Ormus

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Kingdom of Ormus (also known as Ohrmuzd, Hormuz, and Ohrmazd; Portuguese Ormuz) was a 10th to 17th century kingdom located within the Persian Gulf and extending as far as the Strait of Hormuz. The Kingdom was established by Arab princes in the 10th century who in 1262 came under the suzerainty of Persia^[1], before becoming a client state of the Portuguese Empire.

The kingdom received its name from the fortified port city which served as its capital. It was one of the most important ports in the Middle East at the time as it controlled sea-way trading routes through the Persian Gulf to India and East Africa. This port was probably located on the island of Hormoz, which is located near the modern city of Bandar-e Abbas.

The name of the port, the island, and the kingdom is Iranian and ultimately derives from that of the Zoroastrian deity, Ahura Mazda, which becomes Ohrmazd in Pahlavi, Hirmiz in Manichaean Middle Persian, and Hormoz in New-Persian.

Contents 1 History 2 Accounts of Ormus society 3 Depiction in literature 4 References

[edit] History

The city-state of Ormus dates back to the 13th century when it controlled the slave market from Africa and Arabia to Khorasan in Persia. At its zenith in 13th to 14th century, Ormus (or Ormuz) was a powerful naval state with a large and active trading fleet and a powerful navy. Petrashevsky reports the size of the fleet to be up to 500 fighting ships. It should be noted that these ships were not armed with cannons.

In September, 1507, the Portuguese Afonso de Albuquerque landed on the island. Portugal occupied Ormuz from 1515 to 1622. It was during the Portuguese occupation of the island that the Mandaeans first came to western attention. The Mandaeans were fleeing persecution in the vilayet of Baghdad (which, at the time, included Basra) and Khuzestan in Iran. When the Portuguese first encountered them, they mistakenly identified them as "St. John Christians," analogous to the St. Thomas Christians of India. The Mandaeans, for their part, were all too willing to take advantage of the confusion, offering to accept papal authority and Portuguese suzerainty if the Portuguese would invade the Ottoman Empire and liberate their coreligionists. The Portuguese were attracted by the prospect of what appeared to be a large Christian community under Muslim rule. It was not until after the Portuguese had committed themselves to the conquest of Basra that they came to realize that the Mandaeans were not what they claimed to be.

As vassals of the Portuguese state, the Kingdom of Ormus jointly participated in the 1521 invasion of Bahrain that ended Jabrid rule of the Gulf archipelago. The Jabrid ruler was nominally a vassal of Ormus, but the Jabrid King, Muqrin ibn Zamil had refused to pay the tribute Ormus demanded, prompting the invasion under the command of Portuguese conquistador, António Correia^[2]. In the fighting for Bahrain, most of the combat was carried out by Portuguese troops, while the Ormusi admiral, Reis Xarafo, looked on^[3]. The Portuguese ruled Bahrain through a series of Ormusi governors. However, the Sunni Ormuis were not popular with Bahrain's Shia population which suffered religious disadvantages^[4], prompting rebellion. In one case the Ormusi governor was crucified by rebels^[5], and Portuguese rule came to an end in 1602 after the Ormusi governor, who was a relative of the Ormusi king^[6], started executing members of Bahrain's leading families^[7].

After the Portuguese made several abortive attempts to seize control of Basra, the Safavid ruler Abbas I of Persia conquered the kingdom with the help of the British, and expelled the Portuguese from the rest of the Persian Gulf, with the exception of Muscat. The Portuguese returned to the Persian Gulf in the following year as allies of Afrasiyab, the Pasha of Basra, against the Persians. Afrasiyab was formerly an Ottoman vassal but had been effectively independent since 1612. They never returned to Ormus.

In the mid-17th century it was captured by the Imam of Muscat, but was subsequently recaptured by Persians. Today, it is part of the Iranian province of Hormozgan.

