When Arabia was Eastern Ethiopia (Part 3) – by – Dana Marniche
It should be understood that many of the names of Cushitic speaking tribes today in the horn of Africa – Somalia, Djibouti and Ethiopia/Eritrea – were also known in early Arabia. In Somalia such clans as the Yahar, Darood, the Mahra or Maheyra of Somalia and the Yemen, Makhar or Makir (Machir), Bin Sama’al or Somali(or Sam’al and El Sama of Yemen), Rahawein (ancient Rahawiyyin or Ru’ayn or Rahawi of Yemen) and smith clans such the Hubir (Heber), Yubir, Sabi, Tumal and Wubar (or Wabar) are mentioned in ancient times and through the early Islamic period as Himyarite and Sabaean tribes in South Arabian inscriptions., They are in fact, found in earlier Mesopotamian inscriptions and later Arabic documents. The phrase as divided as the Sabaeans as Diop mentioned has everything to do with this dispersal.
Other tribes located today both in Arabia and in Africa claiming descent from Himyar and Kahlan, descendants of Qahtan, through Abd Shams Saba or Saba and his sons Himyar and Kahlan are the Afar (Afari or Afariyyah in Arabia), and Danakil or Anagil, (Nakh’l, Nakhawila or An-Nakha al Nakha of Arabia) and many other tribes. Thus, the bulk of the tall Cushitic speakers of Somalia, Djibouti, Eritrea and Puntland are likely derived from African peoples who had settled in ancient times in south Arabia. This settlement very likely began during the Neolithic and/or Copper Age (between 7th and the 3rd millennium B.C. )when elements of the Doian neolithic of Somalia begin to appear in the Rub al Khali and tall, oval-headed “Negroids” as Anati put it, begin to appear in the rock art of the Central Arabian and Syrian Arabian deserts.
Another group of African affiliation appeared in the rock art along the coasts of Arabia, and this population was tied to the smaller or shorter-statured populations that appeared in the deserts of Egypt and Sudan as well as along the Nile in both places in the proto-dynastic period. This group was no doubt related to the Beja or Bega populations and the names of the Beja or Bega or Buga as they were called in earlier writings appear on both sides of the Arabia Sea as well. They include the Beza’a or Bayzan , Beni Amer or Amir, Abdah or Ababdah, Huweitat, Atmaan, Umar’ar, Hada or Hadandowa, Bishari, Erigat, Orteyga, Bediyat,. The Beja of Sudan of modern Eritrea and Egypt are descendants of ancient Afro-Arabian bedouin who had intermixed with later Islamic Arabians coming from Hejaz through Sinai during the hegemonic period of Islam. They in fact have always extended up to Sinai and into the area of Transjordan. They are also traditionally called Matat or Madid which may be related to the ancient Egyptian name for peoples in these same regions – “Madjayu”.
The most recent wave of Arabian origin to enter the region of Sudan and East Africa are the people whose names are still found on both sides of the Nile are the Sudanese Arabs who came after the birth of Muhammed and until the 18th century. They include the Manasse’ir (Mansour), Kababish or Kabsh, Beni Amer, Ja’aliya or Ja’aliin, Bishari’in, Humr, Muzeina, Haweitat, Hamar, Rufa or Ruwafa, Khuzam, Salamat,, Hamid, Gerar, Hamran, Mugharba, Lahawi, Ma’aza. Habbaniyya, Mahass, Rashaida, Djerafin (Terapin), Hawara, Kuwahla, Bayza’a, Rikab, Shaikyia, Dhubaniyya and Mesiria to name just a few. These tribes are in part and in full the descendants of tribes of the Arabian bedouin of North Africa Rabia, Sulaym, Hilal, and Ghatafan who began emigrating from the Hejaz area of northwestern Arabia into Egypt as early as the 9th c. A.D. and continued their immigration as late as a few centuries ago. They had originally conquered Egypt and North Africa and finally moved southward into Sudan, Chad and Eritrea.
The Last Living Descendants of Shem
Early Muslim writers outside of Arabia were often confused on the origin of the true Arabs. They sometimes divided them into Ishmaelites and Qahtanis or northern Arabians and southern ones. But most northern Arabian bedouin had traditions of coming from the Yemen from the kingdom of Himyar or Humayr and Saba who were descendants of Qahtan, while the dark skinned tribes of Qahtan in the Yemen in fact claimed an African origin.
