Page 100 - UAE Truncal States

The Tribal Structure of Society

families spent the summer there while the men went to the pearl
banks. Another 150 Za'ab families had settled on the east coast at
Khaur Kalba. While the first group was always heavily involved in,
and often antagonistic to, the politics of the Shaikhdom of Ra’s al
Khaimah, the Za'ab of Khaur Kalba usually supported the shaikh of
Kalba against the overlord in distant Sharjah. In 1968 the Za'ab
population remaining in Sharjah territory was only 710, a very much
larger number of 2,455 being in Ra’s al Khaimah, that is at JazTrah al
Hamra’. However, late in 1968 the shaikh of the Za'ab had various
disagreements with Shaikh Saqr of Ra’s al Khaimah, as a result of
which a large part of the population of JazTrah al Hamra’ accepted the
invitation of Shaikh Zayid of Abu Dhabi to settle there. The Za’ab of
the Trucial States have continued to maintain close links with their
relatives on the Batinah Coast in Oman.

Tanaij
The Tanaij, although numerically a small tribe, were at times of no
small importance in the politics of the northern part of the Trucial
Coast, because they represented by far the largest beduin element in
that area. In the Gazetteer the total number of Tanaij is given as 4,000
of whom 1,500 were beduin; this meant a beduin contingent of about
500 fighting-men whose allegiance or support the Rulers coveted
when conflict was brewing. The nomadic section of the Tanaij used
Daid as a centre; like the NaTm community at Daid, the Tanaij too
had a fortified tower for the defence of their quarters numbering
about 70 houses. Other settled Tanaij lived at Rams in Ra’s al
Khaimah; all the 400 houses of Rams were inhabited by that tribe,
i
but they had only a few houses at Hamrlyah. Most of the settled
Tanaij on the coast used to go pearling. According to the 1968
population census only 424 Tanaij were left in the northern Emirates
and Dubai.
Naqbiyin
The Naqbiyin, who numbered about 1,800 souls in 1905 and 1,889 in
1968, were the natural rivals of the Sharqiyin, with whom they lived
at close quarters almost wherever they settled in Shamaillyah, the
Wadi Ham, Khatt, and in the vicinity of Dibah. Only in Khaur Fakkan
the Naqbiyin in 1905 constituted the tribal majority (150 houses),
dominating a non-tribal immigrant minority from the Persian coast.
In Kalba (earlier called Ghallah) the Naqbiyin lived with Sharqiyin,

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