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172-454: Some of the settled communities developed into distinctive civilizations. Information about these communities is limited and has been pieced together from archaeological evidence, accounts written outside of Arabia, and Arab oral traditions that were later recorded by Muslim historians . Among the most prominent communities were the Thamud , who arose around 3000 BCE and lasted to around 300 CE; and

344-524: A "faraway, half-mythical place" . Dilmun is also described in the epic story of Enki and Ninhursag as the site at which the Creation occurred. The promise of Enki to Ninhursag, the Earth Mother: For Dilmun, the land of my lady's heart, I will create long waterways, rivers and canals, whereby water will flow to quench the thirst of all beings and bring abundance to all that lives. Ninlil ,

516-570: A caste and perform a range of roles, including as a historian or library, musician, poet, mediator of family and tribal disputes, spokesperson, and served in the king's court, not dissimilar from the European bard . They keep records of all births, death, and marriages through the generations of the village or family. When Sundiata Keita founded the Mali Empire , he was offered Balla Fasséké as his griot to advise him during his reign, giving rise to

688-542: A writing system , or in parallel to a writing system. It is the most widespread medium of human communication. They often remain in use in the modern era throughout for cultural preservation . Religions such as Buddhism , Hinduism , Catholicism , and Jainism have used oral tradition, in parallel to writing, to transmit their canonical scriptures , rituals , hymns and mythologies. African societies have broadly been labelled oral civilisations , contrasted with literate civilisations , due to their reverence for

860-655: A Persian dominion under a Yemenite vassal and thus came within the sphere of influence of the Sassanid Empire. After the demise of the Lakhmids, another army was sent to Yemen, making it a province of the Sassanid Empire under a Persian satrap . Following the death of Khosrau II in 628, the Persian governor in Southern Arabia, Badhan , converted to Islam and Yemen followed the new religion. Lihyan , also called Dadān or Dedan,

1032-406: A better understanding of Homeric epics. The long oral tradition that has sustained Albanian epic poetry reinforces the idea that pre-Homeric epic poetry was oral. The theory of oral-formulaic composition was developed also through the scholarly study of Albanian epic verse. The Albanian traditional singing of epic verse from memory is one of the last survivors of its kind in modern Europe , and

1204-503: A collective or tribal memory extending beyond personal experience but nevertheless representing a shared reality. Native languages have in some cases up to twenty words to describe physical features like rain or snow and can describe the spectra of human emotion in very precise ways, allowing storytellers to offer their own personalized take on a story based on their own lived experiences. Fluidity in story deliverance allowed stories to be applied to different social circumstances according to

1376-563: A combination of fresh and salt water for growth, and act as nurseries for many crabs, small fish, and insects; these fish and insects are the source of food for many of the marine birds that feed on them. Mangroves are a diverse group of shrubs and trees belonging to the genus Avicennia or Rhizophora that flourish in the salt water shallows of the Persian Gulf, and are the most important habitats for small crustaceans that dwell in them. They are as crucial an indicator of biological health on

1548-633: A few coral reefs . Compared to the Red Sea, the coral reefs in the Persian Gulf are relatively few and far between. This is primarily connected to the influx of major rivers, especially the Shatt al-Arab (Euphrates and Tigris), which carry large amounts of sediment (most reef-building corals require strong light) and causes relatively large variations in temperature and salinity (corals in general are poorly suited to large variations). Nevertheless, coral reefs have been found along sections of coast of all countries in

1720-593: A giant field across the territorial median line (North Field in the Qatari sector; South Pars Field in the Iranian sector). Using this gas, Qatar has built up a substantial liquefied natural gas (LNG) and petrochemical industry. In 2002, the Persian Gulf nations of Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE produced about 25% of the world's oil, held nearly two-thirds of the world's crude oil reserves , and about 35% of

1892-536: A heavily rhythmic speech filled with mnemonic devices enhances memory and recall. A few useful mnemonic devices include alliteration , repetition, assonance , and proverbial sayings. In addition, the verse is often metrically composed with an exact number of syllables or morae —such as with Greek and Latin prosody and in Chandas found in Hindu and Buddhist texts. The verses of the epic or text are typically designed wherein

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2064-434: A life expectancy similar to that of humans and they can grow up to 3 metres (9.8 feet) in length. These gentle mammals feed on sea grass and are closer relatives of certain land mammals than are dolphins and whales . Their simple grass diet is negatively affected by new developments along the Persian Gulf coastline, particularly the construction of artificial islands by Arab states and pollution from oil spills caused during

2236-405: A means of teaching. Plots often reflect real life situations and may be aimed at particular people known by the story's audience. In this way, social pressure could be exerted without directly causing embarrassment or social exclusion . For example, rather than yelling, Inuit parents might deter their children from wandering too close to the water's edge by telling a story about a sea monster with

2408-603: A name mentioned in Bundahishn . The body of water is historically and internationally known as the Persian Gulf. Arab governments refer to it as the Arabian Gulf or The Gulf, and other countries and organizations have begun using Arabian Gulf. The name Gulf of Iran (Persian Gulf) is used by the International Hydrographic Organization . The dispute in naming has become especially prevalent since

2580-557: A new city there and named it Batan Ardashir after his father. At this time, Eastern Arabia incorporated the southern Sassanid province covering the Persian Gulf's southern shore plus the archipelago of Bahrain. The southern province of the Sassanids was subdivided into three districts of Haggar ( Hofuf , Saudi Arabia), Batan Ardashir ( al-Qatif province , Saudi Arabia), and Mishmahig ( Muharraq , Bahrain; also referred to as Samahij ) (In Middle-Persian /Pahlavi means "ewe-fish".) which included

2752-483: A phenomenon that is explained by the lack of state formation among Albanians and their ancestors – the Illyrians , being able to preserve their "tribally" organized society . This distinguished them from civilizations such as Ancient Egypt , Minoans and Mycenaeans , who underwent state formation and disrupted their traditional memory practices. Albanian epic poetry has been analysed by Homeric scholars to acquire

2924-615: A physical struggle between a Thunderbird and a Whale. One such story tells of the Thunderbird, which can create thunder by moving just a feather, piercing the Whale's flesh with its talons, causing the Whale to dive to the bottom of the ocean, bringing the Thunderbird with it. Another depicts the Thunderbird lifting the Whale from the Earth then dropping it back down. Regional similarities in themes and characters suggests that these stories mutually describe

3096-540: A position of particular importance, as it was believed to be a more reliable medium for information transmission than prose. This belief stemmed from observations that highly structured language, with its rhythmic and phonetic patterns, tended to undergo fewer alterations during oral transmission. Each genre of rhymed poetry served distinct social and cultural functions. These range from spontaneous compositions at celebrations to carefully crafted historical accounts, political commentaries, and entertainment pieces. Among these,

