Compilation by Group Captain Kumar Kirinde, SLAF retd … with some illustrationsin the original missing
A historical nation that was divided between two empires in the 19th century that became two independent nations in the 20th century which united as one nation in the 21st century.
Intoduction
Yemen, officially the Republic of Yemen, is a country in West Asia. Owing to its geographic location, Yemen has been at the crossroads of many civilisations for over 7,000 years. In 1200 BCE, the Sabaeans formed a thriving commercial kingdom that colonized parts of modern Ethiopia and Eritrea. In 275 CE, it was succeeded by the Himyarite Kingdom, which spanned much of Yemen’s present-day territory and was heavily influenced by Judaism. Christianity arrived in the fourth century AD, followed by the rapid spread of Islam in the seventh century. From its conversion to Islam, Yemen became a center of Islamic learning, and Yemenite troops played a crucial role in early Islamic conquests. During the 19th century, the country was divided between the Ottoman and British empires. After World War I, the part controlled by the Ottoman Turks became the Kingdom of Yemen which in 1962 became the Yemen Arab Republic (North Yemen) following a coup. In 1967, the part controlled by the British, the British Aden Protectorate became the independent People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen (South Yemen). In 1990, the two Yemeni states united to form the modern Republic of Yemen. Sana’a is its constitutional capital and largest city.
Saan’a
Covering roughly 455,503 square kilometres (175,871 square miles), with a coastline of approximately 2,000 kilometres (1,200 miles), Yemen is the second largest country on the Arabian Peninsula. Yemen’s estimated population is 34.7 million, mostly Arab Muslims. It is a member of the Arab League, the United Nations, the Non-Aligned Movement and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.
Yemen is one of the least developed countries in the world, facing significant obstacles to sustainable development, and is one of the poorest countries in the Middle East.
Since 2011, Yemen has been enduring a political crisis, marked by street protests against poverty, unemployment, corruption, and a plan to amend Yemen’s constitution and eliminate the presidential term limit. By 2015, the country became engulfed by an ongoing civil war with multiple entities vying for governance, including the Presidential Leadership Council of the internationally recognized government, and the Houthi movement’s Supreme Political Council. This conflict, which has escalated to involve various foreign powers, has led to a severe humanitarian crisis.
In 2019, the United Nations reported that Yemen had the highest number of people in need of humanitarian aid, amounting to about 24 million individuals, or nearly 75% of its population. As of 2020, Yemen ranked highest on the Fragile States Index and second-worst on the Global Hunger Index, surpassed only by the Central African Republic. As of 2024, Yemen is regarded as the world’s least peaceful country by the Global Peace Index. Additionally, it has the lowest Human Development Index out of all non-African countries. Yemen is one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change and among the least prepared to handle its effects.
History
Ancient history
With its long sea border between eastern and western civilizations, Yemen located in the south of the Arabian Peninsula has long existed at a crossroads of cultures with a strategic location in terms of trade on the west of the Arabian Peninsula. Large settlements for their era existed in the mountains of northern Yemen as early as 5000 BC. Five major kingdoms or tribal confederations in South Arabia; Saba, Hadhramaut, Qataban, Ma’in and Himyar, came into existence in at least the 12th century BC.
Saba is thought to be biblical Sheba and was the most prominent federation. The Sabaean rulers adopted the title Mukarrib generally thought to mean unifier, or a priest-king, or the head of the confederation of South Arabian kingdoms, the “king of the kings”. The role of the Mukarrib was to bring the various tribes under the kingdom and preside over them all. The Sabaeans built the Great Dam of Marib around 940 BC. The dam was built to withstand the seasonal flash floods surging down the valley.
Ruins of the Great Dam of Marib
By the third century BC, Qataban, Hadhramaut, and Ma’in became independent from Saba and established themselves in the Yemeni arena. The Sabaeans regained their control over Ma’in after the collapse of Qataban in 50 BC and once again becoming the dominating power in south Arabia.
