Islam in America before Columbus

happyheart · October 29, 2009, 6:52pm

Introduction

There are numerous accounts of Muslims who were intergrated within Native Indian tribes pre Columbus, of Turkic, Moorish and African Muslims leaving colonies to live amongst the Native Indians. There are also historical letters and colonial advertisments describing the threat to the colonies of African Muslim Slaves fleeing and intergrating with the Native American Indians. There is also the case of Mahomet Weyonomonof the Mohegan tribe, who arrived in Britain in 1736 CE (1148 AH) century to discuss the land grabs by the British.

Main article: Muslims First Journey To America
in the 12th century Al-Idrisi reported in Nuzhat Al-Mushtaq Fi Ikhtiraq Al-Afaq (Excursion of the Longing One in Crossing Horizons), that a group of eight Muslim sailors from North Africa sailed west of Lisbon. After sailing west for more than 31 days, they landed on what must have been an island in the Caribbean. The intrepid explorers were initially imprisoned by Indians but were later released when a translator appeared who spoke Arabic
1310 CE (709 AH) Sultan Abu Bakari of the Mandinka kingdom of Mali sent two different fleets of ships, totalling 2,400 ships, sailing west from Africa. The fleets never returned to Africa.
There are also numerous reports of ‘black skinned’ Indians. For example in Honduras Columbus reported seeing Black skinned Indians. Giles Cauvet’s ‘Les Berberes de l’Amerique’ reported that a pre-Columbian tribe in Honduras was know as the Almamys a corruption of the Mandinka word for the Arabic Imam.

…etc.

Native Americans and Islam - The Open Contribution Islamic Encyclopedia, History, People, Places

happyheart · October 29, 2009, 7:01pm

Re: Islam in America before Columbus

Dr. Barry Fell, a noted New Zealand archaeologist and linguist of Harvard University showed detailed existing evidence in his work, “Saga America” that Muslims were not only in the Americas before Columbus arrived, but very active there as well. The language of the Pima people in the South West and the Algonquian language had many words in their vocabulary that were Arabic in origin, and Islamic petroglyphs were found in places such as California.

In the Inyo county of the State of California, according to Fell, there is another petroglyph that states, “Yasus bin Maria” which means in Arabic, “Jesus, son of Mary”. This is not a Christian phrase; in fact, the phrase is to be found in the verses and ayahs of the Holy Quran. This glyph, as Fell believes, is centuries older than the US. In the Western states of the US he found texts, diagrams and charts engraved on rocks that were used for schooling that dated back to 700-800 C.E. The schooling was in subjects such as mathematics, history, geography, astronomy and sea navigation. The language of instruction was Kufic Arabic, from North Africa.

The German art historian, Alexander Von Wuthenau, also provides evidence that Islamic peoples were in America, in the time between 300 and 900 C.E. This was at least half a millennium before Columbus was born! Carved heads, that were described as “Moorish-looking” were dated between 300 and 900 C.E. and another group of heads dated between 900 and 1500 C.E. An artifact found in the earlier group was photographed, and when later examined was found to resemble an old man in a Fez, like the Egyptians.

Ivan Van Sertima is widely renowned for his work, “They Came Before Columbus” which showed that there was definitely contact between the ancient and early African people with the Native Americans. This and another of his works, “African Presence in Early America” both prove that there were African Muslim settlements in the Americas, before the expedition of Columbus was even conceived. His research has shown that Arab Muslim trade was active in America and one can only imagine that the marvellous culture that the Native Americans had that shared so much with Islamic teachings was of great attraction to the Muslims that came so far across the sea.

And for the record, Christopher Columbus, the man who so-called discovered America, himself declared that his impression of the Carib people (i.e., Caribbean people) were “Mohemmedans.” He knew of the Mandinka presence in the New World (Muslims) and that Muslims from the West coast of Africa had settled down in the Carribean, Central, South and North America. Unlike Columbus, they had not come to enslave the populations or plunder the land; they had come to trade and they married among the Natives. Columbus further admitted that on October 21st, 1492, as he was sailing past Gibara on the coast of Cuba, he saw a mosque, and remnants of other masjids have been found in Cuba, Mexico, Texas and Nevada.

On the second voyage Columbus took to the West Indies, the people of Haiti told him that “black” people had been there before him. They showed him spears of these visitors, and further study of the metals involved in their construction showed that they could have been made only in one place: Guinea.

Islam in America before Columbus