Battle of Diu (1509)
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| Battle of Diu | |
|---|---|
| Conflict: Portuguese-Mamluk War Turkish-Portuguese War |
|
| Date: February 3, 1509 | |
| Place: Diu, India | |
| Outcome: Portuguese victory | |
| Combatants | |
.svg){kind=small} Kingdom of Portugal |
 Mamlûk Sultanate Ottoman EmpireZamorin Raja Sultan of Gujarat |
| Commanders | |
| Viceroy Dom Francisco de Almeida | Amir Husain Al-Kurdi of Mamluks Salman Reis, Ottoman Admiral Malik El Isa Zamorin of Calicut |
| Strength | |
| 18 ships, 12 major vessels | 12 ships, 4 major vessels: About 100 vessels in all, made up of galleys and dhows |
| Casualties | |
| Unknown | Unknown |
The naval Battle of Diu was a critical sea battle that took place on 2–February 3, 1509 near the port town of Diu, India 20°N 71°E / 20°N 71°E, between Portugal and a joint fleet of the Mamlûk Burji Sultanate of Egypt, the Ottoman Empire, the Zamorin of Calicut and the Sultan of Gujarat, with technical naval support from the Republic of Venice and the Republic of Ragusa (Dubrovnik).[1] It is also referred to sometimes as the Second Battle of Chaul (Refer section below on precursor to battle).
This battle is critical from a strategic perspective since it marks the beginning of the dominance of the Europeans in the Asian naval theatre. It also marks the spillover of the Christian-Islamic power struggle, in Europe and the Middle East, into the Indian Ocean which was the dominant region of international trade at that time. The battle set the stage for domination of trade in the Indian Ocean by the Portuguese for the next century, and thus greatly assisted the growth of the Portuguese Empire.
The Portuguese followed this battle by rapidly capturing key ports/coastal areas around the Indian Ocean like Mombasa, Socotra, Muscat, Ormuz, Goa, Ceylon and Malacca. This allowed them to circumvent the traditional spice route controlled by the Arabs and the Venetians, and by routing the trade down the Cape of Good Hope, they also simultaneously crippled the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt and the Gujarat Sultanate. The Portuguese sea monopoly lasted until the advent of the British East India Company and the Battle of Swally in 1612.
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[edit] Background
The Samoothiri Raja (anglicised to Zamorin), was incensed at the Portuguese because of their conduct since Vasco da Gama had landed in his kingdom in 1498, and hence had joined forces with the Sultan of Gujarat.
Since Portuguese naval patrols regularly interdicted supplies of Malabar timber for the Mamlûk Red Sea fleet, the Ottoman Sultan, Beyazid II therefore supplied Egypt with Mediterranean-type war galleys manned by Greek sailors. These vessels, which Venetian shipwrights helped disassemble in Alexandria and reassemble on the Red Sea coast, had to brave the Indian Ocean. The galley warriors could mount light guns fore and aft, but not along the gunwales because these cannon would interfere with the rowers. The native ships (dhows), with their sewn wood planks, could carry no heavy guns at all. Hence, most of the coalition's artillery was archers, whom the Portuguese could easily outshoot.
The Egyptian-Ottoman fleet, was sent by the Mamluk Sultan, Al-Ashraf Qansuh al-Ghawri , in 1507 to support, the then Muslim Sultan of Gujarat, Mahmud Begada.
[edit] Precursor to the battle
Diu was a critical outpost in the overall spice trade from India. The Mamluks and their European trade partnerrs, the Venetians, had become wealthy from monopolising the flow of spices from India to Europe. The Portuguese attempt to establish trade with India would require the breaking of this strongly defended and lucrative trade network. In 1505 the King of Portugal, Manuel I, encouraged by Vasco da Gama's exploits, sent his first viceroy, Dom Francisco de Almeida with twenty one ships to strengthen the fledgling Portuguese empire in East Africa and India.
The new Mamluk fleet set out for India in 1507, first fortifying Jeddah against a possible Portuguese attack. It then passed through Aden at the tip of the Red Sea, where it received support from the Tahirid sultan, and then, in 1508, crossed the Indian Ocean to the port of Diu.[2]
In addition to enforcing Portuguese rule, the battle was also undertaken to avenge the defeat at the first Battle of Chaul in March 1508, where Dom Lourenço de Almeida, son of the viceroy, was killed. Francisco de Almeida was so enraged at this death that he is supposed to have said, "He who ate the chick has also to eat the rooster, or pay for it".
At that battle the recently arrived Egyptian fleet, along with the fleet from the Sultan of Gujarat, had surprised the Portuguese fleet over three days of combat. The Egyptian fleet isolated his ship, but let the others escape, taking nine captives back to Diu. The Mirat Sikandari, a Persian account of the Kingdom of Gujarat details this battle as a minor skirmish.[3]
Francisco de Almeida had to chase the Egyptian fleet to avenge his son's death, because Afonso de Albuquerque arrived on December 6, 1508 with orders from the King of Portugal to replace Almeida as the next viceroy.
