History of Massawa

leverage at various times and ruled over Massawa. The port city would also come under the supreme control of the Balaw people (people of half Arab and half Beja descent), during the Balaw Kingdom of Eritrea (12th-15th AD). At this time, the Sheikh Hanafi Mosque, Eritrea's oldest mosque, was built on Massawa Island, along with several other works of early Islamic architecture both in and around Massawa (including the Dahlak Archipelago and the Zula peninsula).

Venetian merchants were said to have lived in Massawa and nearby Suakin in the 15th century.

Ottoman rule

Massawa became prominent when it was captured by the Ottoman Empire in 1557. The Ottomans made it the capital of Habesh. Under Özdemir Pasha, Ottoman troops then attempted to conquer the rest of Eritrea. Due to resistance as well as sudden and unexpected demands for more troops in the Mediterranean and on the border with Persia, the Ottoman authorities placed the city and its immediate hinterlands under the control of one of the aristocrats of the Bellou people, whom they appointed "Naib of Massawa" and made answerable to the Ottoman governor at Suakin. The Ottomans nevertheless built the old town of Massawa on Massawa Island into a prominent port on the Red Sea in typical Islamic Ottoman architecture using dry corals for walls, roof and foundation as well as imported wood for beams, window shutters and balconies. These buildings and the old town of Massawa remain to this day, having withstood both earthquakes and wars with aerial bombardment.

Egyptian rule

During the 19th century, Massawa, along with much of the Northeast African coast of the Red Sea, was ruled by Egypt with Ottoman consent.

Following Egypt's defeat at the Battle of Gura, Egyptian control of the port withered. With the