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Relations with Qatar

Qatar was originally (1766-83) a settlement of the Bani 'Utbah
(rUtubi Arabs) who immigrated from Kuwait. After the conquest of
Bahrain in 1783, the rUtubis moved their seat of Government to
Bahrain and became known by the name of Al-Khalifah. Later the
Jalahimah Arabs, an off-shoot of the'Utubis, settled in the town of
Zubarah on the coast of Qatar and established their sovereignty over
the whole peninsula of Qatar in spite of the objection of Al-Khalifah,
the Rulers of Bahrain, who regarded Qatar as their dependency.
Qatar was for many years under the sway of the Wahhabis who had
also extended their influence to Bahrain and other parts of Arabia.1
During the first half of the nineteenth century, Qatar was regarded
by the British Government as a dependency of Bahrain and it was
therefore not asked to join in the treaties of peace signed with Bahrain
and the other Shaikhdoms. As a dependency of Bahrain, Qatar fell
under the operation of the Maritime Truce of 1835. It was even re­
ported as late as 1867 that the Shaikh of Bahrain paid tribute to the
Wahhabis, who were in power over the coast of Qatar ‘on account of
his possessions in Qatar’.2
The British relationship with Qatar began on 12 September 1868
when the Shaikh of Qatar, Muhammad ibn Thani, signed an agree­
ment of peace with Colonel Lewis Pelly, British Resident in the
Arabian Gulf, promising ‘not to commit any breach of maritime
peace’.3 The Shaikh also acknowledged the authority of the British
Resident in settling any ‘disputes or misunderstandings arising’ from
the enforcement of the ‘Maritime Truce’. The agreement stated, in
connection with Qatar’s relationship with Bahrain, that the Shaikh of
Qatar would maintain friendly relations with the Shaikh of Bahrain.
It also provided for the continuance of payment to Bahrain of ‘the
tribute hitherto paid’ on account of Qatar’s allegiance to Bahrain:1
The British agreement with Qatar of 1868 marked a deviation from
the former British position in regarding Qatar as a dependency of
Bahrain. It acknowledged, although indirectly, the title of Shaikh
Muhammad ibn Thani to Qatar and formed a basis for the emergence
of Qatar for the first time in the history of the peninsula as an in­
dependent town owing no allegiance to Bahrain.

1 Lorimer, pp. 787-8; Saldanha, A Precis of Katar Affairs (1904).
2 Lorimer, pp. 798-800. 3 Ibid., pp. 801-2.
4 Ibid., pp. 801-2; Aitchison, p. 255.
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