[edit] Battle
[edit] Mamluk Egyptian-Ottoman-Gujarat Fleet
- About 100 galleys and dhows[citation needed]
[edit] Portuguese ships
- Five large naus: Flor do Mar (Viceroy's flagship), Espírito Santo (captain Nuno Vaz Pereira), Belém (Jorge de Melo Pereira), Great King (Francisco de Távora), and Great Taforea (Fernão de Magalhães)
- Four smaller naus: Small Taforea (Garcia de Sousa), Santo António (Martim Coelho), Small King (Manuel Teles Barreto) and Andorinho (Dom António de Noronha)
- Four caravelas redondas: (captains António do Campo, Pero Cão, Filipe Rodrigues and Rui Soares)
- Two caravelas Latinas: (captains Álvaro Peçanha and Luís Preto)
- Two gales: (captains Paio Rodrigues de Sousa and Diogo Pires de Miranda)
- One bergantim: (captain Simão Martins)
The Portuguese had eighteen ships commanded by the Viceroy, with about 1,500 Portuguese soldiers and 400 natives from Cochin. The Allied side had one hundred ships, but only twelve were major vessels; the rest were small shallow-draught craft. After detecting the Portuguese, who approached from Cochin to the south, and fearing their technical superiority, the Egyptians decided to take advantage of the port of Diu and its fort, which had its own artillery. It was therefore decided to stay anchored at this port and await an attack from the Portuguese. This may also have been due to the training of the Egyptians, who were used to the more sheltered bays in the Mediterranean. There they also relied upon land-based artillery reinforcements to defeat the enemy. The Portuguese started the battle with a massive naval bombardment using their on board artillery, followed by hand-to-hand combat in the harbor of Diu.
These Portuguese ships had guns of greater caliber, better artillery crews, and were better manned and better built. The Portuguese naval infantry also had an advantage over the Egyptians, not only because they were heavily armed and equipped (armor, arquebuses and a type of grenade made of clay with gunpowder inside), but also because they were seasoned professional seamen.
The tough state-of-the art multi-rigged Portuguese carracks and smaller fast caravels had been developed over the previous decades to cope with the storms of the Atlantic Ocean and were bristling with cannons. The smaller Indian Ocean dhows and Mediterranean-type galleys launched by the coalition of the Samoothiri Raja, Gujarat and Egypt were simply no match. The Portuguese ships were able to shoot their powerful cannons and thus dissuade the smaller craft from coming near them. Even when they did come near, the smaller galleys and dhows were low in the water, and so unable to board the Portuguese ships, while being sprayed from above with small arms, grenades and smaller caliber cannon.
[edit] Aftermath
The spoils of the battle also included three royal flags of the Mamlûk Sultan of Cairo, that were sent to Portugal and are even today displayed in the Convento de Cristo, in the town of Tomar, spiritual home of the Knights Templar. The Viceroy extracted a payment of 300,000 gold xerafins, but rejected the offer of the city of Diu which he thought would be expensive to maintain, although he left a garrison there. The prisoners from the battle of Chaul were also rescued. The treatment of the Egyptian captives by the Portuguese was brutal. The Viceroy ordered most of them to be hanged, burnt alive or torn to pieces by tying them to the mouths of the cannons, in retaliation for his son's death. Commenting on the battle after winning it, Francisco de Almeida said: "As long as you may be powerful at sea, you will hold India as yours; and if you do not possess this power, little will avail you a fortress on the shore."[4]Interestingly, after handing over the Viceroy's post to his successor, Dom Afonso de Albuquerque, Dom Francisco de Almeida left for Portugal in November, 1509, and in December, 1509 was himself killed by the Khoikhoi tribe, near the Cape of Good Hope.
This battle did not end the Portuguese-Ottoman rivalry. A second naval battle occurred, again at Diu, in 1538 when the Turks laid siege to the fortress built by the Portuguese in 1535 with 54 ships, but then for some reason lifted the siege. Suleiman I the Magnificent had sent his admiral Hussein Pasha for another siege of the fortress at Diu in 1547 which, up on failing, marked the end of Ottoman attempts to expand their influence in the Indian Ocean.
[edit] References
- ^ Rogers, Clifford J. Readings on the Military Transformation of Early Modern Europe, San Francisco:Westview Press, 1995, pp. 299–333 [5]
- ^ Brummett, Palmira.Ottoman Seapower and Levantine Diplomacy in the Age of Discovery, SUNY Press, New York, 1994, ISBN 0791417018 , pp. 35, 171,22
- ^ de Camões, Luís. The Lusiadas, 288pp, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002, ISBN 0192801511, 254
- ^ Bayley, Edward C. The Local Muhammadan Dynasties: Gujarat, London, 1886, 222
- ^ Ghosh, Amitav The Iman and the Indian: Prose Pieces, Orient Longman, New Delhi, 2002, ISBN 8175300477, 377pp, 107
- Monteiro, Cmdr. Saturnino ,Batalhas e Combates da Marinha Portuguesa, Vol. I, A.N.C., Library Sá da Costa Editor, Lisbon 2001
- Kerr, Robert, General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, arranged in a systematic order, 1881, 14 vols.At Project Gutenberg, Columbia University
[edit] Additional readings
- Subrahmanyan, Sanjay. The Portuguese Empire in Asia, 1500-1700 - A Political and Economic History, 384pp, Longmans, London, 1993, ISBN 0582050685
- Brummett, Palmira.Ottoman Seapower and Levantine Diplomacy in the Age of Discovery, SUNY Press, New York, 1994, ISBN 0791417018
- Kuzhippalli-Skaria, Mathew. Portuguese and the Sultanate of Gujarat, 1500-1573, 263pp, Mittal Publishers & Distr., New Delhi, 1986,
