Misplaced Pages

Sagallo Сагалло ساغلو
Contemporary engraving showing Sagallo under Nikolai Ashinov's control
SagalloLocation in Djibouti
Coordinates: 11°40′N 42°44′E / 11.667°N 42.733°E / 11.667; 42.733
Country	Djibouti
Region	Tadjourah Region
Elevation	21 m (69 ft)

Sagallo (Russian: Сагалло; Arabic: ساغلو; French: Sagallou; Somali: Sagaalo) is a village situated on the Gulf of Tadjoura, in the country of Djibouti, famous for having been occupied by a Russian monk and adventurer in 1889.

Name

Whether a coincidence or not, "Sagallo" (or "Sakaro") is one of the lunar months in Somali culture.

History

The Ottoman Empire had loose control over the area from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century. In reality, however, the Afar Sultans of Tadjoura were in control. It was during this time, that Sagallo was visited by the Englishman William Cornwallis Harris on his way to Ankobar, in the year 1841. His assistant surgeon, who wrote the report on the expedition, mentioned that water in the village was abundant in wells.

 Tadjoura (to 1883)
France, (French Somaliland and FTAI) 1883–1977
 Djibouti, 1977–present

By the early 1870s, Egypt had been gaining power in the region and, in 1873, the Egyptians occupied Sagallo and other sites on the Gulf of Tadjoura, but their hold didn't last long. In 1884, the Sultan of Tadjoura, Mohammed Loitah, ceded Sagallo to Paul Soleillet of the Société Française d'Obock, forcing the Egyptians to retire.

In 1883, Nikolai Ivanovich Ashinov, a Russian adventurer and burgess of Penza (b. 1856) had visited Abyssinia (the Ethiopian Empire) in order to establish clerical and political ties between the two countries. After his return to Russia, Achinov voiced his plans for an 1888 expedition to the Gulf of Tadjoura to establish a settlement, while claiming to be a free Cossack. Achinov assured the participants that Mohammed Loitah had permanently leased him land in the region. It was purely on his own initiative, and without the involvement of the Russian government, that on 10 December 1888, Achinov along with 165 Terek Cossacks boarded the Kornilov, a ship heading from Odessa to Alexandria. The expedition then boarded the Lazarev which brought them to Port Said. There, Achinov rented the Austrian ship Amfitrida, which entered the Gulf of Tadjoura on 6 January 1889. The expedition was greeted by a group of Ethiopian priests.The French foreign office demanded an explanation of Achinov's actions and the Russian ambassador in Paris distanced the Russian Empire from him. On January 14, the abandoned Egyptian fort of Sagallo was chosen as the new base of the expedition. Achinov named the fort "New Moscow" (Новая Москва, Novaya Moskva). A tent was erected to serve as the church of St. Nicholas and a flag of the expedition was raised. Later, several colonists escaped to Obock, informing the French of the settlement's whereabouts. On 5 February, the Cossacks noticed a French cruiser and three French gunboats. An ultimatum was issued, but Achinov misunderstood it and did not surrender. The artillery barrage that followed came as a complete surprise for the Russians, leaving 6 colonists dead and 22 wounded.

In 1977, after three referendums, the French Territory of the Afars and the Issas finally became independent from France as the newly formed country of Djibouti. By this point, the water had become scarce, and the community of Sagallo used generators to run water pumps, even though it often fell short of raising enough cash to purchase diesel to power the generators. In the early 21st century, however, a UNICEF-backed project installed solar panels on a hill to power a submersible pump that now delivers the water whenever needed.

Climate

See also

• Afro-Russians
• Russian colonialism
• Scramble for Africa

References

1. John Anthony Hunt (1951). A General Survey of the Somaliland Protectorate 1944-1950. p. 10.
2. "Djibouti country profile". BBC.
3. A Political Chronology of Africa, (Taylor & Francis: 2001), p. 132 ISBN 1857431162.
4. The Journal of the Royal Geographic Society of London. Vol. 12. United Kingdom. 1843. p. 221-222.
5. Leila Tarazi Fawaz (2002). Modernity and Culture from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean, 1890--1920. p. 65.
6. "FRENCH SOMALI COAST 1708 – 1946 FRENCH SOMALI COAST | Awdalpress.com". Archived from the original on 9 June 2013. Retrieved 19 April 2013. FRENCH SOMALI COAST Timeline
7. Also spelled Ashinov, Achimov, Atchinoff or Atchimoff
8. (in French) Le cosaque Achinoff in Le Progrès Illustré (French daily newspaper), March 1, 1891
9. Ernest A. Wallis Budge, A history of Ethiopia, Nubia and Abyssinia, Taylor & Francis,1928.
10. ^ "Neva,2001, №8, p. 217-220". Retrieved 15 July 2014.
11. "Lunochkiv" (in Russian). Retrieved 16 July 2014.
12. Kevin Shillington, Encyclopedia of African history, (CRC Press: 2005), p.360.
13. Nohlen, D, Krennerich, M & Thibaut, B (1999) Elections in Africa: A data handbook, p. 322 ISBN 0-19-829645-2
14. "Sagallou: innovating for children". 15 May 2017.
15. "Climate: Sagallo – Climate graph, Temperature graph, Climate table". Climate-Data.org. Retrieved 29 November 2017.

Further reading

• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Sagallo" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 23 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 1001.
• Harding, Les. Dead Countries of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. The Scarecrow Press, 1998.
• Jean Robert Constantin (comte de), L'archimandrite Païsi et l'ataman Achinoff: une expédition religieuse en Abyssinie. Librairie de la Nouvelle Revue, 1891.
• French Somali Coast 1708–1946, schudak.de (without date).

11°40′13″N 42°44′00″E / 11.67028°N 42.73333°E / 11.67028; 42.73333

• History of Djibouti
• European colonisation of Africa
• Former colonies in Africa
• Former Russian colonies
• Russian Empire
• 1889 in Africa
• Gulf of Aden
• Tadjourah Region
• French Somaliland
• France–Russia relations
• Djibouti–Russia relations