EMStaD YEMEN · Early Modern State Development in Yemen

How do early modern states organize effective rule in difficult conditions? EMStaD YEMEN focuses on a country that due to its geographical, religious and social complexities is now considered a failed state – Yemen. The project analyzes how this state achieved stability in the early modern period in the conditions that were similar to those hampering its contemporary development. Scholarship on early modern Islamic history usually focuses on the great Islamic empires, like the Ottoman Empire, while the regions conquered by them, notably the Arab lands, are often viewed through the lens of ‘decline’. EMStaD YEMEN challenges this approach by bringing attention to Yemen as a unique case of an Arab state gaining independence from the Ottoman Empire. Combining understudied Ottoman Turkish and Classical Arabic manuscript sources with the method of comparative study of empires, the project focuses on the influence of the period of Ottoman rule (1535-1638) on the development of the state in Yemen. The project first identifies the innovations in administrative practices, document production, and public ceremonies that were introduced by the Ottoman administration. It then traces the afterlives of these developments during the post-Ottoman period of Yemen’s history. The goal of the project is twofold: (1) to explain how, despite the divisions that supposedly turned modern Yemen into a failed state, a stable political system existed in the region during in the early modern period; and (2) to bring Yemen into the broader context of early modern state transformations in Eurasia. The results of the project will be disseminated through publications for specialists and through an exhibition and blog posts for the general public. The longstanding tradition of Middle Eastern studies, regional expertise and wide variety of ongoing collaborative projects on the comparative study of empires make Leiden University and its Institute for Area Studies the ideal setting for this project.