In 25 BC, the Roman Emperor, Augustus ordered a military campaign to establish Roman dominance over the Sabaeans. But the invading Romans only had a vague and contradictory geographical knowledge about south and therefore the Roman army of 10,000 men was defeated during their advance.
After that he country fell into chaos, and two clans, namely Hamdan and Himyarites. Himyarites, allied themselves with Aksum in Ethiopia against the Sabaeans. King of Saba, El Sharih Yahdhib, launched successful campaigns against the Himyarites and Aksum.
King Dhamar Ali Yahbur
Sana’a (the capital of modern Yemen) came into prominence during his reign, as he built the Ghumdan Palace as his place of residence.
Ghumdan Palace
In 354, Roman Emperor Constantius II sent an embassy headed by Theophilos the Indian to convert the Himyarites to Christianity. According to Philostorgius, a church historian of the 4th and 5th centuries, the mission was resisted by local Jews. Several inscriptions have been found in Hebrew and Sabaean praising the ruling house in Jewish terms for “…helping and empowering the People of Israel.”
The Sasanid Empire (an Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651) annexed Aden, the vital port in Yemen around 570. Under their rule, most of Yemen enjoyed great autonomy except for Aden and Sana’a. This era marked the collapse of ancient South Arabian civilization, since the greater part of the country was under several independent clans until the arrival of Islam in 630.
Middle Ages
Advent of Islam and the three dynasties
Muhammad sent his cousin Ali to Sana’a and its surroundings around 630 AD. At the time, Yemen was the most advanced region in Arabia. The Banu Hamdan confederation was among the first to accept Islam. Muhammad sent Muadh ibn Jabal, as well to Al-Janad, in present-day Taiz, and dispatched letters to various tribal leaders. Major tribes, including Himyar, sent delegations to Medina during the “year of delegations” around 630–631. Several Yemenis accepted Islam before 630. Christians, who were mainly staying in Najran along with Jews, agreed to pay jizyah, a type of taxation historically levied on non-Muslim subjects of a state governed by Islamic law, although some Jews converted to Islam.
The interior of the Great Mosque of Sana’a, the oldest mosque in Yemen
Yemen was stable during the Rashidun Caliphate*, Yemeni tribes played a pivotal role in the Islamic expansion into Egypt, Iraq, Persia, the Levant, Anatolia, North Africa, Sicily, and Andalusia.
* The Rashidun Caliphate consisted of the first four successive caliphs (lit. ”successors”)—Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and Ali, collectively known as the Rashidun, or “Rightly Guided” caliphs who led the Muslim community and polity from the death of the Islamic prophet Muhammad (in 632 AD).
The Rashidun Caliphate
The Sulayhid dynasty was founded in the northern highlands around 1040; at the time, Yemen was ruled by different local dynasties. In 1060, Ali ibn Muhammad Al-Sulayhi conquered Zabid and killed its ruler. Hadhramaut fell into Sulayhid hands after their capture of Aden in 1162. By 1063, Ali had subjugated Greater Yemen. Jibla became the capital of the dynasty.
Jibla (as seen today)
The Ayyubid Sultanate of Egypt* conquered Yemen in 1174 and ruled until 1229. They first conquered Zabid and then marched toward Aden in June and captured it. Due to strong resistance Ayyubids did not manage to secure Sana’a until 1189. The Ayyubid rule was stable in southern and central Yemen, where they succeeded in eliminating the mini-states of that region, while Ismaili and Zaidi tribesmen continued to hold out in several fortresses.
*
The Ayyubid Sultanate was the founding dynasty of the medieval Sultanate of Egypt established by Saladin in 1171 which later expanded beyond Egypt to encompass most of Syria, Hijaz, northern Nubia, Tripolitania and Upper Mesopotamia and Yemen.
