Page 97 - UAE Truncal States

Chapter Two

interwoven political scene north of, but at times also including,
Dubai.
The period most frequently referred to in this description is the
first decade of this century: firstly because the number of members of
the tribes, their tribal areas, settlements and occupational pre-
ferences are well-documented for that period; 113 secondly, because
soon afterwards the fifty years of steady growth of the pearling
economy during the period of British-enforced maritime peace was
interrupted by the First World War. After the war and a brief
increase in the number of people participating in pearling, this main
industry declined dramatically in the 1930s, throwing into disarray
the original pattern of tribal economies.
At the turn of the century about 50,750 out of the 72,000 settled
people in the Trucial Stales lived in the area which now forms the
territory of the five northern Emirates of the United Arab Emirates.
But the majority of the Trucial States’ nomadic population of about
8,000 people did not frequent the mountains so much as the sandy
desert of Abu Dhabi.114 The seasonal migration of certain groups of
the population in the mountain-dominated areas should more
correctly be called transhumance rather than nomadism, because
they moved with some of their belongings from their winter abode to
homes which they occupied only during the summer, while pursuing
a different economic activity.115
The census taken by the Trucial States Development Office in 1968
provides a very useful document for the assessment of the tribal
distribution a short while before the federation was formed. By then
the entire population of the five northern Emirates had risen to
74,880. Yet the tribal population, both settled and nomadic, of the
northern States was at 44,668 even less than at the turn of the
century. 1 lfi

The tribes of the northern area

Sharqiyln
After the Bani Yas the Sharqiyln were the second most numerous
tribe in the Trucial States during the first decade of the 20th century.
They resided without exception in territory under the Qasimi
jurisdiction. The eastern part of the promontory was their stronghold
for several centuries and there is hardly a village in Shamailfyah, that
is the Eastern Coast between Dibah and the border with the

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