Resources

This interactive timeline presents parallel tracks for the histories of the primary geographic areas of our field survey work to contextualize the primary data in our online archive and to facilitate comparative perspectives across the broader region. Most entries provide links to specific sites and objects in our database, allowing for more in-depth exploration. The timeline can be viewed in both 2D and 3D modes on Tiki-Toki, or in .pdf format here.

This bibliography of recommended readings and reference materials on Maldives history and heritage includes hyperlinks to an open-access full-text pdf file for each work.

Exploring Linguistic Connections: Sanskrit and Dhivehi, Daniel Grings & Martin Gluckman, Sanskrit Research Institute

Alves, Jorge Dos Santos. 2005. “Kalu Muhammad Hilali, Sultan of the Maldives (1491-1528).” Archipel, 70:53-65. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi.org/10.3406/arch.2005.3972.

Alves, Jorge Dos Santos. 2005. “Le rêve des jeunes filles portugaises du milieu du XIXe siècle: devenir  reine des Maldives.” Archipel, 70:139-143. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/arch.2005.3974.

Doumenge, François. 2005. “L’halieutique maldivienne, une ethno-culture millénaire.” Archipel, 70: 67-138. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/arch.2005.3973.

Fewkes, Jacqueline,  H. 2009. “A ‘Women’s Space’ at the Indian Ocean Crossroads: Women’s Mosques in the Maldives.” Gender at the Crossroads. Multi-disciplinary Perspectives. ed. Nurten Kara. 277-284.

Forbes, Andrew D.W. 1987. “The Pre-Islamic Archaeology of the Maldive Islands.” Bulletin de l’Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient. 76: 281-288. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/befeo.1987.1726.

Forbes, Andrew D.W. 1984. “A Roman Republican Denarius of c. 90 B.C., from the Maldive Islands, Indian Ocean.” Archipel, 28: 53-60. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/arch.1984.1916.

Forbes, Andrew D.W. 1983. “The Mosque in the Maldive Islands: A Preliminary Historical Survey.” Archipel, 26:43-74. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/arch.1983.1844.

Forbes, Andrew D.W. 1981. “Southern Arabia and the Islamicisation of the Central Indian Ocean Archipelagoes.” Archipel, 21:55-92. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/arch.1981.1638.

Fritz, Sonja. 2002. “The Dhivehi Language. A Descriptive and Historical Grammar of Maldivian and Its Dialects.”  2 Vols. (English version of the habilitation thesis “Deskriptive Grammatik des Maledivischen (Dhivehi) und seiner Dialekte unter Berücksichtigung der sprachhistorischen Entwicklung”, Heidelberg 1997), Beiträge zur Südasienforschung, 191 (Würzburg: Ergon Verlag 2002/Heidelberg: Südasien-Institut). Vol. 1

Fritz, Sonja. 2002. “The Dhivehi Language. A Descriptive and Historical Grammar of Maldivian and Its Dialects.”  2 Vols. (English version of the habilitation thesis “Deskriptive Grammatik des Maledivischen (Dhivehi) und seiner Dialekte unter Berücksichtigung der sprachhistorischen Entwicklung”, Heidelberg 1997), Beiträge zur Südasienforschung, 191 (Würzburg: Ergon Verlag 2002/Heidelberg: Südasien-Institut). Vol. 2

Fritz, Sonja. and Jost Gippert. 1999 “Towards a Historical Phonology of Maldivian.” 125 Jahre Indogermanistik. Graz. ed. M. Ofitsch/Chr. Zinko, Graz 2000, 139-152.

Gippert, Jost. 2013. An Outline of the History of Maldivian Writing.  Grammatica et verba Glamor and verve. Studies in South Asian, historical, and Indo-European linguistics in honor of Hans Henrich Hock on the occasion of his seventy-fifth birthday. ed. Shu-Fen Chen and Benjamin Slade. 81-98.

Gippert, Jost. 2013. “An unusual account of the Miʿrāǧ.” Kutadgu Nom Bitig.Festschrift für Jens Peter Laut zum 60. Geburtstag (Veröffentlichungen der Societas Uralo-Altaica, 87), ed. E. Ragagnin & J. Wilkens. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2015, 163-182.

Gippert, Jost. 2004. “A Glimpse into the Buddhist Past of the Maldives. I. An Early Prakrit Inscription.” Wiener Zeitschrift Für Die Kunde Südasiens 48: 81-109.

Gippert, Jost. 2014. “A Glimpse into the Buddhist Past of the Maldives. II. Two Sanskrit Inscriptions.” Wiener Zeitschrift Für Die Kunde Südasiens 55: 111–44.