3268-664: A pouch for children within its reach. One single story could provide dozens of lessons. Stories were also used as a means to assess whether traditional cultural ideas and practices are effective in tackling contemporary circumstances or if they should be revised. Native American storytelling is a collaborative experience between storyteller and listeners. Native American tribes generally have not had professional tribal storytellers marked by social status. Stories could and can be told by anyone, with each storyteller using their own vocal inflections, word choice, content, or form. Storytellers not only draw upon their own memories, but also upon

3440-566: A pre-existing Semitic stratum. The question of the origin of the Midianites still remains open. The sedentary people of pre-Islamic Eastern Arabia were mainly Aramaic , Arabic and to some degree Persian speakers while Syriac functioned as a liturgical language . In pre-Islamic times, the population of Eastern Arabia consisted of Christianized Arabs (including Abd al-Qays ), Aramean Christians, Persian-speaking Zoroastrians and Jewish agriculturalists. According to Robert Bertram Serjeant ,

3612-811: A reason behind indoctrination . Writing systems are not known to exist among Native North Americans before contact with Europeans except among some Mesoamerican cultures, and possibly the South American quipu and North American wampum , although those two are debatable. Oral storytelling traditions flourished in a context without the use of writing to record and preserve history, scientific knowledge, and social practices. While some stories were told for amusement and leisure, most functioned as practical lessons from tribal experience applied to immediate moral, social, psychological, and environmental issues. Stories fuse fictional, supernatural, or otherwise exaggerated characters and circumstances with real emotions and morals as

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3784-427: A society, with the latter much more likely to use oral tradition and oral literature even when a writing system has been developed or when having access to one. The Akan proverbs translated as "Ancient things in the ear" and "Ancient things are today" refer to present-day delivery and the past content, and as such oral traditions are both simultaneously expressions of the past and the present. Vansina says that to ignore

3956-589: A study published in February 2020, new evidence showed that both Budj Bim and Tower Hill volcanoes erupted between 34,000 and 40,000 years ago. Significantly, this is a "minimum age constraint for human presence in Victoria ", and also could be interpreted as evidence for the oral histories of the Gunditjmara people, an Aboriginal Australian people of south-western Victoria, which tell of volcanic eruptions being some of

4128-422: A verdant land that was part of a wide trading network; he recorded: "That in the island of Tylos, situated in the Persian Gulf, are large plantations of cotton tree, from which are manufactured clothes called sindones , a very different degrees of value, some being costly, others less expensive. The use of these is not confined to India, but extends to Arabia." The Greek historian, Theophrastus , states that much of

4300-399: A viable source of evidence for establishing the affiliation between cultural objects and Native Nations. Oral traditions face the challenge of accurate transmission and verifiability of the accurate version, particularly when the culture lacks written language or has limited access to writing tools. Oral cultures have employed various strategies that achieve this without writing. For example,

4472-576: A written intermediate, and they can also be applied to oral governance. Rudyard Kipling 's The Jungle Book provides an excellent demonstration of oral governance in the Law of the Jungle . Not only does grounding rules in oral proverbs allow for simple transmission and understanding, but it also legitimizes new rulings by allowing extrapolation. These stories, traditions, and proverbs are not static, but are often altered upon each transmission, barring any change to

4644-406: Is 0 m (0 ft)/year. Data from different 3D computational fluid mechanics models, typically with spatial resolution of 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) and depth each element equal to 1–10 metres (3.3–32.8 ft) are predominantly used in computer models. Before being given its present name, the Persian Gulf was called many different names. The Assyrians called it the "Bitter Sea". In 550 BC,

4816-623: Is about 56 km (35 mi) wide at its narrowest, in the Strait of Hormuz. Overall, the waters are very shallow, with a maximum depth of 90 metres (295 feet) and an average depth of 50 metres (164 feet). Countries with a coastline on the Persian Gulf are (clockwise, from north): Iran; Oman 's Musandam exclave ; the United Arab Emirates ; Saudi Arabia; Qatar , on a peninsula off the Saudi coast; Bahrain , an island nation; Kuwait ; and Iraq in

4988-457: Is also a key socio-cultural component in the practice of their traditional spiritualities , as well as mainstream Abrahamic religions . The prioritisation of the spoken word is evidenced by African societies having chosen to record history orally whilst some had developed or had access to a writing script . Jan Vansina differentiates between oral and literate civilisations, stating: "The attitude of members of an oral society toward speech

5160-730: Is also home to many migratory and local birds. There is great variation in color, size, and type of the bird species that call the Persian Gulf home. Concerns regarding the endangerment of the kalbaensis subspecies of the collared kingfishers were raised by conservationists over real estate development by the United Arab Emirates and Oman. Estimates from 2006 showed that only three viable nesting sites were available for this ancient bird, one located 80 miles (129 km) from Dubai, and two smaller sites in Oman. Such real estate expansion could prove devastating to this subspecies. A UN plan to protect

5332-561: Is commemorated as National Persian Gulf day in Iran . With the support of the British fleet, in 1622 'Abbās took the island of Hormuz from the Portuguese; much of the trade was diverted to the town of Bandar 'Abbās , which he had taken from the Portuguese in 1615 and had named after himself. The Persian Gulf was therefore opened to a flourishing commerce with the Portuguese, Dutch, French, Spanish and

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5504-622: Is connected to the Gulf of Oman in the east by the Strait of Hormuz ; and its western end is marked by the major river delta of the Shatt al-Arab , which carries the waters of the Euphrates and the Tigris . In Iran , this is called "Arvand Rud" (lit. Swift River ). Its length is 989 kilometres (615 miles), with Iran covering most of the northern coast and Saudi Arabia most of the southern coast. The Persian Gulf

5676-470: Is destroyed, or occupied by man-made structures. This has had a negative impact on the crustaceans that rely on the mangrove, and in turn on the species that feed on them. The Persian Gulf and its coastal areas are the world's largest single source of petroleum, and related industries dominate the region. Safaniya Oil Field , the world's largest offshore oilfield , is located in the Persian Gulf. Large gas finds have also been made, with Qatar and Iran sharing

5848-493: Is distinct from oral history , which is the recording of personal testimony of those who experienced historical eras or events. Oral tradition is also distinct from the study of orality , defined as thought and its verbal expression in societies where the technologies of literacy (writing and print) are unfamiliar. Folklore is one albeit not the only type of oral tradition. According to John Foley, oral tradition has been an ancient human tradition found in "all corners of

