Jeddah (city): Difference between revisions

'''Juddah''' or '''Jeddah''' (Arabic:{{iarabic| جدة}}) is the most important city and port in [[Saudi Arabia]] near the Red Sea. It is said that the history of the city goes back to the Stone Age. According to some accounts, Arabs and some [[Iran|Iranians]] were the main residents of Jeddah. After the emergence of [[Islam]], the city was ruled by the [[Umayyads]], the [[Abbasids]], the [[Fatimids]], the [[Ottomans]] and the [[Wahhabis]]. [['Abd al-Malik b. Ibrahim al-Jiddi]], and [[Muhammad b. Ibrahim al-Kaziruni]] were prominent scholars of Jeddah. The city is known as the Bride of the Red Sea. It is the point of entry for pilgrims of [[hajj]]. It is a business center in Saudi Arabia, and the second largest city of the country, after [[Riyadh]], with a population of over 3,000,000 people. In recent centuries, many Iranian Shiites arrive in this city first when they go to the hajj pilgrimage, and then they go to [[Mecca]]. Iranian governments, such as the [[Qajar]] government, had an official consulate in Jeddah in order to take care of Iranian pilgrims.

Some people take “jeddah” to mean line or road and seaside (or riverside), and some believe that Jeddah is called so because it was on the seaside, and [[Mecca]] was connected to cities on the other side of the sea through Jeddah. Some people take the term to be an Arabic form for the Nabataean term, Kidd. There are some myths that since the resting place of [[Eve]]—the mother of all human beings—is located in this city, or the city is where she fell from Eden, it is called so (since the word, “jadda”, in Arabic, means grandmother). Others take the name to come from its adjacent sea (Jeddah sea).

Jeddah is located near the seaside plain, [[Tihamah]], 75 kilometers west of [[Mecca]] in the western part of Saudi Arabia. A chain of foothills parallel to the mountain range of [[Hijaz]] separates it from the Eastern part. The city is 419 kilometers away from [[Medina]] and it covers an area of 47,000 hectares (470 square kilometers).

Jeddah’s weather is affected by its location. Since the sea temperature is high during the summer, the humidity rises, and the weather rises to 50 degrees centigrades.

It is said that the history of Jeddah goes back to the Stone Age. On some accounts, [[Quda’a]], an old Arab tribe, were the first people who resided in Jeddah. And on other accounts, during the [[Jahiliyya]] period, 'Amr b. Luhay who changed the [[Tawhid|monotheistic approach]] in Mecca, took some idols from Jeddah to Mecca, and called people to worship them.

However, there are other accounts that [[Salman al-Farsi]]’s Iranian kinsmen who were businessmen resided in Jeddah when they converted to Islam, or the city was built by a [[Sasanid]] monarch. According to Iranian accounts, when Bandar Siraf was destroyed, some of its people moved to Jeddah and resided there. On these accounts, the main inhabitants of Jeddah were Iranians.

Persian merchants tried to construct Jeddah. Iranian monarchs had Iranian merchants who came from other countries reside there. In fact, Jeddah was the anchorage place of ships from [[India]], [[Aden]], and [[Yemen]].

When the Sasanids were lost their power, Jeddah was abandoned such that during the emergence of Islam, it turned into a small village around Hijaz. After the emergence of [[Islam]] in 26 A.H. (647), [['Uthman b. 'Affan]] turned Jeddah into Mecca’s port instead of Shu’aybiyya (a port south of Jeddah). After this, the city thrived again and became the center of the largest global market, especially during the [[hajj]] rituals.

Not much is known about the history of Jeddah in the first centuries after [[Hijra]]. On some accounts, during the [[Umayyad]]s and [[Abbasid]]s, the city was attacked by Abyssinians and Kurks or domestic rebels. For example, in 473 A.H. (1080), merchants left Jeddah because the ruler of [[Mecca]] tried to seize their property and Arabs dominated the city.

Since 918 A.H. (1512), when the Portuguese attacked Muslims’ ships, Jeddah was also threatened and it was defended by Mamluks and then the [[Ottomans]]. In 917 A.H. (1511), Husayn Kurdi, Jeddah’s representative on behalf of Sultan Qansura al-Ghawri, built a fort around the city as a military base to attack the Portuguese. In 948 A.H. (1541), Sharif Muhammad Abu Numay defeated Portuguese to occupy Jeddah in their last attempt to occupy Jeddah, and [[Sultan Sulaym al-Qanuni]] rewarded him with half of the tax incomes of Jeddah.

In 1217 A.H. (1802), [[Wahhabis]] occupied Jeddah, but they could not take over the city because it was highly protected and fortified, until 1220 A.H. (1805) when they attacked Jeddah and slaughtered many people in the city and pilgrims of the [[Ka'ba]]. Jeddah was occupied by the Wahhabis until 1226 A.H. (1811).

In 1811, Muhammad 'Ali Pasha extended the Ottoman dominance to Jeddah. In 1256 A.H. (1840), Jeddah was directly ruled by the Ottomans; its ruler was appointed by them.

Sharif Husayn, who fought for the independence of Arabs, saved Jeddah from the [[Ottomans]]. Since the Wahhabis occupied Mecca in order to dominate [[Hijaz]] in [[Rabi' I]], 1343 A.H. (October 1924), Jeddah was the center of Sharif Husayn’s government. The city was sieged for one year, it was finally dominated in [[Jumada II]] 1344 (December 1925) by the Wahhabi ruler, 'Abd al-'Aziz b. Saud, and eventually the Saudi government was recognized under the Jeddah Treaty on [[Dhu l-Qa'da]] 1345 A.H. (May 1927), and thus Jeddah was annexed to the Saudi realm.

In 1981, Jedda had a population of 1,000,000 people and in 1999, the population was over 2,000,000 with a population growth of 16 percent. Later the population grew into 3,000,000 showing its economic progress and job opportunities. With the growth of the population, governmental and national schools, as well as centers for language learning, were founded. King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah is the third ranking university in Saudi Arabia with 10 colleges. There are six newspapers (two in English) and several weekly and monthly journals in Jeddah.

* Abu l-Hasan 'Ali b. Muhammad al-'Ulaymi al-Muqri al-Qattan al-Jiddi (d. 468 A.H./ 1057)

Since the early 11th century (17th century), books were written about the history of Jeddah.

*The material for this article is mainly taken from [http://fa.wikishia.net/view/جده_(شهر) (جده (شهر] in Farsi WikiShia.