Gippert, Jost. 2003. “Sanskrit as a Medium of Maldivian Buddhism.” Indische Kultur im Kontext. Rituale, Texte und Ideen aus Indien und der Welt. Festschrift für Klaus Mylius. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2005 (Beiträge zur  Indologie, 40), 213-220/487-488. 

Gippert, Jost. 2003. “Pretagrāha toṭaṃ bhindāmi – Magische Silben zur Abwehr von Dämonen. Die Malediven im Wandel der Sprachen und Religionen.” Forschung Frankfurt 2/2003, 36–38. Accessed 11 October 2018.

Gippert, Jost. 2003. “Schriftgebrauch zwischen Kontinuität und Wandel. Zur Wechselwirkung zwischen Sprachgeschichte und Schriftlichkeit.” Die Sprache 44/2, 2004, 173-194/261-269.

Gippert, Jost. 2000. “Early New Persian as a medium of spreading Islam.” Persian Origins: Early Judaeo-Persian and the Emergence of New Persian, ed. Ludwig Paul. 2003, 31-47. Wiesbaden: Harrossowitz.

Haour, Anne, Annalisa Christie, Shiura Jaufar and David Vigoureux. 2017. “Back to ibn Battuta’s island – excavations in the Maldives, 2017.” Nyame Akuma, No 88. December 2017.  33-40.

Haour, Anne, Annalisa Christie and Shiura Jaufar. 2016. “Tracking the Cowrie Shell: Excavations in the Maldives, 2016.” Nyame Akuma, No 85. Jun 2016. 69-82

Jameel, Mauroof. 2017. “Lessons From our Past: Our Traditional House.”  Accessed 15 November 2018. https://www.build.mv/single-post/LESSONS-FROM-OUR-PAST-Our-Traditional-House

Jameel, Mohamed, M. 2018. “Coral Stone Architecture of Maldives: A Brief Overview.” Bulletin of MIHO Museum, 18, (2018), 17-28.

Jameel, Mauroof. 2017. “Exhibition Booklet – Coral Stone Mosques of Maldives: The Vanishing Legacy of the Indian Ocean.” Accessed 15 November 2018

Jameel, Mauroof and Ahmad, Yahaya. 2015. “Coral Stone Mosques of Maldives; the vanishing legacy of the Indian Ocean.” Gulf Pacific Press. Accessed 15 November 2018

Jameel, Mohamed, M. and Ahmad, Yahaya. 2015. “Architectural Heritage of Maldives and its Revival Through Tourism.”  ISP core-to-core Program, B. Asia-Africa Science Platform: Islam and Multiculturalism. 75-84.

Jameel, Mohamed, M. 2012 “Architectural Typological Study of Coral Stone Mosques of Maldives.“ PhD diss., University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur.

Jaufar, Shiura. 2017. “Second Season of Excavation in the Maldives for the ‘Cowrie Shells: An Early Global Commodity’ Project, 2017.” ACCU Nara International Correspondent. Vol 18. 2017. The Eighteenth Regular Report. 27-30.

Jaufar, Shiura. 2017. “Cowrie—an Early Global Commodity: An Archaeological Research on the Islamic Period of the Maldive Islands.” ACCU Nara International Correspondent. Vol 17. 2017. The Seventeenth Regular Report. 30-31.

Kalus, Ludvik and Claude Guillot. 2005. “Inscriptions islamiques en arabe de l’archipel des Maldives.” Archipel,  70:15-52. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi/10.3406/arch.2005.3971.

Knoll, Eva-Maria. 2018. “The Maldives as an Indian Ocean Crossroads.″ Oxford Research Encyclopedias: Asian History. Accessed February 14, 2019. DOI: 10.1093/acrefore/9780190277727.013.32

Koechlin, Bernard. 1989. “Le pourtour et le tour interieur de l’ile de Fua Mulaku – Aperçu ethno-ecologique sur une ile du sud des Maldives et sa population, à partir d’une poésie épique orale”

Litster, M. 2016. Cowry Shell Money and Monsoon Trade: The Maldives in Past Globalizations. Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The Australian National University. Unpublished.

Manguin, Pierre-Yves. 2011. “The Maldives Connection: pre-modern Malay World shipping across the Indian Ocean.” In Civilisations des Mondes Insularies, ed. C. Radimilahy and N. Rajaonarimanana, 261-284. Paris: Éditions Karthala.

Manguin, Pierre-Yves. 2001. “Les techniques de construction navale aux Maldives.” Originaires d’Asie du Sud-Est, Techniques & Culture, 35-36: 21-47

Mikkelsen, Egil. 2000. “Archaeological Excavations of a Monastery at Kaasidhoo. Cowrie Shells and their Buddhist Context in the Maldives.” National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research, Male’ Republic of Maldives.

