Arab News
Madinah: Yusuf Muhammad
Andalusian Arabs and Africans from Mali were among the first travelers to discover the Americas, some 180 years before Columbus arrived there, according to a new documentary film.
Madinah’s Taibah University screened the film at the Sixth International Exhibition and Conference on Higher Education on Wednesday. The conference and exhibition is sponsored by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman, and was launched by Minister of Education Azzam Al-Dakhil.
Khaled Abul Khair, a university member, said the material for the film was collected over two-and-a-half years from various specialized research centers such as the Andalus Center for Studies in Morocco, Sao Paulo University, Federal University of Bahia, the Duchess Luisa Isabel Alvarez Archive in Spain, and research institute in Mali.
The director of the film also consulted more than 33 researchers and university professors and historians in Spain, Morocco, Brazil, Mali and Senegal. This information was corroborated by Western and African historians. It showed that long before Columbus, travelers from Asia, Africa and Europe, which included the Phoenicians, Japanese, Scandinavia’s Vikings and a Chinese Muslim explorer had visited the Americas.
“We also have evidence about the role of the Andalusian Arabs, and King Abu Bakr II of Mali who made a voyage with his army to Brazil 180 years before Columbus was said to have discovered America,” he said.
There is also evidence to show that the Andalus Arabs, in the early phase of their downfall in the thirteenth century, had “transferred much of their civilization to Timbuktu in the gold-rich kingdom of Mali,” Abul Khair said.
Abul Khair said the documentary was prepared based on scientific facts reported by Western scholars whom he met during his travels to Spain and Brazil. It is also based on two books written by Alvarez, who was the duchess of Medina Sidonia City. The two books are We Were Not Us (1992) and Africa Confronts Africa (2008).
The film has interviewees speaking in various languages, including Spanish, Portuguese, French, Arabic and English, while its music was composed by British composer Ali Keeler with influences from Europe, Asia and Africa.
