The African Diaspora in the Indian Ocean World

Images

Introduction
East Africa
Arabian Peninsula
Persian Gulf
South Asia
Outlying Areas

Introduction

Zanjis Fighting #12_40 - Mughal, India, c. 1580-1585. Abu Tahir Tarasusi, Darabname Or. 4615, f. 29b. British Library.   This miniature painting in India comes from the Persian story of Darab fighting the Zanjis (Africans).

Awaiting the Sale in Zanzibar #807757 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   Most East Africans in the Indian Ocean world entered as captives.

A Young Nubian #12_42 - “Tête d’une jeune Nubienne,” 1835. Charley Gleyre (1806, Chevilly-1874, Paris). Huile et crayon sur papier, 28.1 x 21.1 cm. © Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne.   Africans sailed the Indian Ocean as free people long before captive Africans crossed the ocean on slave ships.

Arab Presence along the Swahili Coast #1997922 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   An Arab chief in Kenya with his attendants.

Bilal al-Habashi #1642376 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Bilal, of Ethiopian origin, was among the Prophet Muhammad’s earliest converts. He became the first muezzin of Islam, the man who calls to prayer from the mosque minaret.

Malik Ambar #12_43 - Artist: Unknown, c. 1620. Watercolor on paper. Victoria and Albert Museum.   Malik Ambar (1549-1626), born in Harar, Ethiopia, was sold as a child into slavery and became one of the most celebrated rulers in the Deccan region of India.

Nawab Sidi Mohammed Haider Khan, 1930 #12_34 - Collection of Kenneth and Joyce Robbins.   Some Africans established royal dynasties in India. The Sachin State, established by an African in 1791 in Gujarat, was autonomous until 1941.

Siddi Family in India #13-34 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   Africans and their descendants Africanized the Indian Ocean world, contributing their cultures, talents, skills and labor, and helping shape the societies they entered and made their own.

East Africa

Ethiopian in 1581 #1638099 - A Collection of the dresses of different nations, antient [sic] and modern (London: T. Jefferys, 1757). Art and Architecture Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Sailors and traders from the Upper Nile (Nubia) and Horn of Africa (Ethiopia and Somalia) traveled to India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka in the first century A.D.

Ethiopian Priest and Soldier #87126 - James A. St. Johns, Oriental Album. Characters, costumes, and modes of life, in the valley of the Nile (London: James Madden, 1851). Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Fighting in 16th-century Ethiopia between Christians—supported by the Portuguese—and Muslims resulted in numerous prisoners of war, who were sold into the trans-Indian Ocean slave trade.

Ethiopians #826919 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   In addition to serving in military roles, Ethiopians traded directly with ports in the Indian Ocean, as far away as Malacca in Malaysia.

Gondar #1248215 - Henry Aaron Stern, Wanderings among the Falashas in Abyssinia (London: Wertheim, Macintosh, and Hunt, 1862). Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Gondar, seen in the background, was a major Ethiopian slave market.

An Oromo Captive in Cairo #807794 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   Many Ethiopian captives were Oromo (also called Galla). Oromo chiefs often acted as dealers, sending Christian Oromo to Muslim markets.

Ethiopian Slave Caravan #1263761 - David Roberts, Egypt & Nubia (London: F.G. Moon, 1846-1849). Rare Book Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Enslaved Abyssinian resting at Korti, Nubia.

An Enslaved Ethiopian #1248725 - Henry Salt, A voyage to Abyssinia, and Travels into the Interior of that Country, Executed under the Orders of the British Government in the years 1809 and 1810 (London: F.C. and J. Rivington, 1814). Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In 1868, naturalist Wilhelm Schimper wrote from Ethiopia: "There is a great demand for Galla-Abyssinian slaves in Arabia, and for this reason, the greater part of those stolen from Abyssinia are taken to Mecca and the neighborhood. I found sixty-three stolen Tigrean boys and girls there in the space of thirty by twelve square miles."

A Young Ethiopian #1997966 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Ethiopians have been known in the Indian Ocean world as “Habshi,” a word derived from “Al-Habash,” the Arabic term for Abyssinia, or Ethiopia.

Iskandar Fights With the Inhabitants of Zangbar (Zanzibar) #1597369 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   The Shâhnâmah, or The Book of Kings, by the poet Adbul Kasim Mansar Firdausi (c. 940-1020) is the Persian national epic. It recounts in nearly 60,000 couplets the history and legendary exploits of the pre-Islamic kings and knights, including Alexander the Great (Iskandar). This illustration accompanies a Turkish translation (1616-1620). Alexander the Great never went to Zanzibar.

Iskandar’s Third Battle Against the Soldiers of Zangbar #1597371 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.

Ujiji #1999176 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Ujiji is located on the northeast shore of Lake Tanganyika in Tanzania. British explorer Sir Richard Burton remarked in 1858 that the town was “still the great slave-mart of these regions, the article being collected from all the adjoining tribes of Urundi, Uhha, Uvira, and Marungu. … [A]s these purchases sell in Zanzibar for fourteen or fifteen dollars per head, the trade realizes nearly 500 per cent., and will, therefore, with difficulty be put down.”

Swahili Slave Trader #1159835 - Sir Harry Hamilton Johnston, British Central Africa (Published by Author, 1897). General Research and Reference Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.

Tippu Tip #814743 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   Tippu Tip (1837-1905), of mixed East African and Omani Arab origin, was the most notorious slave trader in Zanzibar. He owned several clove plantations and thousands of enslaved workers. In this illustration, Tippu Tip leaves Matadi, in Congo, with explorer Henry M. Stanley, who had proposed that the Zanzibar trader be made governor of the Stanley Falls District in the Belgian Congo Free State. Tippu Tip was governor there until he returned to Zanzibar in 1890.

Woman in Zanzibar #1267616 - Carlos de Sousa, Scenas Africanas, 1897 a 1917. General Research and Reference Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Most Africans brought to Zanzibar came originally from the countries that are today Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Malawi and Tanzania.

Awaiting the Sale in Zanzibar #807757 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   In the 1830s, an estimated 15,000 captives arrived in Zanzibar every year. About 7,000 were kept locally, mostly to work on the clove plantations. The slave market annually handled about 8,000 captives, who were transferred to slave ships sailing to India, Muscat in Oman, and the islands of Reunion, Mauritius and Rodrigues. By the 1860s, about 19,000 individuals arrived in Zanzibar every year and 10,000 were sold away.

