page_title: History of Somalia
section_title: Early modern
hierarchical_section_title: History of Somalia / Early modern
caption_attribution_description: English: Barawa - Somalia
context_page_description: Somalia, officially the Federal Republic of Somalia and formerly known as the Somali Democratic Republic, is a country located in the Horn of Africa.
  Somalia was an important centre for commerce with the rest of the ancient world, and according to most scholars, it is among the most probable locations of the fabled ancient Land of Punt.
  During the Middle Ages, several powerful Somali states and port towns dominated the regional trade, the Mogadishu Sultanate and Ajuran Sultanate both centered around the port town Mogadishu, the Adal Sultanate and Ifat Sultanate both centered around the port town Zeila, but also the port towns of Barawe, Merca and Berbera.
  In the late 19th century, through a succession of treaties with these kingdoms, the British and Italians gained control of parts of the coast, and established British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland. In southern parts of Somalia, the Italians fought a war with the Somalis around the port town of Merca, dubbed the Banadir Resistance.
context_section_description: Sultan Muhammad was succeeded by his son Shams ad Din, while Emperor Baeda Maryam was succeeded by his son Eskender. During this time, period warfare broke out again between the two states and Emperor Eskender invaded Dakkar, where he was stopped by a large Adalite army, which destroyed the Solomonic army to such an extent that no further expeditions were carried out for the remainder of Eskender's reign. Adal, however, continued to raid the Christian empire unabated under General Mahfuz, the leader of the Adalite war machine, who annually invaded the Christian territories. Eskender was succeeded by Emperor Na'od, who tried to defend the Christians from General Mahfuz but he too was also killed in battle by the Adalite army in Ifat.
  At the turn of the 16th century, Adal regrouped and, around 1527, under the charismatic leadership of Imam Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazi (Gurey in Somali, Gragn in Amharic, both meaning "left-handed"), invaded Abyssinia. Adalite armies, with Ottoman arms and support, marched into Ethiopia and caused considerable damage on the highland state. Many historic churches, manuscripts and settlements were looted and burned during the campaigns. Adal's use of firearms, still only rarely used in Ethiopia, allowed the conquest of well over half of Ethiopia, reaching as far north as Tigray. The complete conquest of Ethiopia was averted by the timely arrival of a Portuguese expedition led by Cristóvão da Gama, son of the famed navigator Vasco da Gama. The Portuguese had been in the area earlier – in the early 16th century, in search of the legendary priest-king Prester John) – and, although a diplomatic mission from Portugal, led by Rodrigo de Lima, had failed to improve relations between the countries, they responded to the Ethiopian pleas for help and sent a military expedition to their fellow Christians. A Portuguese fleet under the command of Estêvão da Gama was sent from Portuguese India and arrived at Massawa in February 1541. Here, he received an ambassador from the Emperor beseeching him to send help against the Muslims. In July, a force of 400 musketeers, under the command of Cristóvão da Gama, younger brother of Estêvão, marched into the interior. Joined by Ethiopian troops, they were at first successful against the Muslims; but, they were subsequently defeated at the Battle of Wofla (28 August 1542), and their commander captured and executed. On 21 February 1543, however, a joint Portuguese-Ethiopian force defeated the Muslim army at the Battle of Wayna Daga, in which Ahmed Gurey was killed and the war won. Ahmed Gurey's widow married his nephew Nur ibn Mujahid, in return for his promise to avenge Ahmed's death, who succeeded Ahmed Gurey, and continued hostilities against his northern adversaries until he killed the Ethiopian Emperor in his second invasion of Ethiopia.
  During the age of the Ajurans, the sultanates and republics of Merca, Mogadishu, Barawa, Hobyo and their respective ports flourished and had a lucrative foreign commerce with ships sailing to and coming from Arabia, India, Venetia, Persia, Egypt, Portugal and as far away as China. Vasco da Gama, who passed by Mogadishu in the 15th century, noted that it was a large city with houses of four or five storeys and big palaces in its centre and many mosques with cylindrical minarets. In the 16th century, Duarte Barbosa noted that many ships from the Kingdom of Cambaya in India sailed to Mogadishu with cloths and spices, for which they in return received gold, wax and ivory. Barbosa also highlighted the abundance of meat, wheat, barley, horses, and fruit on the coastal markets, which generated enormous wealth for the merchants.
  Mogadishu, the center of a thriving weaving industry known as toob benadir (specialized for the markets in Egypt and Syria), together with Merca and Barawa also served as transit stops for Swahili merchants from Mombasa and Malindi and for the gold trade from Kilwa. Jewish merchants from the Hormuz brought their Indian textile and fruit to the Somali coast in exchange for grain and wood. Trading relations were estab
caption: Barawa city was an important medieval centre of Somali enterprise.
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