and the Rahouines, those who frequent its market the most, where the caravans of Haut-Djoub bring ivories, ostrich feathers and leathers.
In Moguedouchou, as in Meurka, the only industry of the inhabitants consisted in the manufacture of cotton fabrics, and not only did this city supply all the Arab trading posts on the coast, but also the ports of the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf.
Its decline began with the conquest of the Arab colonies on the coast by the Portuguese, who seized the relations with the interior of the country. The importation of fabrics from America, which now flow there, dealt it a final blow.
However, the manufacture of fabrics continues within restricted limits. It is a manual work assigned to the abeuches and slaves; and, by a strange peculiarity, this industry has spread throughout the basin of the Ouébi and the Djoub. It is the Bedouins who bring to the place the cotton in lint and the fabrics, coarse but warm and strong, manufactured in the villages of the interior.
p36
The cotton is first shelled between two wooden cylinders, to remove its seed and the capsule that surrounds it. It is then beaten like felt and put into wicks; then the women spin it using a very primitive spinning wheel. They thus obtain four threads of various thicknesses, with which fabrics of six different qualities, but of almost equal dimensions, are made. The men and children put the threads to work: first in skeins: the child, holding the spool in one hand, directs the thread in the shape of an 8 using a small wooden fork.
Then these skeins are put on the loom, glued with corn flour to stiffen them, brushed with a large brush of couch grass which removes the glue, and finally placed on the loom, which is almost at ground level, while the conductor places himself in a hole. A good worker can make in one day a piece of cloth three meters long by sixty-five centimeters wide, unless he is particularly good at making fine fabrics. As for colored fabrics, they receive their final preparation from the traders in the markets of Zanzibar or Bombay. The yellow color, which is widely used in these fabrics, is generally extracted from the flowers of the safflower, a bastard saffron, very abundant on the banks of the Ouébi. The research that I later carried out on this plant, which grows in the countryside like a simple thistle, gave me very interesting results for industry. For, apart from the beautiful yellow dye extracted from the petals of the flowers, one can also extract from the seeds fifty percent of the drying oil. The safflower seed is therefore recommended as an oilseed. But the natives know little more than sesame (sem-sem), which they grind using primitive mills used among the Swahilis.
These mills consist of a mortar, formed from a very hard tree trunk, hollowed out to a depth of one meter to one meter thirty centimeters, and a strong pestle of the same wood whose upper end is connected to a beam supporting an enormous counterweight. It is usually a camel which, harnessed to the beam, turns the mill. But in Moguedouchou, where the price of these animals is quite high, the mills are generally set in motion by unfortunate slaves who waste their days in this painful trade.
Thus, very close to my house, there were four or five mills always in motion, watched over by a shrew who, from time to time, maliciously accelerated the pace of a poor cripple harnessed to the bar. The crushed seed gives its oil, which is then pumped by means of a tow stopper and expressed in jars. This sesame oil, which has a very good taste, is highly sought after and especially very appreciated by gourmets for frying coffee beans. The Bedouins come to buy it at the market in small calabashes, and take it into the interior to anoint their bodies and hair.
The iron, which is mainly used for the manufacture of weapons, spears, daggers, arrowheads, and some accessories, coarse hooks, needles, punches, etc., comes from imports. It is cut into bars and barrels varying from one to four centimeters in width and one in thickness. The forges in which it is worked are very simple. As in southern Arabia, the brazier is activated by a wineskin serving as bellows and whose orifice, lined with an iron tube, is seized in a block of masonry. The blacksmith, crouching, operates this bellows with his left hand, while he stokes his fire with his right. The anvil, square and very small, is set in a beam. A hammer, a pair of pliers, and a few files constitute the tools, in which the feet often act as vices. The iron, once worked, is assembled, and other workers make the wood of the lances or the horn or bone handles of the daggers decorated with zinc or silver.
The rivalry that exists between the districts of Chingani and Hamarhouine splits the Moguedouchou trade into three markets, the main one of which is in front of the fort. The open-air shops are, as in Meurka, managed by soldiers, and their presence neutralizes this location, where the two districts come to traffic. We rarely meet the caravans of Haut-Djoub or Ougadines, which are in advance consigned to a protector or abunt, belonging to one or the other of the two parts of the city.
P38
As for the livestock, they are brought to the beach near the large market of the fort, and most often oxen and sheep are slaughtered on the spot. But tradition has dedicated a special place to slaughter camels, …………… There were in the rock remains of ancient constructions, in the form of square troughs, and it was on this site that for centuries the animals were sacrificed.