Slave Market at Zanzibar #807770 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   Description of the slave market in 1873 by Clement Hill, a secretary at the British Embassy:   “On entering the market we passed by wooden sheds, under which sat, on the left, some half-caste Arabs, on the right some half-clothed negroes. … They were seated in rows round the square, each batch sitting packed close together, and herded by an Arab or negro … who forced into position the luckless wretch who stretched his stiffening limbs beyond the limits allowed him. We counted at that time ninety, of all ages and of both sexes. Many wore a set and wearied look, many were fat and gay, while two young men and a boy alone confirmed, by their skeleton frames and looks of misery, the sensational tales often written of these markets.”

Street Scene in Zanzibar #1998196 - The Graphic, 1873. Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Between 1862 and 1867, 76,700 captives were transported from Kilwa to Zanzibar. They had come, originally, from Malawi, 500 miles from the coast. Another 20,000 were transshipped from Kilwa to northern ports.

Slave Ship Near Zanzibar #1153179 - Jean Baptiste Gochet, La traite des nègres et la croisade africaine (Paris: Ch. Poussielgue, 1891). General Research and Reference Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In 1873, the British Crown and the sultan of Zanzibar signed a convention giving the former the right to search and seize slave ships intercepted around the island. This ship with 184 Africans on board was stranded and seized near Zanzibar. The Liberated Africans—as they were called—were sent to Yemen and Bombay (Mumbai), India.

A Diverse Population #1997952 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   With in-migrations of Arabs from Oman and the forced arrival of people from the Eastern Coast of Africa, the inhabitants of Zanzibar form an ethnically diverse population.

Zanzibari #1997926 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Most inhabitants of Zanzibar are of Bantu origin. About 95 percent of the population is Muslim.

Swahili Women #1997930 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   "Swahili" comes from the Arabic "sawahil" or coast. The Swahili people live on the coast of East Africa in Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique. Kiswahili is not an original language but a new Bantu-based language that incorporates elements of Arabic, Persian, Portuguese and English.

Mansa Musa on His Way to Mecca #488929 - John Ogilby, Africa: being an accurate description of the regions of Ægypt, Barbary, Lybia, and Billedulgerid, the land of Negroes, Guinee, Æthiopia, and the Abyssines (London: T. Johnson, 1670). General Research Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Mansa Musa, emperor of Mali, went on a pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324. He is said to have traveled with an entourage of 60,000. The caravan stayed in Cairo for three months before continuing to Arabia. This 1670 print is titled “The March of the Caravan out of Cairo to Mecca.”

Emperor Mansa Musa #12_44 - Part of Atlas Catalán, showing North Africa with king enthroned and a camel traveler, and southern Spain. Copy; original by Abraham Cresques, c. 1375. John Webb, The Art Archive AA333782   According to chroniclers, while in Cairo, Mansa Musa introduced so much gold into the economy that its price was devalued in the city for many years. His journey made such a lasting impression that more than 50 years later he was depicted on a Spanish map seated on a throne with a gold orb in one hand and a staff in the other.

Slave Market at Cairo, 1885 #807738 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   “The better class of slaves … were all Abyssinian girls, from ten to eighteen years of age, with a yellowish olive complexion, long straight noses, handsome features. … There is a white slave-market adjoining this, where Georgians and Circassians are kept.”—William R. Wilde, 1840.

A Chief Eunuch #1146904 - Alvan S. Southworth, Four Thousand Miles of African Travel (New York: Baker, Pratt & Co., 1875). General Research and Reference Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Eunuchs often rose to positions of importance as harem guards and bodyguards.

Sudanese Woman in Egypt #1997921 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.

Dancer in Egypt #1999059 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In this 1884 illustration, several sub-Saharan African musicians and onlookers can be seen.

Sudanese Musicians in Egypt #1999119 - The Illustrated London News. Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.

Dancers and Servant in Egypt, 1875 #1146896 - Alvan S. Southworth, Four Thousand Miles of African Travel (New York: Baker, Pratt & Co., 1875). General Reference and Research Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.

Male Servant in Egypt #826914 - Costumes of all Nations. Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   African men worked as domestics in Egypt, but as was the case in Morocco, Algeria, the Ottoman Empire and India, large numbers were part of the military. In the 19th century, they were brought from Darfur and Kordofan (Sudan.) They represented most of the Egyptian forces sent in 1863 by Said Pasha to Mexico to support the French troops during the Franco-Mexican War.

Dancers and Musicians at Bridal Procession #835327 - Georg Ebers, Egypt: Descriptive, Historical, and Picturesque (London: Cassell, Petter, Galpin, 1881-1882). Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.

Enslaved Ethiopian #1248648 - James A. St. Johns, Oriental Album. Characters, costumes, and modes of life, in the valley of the Nile (London: James Madden, 1851). Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.

Sudanese Smuggled into Cairo #1999125 - The Graphic. Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   These young women from Sudan were smuggled into Egypt in 1890 after the abolition of the slave trade. They came from different parts of Sudan and had walked across the desert for two months. After they were freed, they were lodged in the Home for Freed Women Slaves. According to the matron, more than 200 women and children smuggled from Mecca and Sudan had passed through the home that year. The traders and their accomplices were arrested and jailed.

Anti-Slavery Trial in Cairo, 1894 #1999118 - The Graphic. Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In August 1894, Ali Pasha Cherif, president of the Egyptian Legislative Council; Shawarbi Pasha, a prominent member of the council; Hussein Pasha Wacyf, a retired general; four slave dealers; and two brokers were tried in Cairo. The dealers had introduced six Sudanese women despite the abolition of the slave trade and had sold them to the three men. The Egyptian authorities acquitted the two pashas because they had merely bought, not traded in, captives; and after Ali Pasha Cherif confessed and asked for clemency, the proceedings against him were stopped. The sellers were sentenced to long jail terms.

Sakalava Woman in Madagascar #1997965 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   The Sakalava were among the slave raiding populations of Madagascar. They conducted raids on the island and into Mozambique.

A Man in Madagascar #1997964 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   People from Madagascar were sent to southern Iran during the 19th century; a sizable black population formed at Hormuz, made of men and women from Madagascar and mainland Africans.

A Couple in Madagascar #1997953 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   The French introduced East African captives into Madagascar. They also transported 359,000 men, women and children into the Mascarenes Islands, principally Reunion and Mauritius, some from Madagascar and others from as far away as Senegal, on the western coast of Africa.