6020-475: Is locally named Ḥajar Asfal . Qataban was one of the ancient Yemeni kingdoms which thrived in the Beihan valley. Like the other Southern Arabian kingdoms, it gained great wealth from the trade of frankincense and myrrh incense, which were burned at altars. The capital of Qataban was named Timna and was located on the trade route which passed through the other kingdoms of Hadramaut, Saba and Ma'in. The chief deity of

6192-474: Is now Yemen's modern capital, Sana'a . According to South Arabian tradition, the eldest son of Noah , Shem , founded the city of Ma'rib. During Sabaean rule, Yemen was called " Arabia Felix " by the Romans, who were impressed by its wealth and prosperity. The Roman emperor Augustus sent a military expedition to conquer the "Arabia Felix", under the command of Aelius Gallus . After an unsuccessful siege of Ma'rib,

6364-513: Is performed. Furthermore, the climate in which traditions are told influences its content. In Burundi , traditions were short because most of them were told at informal gatherings and everyone had to have his say during the evening; in neighbouring Rwanda , many narratives were spun-out because a one-man professional had to entertain his patron for a whole evening, with every production checked by fellow specialists and errors punishable. Frequently, glosses or commentaries were presented parallel to

6536-532: Is similar to the reverence members of a literate society attach to the written word . If it is hallowed by authority or antiquity, the word will be treasured." For centuries in Europe, all data felt to be important were written down, with the most important texts prioritised, such as Bible , and only trivia, such as song, legend, anecdote, and proverbs remained unrecorded. In Africa, all the principal political, legal, social, and religious texts were transmitted orally. When

6708-848: Is taken to be a representation possibly of the Jewish king Malkīkarib Yuhaʾmin or more likely the Christian Esimiphaios (Samu Yafa'). The Aksumite intervention is connected with Dhu Nuwas , a Himyarite king who changed the state religion to Judaism and began to persecute the Christians in Yemen. Outraged, Kaleb , the Christian King of Aksum with the encouragement of the Byzantine Emperor Justin I invaded and annexed Yemen. The Aksumites controlled Himyar and attempted to invade Mecca in

6880-489: Is testified to by the preservation of the most ancient Indian religious text, the Ṛgveda ( c.  1500 BCE ). Research by Milman Parry and Albert Lord indicates that the verse of the Greek poet Homer has been passed down not by rote memorization but by " oral-formulaic composition ". In this process, extempore composition is aided by use of stock phrases or "formulas" (expressions that are used regularly "under

7052-456: Is the namesake of the 1991 Gulf War , the largely air- and land-based conflict that followed Iraq 's invasion of Kuwait . The United States' role in the Persian Gulf grew in the second half of the 20th century. On July 3, 1988, Iran Air Flight 655 was shot down by the U.S. military (which had mistaken the Airbus A300 operating the flight for an Iranian F-14 Tomcat ) while it was flying over

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7224-399: Is through speech or song and may include folktales , ballads , chants , prose or poetry . The information is mentally recorded by oral repositories , sometimes termed "walking libraries", who are usually also performers. Oral tradition is a medium of communication for a society to transmit oral history , oral literature , oral law and other knowledge across generations without

7396-604: The Achaemenid Empire established the first ancient empire in Persis ( Pars , or modern Fars , also known as Persia), in the southwestern region of the Iranian plateau . Consequently, in the Greek sources, the body of water that bordered this province came to be known as the "Persian Gulf". In the book of Nearchus known as Indikê (300 BC), the word "Persikon kolpos" is mentioned for multiple times meaning "Persian gulf". During

7568-935: The Baharna may be the Arabized "descendants of converts from the original population of Christians (Aramaeans), Jews and ancient Persians (Majus) inhabiting the island and cultivated coastal provinces of Eastern Arabia at the time of the Arab conquest". Other archaeological assemblages cannot be brought clearly into larger context, such as the Samad Late Iron Age . Zoroastrianism was also present in Eastern Arabia. The Zoroastrians of Eastern Arabia were known as " Majoos " in pre-Islamic times. The sedentary dialects of Eastern Arabia, including Bahrani Arabic , were influenced by Akkadian , Aramaic and Syriac languages. The Dilmun civilization

7740-519: The Bamums in Cameroon invented a script , the first to be written down was the royal chronicle and the code of customary law . Most African courts had archivists who learnt by heart the royal genealogy and history of the state, and served as its unwritten constitution . The performance of a tradition is accentuated and rendered alive by various gesture, social conventions and the unique occasion in which it

7912-590: The British Empire maintained varying degrees of political control over some of the Persian Gulf states, including the United Arab Emirates (originally called the Trucial States ) and at various times Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, and Qatar through the British Residency of the Persian Gulf . The Persian Gulf was a battlefield of the 1980–1988 Iran–Iraq War , in which each side attacked the other's oil tankers . It

8084-683: The Dilmun civilization. For a long time, the most important settlement on the southern coast of the Persian Gulf was Gerrha . In the second century the Lakhum tribe , who lived in what is now Yemen, migrated north and founded the Lakhmid Kingdom along the southern coast. Occasional ancient battles took place along the Persian Gulf coastlines, between the Sassanid Persian empire and the Lakhmid Kingdom,

8256-509: The Garden of Eden story. Dilmun appears first in Sumerian cuneiform clay tablets dated to the end of fourth millennium BCE, found in the temple of goddess Inanna , in the city of Uruk . The adjective "Dilmun" is used to describe a type of axe and one specific official; in addition there are lists of rations of wool issued to people connected with Dilmun. Dilmun was an important trading center from

8428-599: The Gulf of Aden , and the Gulf of Oman , dolphins and finless porpoises are the most common marine mammals in the waters, while larger whales and orcas are rarer today. Historically, whales had been abundant in the Persian Gulf before commercial hunts wiped them out. Whales were reduced even further by illegal mass hunts by the Soviet Union and Japan in the 1960s and 1970s. Along with Bryde's whales , these once common residents can still can be seen in deeper marginal seas such as Gulf of Aden, Israel coasts, and in

8600-487: The Gulf of Oman and off the coasts in deeper waters, and still migrate into the Red Sea, but mainly in deeper waters of outer seas. In 2017, waters of the Persian Gulf along Abu Dhabi were revealed to hold the world's largest population of Indo-Pacific humpbacked dolphins . One of the more unusual marine mammals living in the Persian Gulf is the dugong ( Dugong dugon ). Also called "sea cows", for their grazing habits and mild manner resembling livestock, dugongs have

8772-724: The Kassite dynasty in Mesopotamia. Dilmun, sometimes described as "the place where the sun rises" and "the Land of the Living", is the scene of some versions of the Eridu Genesis , and the place where the deified Sumerian hero of the flood, Utnapishtim ( Ziusudra ), was taken by the gods to live forever. Thorkild Jacobsen 's translation of the Eridu Genesis calls it "Mount Dilmun" which he locates as

