Human–Environment Interactions in the United Arab Emirates: An Archaeological Perspective

Abstract

This paper provides an archaeological perspective on pre-modern human-environment interactions in the United Arab Emirates over the past 200,000 years. It first outlines the key topographic and ecological zones and highlights localised subsistence strategies, then provides a summary of the development of human societies and their growing economic needs. It then goes on to explore past climate change and human adaptions, the social and economic implications of early farming and herding, and the transition from subsistence strategies to local industries. Generally, it is argued that human interactions with the natural world were driven largely by economic factors, with foreign demand leading to the exploitation of natural resources on an industrial scale.

1 Introduction

The purpose of this chapter is to provide a summary of human-environment interactions within the borders of the present United Arab Emirates (UAE). A diachronic approach is important, since both human societies and the natural environment have developed constantly since their first interactions about 200,000 years ago. Each has developed separately according to its own internal dynamics but, at the same time, their interaction has provided a catalyst to development. We must therefore sketch out the development of human societies and the natural environment as discrete parallel processes, noting particular periods and places where their interaction was significant to the other.

It is further worth stressing that the territory of the present UAE includes a number of topographical and ecological zones, to which human societies adapted their subsistence strategies over time (see Chaps. 2 and 3). For instance, the gravel outwash plains of the Hajar Mountains have these past 8000 years played host to both nomadic pastoralists and sedentary agriculturalists. The development of subsistence strategies was not necessarily evolutionary—i.e. increasingly complex over time—since development could be reversed and was never complete, as witnessed in the persistence of nomadic pastoralism into the mid twentieth century. Indeed, a single topographic/ecological zone might support one or more subsistence strategies in symbiosis, with, for instance, herders and farmers exchanging animal products for agrarian produce. We should moreover be wary about retrospective projections or Orientalist tropes of the ‘unchanging East’. The landscape of date-palm oases familiar today, for instance, may well be 3000 years old but its present reconfiguration is probably only about 300 years old.

Human-environment interactions were historically driven largely by economic factors, namely the extraction of natural resources (Heard-Bey 2004: 164–197). Copper mined in the Hajar Mountains, pearls gathered from the Arabian Gulf, and access to aquifers of the Hajar Mountains enabling date cultivation on the outwash plains constitute the key natural resources. External demand for these commodities led to the development of large-scale industries. The first historical references to the Southeast Arabia, in the mercantile correspondence and state propaganda of Bronze Age Mesopotamia, associate it with the copper-producing land of Magan (Potts 1990: 133–149). During the Middle Age, the region attracted the attention of the Arabic geographers—written in distant Spain and Turkmenistan—largely as a consequence of its pearl exports (Carter 2012: 38–51). By the mid nineteenth century, following the opening of the Suez Canal in an age of galloping globalisation, Southeast Arabia was exporting dates to as far as America (Hopper 2013, 2015: 51–79). The oil of Abu Dhabi is but the latest natural resource around which a national industry has developed (Heard 2011).

2 Topographic/Ecological Zones and Adaptive Subsistence Strategies

The Emirates can be divided into six overlapping topographic or ecological zones. Each of these had a particular set of natural resources leading to a variety of adaptive subsistence strategies. We can image these zones as a transect, moving west to east as follows: (i) the sandy desert of the Rub al-Khali, of which the inhabited part is mostly situated in the Dhafra region of Abu Dhabi; (ii) the Abu Dhabi Islands and facing coastal salt pans or sabkha; (iii) the North Coast, running along the Arabian Gulf between Dubai and Ras al-Khaimah; (iv) the Dhahira gravel plain of the piedmont; (v) the Hajar Mountains and their wadi systems; (vi) the East Coast looking out to the Indian Ocean (see also Chap. 2). Alternative attempts to delineate geographic zones tend to group the entire coastal plain of the Arabian Gulf into a single zone, but this is problematic since the coast of the Abu Dhabi with its islands and sabkha is quite different to that of the northern Emirates with their lagoons and creeks (Potts 2001: 28. Cf. Wilkinson 1977: 63–66, Table 7; Cleuziou and Tosi 2007: 3–15, Fig. 5).

These topographic zones are borne out by traditional Arabic place names and have informed human geography. The principal geographical feature is the great arc of the Hajar Mountains that runs from Ras al-Had to Musandam to project “like a spur into the vitals of Persia” (Lees 1928: 444) as one geographer notably phrased it. Either side of this are the outwash plains. The western is known as the Dhahira, ‘the outside,’ and looks out across the Rub al-Khali to the Arabian Gulf; the eastern is called the Batina, ‘the inside,’ and faces the Indian Ocean. These plains have given their names and/or defined the territories of two of the autochothonic tribes of the Emirates, the Dhawahir, ‘Plain Dwellers’, of the Dhahira and the Sharqieen, ‘Easterners’, of the Batina (Wilkinson 1964: 341). Similarly, the original homeland of the Bani Yas tribe was coterminous with the Dhafra, and they expanded into the neighbouring regions of the Dhahira and the North Coast (sahil ‘Uman al-shimal), where they established their authority in Dubai (Heard-Bey 1982: 27–57, 102–112). In a parallel process, the Qawasim took control of the North Coast and spread through the wadi networks of the Hajar Mountains to seize the Batina and northern approaches of the Dhahira (Heard-Bey 1982: 68–80, 82–100). Human history, in the Emirates as elsewhere, is shaped by natural geography.

2.1 Dhafra Desert and Liwa Oasis

The sand dunes of the Rub al-Khali, ‘Empty Quarter,’ sweep in from Saudi Arabia and cover the majority of the United Arab Emirates (Fig. 22.1). The bulk of their north-eastern extent is known as the Dhafra, taking up most of the emirate of Abu Dhabi, with the Ramlat al-Hamra, ‘the Red Sands,’ at its northern and eastern fringe neighbouring the Dhahira gravel plain. A scattered strip of interdunal palm groves known collectively as the Liwa Oasis lies at the heart of the Dhafra (Wilkinson 2009). This region is at once a place of transit and a place of settlement. It has repeatedly constituted the main land route into and out of southeast Arabia, an east-west axis linking the oases of al-Hasa in Saudi Arabia and al-Ain made possible by Liwa, fortuitously positioned between them. Its strategic importance meant that it could not be left unoccupied. The landscape was not entirely without resources, however. Winter rains provided enough pasturage to support seasonal grazing and the palm groves of Liwa provided a summer crop of dates (Wilkinson 1977: 54–56; Heard-Bey 1982: 180–81). This was supplemented by fishing and pearling in the Abu Dhabi Islands, and, like many places in the Emirates, survival was only possibly in so marginal an environment by an opportunistic diversification of subsistence strategies.