Qahtan is sometimes said to be a child of A’abar or Abir (Biblical Eber or Heber) and otherwise of Asmah who was apparently the Isma’il of later writings. In addition Qahtan (Joktan) son of Abir (Eber) whose brothers were Aram (Aram), Awza or Aus (Uz) had fathered Amalek and A’d (the latter’s name was derived from Adah) are all closely related peoples in Arabian tradition. Amalek in particular ruled from Sana’a in the far southwest corner of Arabia in modern Yemen to Syria at one time. All historical accounts state that the near descendant (great grandson) of Qahtan was Saba (Seba) whose two sons according to most accounts were Himyar (or Humayr) and Kahlan (Nakhete Kalnis of Ethiopian genealogy). These went on to populate the whole of Arabia and to rule a great part of the ancient world under leaders such as Numayr ibn Qassit (Nimrod), the Amelekite rulers Cathim (Heth of the Hittites or Cetimus of Mythology), Anak and Sheshi the Hittite rulers of Canaan, Ak (Og), Kabus, Djurham or Darim (Hadoram) and the Sabaeans or Adite kings of Himyar such as Murath’ad from whom came the name of the Banu Murad (Amurath or Amorites), Akk ( Og the Amorite king of the Rephaim), Al Modad or Al Matat(Almodad), Numan, Ma’afir , and the later Himyarite rulers Awal (Hevila) Dhu’l Karnein and Afrikus who colonized Africa. Incidentally the rulers Anak and Sheshai have been identified as names of the Hyksos rulers Nakhi and Sheshi in Egypt by archeologist David Rohl.
1872A.D. -On the inhabitants of southwest Arabia in Yemen, “The inhabitants of this part of Arabia nearly all belong to the race of Himyar. Their complexion is almost as black as the Abyssinians,” see p. 121 in “Geography of Southern Arabia” by Baron von Maltzan, in Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society of London, Vol. 16, No. 2 , pp. 115-123.
1900 – In this year the sultan of the tribe of Yafa’a described as of “greenish brown” color See Mabel and Theodore Bent Southern Arabia p. 403
1932- Bertram Thomas describes individuals of southern Arabia. Men of the Yafi’i or Yafa’a clans of Ahl Yazid fuzzy haired, greenish–brown and Yahar tribe of the Yafa’a as dark chocolate Anthropological Observations in South Arabia, Bertram Thomas in The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Insdtitute of Great Britain and Ireland Vol. 62 83-103 Jan-June 1932. On a sultan of the Yafa’ai tribe who claim descent from Himyar ibn Qahtan through the tribe of al Haf. They are likely the Haiappa or Chayafa who figure in Assyrian inscriptions circa 8th c. B.C.. and the Ephah of the Bible.
1927 – “The people of Dhufar are of the Qahtan tribe, the sons of Joktan mentioned in Genesis: they are of Hamitic or African rather than Arab types…” See page 236 in “A Periplus of the Persian Gulf”, Arnold Wilson. The Geographical Journal Vol. 69l, No. 3 March 1927, pp. 235-255. (The Dhufar talked about here are the mountains of Oman.)
1929- Bertram Thomas on the modern remnants of the ancient Qahtan tribes: “…these tribes – with the exception of the Harasis – have a tradition of African origin, the order of their local antiquity being Shahara, Bautahara, Mahra, Qara.” Found in The South Eastern Borderlands of Rub-al Khali, Bertram Thomas vol. 73 (LXXIII) No. 3 March 1929.
1932 – Bertram Thomas also observed individuals from a number of clans in the Yemen a man from a tribe called Mashai’a man is described as “very dark brown” The Shahara are “dark brown” and the Bait Marhum of the Kathiri (Keturah) tribe are similarly described. Found in Anthropological Observations in South Arabia The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 62, (Jan. – Jun., 1932), pp. 83-103 The photos of a Mashai’a man and Shahara (of Sheherazade fame) and Kathiri children, Mahra and Qara can be found in Bertram Thomas books. The Shahara are a clan affiliated with the Mahra. The Mashai’a are those mentioned in Assyrian inscriptions. It has also been written or translated as Maasaai.