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8944-742: The Kouyate line of griots . Griots often accompany their telling of oral tradition with a musical instrument, as the Epic of Sundiata is accompanied by the balafon , or as the kora accompanies other traditions. In modern times, some griots and descendants of griots have dropped their historian role and focus on music, with many finding success, however many still maintain their traditional roles. Albanian traditions have been handed down orally across generations. They have been preserved through traditional memory systems that have survived intact into modern times in Albania ,

9116-538: The Last Glacial Maximum ) combined with the shallow depth of the Gulf (on average around 35 metres (115 ft) and at max around 100 metres (330 ft) metres depth) most of the Persian Gulf was exposed as dry land, forming a flat floodplain where a number of rivers converged. This region may have served as an environmental refuge for early humans during periodic hyperarid climate oscillations. The modern marine Gulf

9288-469: The Marib Dam , was built ca. 700 BCE and provided irrigation for about 25,000 acres (101 km) of land and stood for over a millennium, finally collapsing in 570 CE after centuries of neglect. The first known inscriptions of Hadramaut are known from the 8th century BCE. It was first referenced by an outside civilization in an Old Sabaic inscription of Karab'il Watar from the early 7th century BCE, in which

9460-741: The Median , Achaemenid , Seleucid and Parthian empires. Under the leadership of the Achaemenid king Darius the Great (Darius I), Persian ships found their way to the Persian Gulf. Persian naval forces laid the foundation for a strong Persian maritime presence in Persian Gulf, that started with Darius I and existed until the arrival of the British East India Company , and the Royal Navy by mid-19th century AD. Persians were not only stationed on islands of

9632-707: The Nazi invasion . The piracy in the Persian Gulf was prevalent until the 19th century. Many of the most notable historical instances of piracy were perpetrated by the Al Qasimi tribe. This led to the British mounting the Persian Gulf campaign of 1819 . The campaign led to the signing of the General Maritime Treaty of 1820 between the British and the Sheikhs of what was then known as the ' Pirate Coast '. From 1763 until 1971,

9804-666: The Qur'an , old Arabian poetry , Assyrian annals (Tamudi), in a Greek temple inscription from the northwest Hejaz of 169 CE, in a 5th-century Byzantine source and in Old North Arabian graffiti within Tayma . They are also mentioned in the victory annals of the Neo-Assyrian King, Sargon II (8th century BCE), who defeated these people in a campaign in northern Arabia. The Greeks also refer to these people as "Tamudaei", i.e. "Thamud", in

9976-402: The Red Sea . Overall, the wildlife of the Persian Gulf is endangered from both global factors, and regional, local negligence. Most pollution is from ships; land generated pollution counts as the second most common source of pollution. Along the mediterranean regions of the Arabian Sea, including the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea , the Gulf of Kutch , the Gulf of Suez , the Gulf of Aqaba ,

10148-411: The Strait of Hormuz . Other species such as the critically endangered Arabian humpback whale , (also historically common in Gulf of Aden and increasingly sighted in the Red Sea since 2006, including in the Gulf of Aqaba), omura's whale , minke whale , and orca also swim into the Persian Gulf, while many other large species such as blue whale , sei , and sperm whales were once migrants into

10320-502: The Strait of Hormuz . Other significant islands in the Persian Gulf include Greater Tunb , Lesser Tunb and Kish administered by Iran, Bubiyan administered by Kuwait, Tarout administered by Saudi Arabia, and Dalma administered by UAE. In recent years, there has also been the addition of artificial islands for tourist attractions , such as The World Islands in Dubai and The Pearl Island in Doha . Persian Gulf islands are often also historically significant, having been used in

10492-424: The Western Allies used Iran as a conduit to transport military and industrial supply to the USSR, through a pathway known historically as the " Persian Corridor ". Britain utilized the Persian Gulf as the entry point for the supply chain in order to make use of the Trans-Iranian Railway . The Persian Gulf therefore became a critical maritime path through which the Allies transported equipment to Soviet Union against

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10664-406: The attributes of Allah —all-mighty, all-wise, all-knowing, all-high, etc.—often found as doublets at the end of a verse. Among the other repeated phrases are "Allah created the heavens and the earth" (found 19 times in the Quran). As much as one third of the Quran is made up of "oral formulas", according to Dundes' estimates. Bannister, using a computer database of (the original Arabic) words of

10836-643: The oral word and widespread use of oral tradition. Oral tradition is memories, knowledge, and expression held in common by a group over many generations: it is the long preservation of immediate or contemporaneous testimony . It may be defined as the recall and transmission of specific, preserved textual and cultural knowledge through vocal utterance. Oral tradition is usually popular, and can be exoteric or esoteric . It speaks to people according to their understanding, unveiling itself in accordance with their aptitudes. As an academic discipline , oral tradition refers both to objects and methods of study. It

11008-414: The "Persian Gulf war" and various other natural and artificial causes. Uncontrolled hunting has also had a negative impact on the survival of dugongs. After Australian waters, which are estimated to contain some 80,000 dugong inhabitants, the waters off Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, and Saudi Arabia make the Persian Gulf the second most important habitat for the species, hosting some 7,500 remaining dugongs. However,

11180-547: The 1960s. Rivalry between Iran and some Arab states, along with the emergence of pan-Arabism and Arab nationalism , has seen the name "Arabian Gulf" become predominant in most Arab countries. Names beyond these two have also been applied to or proposed for this body of water. The region of the Persian Gulf has been inhabited since the Paleolithic . During most of the Last Glacial Period (115,000–11,700 years Before Present ), due to lowered sea levels (reaching around 125 metres (410 ft) metres below present values during

11352-407: The 3rd century CE, the South Arabian kingdoms were in continuous conflict with one another. Gadarat (GDRT) of Aksum began to interfere in South Arabian affairs, signing an alliance with Saba, and a Himyarite text notes that Hadramaut and Qataban were also allied against the kingdom. As a result of this, the Aksumite Empire was able to capture the Himyarite capital of Thifar in the first quarter of

11524-408: The 3rd century. However, the alliances did not last, and Sha`ir Awtar of Saba unexpectedly turned on Hadramaut, allying again with Aksum and taking its capital in 225. Himyar then allied with Saba and invaded the newly taken Aksumite territories, retaking Thifar, which had been under the control of Gadarat's son Beygat, and pushing Aksum back into the Tihama . The standing relief image of a crowned man,