Mikkelsen, Egil. 1991. “An Archaeological Pottery Sequense from Nilandu, The Maldive Islands.”  Archaeological Test-Excavations on the Maldive Islands. ed. Skjølsvold Arne . The Kon-Tiki Museum Occasional Papers Vol. 2: 185-202

Mohamed, Naseema. 2005. “Note on the Early History of the Maldives.”  Archipel, 70:7-14. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/arch.2005.3970.

Peacock, Andrew. 2018 “Sufi Cosmopolitanism in the Seventeenth-Century Indian Ocean: Shariʿa, Lineage, and Royal Power in Southeast Asia and the Maldives,” in Joshua Gedacht & R. Michael Feener, eds. Challenging Cosmopolitanism: Coercion, Mobility and Displacement in Islamic Asia, 53-80 (Edinburgh University Press, 

Peacock, Andrew. 2020 “History, piety and factional politics in the Arabic chronicle of the Maldives: Ḥasan Tāj al-Dīn’s Ta’rīkh and its continuations” in Asiatische Studien-Etudes asiatiques, 74(1)

R. Michael Feener, “Maldives,” The Encyclopedia of Islam Three. ed. Kate Fleet, et al., (Leiden: Brill, 2021), 89-93.

R. Michael Feener et al., “The Maldives Heritage Survey,” Antiquity Vol.95: 381 (2021), 1-9.

R. Michael Feener, “The Maldives Heritage Survey,” CSEAS Newsletter No. 78 (2020), Centre for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University, 26- 29.

Reynolds, C.H.B. 1984. “The Mosques in the Maldive Islands: Further Notes.” Archipel, 28:61-64. Accessed September 28, 2018. doi:10.3406/arch.1984.1917

Romero-Frias, Xavier. 1999. “The Maldive Islanders – A Study of the Popular Culture of an Ancient Ocean Kingdom” Nova Ethnographia Indica, (available here with permission of the author) Book chapters, Image material

Romero-Frias, Xavier. 2011. “The Stupa at Bodugalu Miskiy, Male’, Maldives.” A Secular Maldives, (August 2014)

Romero-Frias, Xavier. 2011, “The Riba in Fua Mulaku Island. Destruction of an Oceanic Shoreline Funerary Building.” A Secular Maldives, (August 2014)

Romero-Frias, Xavier. 2010. “Images of traditional mosques in Fua Mulaku Island, Maldives”

Romero-Frias, Xavier. 2010. “Astrological drawings in Maldivian Nakaiyteri books”

Romero-Frias, Xavier.  (undated). “Ancient Flags of Maldives”

Sattar, Ahmed Nazim. 2010. “King Kalaafaan Manuscripts.How the Maldives monarchy treasured the remembrance of a fallen king for more than four hundred years”. National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research, Male’ Republic of Maldives. English edition.

Sattar, Ahmed Nazim. 2010. “King Kalaafaan Manuscripts.How the Maldives monarchy treasured the remembrance of a fallen king for more than four hundred years”. National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research, Male’ Republic of Maldives. Dhivehi edition.

Vilgon, Lars. Maldive ODD History: The Maldives Archipelago and its people, vol. 8 (19). (Stockholm: privately printed, 1998).

Vilgon, Lars. Maldive ODD History: The Maldives Archipelago and its people, vol. 6 (17). (Stockholm: privately printed, 1996).

Vilgon, Lars. Maldive ODD History: The Maldives Archipelago and its people, vol. 4 (17). (Stockholm: privately printed, 1994).

Vilgon, Lars. Maldive ODD History: The Maldives Archipelago and its people, vol. 3 (09). (Stockholm: privately printed, 1993).

Vilgon, Lars. Maldive ODD History: The Maldives Archipelago and its people, vol. 1 (17). (Stockholm: privately printed, 1991).

Yajima, Hikoichi.The Islamic History of the Maldive Island by Hasan Taj al-Din, 2 vols. Arabic text, Notes and indices (Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 1982, 1984). Vol.1. Accessed February 3 2019

Yajima, Hikoichi. The Islamic History of the Maldive Island by Hasan Taj al-Din, 2 vols. Arabic text, Notes and indices (Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 1982, 1984). Vol. 2, Pt 1.  Accessed February 1 2019

Yajima, Hikoichi. The Islamic History of the Maldive Island by Hasan Taj al-Din, 2 vols. Arabic text, Notes and indices (Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 1982, 1984). Vol. 2, Pt 2.  Accessed February 1 2019

Yajima, Hikoichi. The Islamic History of the Maldive Island by Hasan Taj al-Din, 2 vols. Arabic text, Notes and indices (Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 1982, 1984). Vol. 2, Pt 3.  Accessed February 1 2019