The Ouadans, the Ibis, the Daouts come by preference to the market of Hamarhouine. Abgals and Mursoudés have reserved for themselves that of Chingani, where is also the residence of their leader, Sultan Mahmoud also called Iman Mahmoud. Apart from these places there is in different streets of the two cities the souk or daily bazaar. They mainly sell provisions, such as fish and vegetables cooked in water: coarse beans, acacia beans, corn cobs, etc.
The coming and going of city buyers clutters these alleys. We also see Bedouin women who sell ropes made of aloe fibers, an edible topsoil very popular with pregnant women, and large turnips whose juice replaces soap to give laundry the whiteness of snow, by mixing it with camel dung.
The men are exclusively responsible for selling butcher's meat. The sale of chickens and gazelles is reserved for Bedouin women.
P39
I said earlier that the abeuches are the great-grandchildren of slaves, who consequently became free. They are quite numerous in Moguedouchou and constitute two-thirds of the population, living in straw huts, sometimes even in houses.
P42
The tower of Abdul-Aziz must be the minaret of an ancient mosque, on the ruins of which stands today another small mosque of more recent date and completely abandoned. One enters the tower by a narrow door half blocked by sand. A spiral staircase leads to its summit: I ventured there with the certainty of seeing the rotten beams supporting the masonry of the steps cracking under my feet. The walls of the stairwell are plastered with a very hard cement on which I found no inscription.
In the small neighboring mosque, whose walls almost entirely disappear under a thick layer of greenish mold, one can nevertheless distinguish some fragments of Persian inscriptions, placed around the mihrab. At the very bottom of the mihrab a large stele of white marble bears some characters in relief. It still read: "El-hadji Yousouf ben Assen helioum el-hamis 19 min Rhamadan 667." Should we attribute the erection of the tower to this character, or should we believe that the mosque was built to honor his memory? None of my guides could answer me. In any case, the date 667 of the Hegira (1250 AD) would make the tower of Abdul-Aziz contemporary with the most beautiful monument of Moguedouchou (mosque of Fekker-eddin), to which I intend to reserve a long chapter. Moreover, the construction in regular rubble was similar, and the Persian cartouches lost in the gaps in the walls bore the same characters as those found in this monument. There was still on the right another epigraphic inscription on black marble, but it was impossible for us to decipher it, and I had to be content to note that the words had been hammered in certain places.
A few meters from the tower and not far from the beach, it is possible to obtain at a shallow depth in the sand some drinking water which is the best that can be had in Moguedouchou. It is there that, every day, we came to get our provisions until the time when the Abgals filled this well and defended its surroundings to worry the garrison.
During this first visit we had collected in the vicinity of the tower fragments of pottery, shards of earthenware from all periods and some fragments of glass bead bracelets, as well as small pieces of copper, identical to the objects that I had collected during the discovery of the glassworks of Cheik Othman.
P50
The wall built to protect Hamarhouine against the hostile incursions of the inhabitants of Chingani had prevented me, that day, from continuing my walk on the neighboring rocks. Without it, I would have found, even in the vicinity of the sea, remains of these precious documents of times gone by, belonging to some dead city buried by the waves.
Following the narrow streets of Hamarhouine, in the midst of the straw huts and miserable huts that line them, one arrives at the mosque of Arbou-Hussein.
This building, of no great importance, dominates a small, almost square cove, closed by nature, and into which the sea, which breaks furiously on the rocks, pours a veritable cataract of foaming waves, all iridescent by the rays of the sun.
A few sections of blackened walls surround the mosque, resting like it on an entablature of the sheer cliff and dug in many places by the hand of man. A little further on, according to the old men, there was a tower of similar construction to the tower of Abdul-Aziz, and high enough to be seen from Meurka. There are no traces of this tower on the rock; however, a staircase cut into a spiral can be seen in the reef, which, through an ogival door, very regularly constructed and of a quite remarkable Moorish character, gives access to a cave formed by the upper entablature. No clue, no inscription reveals the date of these ruins. On the other side of the cove, a street cut into the rock faces this door, and one can still see, on the right and left, some sections of walls identical to those near the mosque. Was this cove a small port of refuge intended to park boats against the violence of the monsoons? or was it used as a repair basin for the Moguedouchou flotilla? It is difficult to say today; but what is certain is that the cave and its surroundings bear traces of human work. The natives told me that they had found small pieces of gold there several times; as for me, I have hardly discovered in the vicinity of these collapsed grounds anything but fragments of pottery and glass beads of little interest.
