Dhows in the Indian Ocean

through Malabar, Sri Lanka and beyond. In fact, Wilkinson notes that, around the 6th century CE, Arab sailors, particularly from the port of Sohar had the know-how to venture on a 2-year, 7000 kms-long journey, trading in spices, textiles, medicines and gemstones26. The ports of Sindh, Kutch, and Gujarat also attracted Arab merchants, but few actually settled there, with the exception of Cambay, Surat, and Karachi during the heyday of those ports, as well as Gwadar (300 miles to the west of Karachi), a dependency of Oman from 1783 to 195827. Historically, Oman was famous for exporting frankincense, dates, copper and Arabian horses to India. On the other side, India exported fabrics, spices and wood used by Omanis to build their ships. Omani ships used to take trade trips to the Indian ports and come back carrying Indian goods and commodities to the peninsula, which would further be taken inland or further to the ports of Basra or Eastern Africa. Central to this trade was the very important industry of boat and ship making which has its own fascinating history.

Dhows in the Indian Ocean

The most important connection between the sea coasts along the Arabian Sea has always been the monsoon, from the Arabic mawsim, meaning weather. Knowledge of the timing, intensity and length of these south-west and northeast winds was the hallmark of sailors, the people of the dhow. Although there is no written evidence to prove the origin of dhows, historians trace their roots to Arabs or Indians using them as fishing or trading vessels to transport goods along the coasts of Arab countries, as well as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and East Africa. Ships that are similar to the dhow have their presence in the 1001 Arabian Nights28. As trading became a way of life, building of dhows was also popularized in the ports of the Arabian Gulf by those who saw them as essential to their daily life. Among them were the boat builders and sailors of Majan (modern Oman) who traded copper and ivory with Mesopotamia. At about

26 Willimanson, A. (1973). Harvard Archaeological Survey in Oman: Suhar and the Sea trade in Oman in the 10th Century AD. 27 Arab merchants also traded with other Indian ports, of course, but the only sizable Arab communities were to be found in the ports on the Konkan and Malabar coasts because elsewhere it took too long for merchants to return to the Gulf. Those who sailed the farthest, to the Malabar coast, tended to settle down and take local wives, the legacy of which is the Mappilas (Indo-Arabs), a sizable minority accounting for a quarter of all people in Kerala and the majority of all Muslims in that state. 28 Alan Villiers was one of the first sailors to recreate the journeys of Arabs along the

African and Arabian coasts in 1939. He later recounted these adventures in Sons of

Sindbad (1940). Severin later re-created the journey from Oman to China. His account is

The Sindbad Voyage (1982).

500 BCE, the early Arabs introduced the dhow: a broad-beamed, shallowdraft vessel with lateen-rigged sails, ideally suited for the coastal waters of the Arabian Gulf and the comparatively mild waves of the Indian Ocean. Although relatively flimsy, it was light and maneuverable and could speed quickly out of the path of threatening weather. Its triangular sails, moreover, were designed to catch even the slightest breeze. The word dhow generally refers to all traditional wooden-hulled boats which ply along the Indian Ocean, although locals in Oman distinguish between a wide range of vessels of different sizes and styles. The original dhows were stitched, with the planks of their narrow, long hulls woven together with coconut husk coir, obtained mainly from Kerala. It was only after the Portuguese arrived in the 16th century that dhows began to be nailed together in the European style. The traditional Arabian dhow, such as the large, ocean-going boom, is curved at both ends, while other types – such as the sambuq and ghanjah boasted a high, square stern, apparently inspired by the design of Portuguese galleons29. These dhows used the lateen sails which enabled them to stay close to the wind. According to Chayya Goswami, the baghlah was converted from the Kachchhi kota by altering the head and adorning the stern. Thus the major types of vessels plying across the Arabian Sea were the baghlah, the ghanjah and the kotia, all primarily distinguishable by the ornamentation at the front. Sur was the major shipyard used by Kutchi shipwrights30. Owing to the vagaries of the weather, trade was seasonal but between the months of November and April, even today, the sea comes alive with white cotton dotting the horizons in events which celebrate this ancient seafaring tradition31 . The crafting of a dhow is considered an art, passed down from one generation to the next. It is a practice filled with respect to an ancient form that still holds up today. Omanis were known for their excellent skills as sailors, backed up by maritime expertise including the time and direction of the monsoon. Arabs were masters in construction of wooden dhows and early Arabs who visited Beypore in Malabar to trade in spices taught the techniques of Uru making to carpenters in this coastal town. The Uru is a large dhow with a wooden keel. The deep waters of Chaliyar River, the availability of a port and the good quality of teakwood in the surrounding Nilambur forest makes

29 Yousuf, K. (2018). ‘Omani dhows: A matter of national pride’. Oman Daily Observer (2018, February 15). 30 Goswami, C. (2016). Globalization before its Time. p. 48-49. 31 See Hawkin’s 1983 report for UNESCO on the Indian Ocean for more details on the dhow-making traditions.

Beypore an ideal location for the construction of dhows. Omanis as well as the Hadhrami tribe in Yemen visited Beypore for centuries for their dhows. In the northern port of Sur in Oman, the dhow making industry is still active, as this heritage skill is being passed on to the younger generation. In this historic trading port, the boatyard is centuries old and its dhows have historically sailed to Indian, Arabian and East African coasts. Nestled quietly on the north-east coast of Oman as the capital of the A’Sharqiyah region, Sur is steeped in the old-world charm of seafaring men and their ships. In the yards, ship building is a continuing art. Many of the workers at the yard are still from Kerala, providing a clear continuing link between these two communities which go back centuries, in fact to the very advent of Islam. In the late 19th century, the use of dhows dwindled in the Indian Ocean. Fatah Al Khair, built in 1951 and fitted with a diesel engine, was among the last of the commercial trading ships from Sur. This ‘last Ghanja’ travelled the Gulf and India, before dropping anchor in Yemen, where she remained until coming back to Sur32. The system of dhows traversing along the Indian, Arabian and East African coasts had an enormous cultural and economic impact on these areas. It made possible a steady flow and interchange of ideas, goods, religions, flavours, and skills. This sharing of ideas and building of an international community significantly predates modern globalisation. Agius summarizes it thus: “The people of the dhow in the days of sail represented the human and physical unity of the Western Indian Ocean. They worked in harmony with the longue durée, sailing and keeping to a seasonal rhythm of trade and fishing”33 .

The history of dhow and their legendary journeys were re-created when Sohar, the replica of a 9th century Arab dhow of the ‘legendary Sindbad’ sailed a distance of 9,600 kilometres between Muscat and Canton in 1981. The dhow was hand built, stitched together with coir and navigated with medieval navigational instruments by British author-explorer Timothy Severin and a crew of 25, who were on a mission to prove that Sindbad's legendary voyages were indeed rooted in historical facts. The dhow was named Sohar for the Omani town where, according to some stories, Sinbad was born34. Today, 200

32 Shah, S. (2018). ‘Oman, the land where Sindbad sailed his Dhow’. Natgeo Traveler. 33 Agius, D. A. (2005). Sea faring in the Arabian Gulf and Oman: People of the Dhow. p. 12. 34 Torabully, who directed ‘The Maritime Memory of the Arabs’ in 2000, speaks of the sambuqs, or dhows made of acacia or teakwood that Sindbad would have used, and how this tradition continues to this day. See Tarabully, Khal. ‘A remarkable legacy of

Wisdom’ in Sultan Qaboos: The Light of Arabia, p. 23.