Arabian Peninsula

Bilal al-Habashi #1642376 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Bilal was among Muhammad’s earliest converts. The son of an enslaved Ethiopian woman, he became a trusted companion of the Prophet. Bilal Al-Habashi (the Ethiopian), as he was also known, was enslaved by Umayyah ibn Khalaf who violently opposed Muhammad and his teachings. When Bilal converted and insisted there was only one God, Ibn Khalaf tortured him. Having heard of Bilal’s tenacity, Abu Bakr (later Sunni Islam’s first caliph) purchased and emancipated him.   From the Siyar-i Nebi (Life of the Prophet), commissioned by the Turkish sultan Murad III in 1594 and completed during the reign of his successor, Mehmet III.

Bilal al-Habashi on the Kaaba #198_332 - Muhammad asked Bilal, who was known to have a powerful, melodic voice, to serve as the community’s first muezzin, the person who calls Muslims to prayer. In this image, Bilal is pictured calling the faithful to prayer on top of the Kaaba, the shrine near the Grand Mosque in Mecca, considered by Muslims to be the most sacred place in the world, to which they turn during prayer.

Quzman Mutilates Himself #1642379 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Blacks, like the man on the left, were portrayed as early Muslims. From the Siyar-i Nebi.

Muhammad Performs a Miracle #1642474 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Three black men are portrayed in this miniature from the Siyar-i Nebi.

Abu Hisham and Two Friends from Medina Sit Before the Prophet Muhammad #1642402 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Two black men are portrayed on the left. From the Siyar-i Nebi.

The Quraysh Discuss the Conversion of Seventy-Two Medinans #1642405 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Two black men are portrayed on the right and left sides. From the Siyar-i Nebi.

Man in Arabia in 1577 #1638077 - A Collection of the dresses of different nations, antient [sic] and modern (London: T. Jefferys, 1757). Art and Architecture Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   In this 16th-century print a “Moor” of Arabia is depicted as a black man with curly hair.

Imams and Others, 1800s #833733 - Andrea Bernieri, Il costumo antico e moderno Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   A black man is portrayed, in the middle, as an elegant learned Muslim.

Blowing up a Slave Dhow in the Arabian Gulf, 1868 #807911 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   In 1863 and 1864, a total of 2,179 Africans were freed from slave ships in the Indian Ocean. Most were settled in the Seychelles, while others were sent to Bombay (Mumbai), India, and Aden, Yemen.

A Slave Ship on the Arabian Coast, 1873 #807902 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   Arabs dominated the trade routes in the Indian Ocean from the sixth century until the arrival of the Portuguese in the late 15th century.

Slave Ship in the Red Sea #1998063 - The Graphic, April 25, 1874. Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   During the 19th century, the Ottomans controlled the Red Sea ports, feeding enslaved Africans into the center of their empire in Anatolia (eastern Turkey). By the 1860s, up to 15,000 individuals were carried on Ottoman ships during the annual pilgrimages to Mecca. Africans were sold at Jeddah and Mecca, or were otherwise exchanged for goods, including steel weapons from Damascus, turquoise or carpets from Persia, and silks from China.

Enslaved Musicians in Mecca , 1888 #53797 - C. Snouck Hurgronje (Christiaan Snouck), Mekka, von Dr. C. Snouck Hurgronje. Mit Bilder-Atlas. (Haag: M. Nijhoff, 1888-1889). Asian and Middle Eastern Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   People from Africa, Turkey, the northern Caucasus, and some from India were enslaved in Mecca. According to C. Snouck, who visited Arabia in the 1880s, “There is a preference for Abyssinians, who have many good qualities, and abound, of all shades from light yellow to dark brown. Circassians [whites] … are little valued on account of their enormous pretensions. … More important, as workers, are the African slaves. They come mostly from the Soudan, and are set to the heavier tasks of building, quarrying, &c.”

Woman and Eunuch in Mecca, 1888 #53804 - C. Snouck Hurgronje (Christiaan Snouck), Mekka, von Dr. C. Snouck Hurgronje. Mit Bilder-Atlas. (Haag: M. Nijhoff, 1888-1889). Asian and Middle Eastern Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Eunuchs worked in harems and were also employed as guards of religious shrines and monuments, such as the Kaaba in Mecca.

Men in Arabia #53839 - C. Snouck Hurgronje (Christiaan Snouck), Bilder aus Mekka, mit kurzem erläuterndem Texte (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1889). Asian and Middle Eastern Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   The black man on the right holding a rifle appears to be a soldier or guard, one of the occupations of Africans in Arabia.

African Women at the Well #1996784 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Slavery continued in Muslim lands in the Indian Ocean world well into the 20th century: Saudi Arabia did not abolish slavery until 1962, and Oman did not officially do so until 1970.

Slave Market in Yemen, 1237 #12_46 - Al-Maqamat, folio 105. Author: al-Qāsim ibn Alī al Harīrī al-Basrī. Illuminator: Yahya ben Mahmud al-Wasiti. Bibliothèque nationale de France   In 1021, an enslaved Ethiopian, Najah, seized power in the city of Zabit. This image represents the slave market at Zabi—at the time the capital of Yemen—in 1237. The illustration is part of “Al-Maqamat” (Assemblies), a genre of rhymed prose narrative. Both the author and the illuminator of this work were born in Iraq.

Pilgrims from Yemen in Mecca #53801 - Asian and Middle Eastern Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Librar.y   Upper left: The two Yemeni musicians were pilgrims asking for alms in Mecca.

African Youngster in Aden, Yemen #1996785 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In the fourth century, Yemen was annexed by the Ethiopian kingdom of Axum. The Ethiopians were later expelled by the Persians. In the early 1500s, the sultan of Sanaa was reported to have 3,000 Ethiopian and Nubian horsemen, brought in as children and trained to be soldiers and guards.

Africans in Aden #1996786 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In Yemen and other Gulf ports, Africans often worked as sailors, dockhands and domestic servants. Between 1865 and 1870, the British Navy settled 2,200 Africans liberated from seized slave ships in Aden. Others were sent to Bombay (Mumbai) and Surat (India), to the Seychelles and to Mauritius.

Women of African Origin in Muscat, Oman #1996789 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In the second decade of the 19th century, three slave markets were held weekly in Oman. Some captives were kept locally while others were transferred to Turkey, Iran, Arabia and India.

Men in Muscat, Oman #1996787 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In the 17th century, Oman established garrisons and factories in Kilwa and on the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba (Tanzania), in Mombasa (Kenya) and in Pate. In Oman, the cities of Muscat and Sur became important centers for the redistribution of captives. They arrived from the Swahili Coast and were transported throughout the Persian Gulf. In the 1860s, an estimated 13,000 African captives were taken to the Gulf every year and 4,000 to 5,000 were sent to Sur in Oman.