2001 – “Mahra is the Arab name for the Bedouin tribes who are different in appearance to other Arabs, having almost beardless faces, fuzzy hair and dark pigmentation – such as the Qarra, Mahra and Harasis… Also on “…the Qarra, Mahra and Harasis with parts of other tribes. The language is derived from the language of the Sabaeans, Minaeans and Himyarites. The Mahra with other Southern Arabian peoples seem aligned to the Hamitic race of north-east Africa… The Mahra are believed to be descended from the Habasha, who colonized Ethiopia in the first millennium BC” p. 250-251, Peoples on the Move by David Phillips, 2001.
Ancient Origins of the Afro-Arabian Qara tribes (also written Qarra, Gara, Kara)
The Qara or Kara claim descent from the Azdites of Kindah kingdom which existed in Central Arabia and the Persian Gulf. The Azd are descendants of Qahtan through Kahlan son of Himyar. They are among those remnants of peoples who claim they came from Africa at a remote period. The dialects of the Qara is related to the pre Arabic dialects of ancient Saba, Himyar and Ethiopia.
1929 – Bertram Thomas describes the Qara or Kara as “the most prosperous tribe of all the Hamitic group, possessing innumerable camels, herds of cattle and the richest frankincense country. They resemble the Bisharin tribe of the Nubian desert. Men of big bone , they have long faces long narrow jaws, noses of a refined shape long curly hair and brown skin.” Quoted on p. 200 in Richmond Palmer’s, The Bornu Sahara ans Sudan 1970 originally published 1936 by John Murray of London. The Qara are actually rather short in stature as well.
2004 On the Qara, “European observers have made much of their physical resemblance to Somalis and Ethiopians, but there is no historical evidence of any connections.” P. 261 J. E. Peterson “Oman’s Diverse Society: Southern Oman”, Middle East Journal Vol. 38, No. 2 Spring 2004.
Claudius Ptolemy mentions the town of “Gerra” in the Geographos (2nd cent CE). Strabo appears to have referred to them as Gerraeans salt traders in the Persian Gulf and Red Sea says they were the Chaldeans pushed from Harran (which was apparently Arabian Hauran) by Nebudchadnezzer. He wrote, “the Gerrhaeans have become the richest of all; and they have a vast equipment of both gold and silver articles, such as couches and tripods and bowls, together with drinking vessels and very costly houses; for doors and wall and ceilings are variegated with ivory and gold and silver set with precious stones.” (Frankincense and Myrrh, A Study of Arabian Incense Trade, Nigel Groom, p. 67).
“The city of Gerrha played a central role in the interchange of commodities of certain regions of the ArabianPeninsula during the reign of the Seleucid King Antioch III (223 – 187 BC) of Syria. Most notable was the frankincense and myrrh of southwestern Arabia in the Yemen and Hadramawt regions. Juba and Pliny refer to the city of Gerrae as Carra as mentioned in his Natural History 1.161-62 an Arabian tribe called Carrae or Carraeans who had the most extensive and fertile agricultural lands in Arabia.
The Qarra or Kara tribe also carry on a salt trade that was one of the hallmarks of the ancient Gerrhaeans or Carrae. Some have tried to relate the name of Carraeans to that of Hagar while others probably more accurately see some correlation with the Korahites of Southwest Arabia who appear to be the Biblical Korah.
” In general, the Egyptians say that their ancestors sent forth numerous colonies to many parts of the inhabited world, by reason of the pre-eminence of their former kings and their excessive population; but since they offer no precise proof whatsover for these statements, and since no historian worthy of credence testifies in their support, we have not thought that their accounts merited recording.”
” After the gods the first king of Egypt, according to the priests, was Menas, who taught the people to worship gods and offer sacrifices, and also to supply themselves with tables and couches and to use costly bedding, and in a word, introduced luxury and an extravagant manner of life.” (The KUSHY/CUSHY LIFE)
“For this reason when many generations later, Tnephachthus, the father of Bocchoris the wise, was king and, while on a campaign in Arabia, ran short of supplies because the country was desert and rough, we are told that he was obliged to go without food for one day and then to live on quite simple fare at the home of some ordinary folk in private station, and that he, enjoying the experience exceedingly, denounced luxury and pronounced a curse on the king who had first taught the people their extravagant way of living; and so deeply did he take to heart the change which had taken place in the people’s habits of eating, drinking, and sleeping, that he inscribed his curse in hieroglyphs on the temple of Zeus in Thebes; and this in fact, appears to be the chief reason why the fame of Menas and his honours did not persist into later ages.”