To the south of this basin, the space that extends between the mosque of Arbou-Husséin and that of Aouès el-Garni forms a small cove covered at high tide. Low tide leaves uncovered a sort of platform of rocks cluttered with algae, and this place is generally sought by women for bathing or for washing.
The holes that serve as bathtubs or swimming pools seem to have probably been the foundations of a dead city, once sitting on these rocks. But since then water and sand have slowly marched to conquer the rocks, and it was difficult for me to recognize if these ruins were really of the same age as the staircase of Arbou-Hussein. Who could say how many thousands of years have passed since the first inhabitants of these beaches? However, I am allowed to consider this dead city as the primitive Moguedouchou, well before Cheik Aouès el-Garni, the man with the mysterious goat.
P52
The mosque of El-Barani (=Fekker Eddin) belonged to Sheikh Moumen, the richest Somali owner of Hamarhouine. Situated almost opposite the fort, currently occupied by the governor, it must have belonged to a group of buildings of which some ribbed vaults appear near the market, when one goes down from Hamarhouine towards Chingani. But the doors that could give access from this side were walled up, so that the mosque was absolutely reserved for the inhabitants of Hamarhouine.
Landslides and rains have piled up materials of all kinds around the monument, which can only be reached by a path covered with brambles and thorns. In a few years, when the slow invasion will have continued its work, one will even be obliged to bend down to enter the old mosque.
There are no more remains of the first enclosure that must have surrounded the mosque of El-Barani. After crossing the threshold of the first door, one enters a courtyard, where there is, on the left, a small lodge.
On the right, there is a fairly deep well and troughs into which water is poured for ablutions.
…………… (follows a detailed description of the mosque) ……………….
P60
Although several days had passed since my visit to the mosque of Fekker Eddin, I did not think it necessary to ask Sheikh Moumen to open for me the small mosque of Arba Reka, situated outside the walls and to which he had the keys. This small white mosque, which was almost behind the governor's palace, had been recently restored, and, thanks to the gaps in its disjointed door, I was able to take a look inside.
It consisted of a single room, the vault of which was supported by four pillars devoid of ornaments. Above the mihrab, some Shirazi inscriptions stood out against the dazzling whiteness of the lime-painted wall. One could see around the perimeter a large earthenware plaque, bearing gold characters like that of the mosque of Fekker Eddin, but, like it too, broken in many places. It allowed the construction of this mosque to be assigned the same date, around the year 667 of the Hegira.
Among the monuments of Hamarhouine, it is necessary to mention the two towers. One, of Arab character in the form of a truncated pyramid, belongs to a mosque without much interest and which has hardly any more than a few deteriorated Shirazi inscriptions. A large courtyard shaded by a large tamarind and a palm tree precedes the mosque. ............... The mosque did not offer anything very curious. (=The Hagi Musa Minaret.)
As for the other round tower, it was remarkably built and belonged to the mosque of Jama.
I had already taken a photographic print of the exterior of the building, but the interior lighting was insufficient to pick out the details of the monument. One is obliged to go down a few steps to enter the mosque; however, the height of the pillars, in relation to the ogives of the doors, gives reason to suppose that the surrounding ground has been raised. The monument, examined as a whole from the terrace of the Salem house, very close to the rest, has seven naves. The first, sixth and seventh are hardly formed of anything other than sections of walls with openings. They were doubtless added to the other naves which constituted the primitive monument, judging by the exterior rendering, similar to that of the Fekker Eddin mosque. Moreover, the mosque seemed to me to be of more recent construction than the tower. However, the architecture of the tower is in no way inferior to the finish of the pilasters and ribs of the interior. There are no inscriptions in the mihrab, as in the El-Barani mosque, but on the mantle run two marble plaques loaded with Persian inscriptions, and on the jambs there are cartouches loaded with Shirazi characters. Above the longitudinal plaques of the mantle are embedded in the masonry four Chinese earthenware cups. The ceiling of the mosque is supported by painted wooden beams that threaten to collapse. Each pillar of the great nave supports a semblance of a capital whose ornaments are set in the mortar, as I had already encountered on certain tombs near the tower of Abdul-Aziz. These ornaments, which contain some Persian characters, are almost entirely disappearing under the mold. A wooden pulpit for the preacher, a sort of large worm-eaten stool, the back covered with writings in Arab and to which are hung rosaries, found, it is said, in the mosque, form all the furniture.
p61
Dirty mats cover the floor of this large nave in which one comes to hear the preachings of Sheikh Sophi. The large tower placed to the east is part of a side nave. Above its ogival door one can read a Persian inscription traced on three longitudinal bands, and the moldings bear some sculptures: "The construction of this minaret was begun in the first days of the month of Moharem 663 of the Hegira (1264 of J.-C.), etc., by Mohammed ben Abchedad."