Fig. 22.1

A historic seasonal Bedouin camping ground in the Dhafra Desert. Credit: Timothy Power

2.2 Abu Dhabi Islands and Sabkha

Much of the northern coast of Abu Dhabi emirate is taken up with barren coastal salt pans known as sabkha. The principal feature of the coastline is Jebel Dhanna, whose dark silhouette rises 114 m above sea level and forms a distinctive landmark. Most of the islands of archaeological interest—including Ghagha, Sir Bani Yas, Marawah and Abu Dhabi itself (King 1998)—are located at no great distance from the coast. A smaller number of salt-dome islands—most notably Dalma and Das—are located farther offshore. The seas here are notably shallow and covered intermittently with pearl oyster beds (see Chap. 12). The Abu Dhabi islands and sabkha together form a coherent topographic zone that served as a communications corridor and provided a rich maritime resource. In addition, the sulphur, used in the manufacture of gunpowder, was mined at Jebel Dhanna in the Late Islamic period (King 2003).

2.3 North Coast

The North Coast runs between Dubai and Ras al-Khaimah. It is distinct from the Abu Dhabi Islands and sabkha to the south as well as the mountainous ‘fjords’ of Musandam to the north, being characterised by its various creeks and lagoons affording safe anchorages around which settlements developed. Dubai, Sharjah, Ajman and al-Hamriya formed around creeks, and Umm al-Quwain (Fig. 22.2), Jazirat al-Hamra and Ras al-Khaimah developed around lagoons (see also Chaps. 4 and 8). It seems likely that the two largest lagoons—Umm al-Quwain and Ras al-Khaimah—were more or less continuously occupied from the Neolithic period, whilst the creeks, which afforded less maritime resources, only seem to have been inhabited during regional episodes of growth. However, since the archaeological record of the North Coast has been massively and deleteriously impacted by modern development, this hypothesis remains difficult to establish beyond doubt.

Fig. 22.2

The lagoon of Umm al-Quwain. Note the mangroves and beach rock. Credit: Timothy Power

2.4 Dhahira Plain

The Dhahira extends along the western flank of the Hajar Mountains from the Dhaid region to al-Ain, continuing south into central Oman (Fig. 22.3). It consists of a gravel plain up to 10 km wide, sloping gently down from the mountains to meet the Ramlat al-Hamra. The porous gravels soak up surface run-off from the mountains, which allows for the formation of aquifers over the igneous bedrock. The aquifers and wadi systems supported the development of a network of aflaj—underground aqueducts—that supported a series of historic oases, including Dhaid, Madam and al-Ain, situated at the edge of the plain to maximise water collection. The plain is covered with acacia and ghaf trees which the bedouin traditionally used for grazing and charcoal production. During heavy winter rains the plain is prone to flooding and, as the flood waters retreat, the suddenly blooming vegetation affords excellent grazing (see Chaps. 5 and 13). The Dhahira has, therefore, been one of the most intensively utilised topographic/ecological zones in southeast Arabia.

Fig. 22.3

The site of Hili on the Dhahira Plain viewed from Jebel Haqlah. Credit: Timothy Power

2.5 Hajar Mountains

The ‘Rocky Mountains,’ as they translate into English, are aptly named (Fig. 22.4). They extend about 700 km from the Emirates into Oman, reaching their full width (100 km) and height (3000 m) in central Oman (Chap. 6). The Emirates section is divided into three distinct areas. To the northwest lies Rus al-Jibal and the Wadi Bih, from which flows the alluvial fan supporting the Shimal Oases of Ras al-Khaimah (Velde 2012); to the northeast is the Wadi Ham/Wadi Abadilah system, at the confluence of which the Masafi Oasis developed (Benoist et al. 2012); the south-central region is dominated by the Wadi Hatta, a key route linking the Arabian Gulf and Indian Ocean. The mountain oases and communication routes were valuable economic and strategic resources, of which Masafi, as both a reasonably large oasis and the gate to the Dhahira and North Coast, was the most important. They were also a small but significant focus of population. The mountains are criss-crossed with myriad minor wadis with hamlets and homesteads supported by scattered palm-groves. During periods of economic boom, there was sufficient demand for agricultural produce from the coastal towns that the mountain slopes were terraced and farming villages developed, as was notably the case in Rus al-Jibal during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries (Kennet 2002).

Fig. 22.4

The Hatta region of the Hajar Mountains. Note the deep wadis providing access through the mountains. Credit: Timothy Power

2.6 East Coast

Much of the eastern seaboard of Southeast Arabia is taken up with the Batina coastal plain. However, the mountains come closer to the sea and the coastal plain tappers off as we move north, so that the Batina plain ends before we enter the Emirates. At the southern end of the East Coast, the historic settlements of Fujairah and Kalba grew up at the broad mouth of the Wadi Ham, where sufficient silt was deposited to allow for agriculture (Ziolkowski and Sharqi 2008). The flat sabkha behind Khawr Kalba indicates that the creek was once part of an extensive lagoon, which would have offered rich marine resources attracting settlement (Eddisford and Philips 2009). At the northern end of the East Coast, the ancient town of Dibba was established at the head of the Wadi Abadilah, which grew to become an important trading station (Jasim 2006). Between them lies Khawr Fakkan. This offers a fine natural harbour but its utility as a port of trade is inhibited by the lack of a natural route to the interior. As a result, it developed into an important way station on the maritime route linking the Gulf to India (Sasaki and Sasaki 2019).

3 The Development of Human Societies and Their Economic Needs

Archaeology is the study of the material culture of past human societies. The archaeological record of the Emirates can be divided into five epochs (Table 22.1): (i) hunter gatherers using a Palaeolithic toolkit between 200,000 and 40,000 years ago; (ii) hunter gatherers and nomadic pastoralists using a Neolithic toolkit between 8000 and 3000 BCE; (iii) sedentary agriculturalists and mercantile elites using Bronze and Iron Age tool technology between 3000 and 300 BCE; (iv) large-scale settlements with long-distance trade links to the Classical Mediterranean and Islamic Indian Ocean between 300 BC and AD 1000; (v) urban settlements with long-distance trade links increasingly oriented towards Europe and America between AD 1000 and 1950. These periods can be defined by changes in their material culture and subsistence strategies. Very generally, we can observe an evolutionary trajectory from less to more complex systems with the pace of development accelerating over time.

