Articles From Our Experts

The remarkable travel journals of an Indian civil servant, who was an eyewitness to the military action at Ra’s al-Khaymah in 1819.

Behind the label of piracy lies a hidden history of empire and ambition in the Gulf.

Ownership of a medal of the Order of the Lion and Sun becomes the subject of an unseemly quarrel, as related by the British Envoy in Tehran.

During the nineteenth century, the Gulf was a hive of economic activity, with merchant ships carrying precious cargoes back and forth to India, making fortunes for traders. But it could also be hazardous for sailors.

Until the 19th century, European powers considered much of the Gulf coastline to be hazardous, but the 1820 survey recorded vital details that contributed to later British involvement in the region.

In 1910, British officials discovered that the Persian authorities at Bandar-e Lengeh were charging travellers a domestic rate to travel to Bahrain, reigniting a decades-long dispute over Persian claims to the islands.

Considered deadly to the “European constitution”, the hot and humid climate of the Gulf was blamed for the deaths of countless British officials in the early nineteenth century.

How did an Agent of the East India Company use his position to collect the manuscripts that went to form the basis of the British Library’s Arabic-language collection?

From its origins as a small London enterprise, the East India Company (EIC) emerged as a powerful commercial and political organisation, whose presence in the Gulf helped shape the region’s modern history.

The 1820 treaty between Britain and ten tribal rulers of the eastern Arabian coast marked the beginning of 150 years of British hegemony in the region, reshaping its political map in a way that is still evident today.

Against the dramatic international backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars, the British in Constantinople, Syria and Persia ensured that they kept one step ahead of a mysterious French officer.

What do the records created by the British Political Agency at Muscat have to offer us?

The story of a Qatari shaikh from the early days of Doha.

There are many different types of vessels used from the Red Sea to India. All of them have developed over the years to suit the local conditions. This is the third article in a series of three by the author, providing context and explanation for nautical terminology in the India Office Records.

Oman’s lease of a major Persian port was defined by obscure origins, and a relationship that was generally uneasy and often contentious – a situation that British authorities were happy to exploit. This is the first article in a series of two.

At the height of the Napoleonic Wars, Britain’s concerns over a possible French invasion of India through Persia led to its deepening intervention in the Gulf.

The first crossing of the Arabian Peninsula by a European, revealed in glimpses by the early correspondence of the Bushire Residency, was indicative of the East India Company beginning to look beyond the Gulf littoral and into Central Arabia.

When Captain Francis Erskine Loch arrived in the Gulf, he very quickly made an impact that would continue to have implications for British attitudes to the Gulf for over 200 years.

George Barnes Brucks was the first Englishman to survey the Gulf’s coasts in the 1820s. But while Brucks’s charts were quickly replaced by more accurate maps, his writings offer fascinating historic insight into the region.

Ships have always been important in the history of the Gulf, and therefore are prominent in the India Office Records and other documents on the QDL. This is the first article in a series of three by the author, providing context and explanation for nautical terminology in the records.