Persian Gulf

Sailors in 1237 #12_49 - Al-Maqamat, folio 119v. 1237. Author: Abū-Muhammad al-Qāsim ibn Alī al Harīrī al-Basrī. Illuminator: Yahya ben Mahmud al-Wasiti. Bibliothèque nationale de France.   As early as the fifth century Arabs brought Africans to southern Iraq to work their date plantations and salt marshes. During the late ninth century Africans took up arms against the Abbassid slaveholders, taking over several cities. They organized their own state, which had its own standing army, and even minted coins. This 1237 illustration is the work of the Iraqi illuminator Yahya ben Mahmud al-Wasiti.

Afro-Iraqi #13_21 - Photograher: © Mohammed Aliwi   Today an estimated 1.5 to 2 million African descendants live in Iraq, mostly in and around Basra where they represent 15 to 20 percent of the population. Pictured here is a young Iraqi living in the Dhi Qar Province Orphanage, holding a stuffed animal given by the U.S. Army.

Afro-Iraqis Today #13-12 - AP Photo/Nabil al-Jurani   Afro-Iraqis represent 5 to 6 percent of the total population. To combat racism, they formed the Movement of Free Iraqis in July 2007. It demands the recognition of blacks as an official minority, an apology for slavery, laws against racial discrimination, and representation in Parliament. Here Salah al-Rekhayis, a candidate for provincial council, campaigns in 2009.

Enslaved Woman in Iran, 1714 #1500086 - Cornelis de Bruyn, Cornelis de Bruins Reizen over Moskovie, door Persie en Indie (Amsterdam: R. en G. Wetstein, 1714). Slavic and Baltic Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   People from Ethiopia, Nubia (Northern Sudan/Southern Egypt) and Somalia; and the East Africans having transited through Zanzibar and other ports of the Swahili Coast were brought to Iran, along with captives from Turkey, Georgia, Armenia and the Caucasus (Russia). Ethiopian and Nubian females were mostly employed as concubines and confidantes in harems and could reach key positions. Females from the Swahili Coast often performed domestic work.

Enslaved Man in Iran, 1714 #1500085 - Cornelis de Bruyn, Cornelis de Bruins Reizen over Moskovie, door Persie en Indie (Amsterdam: R. en G. Wetstein, J. Oosterwyk, H. van de Gaete, 1714). Slavic and Baltic Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   African males were employed as soldiers, field hands, laborers, guards and eunuchs in harems. Eunuchs could wield significant authority and reach high political positions, as well as accumulate economic wealth, since they were paid.

Qaydrush Disguised as Iskandar #1597311 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   The Shâhnâmah, or The Book of Kings, by the poet Adbul Kasim Mansar Firdausi (c. 940-1020) is the Persian national epic. It recounts the history and exploits of the pre-Islamic kings and knights, including Alexander the Great (Iskandar). This illustration accompanies a Turkish translation (1616-1620). A black man is portrayed at the court.

Iskandar Relaxing in Camp #1597282 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   A black man, forefront, appears to be a juggler. From the Shâhnâmah.

Rustam Captures Rakhsh #1597389 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Black men appear on the right and left sides of this miniature. From the Shâhnâmah.

Jamshid Surrounded by Members of Court #1597377 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   A black man with a gold earring can be seen crouching, hands bleeding, on the upper left. From the Shâhnâmah.

Khusrau Parviz Kills the Horse of Bahram Chubina #1597300 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   From the Shâhnâmah.

Siyavush Plays Polo with Afrasiyab #1597314 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   A black man can be seen on the upper right side of the image. From the Shâhnâmah.

South Asia

Porters at a Wedding Procession #832915 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   In the 18th century, Africans from the East Coast and Madagascar were transported to the Makran coast in Pakistan, and to Gujarat (India). Some were then sent to serve Indian and European elites in the north and east as far away as Bengal.

Young Pakistani Sheedi #198_338 - AP Photo/Shakil Adil   Pakistan has the largest number of people of African descent in South Asia. It has been estimated that at least a quarter of the total population living on the Makran coast are of African ancestry—that is, at least 250,000 men and women can claim East African descent on the southern coast of Pakistan and in the easternmost part of southern Iran. In Pakistan, African descendants are called Sheedi (Siddi.) Many are also called Makrani, whether or not they live in Makran.

Sheedi Men #198_339 - Photographer: © Masood Ahmed, Karachi, Pakistan   Many of the African captives brought into the Indian subcontinent entered through the ports of Baluchistan and Sindh in Pakistan. In 1851, the linguist Sir Richard Burton, who served in the British Army in Sindh, noted that up to 700 Bambasi, Habshi, and Zangibari—all Africans—were imported annually into neighboring Baluchistan.

Sheedi Culture #198_342 - AP Photo/Fareed Khan   Every year Sheedis gather at the shrine of the Sufi saint Mangho Haji Syed Sakhi Sultan at Manghopir, a suburb of Karachi, for their most important religious festival. Yaqub Qambrani, a former president of the All Sindh Al Habash Jama’at, a Sheedi organization, stresses, “It was difficult for the community to hold on to its traditions and culture due to slavery and the wadera shahi (feudalism) that was en vogue. We weren’t the only ones that were oppressed. Countless people were oppressed. But because of our physical appearance we were the ones that stuck out. That’s why we were particularly picked on. It is largely the same today, but it is less obvious.”

Sheedi Women #198_341 - AP Photo/Shakil Adil   Much of the vocabulary used by the Afro-Sindhi is a modified Swahili. For instance, the word for shield in Swahili, ngao, is gao among the Afro-Sindhi; the word for moon (or one month) in Swahili, mwesi, is moesi in Afro-Sindhi. In Lyari, a neighborhood of Karachi, there is a Mombasa Street, the name coming from the Kenyan port city. These women are celebrating the Sufi saint Mangho Haji Syed Sakhi Sultan at Manghopir, a suburb of Karachi. Sheedis, like the Siddis of India, also revere the African saint Bava Ghor.

Sheedi Organizations #13-17a - Collection of Aisha Al-Adawiya.   Al-Habsh (The Ethiopian), established in the mid-1960s, was one of the first Sheedi organizations. In 1972, the association Sheedi Community of Kharadar, Karachi, was launched. It traced the origin of the Sheedi to East African soldiers in the Muslim armies of Muhammad bin Qasim, who conquered Punjab and Sindh in 710. Today, some of the most active organizations are the All Sindh Sheedi Welfare Association and the All Sindh Al Habash Jama’at.