Ayyubid Sultanate
The Rasulid dynasty was established in 1229 by Umar ibn Ali, who was appointed deputy governor by the Ayyubids in 1223. When the last Ayyubid ruler left Yemen in 1229, Umar stayed in the country as caretaker. He subsequently declared himself an independent king by assuming the title “al-Malik Al-Mansur” (the king assisted by Allah). Umar first established himself at Zabid, then moved into the mountainous interior, taking the important highland centre Sana’a. However, Zabid remained as the Rasulid capital which was later replaced ed by Taiz.
Al-Qahira Castle’s Garden in Taiz, the capital of Yemen during the Rasulid’s era
Next the Tahirid dynasty ruled Yemen from 1454. Tahirids were a local clan based in Rada’a. They built schools, mosques, and irrigation channels, as well as water cisterns and bridges in Zabid, Aden, Rada’a, and Juban. Their best-known monument is the Amiriya Madrasa (educational institution) in Rada’ District, which was built in 1504.
The Amiriya School
In 1507, the Portuguese intervened by occupying the island of Socotra, a Yemeni island in the Indian ocean and established a fortified enclave on the island.
Then the Portuguese dominated the port of Aden for about 20 years from the fortified enclave on the island of Socotra during this period.
The interest of Portugal on the Red Sea consisted on the one hand of guaranteeing contacts with a Christian ally in Ethiopia and on the other of being able to attack Mecca and the Arab territories from the rear, while still having absolute dominance over trade of spices, the main intention was to dominate the commerce of the cities on the coast of Africa and Arabia. To this end, Portugal sought to influence and dominate by force or persuasion all the ports and kingdoms that fought among themselves. It was common for Portugal to keep under its influence the Arab allies that were interested in maintaining independence from other Arab states in the region.
Realizing how rich the Tahirid realm was, the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt decided to conquer it. The Mamluk army, with the support of some local forces conquered the entire Tahirid realm in 1517 but failed to capture Aden. But the Mamluk victory was short-lived as the Ottoman Empire conquered Egypt in the same year. However the Ottomans conquered Yemen only in 1538. But the Zaydi highland tribes offered stiff and vigorous resistance to the Turkish occupation.
Modern history
The Ottomans had two fundamental interests to safeguard in South Arabia / Yemen: The Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina, and the trade route with India in spices and textiles—both threatened, and the latter virtually eclipsed, by the arrival of the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea in the early 16th century. The Ottoman governor of Egypt, was ordered to command a fleet of 90 ships to conquer Yemen. The country was in a state of incessant anarchy and discord as the Governor described it by saying:
Yemen is a land with no lord, an empty province. It would be not only possible but easy to capture, and should it be captured, it would be master of the lands of India and send every year a great amount of gold and jewels to Constantinople.
Pasha stormed Aden in 1538, killing its ruler, and extended Ottoman authority to include Zabid in 1539 and eventually Tihamah in its entirety. Zabid became the administrative headquarters of Yemen Eyalet (province of the Ottoman Empire). But the Ottoman governors did not exercise much control over the highlands.
The Ottomans sent yet another expeditionary force to Zabid in 1547. Ottoman troops supported by loyal tribal forces stormed Taiz and marched north toward Sana’a in August 1547. Later the Ottomans effectively put Yemen under their rule between 1552 and 1560.
Ottoman soldiers and Yemeni locals
By 1565, Yemen was split into two provinces and placed under the command of two respective governors. Over 80 battles were fought between the Ottomans and local tribesmen. The last decisive encounter took place around 1568 by which only Zabid remained under the possession of the Turks.
In 1632, the Ottomans sent an army from Egypt to fight the Yemenites. Seeing that the Turkish army was too numerous to overcome, the Yemeni tribal army retreated to a valley outside Mecca. The tribesmen eventually surrendered and returned to Yemen.
Ruins of Thula fortress in ‘Amran, where the tribal army barricaded themselves against Ottoman attacks
In 1644. The Yemenites under Al-Mutawakkil Isma’il, an Imam, re-took Yemen from the Ottomans and expanded the territory of Yemen under the Qasimi dynasty.