Table 22.1 Chronological outline of the socio-cultural phases of human society in the region of the present United Arab Emirates

3.1 Early Prehistoric, 200,000–40,000 BP

By far the longest epoch in the archaeological sequence is the Early Prehistoric, roughly equivalent to the Middle Palaeolithic (Cleuziou and Tosi 2007: 19–31). The evidence for human activity in the territories of the modern UAE is patchy and scattered, with long periods between clusters of absolute dates. For example, stone tools found at Jebel Baraka in Abu Dhabi may be dated to around 200,000 years ago, but there is a gap of tens of thousands of years before the next evidence for activity, at Jebel Faya in Sharjah around 125,000 years ago (Wahida et al. 2008; Armitage et al. 2011). There were three major occupations at Jebel Faya, again separated by tens of thousands of years, of which the last can be dated to around 40,000 years ago. This is followed by another occupational lacuna before we reach the Neolithic around 10,000 years ago. Although the limitations of the evidence need to be stressed, the general impression is that the region of the present Emirates was not intensively occupied in the Palaeolithic period. As a result, the impact of humans on the environment—so far as it is possible to tell—seems to have been limited.

3.2 Late Prehistoric, 8000–3000 BCE

It is not until the Neolithic period (c. 8000–3000 BCE) that evidence for human occupation becomes more consistent (Cleuziou and Tosi 2007: 35–60; Potts 2012: 17–33; Magee 2014: 46–86). Most archaeologists would therefore probably agree that the lands of the Emirates have been more or less continuously occupied for the past 10,000 years. The Palaeolithic and Neolithic are distinct from the ensuing periods in that the climate was still changing dramatically, subsequently stabilising into the present climatic regime in the fourth millennium BCE. We should further note that the ‘agricultural revolution’ does not reach the Emirates until the end of the Neolithic period, around 3000 BCE, and most of the local Neolithic societies instead practiced nomadic pastoralism, i.e. the herding of domesticated animal species. During this epoch, human-environmental interactions appear still to have favoured the natural world, with social change in many cases a consequence of adaptions to the changing climate.

3.3 Protohistoric, 3000–300 BCE

Writing was invented in Mesopotamia around 5000 years ago. From this moment on, we have sporadic historical references to Magan, as southeast Arabia was known to the Mesopotamians (Potts 1990: 133–49). However, it is not until the Graeco-Roman period that the quantity and quality of the historical sources becomes more consistent, for which reason we have adopted the term Protohistoric. The local Chalcolithic period is synonymous with the Hafit culture (3000–2500 BCE), named after the type site where it was first discovered, which witnessed the beginnings of metallurgy and agriculture (Cleuziou and Tosi 2007: 107–132; Potts 2012: 35–43; Magee 2014: 87–98). This is followed by the local Bronze Age societies again named after type sites, the Umm al-Nar (2500–2000 BCE) and Wadi Suq (2000–1600 BCE) cultures, with the Late Bronze Age (1600–1200 BCE) only defined relatively recently (Cleuziou and Tosi 2007: 139–278; Potts 2012: 45–87; Magee 2014: 98–125, 152–196). Thereafter comes the Iron Age (1200–300 BCE), which arguably constitutes the peak of prehistoric population associated with the development of extensive oasis agrosystems supported by falaj irrigation (Cleuziou and Tosi 2007: 281–303; Potts 2012: 89–105; Magee 2014: 214–258). These periods display a significant degree of cultural continuity, as evidenced by traditions of collective burial continuing from the Hafit period into the Iron Age, or locally produced coarse wares developing from the Wadi Suq through the Iron Age. Indeed, many sites of the Protohistoric epoch, including well-known sites like Tell Abraq, Hili and Saruq al-Hadid, were continuously or repeatedly occupied between the Umm al-Nar and Iron Age. This epoch is when humans began to have a more serious impact on the natural world, a process that has been dubbed ‘taming the desert’ (Cleuziou and Tosi 2007: 137–157).

3.4 Early Historic, 300 BCE–1000 CE

The période préislamique récente (300 BCE–300 CE), often abbreviated to PIR and rendered into English as the Late Pre-Islamic period, marks a major departure from the local prehistoric cultures of Southeast Arabia (Mouton 2008; Potts 2012: 107–133). From this period on, the material culture of the Emirates demonstrates strong links with western Indian Ocean networks, whilst the appearance of funerary and numismatic inscriptions represents the beginning of an indigenous historical record. Settlement and trade rather mysteriously fell into abeyance for much of Late Antiquity (300–650 CE), possibly because the region of the modern Emirates constituted a demilitarised frontier of the Sasanian Empire (Kennet 2007; Mouton and Cuny 2012; Potts 2012: 135–41). The Early Islamic period (650–1000 CE) witnessed a sustained episode of economic and demographic growth, since the region lay between the major ports of Siraf and Sohar through which much of the Indian Ocean trade of the Abbasid Caliphate was filtered (Wilkinson 1964; King 2001). These periods display a significant degree of cultural continuity, with, for example, many of the common wares that make up the ceramic assemblage develop over the course of the first millennium CE. The integration of Southeast Arabia into Indian Ocean networks led to growing external demand for local natural resources, and it is in this period that the first large scale/proto-industrial exploitation of the environment occurred.

