"Early/Mid 16th Century Arab Settlements in the East Indies" Topic

While I know that many individual Arab traders operated in the region in this period, my online research has thus far failed to elucidate the question of whether there were any discrete Arab settlements of a size sufficient to generate a military presence, that would justify the inclusion of an Arab faction in a spice islands campaign. Any experts out there who can help?

Not really an expert, but I don't think so. Traders, missionaries, mercenary Ottoman gunners, but not Arab settlements.

Like Gurkhan, I'm no expert. If there was a presence it was most likely an 'Arab quarter' in a settlement, perhaps encompassing a few merchants and their buildings. Arab trade was widespread but, as far as I understand it, colonisation wasn't pursued by them in the 'British' way.

What about Arab pirates, then?

Not that I know of – I've seen references to pirates operating out of Muscat and raiding points east in the 18th century, but not this much earlier. Wouldn't claim that's decisive, though.

There were certainly large Chinese pirate forces operating in the region at the time They maintained bases in the Philippines, and even attacked Manila later in the 16th century.

Also, the different ethnic/religious groups often preserved separate identities within polities. Tensions in Malacca between, on the one hand, the foreign and local Muslim traders and political elites, and on the other, the Chinese and Javanese communities, were exploited by the Portuguese to help them conquer the sultanate – so I don't think it's that much of a stretch to include at least mixed-race Muslim, if not necessarily distinct Arab or Indian, factions.

But then again, we know so little detail of the political map of the region in this period that there's probably some room for creative interpretation… so I might just go ahead and incorporate Arab and Indian factions anyway :-).