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'Field Notes on Sa'udi Arabia, 1935' [18r] (40/248)
The record is made up of 1 volume (120 folios). It was created in 1936. It was written in English. The original is part of the British Library: India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. Records and Private Papers Documents collected in a private capacity. .
Transcription
This transcription is created automatically. It may contain errors.
the Sa’udi Arab is small. His average height is near 5 ft. 5 in., his
waist slender, no more than 20 in., his wrists, ankles and all the
bones, diminutive. Oculists aver that the eye of a pure bred
Bedouin Arab is the finest in the world and incapable of contracting
eye diseases.
He wears often the same clothes, no more than a ragged shift and
a headkerchief, in winter and summer, and is accustomed to with
standing great heat and great cold equally.
Dying younger than European men, he also grows up quickly.
Boys of 13 take the field, and at 16 have led forces with distinction.
Between the ages of about 14 and 25 the average Arab is capable
of withstanding almost any climate.
It is his general characteristics and volatility rather than his
physique that make the Sa’udi Arabian unadaptable to modern
warfare.
The ruse, the raid, “ reculer pour mieux sauter ” and nank
attacks in open warfare, are the type of manoeuvre which he favours
and in which he excels.
Arms. See Chapter IX.
2. Attitude of Races towards each other and to Europeans
(a) General
All the inhabitants of Sa’udi Arabia are Arabs, but it is convenient
for the purpose of this section to consider the people by their
territorial divisions.
(b) The Hejazi
In the Hejaz, long contact with the outer world through the
Hejaz ports and through the pilgrims who come from all over the
Moslem world, has tended to make the Hejazi a better educated, if
softer, creature than the Nejdi. Less inclined to warfare and several
times victim of Nejdi fanaticism, the Hejazi, despises, while fearing,
his Nejdi fellow subjects.
He would be tolerant to Europeans if it were not for this fear of
the Nejdi and for his own financial interest, which depend upon his
keeping up the inviolability of the Hejaz as a Holy land foi pilgi ims,
his chief source of income.
(c) The Nejdi
The Nejdi, on the other hand, is, generally speaking, uncom
promisingly anti-European and anti everyone except a Nejdi. He
holds in contempt the Hejazi and other Arabs as decadent and
inclined to heresy in religion. Europeans can travel in Nejd only
with the King’s protection, in Nejdi dress, wearing a beard, and
otherwise conforming to their prejudices.
About this item
- Content
The volume, marked confidential, is Field Notes on Sa'udi Arabia, 1935 , prepared by Donald Banks of the Air Ministry, by command of the Air Council.
The volume begins with a brief forward (folio 2) in which the geographical scope is outlined. The volume is then divided into nine chapters (I-IX) with appendices, as follows:
I - History
II - System of Government
III - Population
IV - Political Geography
V - Physical Geography
VI - Climate and Meteorology
VII - Communications
VIII - Resources
IX - Armed Forces
Appendices - Weights and Measures, Coinage, Calendar and Time, Note on the state of Wahhabism viewed from a military standpoint, Note on Zakat
The volume contains the following route reports:
1. 'Uqair to Riyadh, via al Hasa
2. Riyadh to Wadi A seasonal or intermittent watercourse, or the valley in which it flows. Fatima (near Jedda)
3. Jumaima to Medina
4. Riyadh to Kuwait
The volume contains nineteen maps and plans, as follows:
- Imperial Air and Sea Routes (folio 29)
- Tribal Areas (folio 23)
- Administrative Divisions (folio 33)
- Town Plans of Jedda, Mecca, Medina, Riyadh, and Taif (folios 40, 42, 43, 45, and 46, respectively)
- Diagrammatic Section of Middle Sa'udi Arabia (folio 50)
- Physical Geography (folio 54)
- Chart showing Magnetic Variation in Arabia (folio 59)
- Communications in Sa'udi Arabia (folio 64)
- Diagram of Principal Watering Points, Frontier Posts and Garrisons (folio 70)
- Tribes of Asir (folio 76)
- Panorama of the town of Marat (folio 98)
- Panorama of Muwaih (folio 101)
- Sketch Plan of Muwaih (folio 100)
- Sketch of route Rumaihiya-Jarya (Route Report No. 4) (folio 109)
- General Map (folio 121)
- Extent and format
- 1 volume (120 folios)
- Arrangement
At the beginning of the volume (folios 4-7) is a list of contents with reference to the original pagination.
- Physical characteristics
Foliation: the foliation sequence commences at the front cover with 1 and terminates at the inside back cover with 122; these numbers are written in pencil, are circled, and are located in the top right corner of the recto The front of a sheet of paper or leaf, often abbreviated to 'r'. side of each folio.
Pagination: the volume also contains an original printed pagination sequence.
- Written in
- English in Latin script View the complete information for this record
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'Field Notes on Sa'udi Arabia, 1935' [18r] (40/248), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, IOR/R/15/5/384, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100049274805.0x000029> [accessed 16 April 2024]
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Copyright: How to use this content
- Reference
- IOR/R/15/5/384
- Title
- 'Field Notes on Sa'udi Arabia, 1935'
- Pages
- front, back, spine, edge, head, tail, front-i, 2r:41v, 42v, 43v:45v, 46v:108v, 109v:121v, back-i
- Author
- East India Company, the Board of Control, the India Office, or other British Government Department
- Usage terms
- Open Government Licence