3.5 Late Historic, AD 1000–1950

It is not until the arrival of the Turks in the eleventh century CE that the synthesis of Arab, Persian and Turkish culture that Western scholarship dubs ‘Islamic’ began to take root. Historical evidence becomes increasingly important for our understanding of the past societies of Southeast Arabia during the Islamic centuries. The Emirates was first conquered by the Saljuq Turks of Kirman and then ruled by the Persian Arabs of Hormuz during the Middle Islamic (1000–1600 CE) period (Fiorani Piacentini and Maestri 2009; Fiorani Piacentini 2013). The region was subsequently integrated into the Indian Ocean empire of the Portuguese between 1507 and 1622 CE, a traumatic first encounter with a globally ascendent Europe (Farinha 2009). The entirely of Southeast Arabia was united under the Yarubid Empire of Oman for the first century the Late Islamic period (1600–1950 CE), the fragmentation of which in the eighteenth century led to the emergence of a patchwork of local sheikhdoms and emirates (Bathurst 1967). These included the Bani Yas confederation of Abu Dhabi and Dubai which expanded into the al-Ain Oases, and the Qasimi confederation of Ras al-Khaimah and Sharjah which expanded across the Northern Emirates (Heard-Bey 1982). The region was subsequently dominated by the British between 1822 and 1971 CE, whose divide and rule policy ultimately bequeathed seven emirates to the present federation (Zahlan 1978). The Late Historic epoch is characterised by the emergence of an increasingly globalised world economy, with unprecedented international demand for natural resources giving rise of local industries.

4 Climate Change and Human Adaptions

The climate of the Emirates fluctuated considerably during the Mid to Late Pleistocene (Parker 2009: 42–43). Fluvial silts and lacustrine sediments from the Wadi Dhaid and Liwa Oasis indicate the presence of rivers and lakes between 350–130 ka. Anatomically modern humans emerged in Africa around 300 ka and began to move into Arabia by 200 ka, when hunter gatherer communities were active in the region of Jebel Baraka, a 63 m high hill rising above the Abu Dhabi coastline to the west of Jebel Dhanna (Richter et al. 2017; Wahida et al. 2008). A number of stone tools were found in the area, including hand-axes and scrappers used for butchering animals. These tools were made using the Levallois technique, indicative of a Middle Palaeolithic date around 200,000 years ago. At the time, the Arabian Gulf constituted a vast river-valley system and Jebel Baraka offered a vantage position to hunters preying on game moving along ancient river courses. The period 130–75 ka seems to have been particularly wet, indicated by the formation of alluvial fans along the western edge of the Hajar Mountains in Ras al-Khaimah. It is to this period that the oldest human settlement outside of Africa belongs, a rock shelter at Jebel Faya occupied around 125 ka (Fig. 22.5), a globally important site in the story of the human journey ‘out of Africa’ (Armitage et al. 2011; Zorich 2011).

Fig. 22.5

The Palaeolithic rock shelter at Jebel Faya. Credit: Timothy Power

Climatic conditions became increasingly arid between 20 and 10 ka, part of a global warming that brought the Ice Age to an end (Parker 2009: 43–46). During this period, the Rub al-Khali entered a major phase of aeolian accumulation and sand dunes formed at Awafi near al-Ain. Progressive aridisation was interrupted by a regional wet phase between 15–13 ka, which, as a ‘climatic optimum,’ may have kick-started the Neolithic revolution (Scarre 2018). At Awafi, for instance, the dune field was stabilised and vegetated with grasslands and scattered trees. These conditions may have prompted the migration of nomadic groups out of the Fertile Crescent across the Arabian Peninsula, with a second wave during the Holocene Climatic Optimum (c. 7500–4000 BC), a process known as the ‘Holocene repopulation of Eastern Arabia’ (Uerpmann et al. 2009).

For the much of the Late Pleistocene epoch, the area today occupied by the Arabian Gulf constituted a fertile river valley. This has been conceptualised as a ‘Gulf Oasis,’ where it has been argued the majority of the Palaeolithic population lived, which helps explain the general lack of sites of this period in eastern Arabia (Rose 2010). The Arabian Gulf formed between 12–6 ka as the ice sheets melted and global sea levels rose. Between 14–8.5 ka the shoreline of the emerging Gulf ran due west from Ras al-Khaimah to al-Qatif, so that the Abu Dhabi islands and Qatar Peninsula lay within a vast area of salt marsh much like the present Shatt al-Arab in Iraq (Lambeck 1996). Neolithic settlements on the Abu Dhabi Islands belong to a liminal landscape between land and sea.

The earliest evidence for the Holocene repopulation of Arabia comes from the Abu Dhabi Islands. This rich maritime environment—dubbed the ‘fertile coast’ (al-Hameli et al. 2023)—attracted migrants from the disappearing ‘Gulf Oasis.’ Late Prehistoric occupations are accordingly attested on the islands of Ghagha, Marawah and Dalma. Indeed, the oldest buildings yet found in the Arabian Gulf were recently discovered on Ghagha, consisting of multi-chambered curvilinear structures built of local beach rock, which can be radiocarbon dated to 8500 BCE (Ibid.). Similar structures were found on Marawah with radiocarbon dates ranging between 6000 and 4000 BCE (Beech et al. 2019). Settlement at Dalma was instead characterised by a circular post-hole structure dated between 5000 and 4500 BC (Beech et al. 2000). As such, we see both push and pull factors in play—the flooding of the ‘Gulf Oasis’ and the ‘fertile coast’ of the Emirates—driving population movement.

In a parallel process, the Dhafra desert played an important role in the Holocene repopulation of Arabia. The dunes formed in episodes over tens of thousands of years, beginning around 63–50,000 years ago and ending around 22–11,000 years ago as the climate heated up (Parker 2009: 43). Climatic conditions improved during the Holocene Climatic Optimum (7500–4000 BCE) that followed the end of the last Ice Age, enabling hunter gatherers and/or nomadic pastoralists to migrate from the Fertile Crescent. A cluster of sites was discovered at Umm al-Zamul in the Ramlat al-Hamra, located in an interdunal plain 7 km long by 1 km wide, which produced over 3000 pieces of worked stone (Kallweit et al. 2008). Another cluster of sites from this period is al-Ashoosh in Dubai, located in a broad desert pan c. 1 km², from which over 4000 pieces of worked stone were retrieved (Casana et al. 2009: 33–35). Both sites include arrowheads in the ‘Arabian Bifacial Tradition’ dated between 8000 and 3500 BCE. These extensive stone scatters are evidence for a seasonal occupation by hunter gatherers and/or nomadic pastoralists preying on game drawn to interdunal lakes fed by winter rains. Here the pull factors appear to be stronger—a benign climate creating new opportunities—serving to populate previously uninhabited regions.

