Said ibn Sultan

Said ibn Sultan ( Arabic سعيد بن سلطان, DMG Saʿīd b. Sulṭān ; * June 5, 1791 in Sumail , Oman ; †  October 19, 1856 near Mahé , Seychelles ; also Sayyid Said ) was from 1804 until his death Sayyid of Muscat , Imam of Muscat and Oman and Sultan of Muscat, Oman and Zanzibar .

Saids sphere of influence 1856 (direct rule and stronger influence)

Life

Said ibn Sultan al-Busaidi (Saʿîd ibn Sultân) succeeded Sultan ibn Ahmad (1792-1804) on November 20, 1804 Sayyid of Muscat. He was first appointed ruler together with his brother Salim; since he was only 13 years old, his uncle Sayyid Badr ibn Saif was installed as guardian and regent. After his death on July 31, 1806, his older sister Sayyida Aisha ibn Sultan became regent. On September 14, 1806, she caused Said to be proclaimed sole sultan of Muscat, Oman and Zanzibar.

In 1806, due to a controversy, Said abandoned the title of Imam and instead carried the title of Sayyid (in the sense of a "Highness") in order to distinguish himself from the other members of the al-Busaid tribe.

Under Said ibn Sultan, the Said dynasty ruled its largest area of ​​rule. In addition to the East African coast between Cape Delgado and Mogadishu , large parts of the Gulf coast were also ruled. Thus, through marriage connections with Persian rulers, the port cities of Hormuz , Qishm and Bandar Abbas came under Omani control. With the help of the British , Said also managed to curb the piracy of the Qawasim. This support, however, led to an increased influence of Britain in the Gulf region. The fighting with the Wahhabis from central Arabia continued. In the Moresby Treaty of 1822 with Great Britain, he declared the slave trade between his empire and all Christian states over.

Said concentrated in the following period increasingly on the expansion of the empire in East Africa . In 1829, with the conquest of Mombasa, he succeeded in taking the last independent trading port on the East African coast. Said ibn Sultan is said to have made a (unsuccessful) marriage offer to Queen Ranavalona I of Madagascar in order to incorporate the island into his domain. The subjugation of the Comoros also failed when the Malagasy sultana of Mohéli placed herself under French protectorate in 1842.

Zanzibar developed as the center of the slave trade and the cultivation of cloves to the economic center of the African possessions. In 1832, Said temporarily moved his residence to Zanzibar City , and then officially from 1840. In 1836 he established official diplomatic relations with the USA and in 1840 with Great Britain. In the Hamerton Treaty of October 2, 1845, the export of slaves from its sphere of influence was officially forbidden under pressure from the British, but it was only after effective control by the British Navy that it really came to a standstill many years later. In return, Great Britain recognized the full sovereignty of its country. After Said's death in 1856 while on a boat trip near Mahe, Seychelles, struggles for succession to the throne broke out among his sons, Majid and Thuwaini , which led to the division of the empire.

Others

He had three main wives (he divorced his second and third main wife because of infidelity), and in the course of time there were over 75 concubines in his harem. With these he had 26 sons and 21 daughters, 36 of whom were still alive when he died, including Emily Ruete , who later lived in Germany . In addition to Thuwaini, who had become Sultan of Oman, four of Said's sons became sultans of Zanzibar: Majid bin Said ruled 1856–1870, Barghasch ibn Said 1870–1888, Chalifa ibn Said 1888–1890 and Ali ibn Said 1890–1893.

In the 1840s, Sultan Said sold the precious carved double-leaf wooden door to the wine merchant Louis-Gaspard Estournel , which has since adorned the famous Château Cos d'Estournel winery in Saint-Estèphe near Bordeaux.

Web links

• Genealogy of al-Busaid Dynasty (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Marc Valeri: Oman. Politics and Society in the Qaboos State. Columbia University Press, New York NY 2009, ISBN 978-0-231-70088-7 , p. 24.