I told you because of sun their skin will be dark but their faces features completely different than today Ethiopian and iriterians so when those transports tradesmen wrote about the Arabs whether north or south Arabs that they black that not mean they are black like Ethiopian or horn Africa people you should understand that and if some tribes in horn Africa look like south Arabia Arab that cuz of two reason one is cuz many horn Africans during their occupation Yemen they married/raped Arab girls specially those Arab life along the coastelline of south Arabia the second reason cuz their ancestors were Arabs simply like this and Ethiopia it’s self since ages settled by Arabs from south that why we can see today I’m horn Africa influenced by the southern Arab blood and civilization even your language in north horn Africa all came from south Arabia before 3000 years they were only pure African life in hor Africa and after that Arab start immigrat / settle in hor Africa and from that time African blood start mix with Arabs and that why you people look slightly different than aftican
The same populations that occupied Africa also occupied Arabia from 7,000 to 700 years ago. In the Bronze age there was no difference in the skeletons of the peoples of the Nile and east Africa to those in Africa. The culture between these regions that led to the development of early Sabaean culture is in fact called the Afro Arabian cultural complex by archeologists. Arabia was considered part of Sudan, Kush and Ethiopia by early Greeks and Syrians and others until a late period. Hijaz was “universally ” considered East Africa as late as the 19th century according to colonialist Richard Burton. The tribes on the African part of the Red sea in pre-Islamic times had the same names as the ancient Arabian tribes. Here are some of them. Bin Simal (Somali), Mahra, Afariyyah/Afar, Djorham/Hadoram/Hadharme or Hadareb, Wubar, Yahar, Rahawayn/Ruhawayn, Makhir/Makharam, Mahass, Baliyy, Kala, Sabai, Sabi all belonging to the Qahtan and Kahlan, Himyarite people. The Greeks, people like Strabo, Diodorus and Nonnus considered people of Meroe, people of the Blue Nile and east of the Nile to be the same people as the Arabians. They thus called them Arabians.
Southern Yemen was modified early by the Sassanid Iranians and early merchants non-Arab as shown by the appearance of brachycephalic (round-headed peoples of the coast) in late Parthian times. This area was also taken over by the Turks.
There is not a single Arab confederation mentioned as being fair in color in early Islamic times except for one that were said to resemble the slaves. Arab features are rarely found in Arabia any more only among the Tihama, Nejd people (Wadi Dawasir), parts of Yemen and Hadramaut and in Wadi Beish. Hashimites and Quraysh from teh Kinanah were the only noble Arabs and they are all called black and tar colored people. i guess that must be the holy blood your talking about.
Oh how wrong you are, the language and customs of those in Ethiopia is a Afro-Asiatic not Arab/Asiatic/Afro. With that observation I don’t even have to touch anything else in your comment.
so it’s not ( when Arabia was estern Ethiopia) it’s ( when Ethiopia was the backyards of Arabia ) and please you and other like you stop put photos taken for the Arabs living along the coastelline of south and west Arabia cuz those are not representing the pure Arabs cuz their blood mixed with Africans and Ethiopians that’s they look more like horn africa people and this prove nothing but a joke . Arabs always have their own holly blood and features and you horn Africa people you were and still today and forever you will be our brothers and friends and we share many commen things and we Arab proud to be afriends to such free proud nations
Just remember today Arab means nationality and not blood.
and yet Arabs and Persians are just as racist if not more racist against blacks than most Europeans? In fact if blacks are your brothers in Islam why is it that a black Muslim man cant marry a Light skinned Muslim Arab or a Persian Muslim woman, explain this to me and everyone else? But a Light skinned Arab Muslim or Persian Muslim man can marry have sex with and rape Black Muslim woman or any black woman for that fact? Everyone just know this, when a light skinned Arab Muslim (ottoman Turk) starts calling your brother or my friend he is about to take something from you, beware.