The shoreline of the Arabian Gulf stabilised around 6 ka and the present climate was established around 5 ka, i.e. between 4000 and 3000 BCE (Parker 2009: 46). The drop in the number of sites during the terminal Neolithic has been dubbed the ‘dark millennium’ (Uerpmann 2002), which, it has been claimed, was the result of a deterioration of the climate to something approaching present conditions. Although there have been attempts to identify wetter and drier episodes over the past 5000 years, not all of these have been convincing and it is perhaps safest to assume the climate has not changed significantly in that time.

5 Taming the Desert: Early Farming and Herding

One of the key human-environment interactions involved the domestication of plants and animals, as well as the harnessing of water resources needed for agriculture and animal husbandry. It took thousands of years for these early experiments to develop into the date-palm oases and camel caravan networks that have been so fundamentally important to the social and economic history of the Emirates. Probably the oases took their place in the landscape around the start of the Iron Age II period about 3000 years ago, following the development of the falaj irrigation system. Southeast Arabia was not integrated into the pan-Arabian camel caravan networks until the PIR.A period over 2000 years ago, a process which was to have long-term repercussions, for it was through these networks that the Arabs and eventually Islam arrived around fourteen centuries ago.

5.1 Early Agriculture

The earliest move towards sedentary agriculturalism in the UAE began in the Hafit period (3000–2500 BCE). Perhaps the most characteristic aspect of the Hafit culture are the circular stone cairns containing collective burials (Fig. 22.6), up to 12 m in diameter and 2 m high, usually located prominently on the crests of hills and therefore probably intended to delineate tribal territory and grazing grounds. It has nevertheless been demonstrated that the tombs generally overlook areas of agricultural potential, raising the possibility that they were once associated with ephemeral proto-agricultural communities (Giraud 2009). Indeed, an agropastorlist interpretation of Hafit society can be put forward on the basis of ethnographic analogies with Mahra and Dhofar, wherein a largely pastoralist subsistence strategy is complemented by opportunistic agriculture following heavy winter rains and the intensive utilisation of wild cereals, legumes and fruits (Magee 2014: 97–98).

Fig. 22.6

Reconstructed beehive tombs at Jebel Hafit near al-Ain. Credit: Timothy Power

Only a handful of settlement sites are known from the Hafit period. The first to have been discovered and still one of the most impressive is that of Hili 8 in al-ʿAin (Cleuziou 1982). The beginning of occupation is dated by a C14 sample to approximately 3000 BCE, whilst the Mesopotamian-influenced ceramics may be placed in the first half of the third millennium. Links with the Hafit culture are underscored by the cairn burials on the crest of nearby Jabal Haqlah, just over the border in Oman, so that the settlement flourished in ‘the shadow of the ancestors.’ Hili 8 produced the first clear evidence for agriculture in the Emirates and southeast Arabia more broadly. Palaeobotanical finds include charred grains of wheat, barley and possibly sorghum, peas, jujube and melon seeds, and over a hundred carbonised date stones; the imprints of many of these species were moreover found on the mud bricks (Cleuziou and Costantini 1980).

5.2 Falaj Irrigation

One of the key developments of this period was the introduction of the falaj (pl. aflaj), a kind of underground aqueduct cut through the bedrock delivering a continuous supply of water (Fig. 22.7). Many aflaj were still in use as late as the 1970s and the previous generation of archaeologists, ethnographers and historians had ample opportunity to study them (Wilkinson 1977; al-Tikriti 2011; Heard-Bey 2004: 176–181). Two types of falaj were observed operating in ‘traditional’—i.e. Late Islamic—oases. The ghayl falaj is fed by shallow surface and sub-surface water flowing through wadi gravels and alluvial fans; and the dawudi falaj taps into deep underground aquifers formed at the base of mountains (Charbonnier 2014).

Fig. 22.7

Schematic cross-section through an archetypal falaj. Credit: Julien Charbonnier

The structure of the falaj consists of five key elements: the mother well, the tunnel, the cut-and-cover section, the shari‘a and the surface channels. Only the dawudi falaj is fed by one or more mother wells (lit. umm ma’, ‘mother of water’) located at the foot of the mountains, whilst rudimentary dams or diversion channels push water from the wadi into the ghayl falaj. The tunnel runs at an incline of between 1/500 and 1/2500 to enable the water to flow perpetually by force of gravity alone; it is built by excavating a series of vertical shafts (thuqba, pl. thiqab) which are subsequently linked by the sloping tunnel. As the tunnel passes through unconsolidated ground to approach the surface it is lined and covered with cemented (tasrij, noun saruj) stone blocks to create the cut-and-cover section; uniquely in the early Islamic period baked bricks were also used, for which Sohar was a famous production centre. The falaj finally comes to the surface at the shari‘a, an open section often expanded into a pool, where people could collect drinking water and wash; domestic settlement therefore usually formed around the shari‘a and, as a strategic resource, it was often guarded by defensive structures. Grey water was then carried through a dendritic network of surface channels, which, by the Late Islamic period at least, were formed by parallel rows of cemented stones and framing a smooth saruj base.

When exactly the falaj first appeared in Southeast Arabia has long been a subject of the debate (Magee 2014: 217). The best dated falaj, known as AM-2, was found at al-Madam in Sharjah (Córdoba 2013: 148). The tunnel is 1.6 m high × 50 cm wide and runs for 800 m before coming to the surface. From there an arterial surface channel 1 m wide × 50 cm deep extends a further 52 m, feeding flanking rows of perpendicular subsidiary channels each linked to a linear series of tree pits. This irrigated area may plausibly be identified as a palm grove. The case for an Iron Age II date rests on an uncontaminated ceramic assemblage and a 1160–808 BCE radiocarbon date from a shell found in the irrigation channels. Perhaps the most securely dated falaj was found at Salut in central Oman. Uranium-Thorium dating of stalagtites formed in the underground tunnels of the Falaj Shaww suggests that it was used between 450 BCE and 1150 CE (Cremaschi et al. 2018: Table 1, p. 137). This places its excavation in the Iron Age III period (600–300 BCE). Although the number of aflaj for which absolute dating is available is extremely limited, the evidence is sufficient to determine that falaj use spread through Southeast Arabia in the first half of the first millennium BC.

