Roberta Fedele Saudi Gazette JEDDAH – The Jeddah Cultural Club recently hosted a lecture in Arabic by Philippe Petriat, PhD Student at Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne University and Researcher at the French Center in Sanaa for Archaeology and Social Science. Petriat shared with the audience some of the results emerging from his studies on the history of the first European presence in Jeddah in the 19th century. “The city of Jeddah as we know it today only appeared in the 1950s thanks to the effects that oil production had on Saudi Arabia's economy and the extraordinary urban development of the city. It is in this period that the real predecessors of European expatriates in Saudi Arabia should be searched for,” said Petriat. “However, Europeans didn't wait until the 20th century to reach the Arab Peninsula. The history of their presence in the Arab Gulf can be traced back to the 17th century even though only in the 19th century they started settling, having diplomats and acquiring properties in Jeddah,” he added. Commercial and diplomatic documentation and travel books by 19th century European travellers such as John Lewis Burckhardt, Charles Montagu Doughty, Charles Huber, Achille Erasme Buez and Charles Didier constitute the main sources of reference used by Petriat to delineate the history of Europeans in Jeddah in the 19th century. These travellers described Jeddah as a city in which the abundant foreign community was mainly composed of Indian Muslims and Arabs of the peninsula while the few Europeans were essentially diplomats, travellers and small Greek merchants selling merchandise from Egypt whose temporary residence were to last until they gathered enough savings to go back to the Mediterranean. “The first house of European merchants mentioned in Jeddah was that of the Sawa brothers, a Greek family coming from the city of Lemnos like most of the Christian merchants living in Jeddah in 1858. In the mid of the 19th century, the Sawa house represented the only Christian house in a city dominated by Arab and Indian merchants and a real institution for European travellers,” said Petriat. “Strategically positioned at the port in front of the customs house, the Sawas were particularly visible in the life of the city. French consular archives reveal that this house was the correspondent in Jeddah of several Greek merchant houses of Cairo and Alexandria and used to lend money to well-known Arab merchant families in the Red Sea such as that of the Hadramis,” he added. Petriat also explained that the 19th century saw the establishment of the first European consulates in Jeddah. The first English consul arrived in 1836 and the first French consular agency was opened in 1839. “It's the appearance of European diplomats, assuring judicial and commercial privileges to Greek merchants, along with an increasing commercial interest for the Red Sea and the prohibition for non-Muslim Europeans to enter a great commercial hub like Makkah that explains the growing presence and concentration of European traders in Jeddah during the second half of the 19th century. This presence also proves the integration of Hijaz and the regional environment to the world economy whose centre was to revolve more and more around Europe,” said Petriat. In the course of his studies, Petriat found out that Arab sources like Chronicles and Histories of Hijaz were little talkative about the presence of Europeans in Jeddah a part from highlighting commercial disputes and concurrence with local merchants. In general, the relationship between locals and Europeans that Petriat describes was characterized by moments of tension, collaboration and partial integration. Among various incidents in which opposition to local merchants of the Sawa house and British and French diplomats was rife, Petriat mentioned the 1858 riots that sprang from a dispute concerning the nationality of a boat. Two years before the Arab merchants decided to boycott the Sawas refusing to trade with them and carry their merchandise unless they renounced to consular protection in settling their commercial affairs with the merchants of Jeddah. Other reasons of tension quoted by Petriat was the European fear of Muslim fanaticism and Great Britain's decision to lead and support the Ottoman resolution to put an end to the commerce of slaves, not without the lurking idea of strengthening their presence in the Red Sea and the Ottoman Empire. Also the attacks by Bedouin tribes menacing Jeddah or the implication of European powers in turmoil touching near countries could cause worries, anxiety and restriction of movement for Europeans living in Jeddah. According to Petriat, these tensions and the difficult climatic and sanitary conditions shouldn't however impose the image of a hostile environment. “Commercial relations were very fruitful. In the end of the 19th century, important European houses like Van de Pool and Gellatly Hankey and other European establishments were doing businesses with Arab merchants. Jorelle for instance, French merchant of Jeddah in the 1870s and agent of Lloyds company cooperated with the Jamjoum, Ba Haroun, Ba Zar'a, Ba Ishin, Ba Naja and Ba Junayd Arab merchant families,” explained Petriat. “Several notables, who were mostly local merchants, played the role of privileged interlocutors to the consuls when the Ottoman governor or the Sharif of Makkah kept themselves distant and some diplomatic documents reveal the diplomats' general feeling of well-being and sensation of being accepted by the inhabitants of Jeddah. Besides, a real social life comprising diners and national days celebrations within the consulates used to take place in Jeddah, sometimes acquiring a local style,” he concluded.