Sheedi Organizations #13-17b -  

Sheedi Boy in Sindh #198_340 - Photographer: © Masood Ahmed, Karachi, Pakistan   The Sheedi community is predominantly poor and has a small educated class, mostly in the interior of Sindh. "We have just awoken," says one community organizer; "I feel things will get better for the next generation."

Iskandar Fights in India #1597366 - Spencer Collection, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   The Shâhnâmah, or The Book of Kings, by the poet Adbul Kasim Mansar Firdausi (c. 940-1020) is the Persian national epic. It recounts the history and exploits of the pre-Islamic kings and knights, including Alexander the Great (Iskandar). This illustration accompanies a Turkish translation (1616-1620). In 326 , Alexander the Great conquered the Punjab in what is now Pakistan. African soldiers can be seen in this miniature.

African Muslim Theologians #12_61 - Artist: Murad. Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.: Purchase, F1942. 17a – 18a   Shah Jahan, ruler of the Mughal Empire between 1628 and 1658—and builder of the famous Taj-Mahal—honors Muslim learned men, including two Africans.

Performers in Malabar #1244277 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Regular slave trading to India is believed to have started in the 13th century and increased significantly in the 16th century during religious wars in Ethiopia. Most Africans worked at menial tasks, but in contrast to what happened in the Americas, others rose to high positions and founded ruling dynasties during slavery.

Indian Musicians, Early 1800s #832917 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   Adult men were the most in demand in India. They were barbers, musicians, field laborers, water carriers, guards, soldiers and sailors. By the 1820s preference shifted toward boys—who were more easily controlled than adults—and women for domestic work and as concubines and prostitutes. The slave trade to India was organized at different times by the Arabs, the Portuguese, the British and the Indians.

Muslim Snake Charmers, Allahabad #1125340 - J. Forbes Watson and John William Kaye, eds., The People of India (London: Indian Museum, 1868-1875). Photography Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Africans who arrived on the coasts were retained locally or transferred inland to various regions, including as far away as Allahabad in the northeast. In 1811 the British colonial government enacted the Abolition Act, which made the slave trade illegal. Slavery was not officially abolished in India until 1838. Illegal forms of slavery continued thereafter.

Man of African Origin in Assam, India #1125265 - J. Forbes Watson and John William Kaye, eds., The People of India (London: Indian Museum, 1868-1875). Photography Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Assam lies in the extreme northeast of India, between Bhutan and Bangladesh. Africans have been present in India for centuries. Even as they have intermarried with local populations, many can still be differentiated through their physical traits and cultural practices.

Sidi Said Mosque #12_37 - Photographer: © Alfie (Helmut Schütz)   The mosque was built by the Ethiopian Sidi Said, a royal slave, also known as Shaikh (honorific title) Said al-Habashi (the Ethiopian). Sidi Said retired a wealthy man to Ahmedabad, in the state of Gujarat. Extremely learned and devout, he built the mosque in 1570-1571, and close by he opened a soup kitchen for the poor. He is buried near the mosque, and his grave continues to be a site of worship for Muslims.

Sidi Said Mosque #12_38 - Photographer: © jaymasood   The ornamented “Tree of Life” window is carved in sandstone. Another window represents a smaller tree of life flanked by palm trees and a vine.

Sidi Said Mosque #12_39 - Photographer: © jaymasood   The Sidi Said Mosque is considered one of the best examples of architecture in Gujarat.

Sidi Said Mosque #12-21 - © Adrewine Photography   The interior of the mosque contains 15 areas, each with a different type of ceiling.

Nawab Sidi Mohammed Haider Khan, 1930 #12_34 - Collection of Kenneth and Joyce Robbins.   After renouncing his rights to the throne of Janjira, Sidi Mohammad Abdul Karim Khan established the Sachin State in 1791 in Gujarat. It survived until 1948, when it was incorporated into Bombay (Mumbai) before becoming part of Gujarat. The Siddi dynasty was Muslim and ruled over a population 85 percent Hindu and 13 percent Muslim. Nawab Sidi Mohammed Haider Khan was enthroned as the seventh ruler of Sachin in 1930. A well-read intellectual, he retired to Mumbai where he died in 1970.

The Nawab of Sachin, 1930 #12_41 - Collection of Kenneth and Joyce Robbins.   <a class="video-launcher" href="video.php?name=SIDDI%2520NAWAB%2520OF%2520SACHIN.f4v">Click here to view video of Nawab of Sachin and religious ritual by Sidi Goma Group of Bharuch District, Gujarat.</a>   From Africa to India: Sidi Music in the Indian Ocean Diaspora. © Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy and Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy, 2003.   This picture was taken during the installation of Haider Khan (on the throne with a footstool) as Nawab of Sachin..

Siddis, Gujarat #13_37 - Photographer: © Firoze Shakir, Poet Photographer, Mumbai, India   <a class="video-launcher" href="video.php?name=SIDDI%2520QAWWALI.f4v">Click here to view video Song in Honor of Bava Gor.</a>   From Africa to India: Sidi Music in the Indian Ocean Diaspora. © Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy and Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy, 2003.   In Gujarat, the 10,000 Siddis are Muslim and speak Gujarati, but some speak a language that mixes Gujarati and Swahili. Siddi Muslims in India (and Sheedis in Pakistan) revere the 14th century African saint Bava Gor, and his sister Mai Misra.

Siddi Fakirs in Gujarat #13_36 - Photographer: © Firoze Shakir, Poet Photographer, Mumbai, India   <a class="video-launcher" href="video.php?name=SIDDI%2520FAKIR.f4v">Click here to see video of Fakirs in Gujarat.</a>   Voices of the Sidis: The Tradition of the Fakirs. © Beheroze Shroff, 2005.   The fakirs often perform in the streets and at shrines during the celebrations held for Muslim Sufi saints.