5.3 Oasis Agrosystem

The oasis landscape of Southeast Arabia emerged in fits and starts over a very long period of time. It was perhaps not until the eighteenth century CE, however, that the present reconfiguration of the oases was finalised (Fig. 22.8). The historic oases of southeast Arabia are in fact comprised of three discrete zones: an inner oasis made up of sunken irrigation basins planted with date palms and sub-canopy fruits and vegetables; an outer oasis consisting of open fields given over to the cultivation of cereals and animal fodder; and an oasis hinterland constituting a managed savannah landscape providing grazing (Wilkinson 1977: 69, Fig. 12). The surviving palm groves the visitor sees today belong to the inner oasis zone, with much of the outer oasis and oasis hinterland lost to modern development, leaving only isolated areas of the historic landscape intact.

Fig. 22.8

The palm groves at the heart of the oasis agrosystem. Note the bananas growing in the shade of the canopy. Qattara Oasis, al-Ain. Credit: Timothy Power

An excellent case study in the origin and development of oasis agrosystems is presented by archaeological work in al-Ain and Buraimi. Seven historic oasis agrosystems survive amidst the suburban sprawl of the late twentieth century towns (Power and Sheehan 2012). Excavations appear to capture the moment of transition from open field systems of arable crops to intensive cultivation of date-palms in sunken basins (bustan, pl. basateen) fed by aflaj in the early Iron Age (Power and Sheehan 2011: 273). Episodes of expansion and contraction can be detected by archaeological survey (Power et al. 2015, 2016, 2017; Sheehan et al. 2018). When placed in their proper historical context, it is possible to put forward theories as to the developmental dynamics that transformed the historic environment (Power 2018). We shall shortly return to this issue, but for now it is sufficient to note that the oasis agrosystem formed the basis for settled life in the interior, while the agricultural surplus enabled an expansion of settlement on the coast.

5.4 Animal Husbandry

Herding reached the Emirates earlier than farming. Arrowheads employing Neolithic technology—known as Fasad points from the type-site in Oman where they were first discovered (Charpentier 1996)—appear at a number of sites. Those at Jabal Faya in Sharjah Emirate, for example, were found together with a marine shell which produced a radiocarbon date between the mid ninth and early eighth millennium BCE (Uerpmann et al. 2009: 209–10). It is unclear whether the spread of Neolithic stone technology into southeast Arabia was part of a package further including nomadic pastoralism. However, unambiguous evidence for nomadic pastoralism has been found at the later site of Buhais 18, not far from Jabal Faya, which was occupied in the fifth millennium BCE. A large number of animal bones were recovered and studied from butchery sites (Uerpmann and Uerpmann 2008). Over 90 per cent of the bones are from domesticated sheep, goat and cattle, with the remainder from wild animals like gazelle and camels, indicating the declining importance of hunting. Most of the sheep and goat were elderly females, indicating that they had been kept for their milk. Indeed, this nomadic herding community very likely moved to Buhais 18 during the lambing season in the spring, and spent the summers fishing on coastal and island settlements like ʿAqab and Marawah. Already in the Neolithic, life in the Emirates was characterised by the seasonal migration between the coast and interior (Uerpmann and Uerpmann 2000: 232–33).

5.5 Camel Domestication

The domestication of the Arabian camel—more properly, the dromedary—probably occurred at the end of the Bronze Age and beginning of the Iron Age, in the later centuries of the second millennium BCE (Magee 2014: 197–213). A general characteristic of domesticated compared to wild species is an overall reduction in body size, so that archaeozoologists are able to distinguish between wild and domesticated camel bones. Bones from Buhais 18 indicate that wild camels were being hunted in the Neolithic period and provided a significant amount of the meat diet. The faunal assemblage at the butchery sites of al-Safouh in Dubai city and Baynunah in Abu Dhabi emirate is almost entirely dominated by wild camel bones, testifying to the existence of specialised hunting zones in the Bronze Age (Von der Driesch et al. 2008). Indeed, the proportion of camel bones in the faunal assemblage of Tell Abraq in Umm al-Qaiwain fell from 50% to 5% over the course of the Bronze Age, suggesting that the overhunting led to a crash in the local wild camel population. Yet by the Iron Age II period (1100–600 BCE) the proportion of camel bones at Tell Abraq had recovered even as the bone size has decreased, immediately implying that we are now dealing with a managed herd of domesticated camels. This is confirmed by an Iron Age II faunal assemblage from Muweilah, which was sufficiently large enough to ascertain that most of the bones belonged to juveniles slaughtered for their meat (Uerpmann and Uerpmann 2002). No zooarchaeological data from the late Bronze and early Iron Age has yet been found, but the comparison of the two periods suggests the camel was domesticated in this transitional period.

The use of camels for transport seems to have been a secondary development. Archaeozoology has not yet been able to identify when camels were used for carrying riders and bearing loads, and we must instead rely on historical sources and material culture. The earliest regional depictions of camels being ridden are found on carved reliefs from a palaces at Tell Halaf and Carchemish in Syria, dated loosely from the late tenth to ninth century. At much the same time in the Emirates, camel figurines with saddles and/or loads strapped to their backs begin to appear at Muweilah in Sharjah (Fig. 22.9), which flourished between the tenth and eighth centuries BCE (Magee 2015). The domestication of the camel therefore led to the emergence of new forms of nomadic pastoralism in the tenth and ninth centuries BCE. An Assyrian victory stela records the defeat in 853 BC of Arab bedouin in the Badiyat al-Sham, the semi-desert region between Syria and Iraq, resulting in the capture of a thousand camels (Hoyland 2001: 59). However, there is as yet no evidence that camels were used for long-distance trade. One might argue that a network of pan-Arabian caravan networks could only emerge after the hitherto impenetrable deserts had been populated by camel herding nomads.

Fig. 22.9

Camel figurine from Muweilah. Source: Figura de camello (50390168996).jpg by Ángel M. Felicísimo, licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

5.6 Caravan Networks

It is not until the eighth century BC that we have firm evidence for long-distance camel-borne trade, beginning with the frankincense trade between Yemen and the Levant (Crone 1987: 12–29). Arguably, it was not until the third century BCE that Southeast Arabia became integrated into the pan-Arabian caravan networks (Potts 1988). The excavators of Mleiha in Sharjah believed that the site was first settled by nomads arriving from northern Arabia, who established a sprawling settlement of semi-permanent palm-frond houses that, over time, developed into permanent town of mudbrick houses (Mouton and Schiettecatte 2014). Almost a third of the ceramic assemblage of the earliest occupational levels is made up of ‘Thaj Ware’ imported from Northeast Arabia, and its locally produced coinage—the earliest minted in the Emirates—imitated that of Thaj, the largest city in eastern Arabia (Mouton 2008: 47; Macdonald 2010). The caravan network reached as far as southwest Arabia, as evidenced by Yemeni alabaster beehive vessels likely imported via Thaj (Hassell 1997). The integration of southeast Arabia into the pan-Arabian caravan networks, which so influenced the social and economic history of the Emirates, was only made possible by the domestication of the camel and camel-herding nomadic pastoralism.