These reported inscriptions would seem to confirm my opinion on the relatively recent construction of the mosque compared to the origin of the monument prior to Fekker Eddin. The well cut at its feet deep in the rock and whose waters feed the ablutions troughs, the character of the door and the windows of the tower would make me suppose that the primitive monument was contemporary with the tower of Arbou-Hussein. Constructions sitting on the rock also seem to reveal to us the existence of another neighboring tower; but we can only see the first steps near the mosque of Arba Reka, behind the fort.
I had found the entrance to the tower of Abdul-Aziz blocked by sand; it was much worse for that of Jama, blocked by heaps of bat droppings whose lair it is. A pungent and nauseating odor seized us by the throat …………………………
P52 (again)
Note: Hamar-Hiérir is now called Hamar Jabjab and Bet-Fras lays further along the coast.
The imposing remains allow us to reconstruct its ancient splendor. The purple and gold, of which oriental travelers are so lavish in their descriptions, must certainly have contributed in large part to the decoration of the superb buildings of a city which, from the hills of Bet-Fras (=Horse Hill and is situated SW of Hamarhouine) to the shore, extended over an area of nearly six square kilometers!
In my morning walks on the neighboring heights, to the south of the current Moguedouchou, I discovered the remains of the old ramparts, the ruins of the towers and gates of the ancient city, which gave me a high idea of its importance.
Today the herds graze on the hillsides, in these wastelands where the foot of the passer-by tramples at each step ancient tombs and where once stood rich palaces. When, in search of some building materials, the slave's pickaxe digs this ground which seems to be made of the dust of past generations, it is not rare to see entire sections of walls emerge, carefully plastered with lime and loaded with ornaments, attesting to an advanced ciliation. Sometimes one discovers entire houses, with their different rooms perfectly distributed. They had disappeared in some cataclysm of the ground, and, under the shroud of sand which covered them, one finds curious types of fine or coarse pottery.
I had charged the slaves busy with the earthworks to collect all the interesting debris, because the time of my departure for the interior was approaching, and I could not waste my time directing the excavations.
P62
The large graves that cover the slopes of Bet-Fras also offered me many observations. Almost all of those that are standing are due to the Arabs and they dominate, both on the Hamarhouine side and on the Chingani side, the cemeteries of the two districts. The inhabitants of Mouguedouchou have given up honoring the memory of their dead with the same pomp as their ancestors. ……………
P197-198
In my walks on the hills of Bet-Fras, I discovered, apart from the other monumental tombs, and right next to the remains of a square mosque, covered with graphic inscriptions, the tomb of a chief, which bore the date 645 of the Hegira and which, consequently, was contemporary with Fekker-Eddine.
Although the gables which were to crown the four corners had been removed and the sands had obstructed the approaches, what remained of the mausoleum was of a remarkable finish of execution and of which nothing can give a better idea than the reproduction above. How much I regretted the destruction of the neighboring mosque, which doubtless had less character but whose walls were to bear an entire page of the history of old Moguedourhou ……………
P198 (again)
We had to bother ourselves to push a reconnaissance as far as Hamar-Hiérir, the little Hamar (Hamar, abbreviation of Hamarhouine), located about an hour's walk from the caves I have mentioned, on the road from Moguedouchou to Némo. There once existed a small town of which today we can hardly find anything but rare vestiges buried in the middle of the sand and grass.
An entire slab, however, still remains standing in the middle of the solitude, as if to protest against the insult of the centuries, as well as two large round troughs regularly cut from a single block of stone and whose diameter measured two rifle-lengths. The ruins of Hamar-Hiérir have a great analogy with all those that we find on the coast, and particularly in the country of the Bayouns.
By their construction, they seemed to me to be contemporary with the mosques of old Moguedouchou and traditions traced them back to the domination of the Adjouranes (Ajuran).
