Italy in the Horn of Africa and the Ethiopian Islamic Literary Tradition
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WPF Historic Publication Italy in the Horn of Africa and the Ethiopian Islamic Literary Tradition Alessandro Gori December 31, 2010 Original copyright © 2010 by World Public Forum Dialogue of Civilizations Copyright © 2016 by Dialogue of Civilizations Research Institute The right of Alessandro Gori to be identified as the author of this publication is hereby asserted. The views and opinions expressed in this publication are those of the original author(s) and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views and opinions of the Dialogue of Civilizations Research Institute, its co-founders, or its staff members. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please write to the publisher: Dialogue of Civilizations Research Institute gGmbH Französische Straße 23 10117 Berlin Germany +49 30 209677900 [email protected] Italy in the Horn of Africa and the Ethiopian Islamic Literary Tradition: L. Robecchi Bricchetti and his Collection of Manuscripts Alessandro Gori Assistant Professor, Department of Linguistics, University of Florence, Italy Originally published 2010 in World Public Forum Dialogue of Civilizations Bulletin 7, 349–56. 2 Prolegomena The role played by travellers, explorers, adventurers, commercial agents, and more and less official envoys of European powers in paving the way for the colonial expansion in Asia and Africa cannot be underestimated. It is a well known fact that these forerunners of the military occupation were sometimes also scholars, sincerely interested in the culture of the local peoples, or at least they were conscious that it would have been impossible to control the “natives” without knowing their culture and languages. They thus promoted the collection of manuscripts, artefacts, oral histories and traditions to have a clear image of the peoples whose territories they were visiting. Italians in the Horn of Africa are no exception to this cultural and historical phenomenon. One can just mention the names of one of the most accomplished scholars in the field of Ethiopian and Somali Studies, Enrico Cerulli, who travelled extensively in the Horn and thus acquired a firsthand knowledge of the country and the people they were studying. Here I should like to draw your attention to a relatively less known Italian traveller to the Horn of Africa, Luigi Robecchi Bricchetti, and to show how his stay in Harar contributed to the creation of one of the very few collections of Ethiopian Arabic Islamic manuscripts in Europe. 1. Luigi Robecchi Bricchetti: some general biographical data Luigi Robecchi Bricchetti was born in Pavia on the 21st of May 1855 and in his native town in Northern Italy died on the 31st of May 1926. He was a graduated engineer of the Polytechnic Institute in Zürich. His first long trip was to the Libyan Desert in Egypt in 1885-86. He reached the oasis of Siwa, where the famous temple of Jupiter Ammon is located. He visited the ancient ruins whose structure and decoration he described in a series of beautiful sketches. During his stay in Siwa, Robecchi Bricchetti stealthily managed to enter the wide necropolis beside the temple and to collect thirty skulls which are still nowadays kept in the Anthropological Museum of Florence and in the Civic Anthropological Museum of Pavia. 3 In 1888-1889 carried out his stay in Harar with which I deal at some length in the following lines. In 1890 supported by the “Italian Geographical Society” he travelled to the Benadir region (an Italian protectorate since 1889). He landed in Hobyo where he was hosted for a month by the local sultan, Yusuf ‘Ali. From Hobyo he headed northwards to explore, for the first time ever, the valley of the Nogal river which he described from a geographical, anthropological, geological and environmental point of view. In 1891 he was once again in Hobyo by Yusuf ‘Ali. From there, he went south to the Webi Shabelle which he started exploring: however, the full exploration of the river valley was realized only later by Luigi Amedeo di Savoia Duca degli Abruzzi in 1928-9 (Enrico Cerulli took part in this expedition). Robecchi Bricchetti tried to penetrate the Somali hinterland: his idea was to reach Harar from Somalia. He did not succeed, due to the Ethiopian pressure on the Somali regions. He thus decided to completely change direction and moved northwards to Berbera and the “Aromatica regio” (the land of the perfumes: the ancient Punt, where myrrh and frankincense are produced). He explored the Somali coastal regions on the Gulf of Aden and came back to Italy. This was his last travel to the Horn. Robecchi Bricchetti went once more to Libya in 1895, disguised as a Swiss citizen to