11696-486: The 5th century, Beth Qatraye was a major centre for Nestorian Christianity , which had come to dominate the southern shores of the Persian Gulf. As a sect, the Nestorians were often persecuted as heretics by the Byzantine Empire , but eastern Arabia was outside the Empire's control offering some safety. Several notable Nestorian writers originated from Beth Qatraye, including Isaac of Nineveh , Dadisho Qatraya , Gabriel of Qatar and Ahob of Qatar. Christianity's significance

11868-401: The 7th century CE, Eastern Arabia was controlled by two other Iranian dynasties of the Parthians and Sassanids . By about 250 BCE, the Seleucids lost their territories to Parthians , an Iranian tribe from Central Asia . The Parthian dynasty brought the Persian Gulf under their control and extended their influence as far as Oman. Because they needed to control the Persian Gulf trade route,

12040-558: The 8th and 7th century BCE, there was a close contact of cultures between the Kingdom of Dʿmt in Eritrea and northern Ethiopia and Saba. Though the civilization was indigenous and the royal inscriptions were written in a sort of proto- Ethiosemitic , there were also some Sabaean immigrants in the kingdom as evidenced by a few of the Dʿmt inscriptions. Agriculture in Yemen thrived during this time due to an advanced irrigation system which consisted of large water tunnels in mountains, and dams. The most impressive of these earthworks, known as

12212-427: The Bahrain archipelago that was earlier called Aval . The name, meaning 'ewe-fish' would appear to suggest that the name /Tulos/ is related to Hebrew /ṭāleh/ 'lamb' (Strong's 2924). The Christian name used for the region encompassing north-eastern Arabia was Beth Qatraye, or "the Isles". The name translates to 'region of the Qataris' in Syriac . It included Bahrain, Tarout Island , Al-Khatt, Al-Hasa , and Qatar. By

12384-520: The British merchants, who were granted particular privileges. The Ottoman Empire reasserted itself into Eastern Arabia in 1871. Under military and political pressure from the governor of the Ottoman Vilayet of Baghdad , Midhat Pasha , the ruling Al Thani tribe submitted peacefully to Ottoman rule. The Ottomans were forced to withdraw from the area with the start of World War I and the need for troops in various other frontiers. In World War II ,

12556-551: The Greek geographers, for instance, we read of two islands, named Tyrus or Tylos , and Arad, Bahrain , which boasted that they were the mother country of the Phoenicians, and exhibited relics of Phoenician temples." The people of Tyre in particular have long maintained Persian Gulf origins, and the similarity in the words "Tylos" and "Tyre" has been commented upon. However, there is little evidence of occupation at all in Bahrain during

12728-657: The Indian Ocean in the early 16th century following Vasco da Gama 's voyages of exploration saw them battle the Ottomans up the coast of the Persian Gulf. In 1521, a Portuguese force led by commander Antonio Correia invaded Bahrain to take control of the wealth created by its pearl industry. On April 29, 1602, Shāh Abbās , the Persian emperor of the Safavid Persian Empire , expelled the Portuguese from Bahrain, and that date

12900-536: The King of Hadramaut, Yada`'il, is mentioned as being one of his allies. When the Minaeans took control of the caravan routes in the 4th century BCE, however, Hadramaut became one of its confederates, probably because of commercial interests. It later became independent and was invaded by the growing Yemeni kingdom of Himyar toward the end of the 1st century BCE, but it was able to repel the attack. Hadramaut annexed Qataban in

13072-553: The Kingdom of Maīin, as far away as al-'Ula in northwestern Saudi Arabia and even on the island of Delos and Egypt. It was the first of the Yemeni kingdoms to end, and the Minaean language died around 100 CE . During Sabaean rule, trade and agriculture flourished, generating much wealth and prosperity. The Sabaean kingdom was located in Yemen, and its capital, Ma'rib , is located near what

13244-758: The Lihyanites fell into the hands of the Nabataeans around 65 BCE upon their seizure of Hegra then marching to Tayma , and finally to their capital Dedan in 9 BCE. Werner Cascel consider the Nabataean annexation of Lihyan was around 24 BCE under the reign of the Nabataeans king Aretas IV . The Thamud ( Arabic : ثمود ) was an ancient civilization in Hejaz , which was a flourished kingdom from 3000 BCE to 200 BCE. Recent archaeological work has revealed numerous Thamudic rock writings and pictures. They are mentioned in sources such as

13416-702: The Parthians established garrisons in the southern coast of Persian Gulf. In the 3rd century CE, the Sassanids succeeded the Parthians and held the area until the rise of Islam four centuries later. Ardashir , the first ruler of the Iranian Sassanians dynasty marched down the Persian Gulf to Oman and Bahrain and defeated Sanatruq (or Satiran), probably the Parthian governor of Eastern Arabia. He appointed his son Shapur I as governor of Eastern Arabia. Shapur constructed

13588-442: The Persian Gulf by the United Arab Emirates and Oman also raised concerns that habitats of species such as the hawksbill turtle , greater flamingo , and booted warbler may be destroyed. The dolphins that frequent the Persian Gulf in northern waters around Iran are also at risk. Recent statistics and observations show that dolphins are at danger of entrapment in purse seine fishing nets and exposure to chemical pollutants; perhaps

13760-422: The Persian Gulf in recent years. Aside from direct damage to the coral, the construction waste creates "traps" for marine life in which they are trapped and die. The result has been a dwindling population of the coral, and as a result a decrease in number of species that rely on the corals for their survival. A great example of this symbiosis are the mangroves in the Persian Gulf, which require tidal flow and

13932-505: The Persian Gulf, but also had ships often of 100 to 200 capacity patrolling empire's various rivers including Shatt-al-Arab , Tigris , and the Nile in the west, as well as Sind waterway, in India. The Achaemenid high naval command had established major naval bases located along Shatt al-Arab river, Bahrain, Oman, and Yemen. The Persian fleet would soon not only be used for peacekeeping purposes along

14104-453: The Persian Gulf, killing all 290 people on board. The United Kingdom maintains a profile in the region; in 2006 alone, over 1 million British nationals visited Dubai . In 2018, the UK opened a permanent military base, HMS  Jufair , in the Persian Gulf, the first since it withdrew from East of Suez in 1971 and is developing a support facility in Oman. Eight nations have coasts along

14276-448: The Persian Gulf. Corals are vital ecosystems that support multitude of marine species, and whose health directly reflects the health of the Persian Gulf. Recent years have seen a drastic decline in the coral population in the Persian Gulf, partially owing to global warming but mostly to irresponsible dumping by Arab states like the UAE and Bahrain. Construction garbage such as tires, cement, and chemical by products have found their way to

14448-506: The Persian Gulf. Alexander had planned to settle the eastern shores of the Persian Gulf with Greek empires, and although it is not clear that this happened on the scale he envisaged, Tylos was very much part of the Hellenised world: the language of the upper classes was Greek (although Aramaic was in everyday use), while Zeus was worshipped in the form of the Arabian sun-god Shams. Tylos even became