The rule of Al-Mutawakkil Isma’il 1675 AD
By this time Yemen has become the sole coffee producer in the world. The country established diplomatic relations with the Safavid dynasty of Persia, Ottomans of Hejaz, Mughal Empire in India, and Ethiopia, as well. In the first half of the 18th century, the Europeans broke Yemen’s monopoly on coffee by smuggling coffee trees and cultivating them in their own colonies in the East Indies, East Africa, the West Indies, and Latin America. The imamate did not follow a cohesive mechanism for succession, and family quarrels and tribal insubordination led to the political decline of the Qasimi dynasty in the 18th century.
The British
In the 19th century, the British were looking for a coal depot to service their steamers en route to India. It took 700 tons of coal for a round-trip from Suez to Bombay. East India Company officials decided on Aden. The British Empire tried to reach an agreement with the Zaydi imam of Sana’a, permitting them a foothold in Mocha, and when unable to secure their position, they extracted a similar agreement from the Sultan of Lahej, enabling them to consolidate a position in Aden. The British managed to occupy Aden and evicted the Sultan of Lahej from Aden and forced him to accept their “protection”. In November 1839, 5,000 tribesmen tried to retake the town but were repulsed and 200 were killed.
With emigrants from India, East Africa, and Southeast Asia, Aden grew into a world city. In 1850, only 980 Arabs were registered as original inhabitants of the city.
Aden city and port in the late-1800s
Starting in 1890, hundreds of Yemeni people from Hajz, Al-Baetha, and Taiz migrated to Aden to work at ports, and as labourers. This helped the population of Aden once again become predominantly Arab after, having been declared a free zone, it had become mostly foreigners.
But the English presence in Aden put them at odds with the Ottomans. The Turks asserted to the British that they held sovereignty over the whole of Arabia, including Yemen as the successor of Mohammed and the Chief of the Universal Caliphate.
Ottoman return
The Ottomans were concerned about the British expansion from the British ruled subcontinent to the Red Sea and Arabia. They returned to the Tihamah in 1849 after an absence of two centuries. The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 strengthened the Ottoman decision to remain in Yemen. By 1873, the Ottomans succeeded in conquering the northern highlands. Sana’a became the administrative capital of Yemen Vilayet (a first level administrative division of the Ottoman Empire).
Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen
Imam Yahya hamid ed-Din al-Mutawakkil was ruling the northern highlands independently from 1911, from which he began a conquest of the Northern Yemen lands creating the Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen him as the king.
Imam Yahya and his troops in Sana’a
Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen (in red)
Flag and Coat of Arms of the Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen
The Italian Empire was the first to recognize this kingdom in 1926.
Kingdom of Yemen flag in the UN in the 1950s.
This created a great deal of anxiety for the British, who interpreted it as recognition of Imam Yahya’s claim to sovereignty over Greater Yemen, which included the Aden protectorate and Asir. Later Imam Yahya signed a treaty with the British government in 1934 recognising the British sovereignty over Aden Protectorate that was governed as part of British India.
The Aden Protectorate consisted of the port city of Aden and its immediate surroundings. The Aden Settlement, and later Aden Colony, also included the outlying islands of Kamaran (de facto), Perim and Kuria Muria as dependencies.
Aden Protectorate dependencies shown in red
In 1937, Aden protectorate was separated from British India and made a colony, the Aden Colony, as crown colony of the United Kingdom (a status that it retained until 1963).
Flag and Emblem of the Aden Colony
The Colony of Aden was divided into an eastern colony and a western colony. Those were further divided into 23 sultanates and emirates, and several independent tribes that had no relationships with the sultanates. The deal between the sultanates and Britain detailed protection and complete control of foreign relations by the British.
During World War II, Aden had increasing economic growth and became the second-busiest port in the world after New York City. After the rise of labour unions, a rift was apparent between the sectors of workers and the first signs of resistance to the (British) occupation started in 1943.
