Yemen 1849 - Diary of Ottoman Expedition

352 pp, color and b/w figures, facsimile pages, pb ,in Turkish-English.

An Ottoman Turkish physician, Mustafa Hami joins an Ottoman Military expedition to Yemen. The aim of this expedition is to bring Yemen under Ottoman control again. On the 23 March 1849 the expeditionary corps, marched out of Jeddah. Mustafa Hami describes in almost 80 pages the route of the Ottoman expeditionary corps. He furnishes exact records of time and place, expressed partly in hours of march. His report ends with the re-entry of the force into Hudaydah after their abortive installation in Sana’ in the middle of September 1849. The first part of his report on the Yemen is devoted in the first place to military matters. The second part with over 27 pages of closely written text contains geographical data. He describes minutely the fortifications of the towns with the layout and names of their towers and gates. We leam of mosques and shrines, and agrarian products and taxation revenues are tabulated. 'Ethnographic’ information fill out the descriptions of places. Mustafa HamT as a trained medical man practising in the Yemen, also concerns himself with various illnesses. The manuscript ends with 27 pages of colour illustrations that were drawn by Mustafa Hami. The Illustrations contains two maps with Red Sea and Harbour of Kamran followed Yemen’s important cities, fortifications, holy shrines, but also plants, and other peculiarities, like weapons. The Manuscript in facsimile is transliterated into Latin script and translated into modem Turkish. Introduction and extensive notes both in English and in Turkish makes this book an excellent tool to leam the history, geography and human landscape of mid-19th century Yemen.