History of Mogadishu: Difference between revisions - Wikipedia

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Duarte Barbosa, the famous Portuguese traveler wrote about Mogadishu (c 1517-1518):<ref>{{Cite book|last=Abdullahi|first=Mohamed Diriye|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2Nu918tYMB8C&q=Portugees+Duarte+Barbosa+mogadishu&pg=PA18|title=Culture and Customs of Somalia|date=2001|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|isbn=978-0-313-31333-2|language=en}}</ref>{{Blockquote|It has a king over it, and is a place of great trade in merchandise. Ships come there from the kingdom of Cambay (India) and from Aden with stuffs of all kinds, and with spices. And they carry away from there much gold, ivory, beeswax, and other things upon which they make a profit. In this town there is plenty of meat, wheat, barley, and horses, and much fruit: it is a very rich place.|sign=|source=|title=}}

In 1542, the [[Portuguese Empire|Portuguese]] commander João de Sepúvelda led a small fleet on an [[Battle of Benadir|expedition to the Somali coast]]. During this expedition he briefly attacked Mogadishu, capturing an Ottoman ship and firing upon the city, which compelled the sultan of Mogadishu to sign a peace treaty with the Portuguese.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Schurhammer|first1=Georg|date=1977|title=Francis Xavier: His Life, His Times. Volume II: India, 1541–1545|translator-last=Costelloe|translator-first=Joseph|location=Rome|publisher=Jesuit Historical Institute|url=https://archive.org/details/fx-schurhammer2/page/n117/mode/1up}} pp. 98–99. See also {{cite book|last1=Strandes|first1=Justus|date=1968|title=The Portuguese Period in East Africa|edition=2nd|series=Transactions of the Kenya History Society|volume=2|location=Nairobi|publisher=East African Literature Bureau|oclc=19225}} pp. 111–112.</ref>

The [[Portuguese Empire]] was unsuccessful of conquering Mogadishu permanently despite the City being destroyed by a powerful naval Portuguese commander called [[Portuguese Navy|João de Sepúvelda]], after the [[Battle of Benadir|Battle of Benadir a peace treaty was signed]].<ref>The Portuguese period in East Africa – Page 112</ref>

According to the 16th-century explorer, [[Leo Africanus]] indicates that the native inhabitants of the Mogadishu polity were of the same origins as the denizens of the northern people of [[Zeila]] the capital of [[Adal Sultanate]]. They were generally tall with an olive skin complexion, with some being darker. They would wear traditional rich white silk wrapped around their bodies and have Islamic turbans and coastal people would only wear sarongs, and wrote [[Arabic]] as a lingua franca. Their weaponry consisted of traditional Somali weapons such as [[sword]]s, [[dagger]]s, [[spear]]s, [[battle axe]], and [[bow and arrow|bows]], although they received assistance from its close ally the [[Ottoman Empire]] and with the import of firearms such as [[musket]]s and [[cannon]]s. Most were Muslims, although a few adhered to heathen bedouin tradition; there were also a number of Abyssinian Christians further inland. Mogadishu itself was a wealthy, and well-built city-state, which maintained commercial trade with kingdoms across the world.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Njoku|first=Raphael Chijioke|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FlL2vE_qRQ8C&q=portuguese+mogadishu&pg=PA39|title=The History of Somalia|date=2013|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-0-313-37857-7|language=en}}</ref> The [[metropolis]] city was surrounded by walled stone fortifications.<ref name="Leo Africanus source">{{cite web|last=(Africanus)|first=Leo|date=6 April 1969|title=A Geographical Historie of Africa|url=https://archive.org/stream/historyanddescr03porygoog#page/n180/mode/2up|access-date=6 April 2018|publisher=Theatrum Orbis Terrarum|via=Google Books}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Dunn|first=Ross E.|url=https://archive.org/details/adventuresofibnb00ross_0|title=The Adventures of Ibn Battuta|publisher=[[University of California]]|year=1987|isbn=978-0-520-05771-5|location=Berkeley|page=373|url-access=registration}}, p. 125</ref>