Kamaran Island is the largest Yemeni island in the Red Sea. The 108 km2 (42 sq mi) island is 18 km (11 mi) long and 7 km (4.3 mi) wide and is strategically located at the southern end of the Red Sea. It is a "shelf island" located in the shallow waters of the Arabian peninsula's continental shelf with coral reefs surrounding three sides of the island. The population numbers 2,200.
Habesh Eyalet was an Ottoman eyalet. It was also known as the Eyalet of Jeddah and Habesh, as Jeddah was its chief town, and Habesh and Hejaz. It extended on the areas of coastal Hejaz and Northeast Africa that border the Red Sea basin. On the Northeast Africa littoral, the eyalet comprised Suakin and their hinterlands.
The Ottoman Navy or The Imperial Navy, also known as the Ottoman Fleet, was the naval warfare arm of the Ottoman Empire. It was established after the Ottomans first reached the sea in 1323 by capturing Praenetos, the site of the first Ottoman naval shipyard and the nucleus of the future navy.
Seydi Ali Reis (1498–1563), formerly also written Sidi Ali Reis and Sidi Ali Ben Hossein, was an Ottoman admiral and navigator. Known also as Katib-i Rumi, Galatalı or Sidi Ali Çelebi, he commanded the left wing of the Ottoman fleet at the naval Battle of Preveza in 1538. He was later promoted to the rank of fleet admiral of the Ottoman fleet in the Indian Ocean, and as such, encountered the Portuguese forces based in the Indian city of Goa on several occasions in 1554. Seydi was able to unite several Muslim countries on the coast of the Arabian Sea against the Portuguese.
The Ottoman–Portuguese or the Turco-Portuguese confrontations refers to a series of different military encounters between the Portuguese Empire and the Ottoman Empire, or between other European powers and the Ottoman Empire in which relevant Portuguese military forces participated. Some of these conflicts were brief, while others lasted for many years. Most of these conflicts took place in the Indian Ocean, in the process of the expansion of the Portuguese Empire, but also in the Red Sea. These conflicts also involved regional powers, after 1538 the Adal Sultanate, with the aid of the Ottoman Empire, fought against the Ethiopian Empire, which was supported by the Portuguese, under the command of Cristóvão da Gama, the son of the famous explorer Vasco da Gama. This war is known as the Ethiopian–Adal war.
The Ottoman-Portuguese conflicts were a period of conflict during the Ottoman–Portuguese confrontations and series of armed military encounters between the Portuguese Empire and the Ottoman Empire along with regional allies in and along the Indian Ocean, Persian Gulf, and Red Sea.
The Tahirid Sultanate were an Arab Muslim dynasty that ruled Yemen from 1454 to 1517. They succeeded the Rasulid Dynasty and were themselves replaced by the Mamluks of Egypt after only 63 years in power.
Amir Husain Al-Kurdi,, named Mihir Hussain or Mir-Hocém or Mirocém by the Portuguese, was a Kurdish governor of the city of Jeddah in the Red Sea, then part of the Mamluk Sultanate, in early 16th century. He stood out as admiral of the Mamluk fleet fought by the forces of the Portuguese Empire in the Indian Ocean. Shortly after the arrival of the Portuguese to the Indian sea, Mirocem was sent by the last Mamluk Sultan, Al-Ashraf Qansuh al-Ghawri, to defend his interests in the sea, including the defense of the fleets of Muslim pilgrims to Mecca, then part of the sultanate.
The siege of Diu occurred when an army of the Sultanate of Gujarat under Khadjar Safar, aided by forces of the Ottoman Empire, attempted to capture the city of Diu in 1538, then held by the Portuguese. The Portuguese successfully resisted the four months long siege. It is part of the Ottoman-Portuguese war.
Egyptian Mamluk–Portuguese conflicts refers to the armed engagements between the Egyptian state of the Mamluks and the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean, following the expansion of the Portuguese after sailing around the Cape of Good Hope in 1498. The conflict took place during the early part of the 16th century, from 1505 to the fall of the Mamluk Sultanate in 1517.
Hadım (Eunuch) Suleiman Pasha was an Ottoman statesman and military commander of Greek descent. He served as the governor of Ottoman Egypt in 1525–1535 and 1537–1538, and as Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire between 1541 and 1544. He was a eunuch.
The Ottoman–Mamluk War of 1516–1517 was the second major conflict between the Egypt-based Mamluk Sultanate and the Ottoman Empire, which led to the fall of the Mamluk Sultanate and the incorporation of the Levant, Egypt, and the Hejaz as provinces of the Ottoman Empire. The war transformed the Ottoman Empire from a realm at the margins of the Islamic world, mainly located in Anatolia and the Balkans, to a huge empire encompassing much of the traditional lands of Islam, including the cities of Mecca, Cairo, Damascus, and Aleppo. Despite this expansion, the seat of the empire's political power remained in Constantinople.