The Noble Ikhlas Khan #198_331 - Muhammad Khan, The Noble Ikhlas Khan With a Petition. Muhammad Khan (17th century), India. Opaque watercolor and gold on paper, c. 1650. 4 23/32 in. x 4 1/4 in San Diego Museum of Art.   In 1490, an African guard, Sidi Badr, seized power in Bengal and ruled for three years before being murdered. Five thousand of the 30,000 men in his army were Ethiopians. After Sidi Badr’s assassination, high-level Africans were driven out and migrated to Gujarat and the Deccan. In the Deccan sultanate of Bijapur, Africans formerly enslaved—they were called the “Abyssinian party”—took control. The African regent Dilawar Khan exercised power from 1580 and was succeeded by Ikhlas Khan. The Abyssinian party dominated the Bijapur Sultanate and conquered new territories until the Mughal invasion in 1686.

Portrait of a Young Man #12_36 - Portrait of a Young Man, Indian, about 1620. Deccan, India. Opaque watercolor on paper 25.5 x 17.9 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Special Fund for the Purchase of Indian Art, 13.1397.   This portrait is believed to be the Afro-Indian Sultan Burhan Nizam Shah III (1605-1632), who ruled in the sultanate of Ahmednagar, in northwest Deccan.

Malik Ambar #12_43 - Artist: Unknown, c. 1620. Watercolor on paper. Victoria and Albert Museum.   Malik Ambar (1549-1626) was born in Harar, Ethiopia, and was sold into slavery. He changed owners several times in Yemen, Iraq and Arabia before arriving in India, where he was enslaved by Chengiz Khan (himself an Ethiopian and a former slave), the prime minister of the sultanate of Ahmednagar in the Deccan region. Malik Ambar married his daughter to a young heir of the Ahmednagar dynasty; he named him Sultan Murtaza Nizam Shah II in 1600 and became his prime minister. Ambar was in office from 1600 to 1626. Having a deep interest in architecture, he founded and designed the city of Khadki (now Aurangabad), including its sophisticated water system, several mosques and a church. He was reputed for his skills in guerrilla warfare and had an African army of 7,000.

Tomb of Malik Ambar #198_336 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   “A mile outside Raoza [now Khuldabad] proper, north-west, stands the tomb of Malik Ambar, the celebrated minister of Ahmednagar and the founder of the city of Aurangabad. It is built of plain stone, and is surmounted by a lofty dome, the interior of which is carved in various devices, and is remarkable for the echo which it possesses. The grave, which consists of a small stone-covered mound in the usual Mahomedan style, occupies a raised platform in the centre. It contains no inscription of any kind.”—Syed Hossain Bilgrami, ed., Historical and descriptive sketch of His Highness the Nizam’s Dominions (Bombay, 1884)

Malik Ambar (? ) #12_35 - Portrait of Malik Ambar. Southern Indian, 1610-20, Ahmednagar, Deccan, India. Opaque watercolor on paper 36.7 x 23.9 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Ross-Coomaraswamy Collection, 17.3103.   This portrait, putatively of Malik Ambar, is believed to be of his son, Fateh Khan. Fateh Khan married the daughter of another Habshi (Ethiopian), one of the most powerful nobles in the kingdom. In 1631 vizier—top official—Fateh Khan deposed the sultan and installed Hussain Shah in his place. Khan held the real power until 1633, when both were exiled to Delhi and the kingdom was annexed by the Mughals.

Sidi Sa’d Lyre Player #12_50 - Mughal or Deccani Painting, c. 1640-1660. Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection.   Sidi Sa’d was a follower of the Ethiopian-born Deccan ruler Malik Ambar. He is shown playing the typical Nubian lyre. Today these lyres, called nangas by the Siddis, can be seen in their shrines, but no one knows how to play them.

Nubian Lyre #1999209 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Nubian musicians brought their traditional lyre to the countries they traveled to, voluntarily or forcibly. Pictured here is an enslaved Nubian playing the lyre in North Africa.

The Janjira Fortress #13_31 - Photographer: © Iyer Rajgopal   <a class="video-launcher" href="video.php?name=SIDDI%2520DYNASTY%2520IN%2520JANJIRA.f4v">Click here to view video of Janjira.</a> From Africa to India: Sidi Music in the Indian Ocean Diaspora. © Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy, and Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy, 2003   The island of Janjira (from jazeera, island or peninsula in Arabic) was a formidable fortress entirely surrounded by large walls with 22 rounded bastions. It was also known as Habsan (from Habsha, Ethiopia).

Janjira #13_22 - Photographer: © Iyer Rajgopal   The first African to be posted at Janjira was Sidi Ambar Sainak, appointed by Malik Ambar in 1617. In 1621 he became the first independent nawab (prince, from the Arabic naib, or deputy) of Janjira and reigned until his death in 1642. The fortress was built between 1701 and 1728. Its construction was financed by the African nawab Sidi Surur II, formerly an officer. The State of Janjira covered an area of about 325 square miles, part on the island and part on the mainland. The Siddis, who were all related to the nawab, lived on the island. A British official wrote in 1883, “They are either landholders or state servants, and, except a few who are poor, are generally well-to-do and able to meet special charges. They are Sunnis of the Hanufi [sic] school, and, except a few of the younger men, are religious and careful to say the daily prayers.”

Cannons on Janjira #198_334 - Photographer: © Akshay Charegaonkar, Mumbai, India   Well-conceived and well-defended, Janjira was never conquered. Originally, the fort counted 572 cannons; most were made in India, and seven came from various European countries. Siddi rule over the island lasted 330 years. It was inhabited until 1972.

Janjira #13_23 - Photographer: © Himanshu Sarpotdar   There were two Muslim and one Hindu neighborhoods, which contained hundreds of houses. “The Sidis deck their walls with swords, shields, lances, muskets, guns, knives, and daggers. Most well-to-do families have male and female servants, and a stock of cows, buffaloes, goats, and bullocks. Rich families have four to eight bondsmen and bondswomen, generally the children of poor Hindus who have been bought and made Musalmans. These bondsmen and bondswomen are not hereditary and they can at their pleasure leave their master who feeds them and clothes them.”—Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, 1883.

Janjira Architecture #13_24 - Photographer: © Akshay Charegaonkar, Mumbai, India   Janjira is considered one of the best specimens of naval fort architecture. Its inner buildings that housed a full court and garrison were powerful and elegant. Plaques with inscriptions in Persian to the glory of the nawabs decorated some walls. The fort had a grand entrance, a secret exit door and underground passages.

Janjira Water Supply #13_25 - Photographer: © Iyer Rajgopal   The Siddis had made their island self-sufficient. Their water needs were fulfilled by two reservoirs of fresh water.

The Palace on Janjira #13_26 - Photographer: © Himanshu Sarpotdar   The large, fortress-like structure erected on a knoll was the palace of the nawab. It was built around 1707. The walls and floors of several rooms were decorated with colored glass.