14620-551: The Persian Gulf: Bahrain , Iran , Iraq , Kuwait , Oman , Qatar , Saudi Arabia , and the United Arab Emirates . The Persian gulf's strategic location has made it an ideal place for human development over time. Today, many major cities of the Middle East are located in this region. The wildlife of the Persian Gulf is diverse, and entirely unique because of the Persian Gulf's geographic distribution and its isolation from

14792-399: The Persian empires were located in or around Persian Gulf. Siraf , an ancient Sassanid port that was located on the northern shore of the Persian Gulf, located in what is now the Iranian province of Bushehr , is an example of such commercial port. Siraf, was also significant in that it had a flourishing commercial trade with China by the fourth century, having first established connection with

14964-558: The Pharaohs ) canal from the river that is called Nile ( Pirâva ) and flows in Egypt ( Mudrâyâ ), to the sea that begins in Persia ( Pârsa ). Therefore, when this canal had been dug as I had ordered, ships went from Egypt through this canal to Persia, as I had intended. In Sassanian times, the Persian Gulf was called Pūdīg , which comes from Avestan : Pūitika , lit.   'cleansing',

15136-733: The Qatabanians was Amm , or "Uncle" and the people called themselves the "children of Amm". The Himyarites rebelled against Qataban and eventually united Southwestern Arabia (Hejaz and Yemen), controlling the Red Sea as well as the coasts of the Gulf of Aden . From their capital city, Ẓafār , the Himyarite kings launched successful military campaigns, and had stretched its domain at times as far east as eastern Yemen and as far north as Najran Together with their Kindite allies, it extended maximally as far north as Riyadh and as far east as Yabrin . During

15308-614: The Qur'anic text was generated." Dundes argues oral-formulaic composition is consistent with "the cultural context of Arabic oral tradition", quoting researchers who have found poetry reciters in the Najd (the region next to where the Quran was revealed) using "a common store of themes, motives, stock images, phraseology and prosodical options", and "a discursive and loosely structured" style "with no fixed beginning or end" and "no established sequence in which

15480-490: The Quran and of their "grammatical role, root, number, person, gender and so forth", estimates that depending on the length of the phrase searched, somewhere between 52% (three word phrases) and 23% (five word phrases) are oral formulas. Dundes reckons his estimates confirm "that the Quran was orally transmitted from its very beginnings". Bannister believes his estimates "provide strong corroborative evidence that oral composition should be seriously considered as we reflect upon how

15652-569: The Quran from memory, not reading, the predominant mode of teaching it to others. To this day the Quran is memorized by millions and its recitation can be heard throughout the Muslim world from recordings and mosque loudspeakers (during Ramadan ). Muslims state that some who teach memorization/recitation of the Quran constitute the end of an "un-broken chain" whose original teacher was Muhammad himself. It has been argued that "the Qur'an's rhythmic style and eloquent expression make it easy to memorize," and

15824-562: The Roman general retreated to Egypt, while his fleet destroyed the port of Aden in order to guarantee the Roman merchant route to India . The success of the kingdom was based on the cultivation and trade of spices and aromatics including frankincense and myrrh . These were exported to the Mediterranean , India, and Abyssinia , where they were greatly prized by many cultures, using camels on routes through Arabia, and to India by sea. During

15996-612: The Shatt al-Arab but would also open the door to trade with India via Persian Gulf. Following the fall of Achaemenid Empire, and after the fall of the Parthian Empire , the Sassanid Empire ruled the northern half and at times the southern half of the Persian Gulf. The Persian Gulf, along with the Silk Road , were important trade routes in the Sassanid Empire. Many of the trading ports of

16168-675: The Sumerian goddess of air and south wind had her home in Dilmun. It is also featured in the Epic of Gilgamesh . However, in the early epic " Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta " , the main events, which center on Enmerkar 's construction of the ziggurats in Uruk and Eridu , are described as taking place in a world "before Dilmun had yet been settled". Gerrha ( Arabic : جرهاء ), was an ancient city of Eastern Arabia, on

16340-480: The United Arab Emirates comprised the ecclesiastical province known as Beth Mazunaye. The name was derived from 'Mazun', the Persian name for Oman and the United Arab Emirates. During Minaean rule, the capital was at Karna (now known as Sa'dah ). Their other important city was Yathill (now known as Baraqish ). The Minaean Kingdom was centered in northwestern Yemen, with most of its cities lying along Wādī Madhab . Minaean inscriptions have been found far afield of

16512-508: The Vedangas. Each text was recited in a number of ways, to ensure that the different methods of recitation acted as a cross check on the other. Pierre-Sylvain Filliozat summarizes this as: These extraordinary retention techniques guaranteed an accurate Śruti, fixed across the generations, not just in terms of unaltered word order but also in terms of sound. That these methods have been effective,

16684-473: The ancient Greek and Roman civilizations were an exclusive product of an oral tradition. An Irish seanchaí (plural: seanchaithe ), meaning bearer of "old lore" , was a traditional Irish language storyteller (the Scottish Gaelic equivalent being the seanchaidh, anglicised as shanachie). The job of a seanchaí was to serve the head of a lineage by passing information orally from one generation to

16856-666: The ancient Greek name for Muharraq island. Herodotus 's account (written c. 440 BCE) refers to the Io and Europa myths. ( History, I:1). According to the Persians best informed in history, the Phoenicians began the quarrel. These people, who had formerly dwelt on the shores of the Erythraean Sea ( the eastern part of the Arabia peninsula ), having migrated to the Mediterranean and settled in

17028-585: The area as the "land of the Iobaritae" a region which legend later referred to as Ubar . The origin of the Midianites has not been established. Because of the Mycenaean motifs on what is referred to as Midianite pottery , some scholars including George Mendenhall, Peter Parr, and Beno Rothenberg have suggested that the Midianites were originally Sea Peoples who migrated from the Aegean region and imposed themselves on

17200-474: The area belonged to the Dilmun civilization, which was conquered by the Assyrian Empire in 709 BCE. Gerrha was the center of an Arab kingdom from approximately 650 BCE to circa 300 CE. The kingdom was attacked by Antiochus III the Great in 205-204 BCE, though it seems to have survived. It is currently unknown exactly when Gerrha fell, but the area was under Sassanid Persian control after 300 CE. Gerrha

17372-503: The basin started 15,000 years ago due to rising sea levels of the Holocene glacial retreat . The International Hydrographic Organization defines the Persian Gulf's southern limit as "The Northwestern limit of Gulf of Oman". This limit is defined as "A line joining Ràs Limah (25°57'N) on the coast of Arabia and Ràs al Kuh (25°48'N) on the coast of Iran (Persia)". This inland sea of some 251,000 square kilometres (96,912 sq mi)