collect information on account of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Italy was at that time very active in North Africa. The mission failed and Robecchi Bricchetti returned to Italy. Since then, Robecchi Bricchetti seems to have stopped travelling. No other adventurous trip is mentioned in his biographies. At his death, Luigi Robecchi Bricchetti left an enormous and manifold scientific legacy. Besides his travelogues and correspondences full of linguistic and anthropological information, he left to the museum of his native town his maps and detailed itineraries, his collections of fossils, exotic plants, animals and insects (among them most famous is his impressive collection of Somali ants), clothes, jewels and artefacts of different nature are of enormous interest. The photos he took while travelling are exceptional and invaluable first hand documents and was shown in a recent (2004) exhibition. 4 2. Robecchi Bricchetti’s travel to Harar (12/04/1888-25/04/1889) 2.1 General political background In 1869 the opening of the Suez Canal had a long lasting consequence in the network of ports of the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. Sawakin, for example, was practically substituted by the more modern Port Soudan. Hudayda and Muha were revitalized. More significantly, the decline of the Ottoman presence in the area favoured a slow but steady expansion of the European powers. A harsh competition started to conquer the most favourable positions on the coasts of two seas and the continents. Britain which had already established its presence in Aden (1839/49), created the British Somaliland Protectorate in 1887: Berbera and Zayla‘ were the two main gates of this territory and permitted to the British to secure the control on their trade routes to India. Berbera slowly had the better of Zayla‘ which had been since the Middle Ages the most important way out for the merchandise coming from the Ethiopian hinterland. In 1862 the ‘Afar sultan of Obock (on the gulf of Tadjoura), Dini Ahmad, Abu Bakr ceded to France the area around the port in what is now North Djibouti. In 1880 the Frenchmen Denis de Revoyre and Pierre Arnoux founded the Compagnie Franco- éthiopienne to foster the commercial relationships between Obock and the Ethiopian hinterland. The trading company failed but the French colonial expansion in Indo- China and Madagascar needed a coaling station and a secure port in the area. So in 1884 the governor Léonce Lagarde moved the seat of the colonial administration to Djibouti. The new French colony of the “Territoire des Afar et Issas” was started. In 1896 Djibouti had practically overwhelmed the role of the ports of Zayla‘ and Tadjoura. The French railway Addis Abeba - Djibouti (chemin de fer franco-éthiopien ; since October 1981 Chemin de fer Djibouto-Ethiopien (C.D.E.) begun in 1897 and finished in 1917 marked the emergence of Djibouti as the main outlet of Ethiopian trade. Within this frame of rivalry among France and Great Britain, Italy had already started its own slow penetration into the Horn. 5 In 1869 the Genoan navigation company owned by Raffaele Rubattino (d. 1881) acquired the bay of ‘Asab thanks to the mediation of the traveller and ex-missionary Giuseppe Sapeto. The bay was then sold to the Italian State in 1881 and the “Colonia di Assab” was created. In February 1885 the Italians led by the naval officer Caimmi landed in Massawa under the auspices of the Hewett treaty of 1884 and with the silent place of Great Britain. On the Somali coast, as already mentioned, in 1889 and 1892 Italy established its protectorate on several ports of the Somali coast among which there was also Mogadiscio. Thus towards the end of the eighties of the 19th century Italy’s presence on the shores of Eritrea was already established or was on its way to be started. What was needed, was to secure the roads towards the hinterland. 2.2 The local scenario The years 1887-1889 saw some major changes in the political geography of Ethiopia and Italy was an important factor in creating the new scenario. 1887 was open by the tragic battle of Dog‘ali 25 kilometres from Massawa where an Italian battalion was ambushed and massacred by the troops of the ras ‘Alula Engeda governor of the Mareb Mällash region. The clash had no practical influence on the Italian presence on the Eritrean coast which on the contrary was strengthen by a larger Italian army sent from the mother country at the end of 1887. For Harar and its region, January 1887 is the year of the battle of Cällänqo where the amir of Harar was defeated by the shewan troops of Menelik II led by ras Mäkwännen Wäldä Mika’el. The city of Harar definitively lost its century - long independence and was incorporated into the expanding Ethiopian monarchy.