St. Mary’s Church built by the English in the 19th century which was converted into the building of the Legislative Council in the 1960s, and is now a museum.
Queen Elizabeth II holding a sword, prepared to knight subjects in Aden as part of a 1954 visit. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh is at right.
Creation of Federation of the Emirates of South Arabia
The Federation of the Emirates of South Arabia was created by the British in February 1959. It was an organization of states within the British Aden Protectorate. The Federation of six states was inaugurated in the British Colony of Aden and the Federation and Britain signed a “Treaty of Friendship and Protection,” which detailed plans for British financial and military assistance. It subsequently added nine states.
Federation of the Emirates of South Arabia (in red)
Flag and Emblem of the Federation of the Emirates of South Arabia
Creation of Federation of South Arabia
The Federation of the Emirates of South Arabia did not succeed for several reasons, the first of which was the British insistence that Aden would be part of the entity, which was rejected by the commercial elite of Aden, most of whom were Indians, Persians, and Jews, because they feared for their future from the sheikhdoms. On the other hand, the leaders of the sheikhdoms feared that they would be overthrown later or that their influence would remain limited due to the dominance of the educated Aden elite, which was made up of a large number of non-Arabs and non-Muslims.
But the British were more worried about the spread of Arab nationalism and as a solution they decided to give more freedom to the rulers of the 15 states of the Federation of Arab Emirates of South Arabia. For this purpose, in April 1962, they made this federation the Federation of South Arabia, a new federal state to be under British protection with Aden as its capital.
Flag and Emblem of the Federation of South Arabia
Fall of the Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen and birth of a republic
The Yemeni kingdom’s lack of modernity and development led to revolutionary and anti-monarchist ideas in various layers of society. The army also fell victim to dissent. It had many anti-monarchist soldiers and officers with Republican and Nasserist views. In December 1961, the Organization of Free Officers (similar to the Nasserist “Free Officers Movement” in Egypt) was created in the Yemeni Kingdom, the purpose of which was to coordinate an anti-monarchist coup.
But King Ahmad died suddenly in September 1962 , throwing the plotters into disarray. His son was crowned in his place on September 19. military revolutionaries quickly switched its plot from the king to his son. Just a week after the coronation of the new king, a coup took place in Sana’a on September 26: Group of the Nasserist officers, called itself a Revolutionary Command Council, overthrew the Yemeni monarchy, and the king and his accomplices fled to the Saudi Arabian border. The new government declared Yemen a republic, the Yemen Arab Republic. The first country to recognize the new republic was the USSR.
Yemen Arab Republic (in red)
Flag of the Yemen Arab Republic and the Coat of Arms introduced in 1974
The dethroned king who escaped to the Saudi Arabian border rallied popular support from northern Zaydi tribes to retake power, and the conflict rapidly escalated to a full-scale civil war which is referred to as the North Yemen civil war. The war broke out between partisans of the Mutawakkilite Kingdom, the Hamidaddin royalists, and the Yemen Arab Republic military.
In response Abdullah al-Sallal, the Yemeni military officer and the leader of Revolutionary Command Council who went on to become the first president of the newborn republic said:
“The corrupt monarchy which ruled for a thousand years was a disgrace to the Arab nation and to all humanity. Anyone who tries to restore it is an enemy of God and man!”.
Abdullah Yahya al-Sallal (R) , the first President of the Yemen Arab Republic.
The Hamidaddin royalists were supported by Saudi Arabia, Britain, and Jordan (mostly with weapons and financial aid, but also with small military forces), whilst the Yemen Arab Republic military were backed by Egypt and the Soviet Union. Egypt provided with weapons and financial assistance and also sent a large military force to participate in the fighting. Soviet Union supplied warplanes. Israel covertly supported the royalists with the supply of weapons.
Egyptian military intervention in North Yemen, 1962