[edit] Accounts of Ormus society

Situated between the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean, Ormus was a "by-word for wealth and luxury"^[8], perhaps best captured in the Arab saying: ‘If all the world were a golden ring Ormus would be the jewel in it’^[9]. The city was also known for its licentiousness according to accounts by Portuguese visitors; Duarte Barbosa, one of the first Portuguese to travel to Ormuz in the late fourteenh century found:

“

The merchants of this isle and city are Persians and Arabs. The Persians [speak Arabic and another language which they call Psa], are tall and well-looking, and a fine and up-standing folk, both men and women; they are stout and comfortable. They hold the creed of Mafamede in great honour. They indulge themselves greatly, so much so that they keep among them youths for the purpose of abominable wickedness. They are musicians, and have instruments of divers kinds. The Arabs are blacker and swarthier than they.[10]

”

This theme is also strong in Henry James Coleridge’s account of Ormus in his life of Portuguese missionary, St Francis Xavier, who visited Ormus on his way to Japan:

“

Its moral state was enormously and infamously bad. It was the home of the foulest sensuality, and of all the most corrupted forms of every religion in the East. The Christians were as bad as the rest in the extreme licence of their lives. There were few priests, but they were a disgrace to their name. The Arabs and the Persians had introduced and made common the most detestable forms of vice. Ormuz was said to be a Babel for its confusion of tongues, and for its moral abominations to match the cities of the Plain. A lawful marriage was a rare exception. Foreigners, soldiers and merchants, threw off all restraint in the indulgence of their passions…Avarice was made a science: it was studied and practiced, not for gain, but for its own sake, and for the pleasure of cheating. Evil had become good, and it was thought good trade to break promises and think nothing of engagements…[11]

”

[edit] Depiction in literature

The following text was written by John Speed in 1626:

The Kingdome of Ormus
hath his owne King tributarte
vnto the King of Lu∫itania. it
containeth the whole shore of
Arabia from the paßage of the
riuer Euphrates vntil C. Raz. alga
ti, likewi∫e part of the Kingdome of
Per∫ia w. adioyneth to the Sea Ba∫ora
and almo∫t al the Ilands of the per∫ian
Gulfe. whose mothe r?itie is Ormus
in the Iland Geru a famous mart

Note that some of this text is missing due to printing faults; the ∫ is the letter for s or sh (see esh (letter)). The words "mothe r?itie" in the text can also be deciphered as "mother Litie", although there is a distinctive space between mothe and r, and the L (marked by ? above) looks most like a (. Lu∫itania refers to the Roman province of Lusitania, i.e. Portugal.

This text is likely derived from a caption on Ortelius' 1567 map of Asia, which was derived from Gastaldi's map of six years prior:

ORMVS Regnum, peculiarem habet Regem
Lusitaniæ Regi tributarium: continetque totam
Arabiam littoralem ab Euphratis fl. ostio vsque
ad C. Razalqati, nec nom partem Regni Persidis
quæ adiacet freto Basoræ, atque insulas fere omnes
sinus Persici. Cuius metropolis est vrbs Ormus
in insula Geru sita, emporium celebre.

[The Kingdom of Ormus has as a distinctive feature a king
who is a tributary to the king of Lusitania. It comprises all 
the Arab coasts from the mouth of the Euphrates to 
Cape Razalqati, the part of the Persian Empire 
bordering on the Bazora straights and almost all islands 
in the Persian Gulf. Its capital is the city of Ormus
on the isle of Gerus, a famous market town.]

Line 20 of Andrew Marvel's poem 'Bermudas' reads:

Jewels more rich than Ormus shows

Ormus is also mentioned in a famous passage from John Milton's epic poem, Paradise Lost:

High on a throne of royal state, which far
outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind,
Or where the gorgeous East with richest hand
Show'rs on her kings barbaric pearl and gold,
Satan exalted sat,

from Book II, lines 1-5

[edit] References

• (On the religion of Ormus) Foltz, R.C. 2004, "Spirituality in the Land of the Noble: How Iran Shaped the World's Religions", Oneworld Publications, Oxford, England. ISBN 1-85168-336-4

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Coordinates: 27°06′N, 56°27′E