STORM
IN
THE
DOLDRUMS
Story
of
Abdullah Luthufee
A
Man who tried to
Change
Maldivives
Malé
Preamble
Maldivesexisted as a unique place on
Earth from a time which cannot be clearly identified as any determination of a
point in the history as the beginning will immediately put in the question
that, could not it have been earlier than that ? From the time people became
sea farers it could have become a place for people who were marooned, initially
when their fragile craft became broken due to any kind of turbulence.
The ancient sea routes that came
from the Mediterranean had a place like Taprobane marked and it is very
unlikely that such sea farers who used a sea route like that did not come
across Maldives.
Seafaring which was completely different from what is known today was just a
case of more adventurism mixed with the human desire to find new lands that
opened up such unknown areas.
The very
central location of the Maldives
in the Indian Ocean would have turned it into
a comfortable place where their vessels could be repaired and in the meantime
exist without much hardship. The first settlements could have started in that
manner.
The
resemblance of types of people from lands close by is proof enough that people
from all such places contributed towards making
the area populated gradually. The presence of Buddhist and Hindu religious
features and even ruins indicate the possible influence from those lands and
now the unshakeable position of Maldives being an Islamic nation proves the
influence that came from the Arabian Region, which could have been easily the
influence from Greco-Roman Trading activities that linked Asia, paving way for
the Arabs who became more dominant in the region due to their places of origin
closest to the group of atolls.
The indications are that Maldives had been a Buddhist Kingdom
sometime back and that it became an Islamic nation when the ruler became a
Moslem.