Do you know what’s your problem you building all your final conclusions and facts based on a wrong and misguid references all of them written by authors called by Arabs ( alshoopion ) most of them are Persians and racist 19 century western travellers and politicians they all wrote these books against Arabs and for apurpose also you are taking what they wrote as a facts ???! not as one point of view also western archeologists they are building all their theories depending in one or two skeleton found them somewhere here broadcast them as a fact and build on a wrong assumption a huge false history … cmon girl understand these are all false facts and assumptions prove nothing but assumption
OK – now I am assuming you are not related to an early Arab. How ’bout that for an assumption.
Ibn Manzur wrote essentially the same as Dhahabi in his Lisaan al Arab:
“The Arabs don’t say a man is white [or: “white man,” rajul abya?] due to a white complexion. Rather, whiteness [al-abya?] with them means an external appearance that is free from blemish; when they mean a white complexion they say ‘red’ (ahmar)… And the Arabs ATTRIBUTE WHITE SKIN TO THE SLAVES.”
Was that an assumption of a 14th century writer of teh ARab dictionary Lisaan al Arab?
I am “assuming” that you are one of the ahmar people who don’t like the fact that the original Arabs called themselves “the blacks” and not the reds.
Please let me know which Arabs you come from since you know so much about the Arabs. And let us see how your people are described.
Al Jahiz said “… the Arabs take pride in their black skin”. Moreover he wrote in the beginning of his Kitab Fakhr al Sudan min al Bidan, “if the Arabs are reddish, then they belong to the Rum(Byzantines), Saqaliba (Slavs) , Persians and Khurasanis”.
Which one of the above are you from? I am assuming you know.
In the 14th century Al Dhahabi wrote in, Siyar A’lam al Nubala II, 168, “This is the meaning of the saying, … ‘a red man as if he is one of the slaves’. The speaker meant that his color is like that of the slaves who were captured from the Christians of Syria, Rome and Persia”.
I assuming that you look like a Syrian and Persian and not like a black i.e. an early Arab or a pure Arab like the Muntafiq, Kaab, Bani Amir bin Szasza Sulaym, Hawazin Wail, Ansar, Qureish, Qahtan, Azd, Tayyi, Adnan or anything else that came out of Arabia and conquered Syria and Mesopotamia and mixed with their people.
Am I RIGHT? Please let me know if I am wrong in which case I will be glad to help you with a description of your true Arab ancestors.
can you explain for me what you mean black ??! are you mean by black they look like African whether from central Africa or horn Africa ( with all my respect to my brother Africans ) or you mean their skin color black but with their Arab features which I already told you during that time there were no a/c and they were fighters traveling thousands of kilometers and spending most of their time under the sun on their homeland Arabia or wherever they travel . it seems to me you are from Sudan or nuba or Ethiopia or iretiria or Somalia or an Arab girl with African features that’s why you want to prove the Arab look like you or you are nationalist Ethiopian from the right wing . and you should know I’m not urging you about cuz I hate Africans or black colors if you think this I’m sorry this is stupidity . I’m urging you cuz I’m feeling sorry for u cuz you totally misunderstanding and your wide knowledge about the subject mixed up . So would you please explain to us what you mean by ( the Arabs are black )… but regarding red yes the Arabs call white people red but my but I mean by the red is the color of the skin by today conceptions . ( again al dhahabi kurdi , ibn manzur barbari amazegi , al jahiz from African root zingy so all of them are not arabs )
Dana where are you I’m waiting for your reply / comments / views about what I wrote in the last comments above , it’s very important for me to know your ideas specially from a girl who really have such huge information and specialized knowledge in this critical subject , as you know how Arabs hate what you are writing, by the way can you please tell me from which country you are and from which area of your country and what people think where are you from when they see for the first time , are you from Israel ?! please I’m waiting for your reply with my best wishes for you and your family …. you know when English settlers reached the east coast of north America for the first time in the 17th century in their devil ship ( mayflower) and found that north America it’s not an empty land and not the promised / holly land their white god promised them of and there is people living in that land since millions of years . their historians start to write their false history of north America to justify their occupation and genocides they done on native American by saying native Americans came from Asia through cipiria 10000 years ago and teaching this stereotype story in schools , colleges , universities to justify their occupation to this land and repeating these lies that all Americans are immigrants whether those came to America 10000 years ago or those came yesterday to open the door for everybody and prove for their generations and the world they have done no mistakes or crimes against humanity in this part of the world . what you are doing is the same thing against arabs
Lol! devil ship?! thats a new one. Sorry, I keep forgetting about the posts I put on here. need to come back more often. First of all I never anything whatsoever about Arabs being black. Modern Arabs are obviously a variety of things. Second of all the postings come straight from the mouths of Syrians and Iranians of the midieval era nort me. Thirdly the term black has nothing to do with features obviously because there are jet black people in Central East Africa today with very refined narrow features – WHICH ARE IN FACT AFRICAN – that they evolved over thousands of years of living in hot arid desert like environments. It is only natural that you would find the same in Arabia which also had desert.
