| Majeerteen Sultanate Migiurtinia سلطنة مجرتين |
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| Capital | Hafun | |||
| Language(s) | Somali, Arabic | |||
| Religion | Islam | |||
| Government | Monarchy | |||
| King | ||||
| - mid-1800s–early 1900s | Osman Mahamuud | |||
| History | ||||
| - Established | mid-18th century | |||
| - Disestablished | early 20th century | |||
The Majeerteen Sultanate (Somali: Saldanadda Majeerteen, Arabic: سلطنة مجرتين), also known as Migiurtinia, was a Somali ruling house in present-day northern Somalia. Ruled by King Osman Mahamuud during its Golden Age, it controlled much of northern and central Somalia in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The polity had all of the organs of an integrated modern state and maintained a robust trading network. It also entered into treaties with foreign powers and exerted strong centralized authority on the domestic front. Much of the Sultanate's former domain is today coextensive with the autonomous Puntland region in northeastern Somalia.
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The Majeerteen Sultanate was established in the mid-18th century by Somalis from the Majeerteen Darod clan. It rose to prominence the following century, under the reign of the resourceful Boqor (King) Osman Mahamuud.[1]
Due to consistent ship crashes along the northeastern Cape Guardafui headland, Boqor Osman's kingdom entered into an informal agreement with Britain, wherein the British agreed to pay the King annual subsidies to protect shipwrecked British crews and guard wrecks against plunder. The agreement, however, remained unratified, as the British feared that doing so would "give other powers a precedent for making agreements with the Somalis, who seemed ready to enter into relations with all comers."[2]
Osman Mahamuud's Sultanate was nearly destroyed in the mid-1800s by a power struggle between himself and his ambitious cousin, Yusuf Ali Kenadid. After almost five years of battle, the young upstart was finally forced into exile in Yemen. A decade later, in the 1870s, Kenadid returned from the Arabian Peninsula with a band of Hadhrami musketeers and a group of devoted lieutenants. With their assistance, he managed to overpower the local Hawiye clans and establish the separate Sultanate of Hobyo in 1878.[1][3]
In late 1889, Boqor Osman entered into a treaty with the Italians, making his realm an Italian protectorate. His rival Sultan Kenadid had signed a similar agreement vis-a-vis his own Sultanate the year before. Both rulers had signed the protectorate treaties to advance their own expansionist objectives, with Boqor Osman looking to use Italy's support in his ongoing power struggle with Kenadid over the Majeerteen Sultanate. Boqor Osman and Sultan Kenadid also hoped to exploit the conflicting interests among the European imperial powers that were then looking to control the Somali peninsula, so as to avoid direct occupation of their territories by force.[4]
With the gradual extension into northern Somalia of Italian colonial rule, both Kingdoms were eventually annexed to Italian Somaliland in the early 20th century.[4]
As with the Sultanate of Hobyo, the Majeerteen Sultanate exerted a strong centralized authority during its existence, and possessed all of the organs and trappings of an integrated modern state: a functioning bureaucracy, a hereditary nobility, titled aristocrats, a state flag, as well as a professional army.[5][6]
The Majeerteen Sultanate's ruler, however, commanded more power than was typical of other Somali leaders during the period. As the primus inter pares, Boqor Osman taxed the harvest of aromatic trees and pearl fishing along the seaboard. He retained prior rights on goods obtained from ship wrecks on the coast. The Sultanate also exerted authority over the control of woodland and pastureland, and imposed both land and stock taxes.[7]
In the early 19th century, Somali seamen on the northern coast barred entry to their ports, while engaging in trade with Aden and Mocha in adjacent Yemen using their own vessels.[8]
According to official reports from 1924 commissioned by the Reggio Governo della Somalia Italiana, the Majeerteen Sultanate maintained robust commercial activities before the Italian occupation of the following year. The Sultanate reportedly exported 1,056,400 Indian Rupees (IR) worth of commodities, 60% of which came from the sale of frankincense and other gums. Fish and other sea products sold for a total value of 250,000 IR, roughly equivalent to 20% of the Sultanate's aggregate exports. The remaining export proceeds came from livestock, with the export list of 1924 consisting of 16 items.[9]
In addition to a strong civil administration, the Majeerteen Sultanate maintained a regular army. Besides protecting the polity from both external and internal threats, military officials were tasked with carrying out the King's instructions. The latter included tax collection, which typically came in the form of the obligatory Muslim alms (seko or sako) ordinarily tithed by Somalis to the poor and religious clerics (wadaads).[7][10]
Established in 1998, the autonomous Puntland region in northeastern Somalia now administers much of the former territories of the Majeerteen Sultanate (Migiurtinia).[11]