17544-464: The bottom of the Strait, while ocean water with less salinity flows in through the top. Another study revealed the following numbers for water exchanges for the Persian Gulf: evaporation = –1.84 m (6.0 ft)/year, precipitation = 0.08 m (0.26 ft)/year, inflow from the Strait = 33.66 m (110.4 ft)/year, outflow from the Strait = -32.11 m (105.3 ft)/year, and the balance

17716-525: The collapse of the Kassite dynasty, Mesopotamian documents make no mention of Dilmun with the exception of Assyrian inscriptions dated to 1250 BCE which proclaimed the Assyrian king to be king of Dilmun and Meluhha . Assyrian inscriptions recorded tribute from Dilmun. There are other Assyrian inscriptions during the first millennium BCE indicating Assyrian sovereignty over Dilmun. Dilmun was also later on controlled by

17888-464: The corrupt and uncorrupted hadith, this other source of revelation is not nearly so free of corruption because of the hadith's great political and theological influence.) At least two non-Muslim scholars ( Alan Dundes and Andrew G. Bannister) have examined the possibility that the Quran was not just "recited orally, but actually composed orally". Bannister postulates that some parts of the Quran—such as

18060-438: The current number of dugongs is dwindling, and it is not clear how many are currently alive or what their reproductive trend is. Ambitious and uncalculated construction schemes, political unrest, ever-present international conflict, the most lucrative world supply of oil, and the lack of cooperation between Arab states and Iran, have had a negative impact on the survival of many marine species, including dugongs. The Persian Gulf

18232-636: The duality either way would be reductionistic. Vansina states: Persian Gulf The Persian Gulf , sometimes called the Arabian Gulf , is a mediterranean sea in West Asia . The body of water is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula . It is connected to the Gulf of Oman in the east by the Strait of Hormuz . The Shatt al-Arab river delta forms

18404-520: The earliest Semitic-speaking civilization in the eastern part was Dilmun , which arose around the end of the 4th millennium BCE and lasted to around 600 CE. Additionally, from around the second half of the 2nd millennium BCE, Southern Arabia was the home to a number of kingdoms, such as the Sabaeans and the Minaeans , and Eastern Arabia was inhabited by Semitic-speaking peoples who presumably migrated from

18576-441: The episodes must follow".{{ref|group=Note|Scholar Saad Sowayan referring to the genre of "Saudi Arabian historical oral narrative genre called suwalif ". The Catholic Church upholds that its teaching contained in its deposit of faith is transmitted not only through scripture , but as well as through sacred tradition . The Second Vatican Council affirmed in Dei verbum that

18748-623: The far east in 185 AD. Portuguese influence in the Persian Gulf lasted for 250 years; however, since the beginning of the 16th century, Portuguese dominance contended with the local powers and the Ottoman Empire. Following the arrival of the English and the Dutch, the Safavid Empire allied with the newcomers to contest Portuguese dominance of the seas in the 17th century. Portuguese expansion into

18920-714: The first by comparing inconsistencies in the transmitted versions of literature from various oral societies such as the Greek, Serbia and other cultures, then noting that the Vedic literature is too consistent and vast to have been composed and transmitted orally across generations, without being written down. In the Middle East, Arabic oral tradition has significantly influenced literary and cultural practices. Arabic oral tradition encompassed various forms of expression, including metrical poetry , unrhymed prose , rhymed prose ( saj' ), and prosimetrum —a combination of prose and poetry often employed in historical narratives. Poetry held

19092-622: The folk epics known as siyar (singular: sīra) were considered the most intricate. These prosimetric narratives, combining prose and verse, emerged in the early Middle Ages. While many such epics circulated historically, only one has survived as a sung oral poetic tradition: Sīrat Banī Hilāl . This epic recounts the westward migration and conquests of the Banu Hilal Bedouin tribe from the 10th to 12th centuries, culminating in their rule over parts of North Africa before their eventual defeat. The historical roots of Sīrat Banī Hilāl are evident in

19264-566: The generations. Many forms of recitation or pathas were designed to aid accuracy in recitation and the transmission of the Vedas and other knowledge texts from one generation to the next. All hymns in each Veda were recited in this way; for example, all 1,028 hymns with 10,600 verses of the Rigveda was preserved in this way; as were all other Vedas including the Principal Upanishads , as well as

19436-553: The head of the bay behind the islands of Bahrain. Bahrain was referred to by the Greeks as Tylos , the center of pearl trading, when Nearchus came to discover it serving under Alexander the Great . From the 6th to 3rd century BCE Bahrain was included in Persian Empire by Achaemenians , an Iranian dynasty . The Greek admiral Nearchus is believed to have been the first of Alexander's commanders to visit this islands, and he found

19608-812: The help of elaborate mnemonic techniques : According to Goody, the Vedic texts likely involved both a written and oral tradition, calling it a "parallel products of a literate society". Mostly recently, research shows that oral performance of (written) texts could be a philosophical activity in early China . It is a common knowledge in India that the primary Hindu books called Vedas are great example of Oral tradition. Pundits who memorized three Vedas were called Trivedis. Pundits who memorized four vedas were called Chaturvedis. By transferring knowledge from generation to generation Hindus protected their ancient Mantras in Vedas, which are basically Prose. The early Buddhist texts are also generally believed to be of oral tradition, with

19780-526: The human intellect, and the memory to retain information and sharpen imagination. Perhaps the most famous repository of oral tradition is the west African griot (named differently in different languages). The griot is a hereditary position and exists in Dyula , Soninke , Fula , Hausa , Songhai , Wolof , Serer , and Mossi societies among many others, although more famously in Mandinka society . They constitute

19952-459: The importance of storytelling in preserving Roman history . Valerius Maximus also references oral tradition in Memorable Doings and Sayings (2.1.10). Wiseman argues that celebratory performances served as a vital medium for transmitting Roman history and that such traditions evolved into written forms by the third century CE. He asserts that the history of figures like the house of Tarquin

20124-400: The international waters only breached by the narrow Strait of Hormuz . The Persian Gulf has hosted some of the most magnificent marine fauna and flora, some of which are near extirpation or at serious environmental risk. From corals, to dugongs , Persian Gulf is a diverse cradle for many species who depend on each other for survival. However, the Persian Gulf is not as biologically diverse as

20296-479: The introduction of text , oral tradition remained the only means of communication in order to establish societies as well as its institutions. Despite widespread comprehension of literacy in the recent century, oral tradition remains the dominant communicative means within the world. All indigenous African societies use oral tradition to learn their origin and history , civic and religious duties, crafts and skills, as well as traditional myths and legends . It