African features? yes early ARABIANS had African features as their skeletons and crania show so well. Some the oldest in fact from the Umm an Nar Bronze age had LONG, WIDE, FLAT NOSES with a large and distinct PROGNATHISM which they got most likely from their MESOPOTAMIAN ANCESTORS OF THE ERIDU CULTURE OF ZIGGURATS dating from the 4th MILLENIA BC.. THESE ORIGINAL ARABS, later mixed with and encountered tall “elegant” elongated “NEGROID” oval-headed types of the Central Arabian and SyroArabian deserts as spoken of by Emmanuel Anati authro fo Rock Art of Central Arabia and other specialists on rock art. Judging from their rock art which is very much connected to the African Sahara and their material culture they came to Arabia during the neolithic by way of Somalia . They could not have looked much different than modern Woodabe, Rendili or Samburu of east Africa. If you want to say the latter don’t have “African features” that is your perogative.
Now when I say black i don’t mean descendant of an “abid” or slave or “coolie’, which is what you mean. Nor did the Syrian Al Dhahabi or Al Manzur of Tunisia mean “abid” when he said the Arabs refer to themselves as the blacks. Because in the earliest days and among real Arabs “slave” was someone ‘ahmar’ with fair skin “like a captured Syrian or Persian” Turk or Slav.
During the Bronze Age people related to the smaller Beja types also settled in the Ghassulian region and along the coasts of Arabia as they had once settled A group Nubia and much of proto-dynastic Egypt. This was of course before the Beja mixed with Turks and other non-African people. Now if you would like to believe the ancient Beja didn’t not have Afrrican features that is your perogative.
In any case these people populated the entirety of Arabia and much of southern Mesopotamia and were not influenced by the broad headed fair-skinned people of the Levant until the advent of the Sassanians and Scytho related Iranians.. You must understand in the age of the Greeks the Yemen and Abyssinia are both called the country of the Indi or INDIA Minor because they were considered one people. In the north of course the people are variously described as black and brown like the Ethiopians or “abyad” LIKE THE ABYSSINIANS because abyad meant someone with a clear skin without blotches. NEVER, EVER, EVER WAS THE TERM ABYAD OR SUMRA/SAMARA USED BY THE EARLY ARABS FOR PEOPLE OF FAIR SKIN.
That might however be how modern Syrians Lebanese and their descendants use the word “abyad” but that has nothing to do with the Arabs who were an African related people. If you want the sources documenting that fact just let me know as in LISAAN AL ARAB by ARABIC LINGUIST. IBN MANZUR, by AL THALABI, and DHAHABI.
Some tribes like those descended from the Azd are called very tall, very black and huge with kinky hair. When individuals are described among these black tribes they are said by these for the most pare NON_ARAB historians to have ” red eyes” like Nabtal ibn al harith from the tribe of Aus (described by al-Baladhuri) , with flat noses andkinky hair like Saad ibn Waqqas (as Dhahabi said,. Actually yes – these are African features.
You speak of false history. I got news for you – some historians started writing “false hstory” about the Arabs as well claiming that Arabs looked like Syrians and Iranians peoples the Arabs looked down on and whose color they held in contempt. They also took the ARAB WORD “ABYAD” and gave it their own meaning! i guarantee you the original Arabs and the present people of East Africa were once the same people and it was that way in the time of Muhammad (pbuh)..
In early Greek and Syrian texts the northern part of of Arabia was named in their texts ‘Kush” or “Ethiopia”. Until the 14th century Arabia including the Nejd was known as part of “Bilad es Sudan” and obviously for good reason!.