Jamal Masjid (Mosque) #13_27 - Photographer: © Pradosh Biswas   There were four mosques on the island. One was the royal mosque and another was reserved for visitors. The Jama Masjid (white building), located by a water reservoir, was the main mosque.

Janjira Style #13_28 - Photographer: © Himanshu Sarpotdar   This ornamented door shows the elegance of the various buildings on Janjira.

Tombs on Janjira #13_29 - Photographer: © Pradosh Biswas   These tombs of nawabs and noblemen are located opposite the Jamal Masjid.

Tomb of Sidi Surur Khan #198_335 - Photographer: © John K. Davies   Sidi Surur II was chosen as the nawab of Janjira in 1707. Prior to his appointment, he was in charge of another fort—west of the island—that had been overtaken by the Siddis. With the money raised for the construction of the fort, he built this tomb at Khokri, a mosque in Rajpuri and a mansion on Janjira for his daughter. Next to his tomb are the smaller tombs of Sidi Qasim Khan and his brother Sidi Khairiyat Khan; the latter was the commander of the Siddi army and the nawab of Janjira from the 1670s until his death in 1696.

The Nawabs of Sachin and Janjira, 1930 #12_41 - Collection of Kenneth and Joyce Robbins.   Janjira’s population in 1941 was more than 103,000, 82 percent of whom were Hindus and 17 percent Muslims. The African descendants were all related to the king. Several hundred Jews (Bene Israel) also lived in the kingdom. This picture was taken during the installation of Haider Khan (on the throne with a footstool) as nawab of Sachin; the 22nd nawab of Janjira, Sidi Mohammed Khan III, is the fourth man seated from the right.

The Entrance of the Palace of the Nawab of Janjira #13_42 - Photographer: © Khalil Sawant   After leaving the island of Janjira, the nawabs settled in Murud on the mainland. Their Ahmad Ganj Palace was built in 1904. The grounds cover 45 acres and hold a mosque, the tombs of the previous rulers, and a number of other structures (some of which no longer exist) such as staff and servants’ apartments, nursery, dispensary, tennis court and swimming pool.

The Palace of the Nawab of Janjira #13_41 - Photographer: © Khalil Sawant   The palace is built on a cliff overlooking the Arabian Sea. Its Turkish architect designed it so that it appears to be a different structure depending on the angle from which it is viewed. The palace itself is more than 20,000 square feet, and an extension covers more than 10,000 square feet. The palace, with its magnificent rooms, stained glass ceiling, marble staircases and unique decorations is still inhabited by the nawab family.

Musician in India #psnypl_dan_1767 - Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts The New York Public Library.   Between 1770 and 1834, more than 6,200 people from Mozambique were transported to Diu and Daman in Gujarat, and to Goa, the Portuguese enclave. Between 1830 and 1875 Africans liberated from slave ships were sent to Surat and Mumbai—half the Africans in that city worked in the maritime professions—and some migrated to Hyderabad to the southeast, where an African Cavalry Guard was formed in 1863.

Siddis, Karnataka #13_34 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   Many East Africans—mostly from Mozambique—brought by the Portuguese to Goa on the western coast of India escaped from slavery and migrated to the south. They took refuge in the remote Western Ghats mountains of Northern Karnataka. Others fled to the Muslim areas where the men could enroll in the armies and navies and rise through the ranks. Siddi rulers like Malik Ambar welcomed them. The exodus was such that the Portuguese signed contracts with some rulers, who were to return the runaways or pay their value.

Siddi Woman #13_47 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   <a class="video-launcher" href="video.php?name=Voices%2520of%2520the%2520Sidis_Ancestral%2520Links%2520I.f4v">Click here to view videos of a Siddi family in Mumbai.</a>   Voices of the Sidis: Ancestral Links. © Beheroze Shroff, 2005.   Siddis—also called Habshi, Kaphri or African—number about 50,000 in India. It is estimated that 18,000 live in the state of Karnataka, 10,000 in Gujarat and 12,000 in Andhra Pradesh (mostly in Hyderabad). Many Muslim Siddis left after Indian independence in 1947 and settled in Pakistan.

Siddi Family, Karnataka #12_20 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   Many Siddis do not know much about their origin, but an elder explained: “A long time ago a Hindu king brought my ancestors here from a place called Africa. The Hindu king wanted to have strong and hardworking men to work his property and women to work in his many houses. So he sent ships beyond the horizon and brought our ancestors. Then the Portuguese came and brought Siddis to Goa to work in their houses. Then the British came with more Siddis from Africa to work in their army and fight against the Indians. When they had a chance our forebears fled from Goa and Bombay and settled here and in other parts of Uttara Kannada.”—Charles Camara, “The Siddis of Uttara Kannada” in Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy and Edward A. Alpers, eds., Sidis and Scholars.

Siddi Family #12_22 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   The Siddis of Karnataka are Muslims or Catholics and a few are Hindus. Marriages across religions are common. The Hindus trace their ancestry to Africans brought by Arab traders and sold to high-caste Hindus. They place themselves in the caste system, below some castes and above others. The Muslims trace their origin to the African-Indian kingdom of Bijapur in the Deccan, while the Catholics trace theirs to Goa via the Portuguese slave trade from Mozambique.

Affirmative Action #12_23 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   The Siddis who live in the forests and high plains south of Goa are mostly farmers. Since 2003, they are part of the “Scheduled Tribes,” ethnic communities who qualify for special educational and economic assistance, a type of affirmative action.

Quilter, Karnataka #12_24 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   The Siddis have adopted and adapted many cultural aspects of the Indian peoples with whom they have lived for generations. They have also retained and transformed certain cultural and artistic traditions from Africa.

Siiddi Quilt #12_25 - Photographer: © Henry Drewal   Siddi women in Karnataka are renowned for their quilts. A Siddi quilt (kawandi) is made with the family’s discarded clothes. Very colorful and dynamic, the quilts are visually striking.

A Siddi Family in Gujarat #13_43 - Photographer: © Raveesh Vyas   <a class="video-launcher" href="video.php?name=V001_MMV58334_TEN_MOV-1.flv">Click here to see a video of Siddis in Gujarat</a>   AFP   In Gujarat, some Siddis live in the Gir forest. A large part of their traditional land has been seized and turned into a national park. This man used a chhakda to transport his family to the town of Saurashtra during a Muslim festival.