The Yemen Eyalet was an eyalet (province) of the Ottoman Empire. Although formally an integral part of the empire, the far-flung province was notoriously difficult to administer, and was often lawless. During the early 17th century, the Eyalet was entirely lost to the Yemeni Zaidi State, only to be recovered by the Ottomans two centuries later. The Yemen Eyalet was reorganized in 1849, upon Ottoman takeover of much of Greater Yemen territories. In 1872, most of it became Yemen Vilayet after a land reform in the empire.
The capture of Muscat occurred in 1552, when an Ottoman fleet under Piri Reis attacked Old Muscat, in modern Oman, and plundered the town from the Portuguese. These events followed the important Ottoman defeat in the third siege of Diu in 1546, which put a stop to their attempts in India, but also the successful capture of Aden in 1548, which allowed the Ottomans to resist the Portuguese in the northwestern part of the Indian Ocean.
The Ottoman campaign against Hormuz took place in 1552–1554. An Ottoman fleet led by Admiral Piri Reis and Seydi Ali Reis was dispatched from the Ottoman harbour of Suez to eliminate the Portuguese presence from the northwestern part of the Indian Ocean, and especially their fortress at Hormuz Island.
Sefer Reis was an Ottoman admiral and privateer who was active against the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean in the 16th century.
The siege of Aden occurred when the Portuguese Governor of India, Afonso de Albuquerque, launched an unsuccessful expedition to capture Aden on 26 March 1513.
Mustafa Bayram was from Yemen and Selman Reis' nephew. After Selman Reis fell into a dispute with Hayreddin al-Rumi in 1528, he was murdered later on by al-Rumi. The two had fights because Selman Reis was relieved of the duty to lead the Ottoman Navy in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean. However he refused to step down and continued to lead the navy. Nonetheless, the post had been given to al-Rumi. Before Selman Reis was killed, he had given an order to Mustafa Bayram and Hoca Sefer. Under Mustafa Bayram's supervision, they would go to Diu and help Bahadur Shah of Gujarat to fight against the Portuguese Empire.
Mir Ali Beg was an Ottoman corsair in the late 16th century. Throughout the 1580s, Ali Beg reportedly led several expeditions in the attempt of the Ottoman Empire to contest the Portuguese control of the Persian Gulf, Red Sea, and Indian Ocean down the Eastern Coast of Africa. He began this chain of expeditions in 1581, when he raided the Portuguese controlled city of Muscat, Oman, which appears to have been a resounding success. From there he would begin making his way down the Eastern African Coast, reaching the Kenyan city of Malindi by 1585. Ali Beg would return from his first expedition to the Swahili Coast in 1586 resoundingly successful, having "managed to secure the allegiance of every major Swahili port town except Malindi, to capture three fully laden Portuguese vessels, and to return safely to Mocha with some 150,000 cruzados of booty and nearly sixty Portuguese prisoners." However, the success of Mir Ali Beg's expeditions were widely kept a secret from the general Ottoman government, because three government members: Hasan Pasha, Kilich Ali Pasha, and Hazinedar Sinan Pasha, had hatched a conspiracy to gain more funding for naval expeditions by lying to the central government about an exaggerated Portuguese threat. Because news of Ali Beg's success would suggest that they were already in control of the sea, and thus would need no new funding, they kept it to themselves. However, this would come back to haunt them as in 1588 the Swahili people would arrive in Yemen requesting aid from the Portuguese fleet, and Hasan Pasha would have no credibility on which to ask for government funding or assistance, forcing him to send Mir Ali Beg back with just his same small fleet of five ships and 300 men. This would ultimately cost Ali Beg and the Ottomans, with his fleet being defeated in 1589 in Mombasa not only by the Portuguese but also a surprise third faction of supposed Zimba cannibals that ambushed them during battle. Mir Ali Beg would surrender to the Portuguese fleet and be taken captive along with much of his crew. He would then be sent to Goa and later Lisbon where he would convert to Christianity and live for the remainder of his life.
The siege of Jeddah was a naval battle that took place in the harbor of Jeddah between a Portuguese expeditionary force under Lopo Soares de Albergaria and Ottoman elements under Selman Reis. The Portuguese fleet arrived off the city’s coast on Easter day, 1517, Hijri year 923, and moored in the channel. After a quick naval action that day with few casualties, shore artillery prevented the Portuguese from landing, and weather ultimately caused them to withdraw.
