Page 211 - Arabian Gulf Intellegence

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MUSKAT. 169
5. The Muskat Arabs in 1705-06 were still infesting the coast,
a. d. 1705-06. taking every ship they could overpower.
6* In the following year their attention was turned to a more regular
system of naval warfare, for they obtained per­
a. d. 1706-07.
mission from the King of Pegu to build ships at
the ports in his country, and spread their fleets over the seas which
surround the peninsula of India. Some of their ships carried from
thirty to fifty guns. They made descents on several towns on the
Malabar Coast, both to obtain plunder and a fixed station, from which
they might annoy the trade, or resist the Mogul or Muratha fleets, or even
the more powerful vessels of the European nations.
7. These depredations led to the Mur at has* equipping a fleet of
sixty vessels, not only to repel the Arabs, but to act also as pirates
against all defenceless vessels.
8. The captures by the Arabs and Murathas became so numerous
that the King of Persia contemplated the deputation of ambassadors to
Bombay and Batavia, to solicit naval aid against the pirates. It having
been considered politic to prevent the adoption of either of those
measures, as the first would only have exposed the then weak state of
Bombay, and the second, if complied with, might have obtained a
preference to the Dutch in the Persian market, our Agent in Persia
promised, as soon as the war in Europe should cease, that a naval force
should be sent to destroy the pirates.
9. Without detailing the various depredations committed by the
Arab cruisers, it may be stated that the imbecile
a. d. 1707-08 to 1717.
6tate of the kingdom of Persia in the commence­
ment of the last century was favourable to the growing power of Muskat,
the ruler of which was at this period master of all the islands in the
Gulf; and it is probable that it maintained its ascendancy in that
quarter during the establishment of the Afghans in Persia, or until the
year 1730.
10. Bahrein was taken from the Arabs in the reign of Nadir Shah,
by Mahomed Takee Khan, the Governor of Fars, and there can be no
doubt of the influence of Persia having been completely restored by
that prince in the Gulf, as even the Muskat Government was at this
period obliged to pay tribute to Persia.
11. The Persians were driven out of Oman by Ahmed bin Saeed,
the Governor of Sohar, for which act he was elected Imaum. He led
an army by land towards Ras-ool-Khyma, and would have reduced the
Seer principality to his allegiance had he not been abandoned by some

* The piracies of the Muskat Arabs gave rise to another formidable pirate, Angria of
Colaba, in the vicinity of Bombay.

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