Berbera (
Somali Barbara,
Arabic ??????) is a city in northwestern
Somalia. It was for centuries the capital of the
Somaliland region and also the colonial
capital of
British Somaliland from 1870 to 1941 when it was moved to
Hargeisa. Located strategically on the
oil route, Berbera has a
deep sea port that was completed in 1969, and which is still the main commercial
seaport for
Somalia.
The city was first described in the eighth chapter of the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea written by a Greek merchant in the first century CE. Here it is referred to as "Malao."
After Avalites there is another market-town, better than this, called Malao, distant a sail of about eight hundred stadia. The anchorage is an open roadstead, sheltered by a spit running out from the east. Here the natives are more peaceable. There are imported into this place the things already mentioned, and many tunics, cloaks from Arsinoe, dressed and dyed; drinking-cups, sheets of soft copper in small quantity, iron, and gold and silver coin, not much. There are exported from these places myrrh, a little frankincense, (that known as far-side), the harder cinnamon, duaca, Indian copal and macir, which are imported into Arabia; and slaves, but rarely.[1]
The city was also described in the 13th century by Arab geographers and travellers.