6 From Subsistence Strategies to Local Industries

By taming the landscape, the past societies of the Emirates developed adaptive subsistence strategies suited to a range of topographic/ecological zones. Certainly, during the Protohistoric epoch these societies were producing a regular agricultural surplus that could be taxed, stored, redistributed and traded. From this moment on we are dealing with economics and politics. By the Iron Age, local polities with walled cities and columned halls—‘chiefdoms’ rather than ‘states’ owing to the lack of writing and record keeping—based on the successful management of the oasis agrosystem had emerged. The Protohistoric economy thus developed far beyond the subsistence level. At certain moments external demand for the natural resources of southeast Arabia caused traditional subsistence strategies to develop into regional industries. This seems already to have been the case with copper mining in the Umm al-Nar period. But it was not until the Early Historic period that pearling and date production reached something approaching an industrial scale. The evidence is much better for the Late Historic period, when globalisation unlocked new markets and external demand spiked, leading to a rapid acceleration of the human impact on the natural environment (Heard-Bey 2004: 164–97).

6.1 Pearling

It is not until the PIR.C period, from the late first century BCE to the early second century CE, that the exploitation of the pearl beds reached semi-industrial proportions. The expansion of Indian Ocean trade opened up large new international markets, not least with the Roman Empire: pearl earrings appear frequently in the Fayyum portraits. The Early Historic site of ed-Dur, located on the southern shore of the lagoon of Umm al-Quwain, flourished during this period. Coins, ceramics and glass from ed-Dur attest to trade with Greece, Rome, Persia and India (Haerinck 1998). On this basis, ed-Dur has been identified as the port of Omana, mentioned as a source of pearls in the Periplus Maris Erythraei, a Graeco-Roman mercantile treatise of the first century AD (Potts 1990: 306–310). Evidence for pearling included a lead weight with an iron ring used by pearl divers to descend rapidly to the pearl beds, virtually identical to those used up to the twentieth century, and forty-one pearls have been found scattered among the excavated graves (Carter 2012: 18–19). Most impressive of all are the vast oyster shell middens covering nearby Akab Island, a clear indication of the scale of activity.

During the Middle Islamic period, between the twelfth and sixteenth centuries CE, the site of Julfar in Ras al-Khaimah became the leading pearling centre of the lower Gulf (Power 2017: 228–237). It is first mentioned as a place where pearls are to be found by the twelfth-century geographer al-Idrisi (Carter 2012: 45–48). The industry was well-established by the time the Portuguese arrived in the early sixteenth century:

Passing above this place Profam [Khor Fakkan], we come to another called Julfar, where dwell persons of worth, great navigators and wholesale dealers. Here is a very great fishery as well of seed-pearls as of large pearls, and the Moors of Ormus [Hormuz] come hither to buy them and carry them to India and many other lands. The trade of this place brings in a great revenue to the King of Ormus. (Barbosa 1918–1921: 73–74).

Julfar is associated with the sites of al-Mataf (Fig. 22.10) and al-Nudud, located either side of the entrance to the lagoon of Ras al-Khaimah (Velde 2012). They developed a truly urban character between the fourteenth and sixteenth century, with tightly packed stone houses along narrow lanes within city walls (Kennet 2003; Carter et al. 2020). A considerable extramural settlement of post-hole structures grew up in this period, and the whole coastline from Rams to Ras al-Khaimah appears to have been intensely occupied. Historical sources demonstrate that virtually all of the present coastal settlements existed by the sixteenth century (King 2006), and recent survey work in Umm al-Quwain has revealed the undisturbed remains of a stone-town of this period (Power et al. 2022), so we might place the first urbanisation of the coast in the Middle Islamic period.

Fig. 22.10

The site of al-Mataf in Ras al-Khaimah, part of the ancient pearling city of Julfar. Credit: Derek Kennet

Whether or not the growing scale and intensity of human settlement placed a strain on the natural environment is unclear. It has been suggested that one of the two major pearl beds collapsed in the early sixteenth century as a result of overfishing (Floor 2014: 1), leading to conflict over the remaining pearl fisheries. Certainly Julfar itself declined in the course of the sixteenth century, and though this was clearly a complex multicausal phenomenon that included silting of the lagoon (Velde 2012: 219), it is possible that environmental degradation was a contributing factor.

A second urbanisation of the coast occurred between the eighteenth and early twentieth centuries in response to a regional pearling boom (Carter 2009). Unfortunately, the archaeology of most of these towns has largely been obscured by modern development, with the notable exception of the forts, which have been preserved as heritage monuments. Abu Dhabi is a case in point. It was established in the late eighteenth century, but all that remains of premodern settlement is the core of Qasr al-Hosn, the dynastic seat of the Al Nahayyan (Maitra and Hajji 2001). The only well-preserved historic town of the north coast is Jazirat al-Hamra, the ruins of which—abandoned in the mid twentieth century—largely date to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (Priestman 2020).

The pearl boom peaked in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. By this time the British had ended the mass transport of enslaved Africans, forcing reduced slave trade underground, and the labour needs of the industry were met by the mass mobilisation of the population. A pattern of seasonal migration (tahwil) from the interior to the coast emerged, with up to 78% of the male population involved in the ‘great dive’ (ghaws al-kabir) each summer (Heard-Bey 1982: 199; Carter 2009: 276).