Monkey Tamer, Colombo #1996792 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   As early as the fifth century, Ethiopians traveled to Sri Lanka (Ceylon) and traded in Matota in the northwestern part of the island; but Africans were forcibly settled there during the Portuguese, Dutch and British eras starting in 1505. In the Portuguese period, they came mostly from Mozambique. Many were also transported from Goa, on the western coast of India. Slavery was abolished in the 1820s but continued until at least 1845.

Boxer James Morka #1996791 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   In the 14th century, the ruler of Colombo employed 500 Ethiopian soldiers. During the Dutch and British periods Africans from Madagascar and the East African Coast were introduced into Sri Lanka. They assisted the Portuguese in seizing or controlling the strategic ports of the Indian Ocean, beginning with those in Sri Lanka. About 4,000 Africans built the fortress of Colombo in the late 17th century.

Afro-Sri Lankan #1996790 - Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library.   Historical records indicate that in the 19th century 874 African soldiers served in the 3rd and 4th Ceylon regiments. In 1865, when the 3rd Ceylon Regiment’s detachment in Puttalam was disbanded, soldiers from the African garrison were given plots of land in the area, where they retired.

Kaffir Women #12_53 - Photographer: © Leah Worthington   Click here to view a video of a Kaffir community in Sri Lanka. Kaffir Culture, © Kannan Arunasalam   <a title="http://vimeo.com/7234191" class="video-launcher" href="/video-external.php" target="_blank">http://vimeo.com/7234191</a>   Although Kaffir, meaning “unbeliever” in Arabic, is a derogatory term in Africa, Afro-Sri Lankans use it to refer to themselves. This group of women are from the community of Sirambiyadiya in the Puttalam District in northwest Sri Lanka.

Kaffir Woman #12_51 - Photographer: © Leah Worthington   Afro-Sri Lankans spoke Indo-Portuguese, a Creole born during the Portuguese time. They retained it during the Dutch and British periods and have switched to Sinhala and Tamil with independence and the generalization of formal education.

Kaffir Singer #12_52 - Photographer: © Leah Worthington   The popular Sri Lankan dance called Kaffrinha Baila is a direct result of the historic contact between the Kaffirs, Portuguese and Sinhalese. Today, the music of the Afro-Sri Lankans is enjoying great success among the larger population made up primarily of Sinhalese, Tamil and Vedda.

Outlying Areas

Turkish Soldiers #831283 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   African males were used in a number of functions in the Ottoman Empire, as domestics, in agriculture and industry, and in the military. Two African soldiers appear in this print, which shows military personnel from various provinces.

Turkish Troops #831303 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   Black soldiers in the Turkish army, 1828.

Chief of the Black Eunuchs, 1714 #94380 - Art and Architecture Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Nubian and Ethiopian eunuchs served for the protection and maintenance of harems, as palace guards and staff, as confidential servants, and as keepers of mosques and tombs.

Chief of the Black Eunuchs, 1749 #811947 - Picture Collection, Mid-Manhattan Library, The New York Public Library.   The castration of young boys from Ethiopia and Sudan was generally performed by Ethiopian Christians who sold them to Egypt and the Ottoman Empire.

The Black Sultaness, 1749 #1638018 - Art and Architecture Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Some of the sultans’ concubines could reach high positions.

African and European Eunuchs #85587 - Art and Architecture Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   Slavs, Germans and Circassians (from the Caucasus) were acquired through wars and raids and sold into slavery in the Ottoman Empire. They were the most numerous slaves until the development of the trade in sub-Saharan Africans.

Slave Market, 1854 #85978 - Art and Architecture Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, The New York Public Library.   By the 1860s, up to 15,000 individuals were carried annually on Ottoman ships during the pilgrimages to Mecca and Medina. The Ottoman Empire officially abolished the slave trade in 1890, but it secretly continued, as did slavery, until World War I. This print offers a view of the slave market in Constantinople (Istanbul) in 1854.

Judith With Her Maidservant Abra #12_45 - Judith With the Head of Holofernes c. 1495-1500 Andrea Mantegna (c. 1431-1506) - Tempera on linen, 48.1 x 36.7 cm National Gallery of Ireland Collection Photo © National Gallery of Ireland NGI 442   One of the figures depicted in Renaissance European art, based on the apocryphal Book of Judith, is of a black maidservant assisting Judith, a Jewish rebel who charms her way into the quarters of Holofernes, a commander of a conquering army, and cuts off his head while he is passed out from drinking.

Adoration of the Magi #12_48 - Andrea Mantegna, Adoration of the Magi, c. 1495-1505 – Distemper on linen, 48.6 x 65.6cm. The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.   The Christian story of the Magi, appearing in the Gospel of Matthew, has been interpreted to have included an Abyssinian, Balthazar, among the “Three Wise Men” or “Three Kings from the East.” East Africans—specifically, Nubians and Sudanese—were taken to the area of Palestine as part of the larger slave trade into the Middle East via Cairo. Other sub-Saharan Africans, free Muslims from the Sudan and Christians from Ethiopia, also migrated and formed their own settlements in the area comprising Palestine and Israel.

Mousa Mohammed Qous #15_10 - Photographer: © Andrew Courtney   <a class="video-launcher" href="video.php?name=African%2520Palestinian.f4v">Click here to view video of Ali Jiddah, African Palestinian in Jerusalem. African Palestinian: Ali Jiddah. © Andrew Courtney & Emily Perry, 2005.</a>   As early as the 13th century, some Africans were appointed guardians of the Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem. In the 19th century Africans worked as water carriers, farmers, masons, street vendors or shop owners. Today about 350 people who identify as Palestinians and Africans live in the Old City.

Hawwa Mohamed Kanambo #15_11 - Photographer: © Andrew Courtney   Some Africans arrived during the British Mandate of Palestine between 1917 and 1948. They mostly came from Senegal, Chad, Nigeria and Sudan. Others were part of the Egyptian-led army that tried to reclaim land after the creation of the State of Israel in 1948. Still others settled in Jerusalem, the third holiest place in Islam (after Mecca and Medina), following a pilgrimage. African Palestinians are numerous in Jericho, the West Bank and Gaza. Bedouins of African origin form a third of the population of Rahat.

Mohammed Hassan Bullala #15_12 - Photographer: © Andrew Courtney   In 1935 the African Palestinians founded the Sudanese Welfare Club in Jerusalem, which was followed by the African Youth Club, established in 1978. In 1983, they regrouped in the African Community Society. The Palestinian African Community Center operates in the Old City near the Al-Aqsa compound.