Page 35 - The Origins of the United Arab Emirates_Neat

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The Trucial Slates in 1919: Rule by Tradition 11
In the middle of the twentieth century, Liwa had about fifty-two
settlements, inhabited by the Bani Yas and the Manasir.22 Another
area that Lorimer believed came within the shaykhdom of Abu
Dhabi was al-Khatam, a sandy tract that divided Dafrah on the
west from north-eastern Oman and whose principal inhabitants
were the Bani Yas, the Manasir and the Na‘im.2:< Abu Dhabi
town, the capital of the shaykhdom, lies on an island; until the
discovery of oil, the inhabitants lived almost entirely by diving
for pearls and by fishing. Date cultivation was limited, because
of the aridity of the area, but grazing for animals was plentiful.
The shaykhdom also contains countless small islands that lie ofT
the coast between Sabkhat Matti and Abu Dhabi town; these
include Arzanah, Dalma, Das, Qarnayn, Sa‘diyyat, Sir Bani Yas,
Umm al-Nar, al-Fayya and al-Yasat.
Although Abu Dhabi was the largest in area of all the Trucial
shaykhdoms, it ranked third in terms of population. In 1908, towards
the end of Zayid’s rule, it had around 11,000 inhabitants, most
of whom belonged to the Bani Yas. The foreigners settled there,
mostly Persians, numbered about 500. By 1939, largely because
of the instability of the ruling family and the economic depression,
which greatly hampered the pearl trade, the population had fallen
to only 10,500. It was not until the early 1960s that there occurred
the large-scale migration that gave Abu Dhabi its present population
of around 250,000.

DUBAI

The geographical location and physical characteristics of Dubai,
coupled with the initiative of its various rulers, have contributed
greatly to its rise as a thriving centre of trade, as a result of
which it is today the principal entrepot of the UAE. Its history
during the first half of the twentieth century is essentially that
of a vigorous merchant community.
In 1939 Dubai had a population of about 20,000, making it
the most populous of the Trucial shaykhdoms, and also giving
it the highest density of population. At least one-quarter of its
inhabitants were foreign: there were around 2000 Persians, 1000
Baluchis and a large number of Indians; the rest were from Hasa,
Bahrain and Kuwait. Almost the whole of the shaykhdom’s settled
population lived in Dubai town.
The people of Dubai were in the vanguard of the economic
and social transformation of the Gulf, for it was there, beginning
early in the twentieth century, that a new merchant class, who
did not rely entirely on the pearl trade, began to be formed.