6.2 Dates

It is probably not until the Early Historic epoch that dates began to be grown as a cash crop for export. The Batina port of Sohar emerged in the ninth and tenth centuries as a major Indian Ocean entrepôt, connecting East Africa with the Persia, India and China (Averbuch 2017). East African ivory, slaves and gold were exchanged for Iraqi date-wine and southeast Arabian dates, the importance of which one contemporary account makes clear:

The Zanj feel great awe in their hearts for the Arabs. If they catch sight of an Arab, they prostrate themselves before him and say, ‘This man is from a kingdom where the date tree grows!’ This is because of the prestige that dates enjoy, both in their land and in their hearts. (Abu Zayd al-Sirafi trans. Macintosh-Smith 2014: 121)

To produce dates in large enough quantities to maintain a balance of trade, the historic oases were expanded by the digging of new aflaj and excavation of new sunken palm groves, the labour for which was provided by enslaved East Africans. The Omani sources refer to the slaves of the Batina. In one account, they speak of the justice of a local ruler who forbade slaves being worked day and night (al-Rawas 1990: 234–236). Archaeological surveys of the hinterland of Sohar demonstrates that 6200 hectares were brought under intensive cultivation during the peak of settlement in the ninth and tenth centuries (Costa and Wilkinson 1987: 225–226). In a subsidiary development, the oases of al-Ain and Buraimi—connected to Sohar by the Wadi al-Jizzi—appear to have expanded significantly at this time (Power and Sheehan 2012; Power et al. 2015, 2016, 2017; Sheehan et al. 2018).

The Late Historic period witnessed a major increase in date exports and the expansion of the oasis landscape. The stimulus again came from the Indian Ocean when, in the course of the seventeenth century, the Yarubids of Oman united Southeast Arabia and conquered East Africa. The oases grew in the eighteenth century as the Yarubids secured access to new markets in India and ensured a supply of cheap labour from Africa. The Imam Sayf b. Sultan al-Ya‘rubi is reported to have “improved a large portion of Oman by making water-courses and planting date and other trees… [At the time of his death in 1711] he had acquired one-third of all the date-trees in Oman” (Ibn Raziq trans. Badger 1871: 93. Cf. Mershen 2001: 158–159). In al-Ain and Buraimi, the archaeological evidence suggests a massive building boom and significant expansion of the oases, and once again access to the Indian Ocean via nearby Sohar was likely a key factor in this growth (Power and Sheehan 2012: 297–303; Power 2018).

Another phase of expansion occurred in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This time the investment capital came from the Arabian Gulf, which, as we have seen, was being transformed by the pearling boom. Shaikh Zayed I b. Khalifa invested the bumper profits of the pealing industry in the oases of al-Ain, either buying derelict palm groves and repairing choked aflaj, or establishing new agricultural estates (Lorimer 1915: 264; Heard-Bey 1982: 225). Slaves were readily available and widely used across the Arabian Gulf and Southeast Arabia. A letter to the Sultan of Zanzibar observed that “with ten baskets’ worth of dates that a man now gets on credit he can get 20 slaves at Zanzibar worth $1000” (cited by Hazell 2011: 124). In 1902, a visitor to the Buraimi Oasis noted that “the gardens are well kept, and all the labour is done by slaves, who form, I think, at least one-half of the population” (Zwemer 1902: 62). An argument can be made that the traditional oasis agrosytems of southeast Arabia were transformed into a plantation style economy, using slaves to produce a cash crop for export, a trajectory that peaked in response to the massive new markets opening up in Europe and America (Hopper 2013, 2015: 51–79).

7 Conclusion

Human-environmental interactions in the pre-modern Emirates were, like most places and periods in world history, primarily driven by economic exigencies. Subsistence strategies adapted to changing climatic conditions across a diverse range of topographic/ecological zones allowed early human societies to thrive. As southeast Arabia was brought into a series of ever larger exchange networks, first in the Arabian Gulf and then across the Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean, external demand for its natural resources grew. This led to craft diversification and social stratification: certain sections of society specialised in resource procurement and elites manipulated resource redistribution to maintain their position. By the Early Bronze Age, the economy was perhaps already orientated to the supply of raw materials to early states in Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley. We might even identify world-system patterns of unequal exchange (Algaze 1993). For example, copper was certainly being used by the sixth millennium in the Fertile Crescent but did not start to be used in southeast Arabia until the third millennium BCE. One might simply assume that it took centuries for the pioneering technology of the core to permeate the periphery, but we might alternatively suggest that technological progress was inhibited by the ready supply of manufactured commodities exchanged for raw materials.

This reliance on the export of raw materials to foreign markets helps explain the settlement patterns noted by archaeologists over the longue durée. The Abu Dhabi Islands and North Coast were, once the current climate regime stabilised around 5000 years ago, incredibly inhospitable and difficult places to live. The only reason to intensively inhabit such as barren landscape was the extraction and exchange of raw materials, notably the native pearls so highly prized by foreign merchants. The people of the Gulf were themselves aware of this. As one local ruler explained to a nineteenth century British traveller, “we are all from the highest to the lowest slaves to one master, the Pearl” (quoted in Hopper 2015: 8). This is why the Abu Dhabi Islands and North Coast were only intensively occupied during periods of high foreign demand for pearls. Something similar may be said for the rocky slopes of the Hajar Mountains in Ras al-Khaimah, which were only worth cultivating when there was strong foreign demand to make the meagre returns worthwhile. In periods of low foreign demand, the local people sought their fortunes on the facing shore of the Gulf or retreated to the most fertile regions of southeast Arabia. It is further possible to posit the oases and lagoons—where food and shelter was most readily available—as refugia where pockets of the indigenous population waited out the economic depressions and political disturbances that periodically gripped the region.

Human societies therefore survived in a marginal environment by remaining highly mobile and diversifying their subsistence strategies. The exploitation of natural resources, indeed, the very inhabitation of areas outside the refugia, may be understood as an opportunistic adaptation responding to external demand. This could at times result in overexploitation, as when the pearl beds were overfished in the early sixteenth century, leading to political fallout. Or else the overdependence on a single industry could lead to catastrophic social trauma, as when the pearling industry collapsed in the 1930s. Generally, however, the small pre-modern population size and limited technological capabilities meant that the human-environmental interactions were relatively well-balanced.

8 Recommended Readings

This paper provides an overview of archaeological perspectives on human-environmental interactions in the Emirates, highlighting some of the key topics of research and providing major bibliographic references for the general reader, and as such functioning in some sense as a bibliographic essay. For readers wishing to develop their interest in the history and archaeology of the Emirates, I would recommend the following introductory and/or reference works given in suggested order of reading: Potts (2012), Cleuziou and Tosi (2007), Magee (2014), Heard-Bey (2004), Wilkinson (1977).