20468-510: The islands were covered in these cotton trees and that Tylos was famous for exporting walking canes engraved with emblems that were customarily carried in Babylon. Ares was also worshipped by the ancient Baharna and the Greek empires. It is not known whether Bahrain was part of the Seleucid Empire , although the archaeological site at Qalat Al Bahrain has been proposed as a Seleucid base in

20640-701: The land with maritime trade between diverse regions as the Indus Valley and Mesopotamia in the early period and China and the Mediterranean in the later period (from the 3rd to the 16th century CE). Dilmun was mentioned in two letters dated to the reign of Burna-Buriash II (c. 1370 BCE) recovered from Nippur , during the Kassite dynasty of Babylon . These letters were from a provincial official, Ilī-ippašra , in Dilmun to his friend Enlil-kidinni in Mesopotamia. The names referred to are Akkadian . These letters and other documents, hint at an administrative relationship between Dilmun and Babylon at that time. Following

20812-451: The last survivor of the Balkan traditions. "All ancient Greek literature", states Steve Reece, "was to some degree oral in nature, and the earliest literature was completely so". Homer 's epic poetry, states Michael Gagarin, "was largely composed, performed and transmitted orally". As folklores and legends were performed in front of distant audiences, the singers would substitute the names in

20984-479: The late fourth millennium to 1800 BCE. Dilmun was very prosperous during the first 300 years of the second millennium. Dilmun's commercial power began to decline between 2000 BCE and 1800 BCE because piracy flourished in the Persian Gulf. In 600 BCE, the Babylonians and later the Persians added Dilmun to their empires. The Dilmun civilization was the centre of commercial activities linking traditional agriculture of

21156-664: The lived experience of earthquakes and floods within tribal memory. According to one story from the Suquamish Tribe , Agate Pass was created when an earthquake expanded the channel as a result of an underwater battle between a serpent and bird. Other stories in the region depict the formation of glacial valleys and moraines and the occurrence of landslides, with stories being used in at least one case to identify and date earthquakes that occurred in 900 CE and 1700. Further examples include Arikara origin stories of emergence from an "underworld" of persistent darkness, which may represent

21328-487: The long and short syllables are repeated by certain rules, so that if an error or inadvertent change is made, an internal examination of the verse reveals the problem. Oral traditions can be passed on through plays and acting, as shown in modern-day Cameroon by the Graffis or Grasslanders who perform and deliver speeches to teach their history through oral tradition. Such strategies facilitate transmission of information without

21500-408: The mangroves as a biological reserve was ignored by the emirate of Sharjah, which allowed the dredging of a channel that bisects the wetland and construction of an adjacent concrete walkway. Environmental watchdogs in Arabia are few, and those that do advocate the wildlife are often silenced or ignored by developers of real estate many of whom have governmental connections. Real estate development in

21672-462: The mid-sixth millennium BC, when the Gulf was part of an extensive trade network that involved the Ubaid settlements in Mesopotamia and communities along the entire Gulf coast. For most of the early history of the settlements in the Persian Gulf, the southern shores were ruled by a series of nomadic tribes. During the end of the fourth millennium BC , the southern part of the Persian Gulf was dominated by

21844-418: The millennium have taught us anything, it must be that oral tradition never was the other we accused it of being; it never was the primitive, preliminary technology of communication we thought it to be. Rather, if the whole truth is told, oral tradition stands out as the single most dominant communicative technology of our species as both a historical fact and, in many areas still, a contemporary reality. Before

22016-461: The most alarming sign is the "mass suicides" committed by dolphins off Iran's Hormozgan province, which are not well understood, but are suspected to be linked with a deteriorating marine environment from water pollution from oil, sewage, and industrial run offs. The Persian Gulf is home to over 700 species of fish, most of which are native. Of these 700 species, more than 80% are reef associated. These reefs are primarily rocky, but there are also

22188-477: The most prominent of which was the invasion led by Shapur II against the Lakhmids, leading to Lakhmids' defeat, and advancement into Arabia, along the southern shorelines. During the seventh century the Sassanid Persian empire conquered the whole of the Persian Gulf, including southern and northern shores. Between 625 BC and 226 AD, the northern side was dominated by a succession of Persian empires including

22360-494: The narrative, sometimes answering questions from the audience to ensure understanding, although often someone would learn a tradition without asking their master questions and not really understand the meaning of its content, leading them to speculate in the commentary. Oral traditions only exist when they are told, except for in people's minds, and so the frequency of telling a tradition aids its preservation. These African ethnic groups also utilize oral tradition to develop and train

22532-416: The next about Irish folklore and history, particularly in medieval times. The potential for oral transmission of history in ancient Rome is evidenced primarily by Cicero , who discusses the significance of oral tradition in works such as Brutus , Tusculan Disputations , and On The Orator . While Cicero ’s reliance on Cato’s Origines may limit the breadth of his argument, he nonetheless highlights

22704-593: The northwest shoreline. The Persian Gulf has many fishing grounds, extensive reefs (mostly rocky, but also coral ), and abundant pearl oysters , however its ecology has been damaged by industrialization and oil spills . The Persian Gulf is in the Persian Gulf Basin , which is of Cenozoic origin and related to the subduction of the Arabian Plate under the Zagros Mountains . The current flooding of

22876-498: The northwest. Various small islands also lie within the Persian Gulf, some of which are the subject of territorial disputes between the states in the region. Exclusive economic zones in the Persian Gulf: Countries by coastline length : The Persian Gulf is home to many islands such as Bahrain, an Arab state. Geographically, the biggest island in the Persian Gulf is Qeshm island , belonging to Iran and located in

23048-468: The oldest oral traditions in existence. A basalt stone axe found underneath volcanic ash in 1947 had already proven that humans inhabited the region before the eruption of Tower Hill. Native American society was always reliant upon oral tradition, if not storytelling , in order to convey knowledge, morals and traditions amongst others, a trait Western settlers deemed as representing an inferior race without neither culture nor history, often cited as

23220-405: The oral passing of what had been revealed through Christ through their preaching as teachers. Jan Vansina , who specialised in the history of Central Africa , pioneered the study of oral tradition in his book Oral tradition as history (1985). Vansina differentiates between oral and literate civilisations, depending on whether emphasis is placed on the sanctity of the written or oral word in

23392-483: The overall meaning. In this way, the rules that govern the people are modified by the whole and not authored by a single entity. Ancient texts of Hinduism , Buddhism and Jainism were preserved and transmitted by an oral tradition. For example, the śrutis of Hinduism called the Vedas , the oldest of which trace back to the second millennium BCE. Michael Witzel explains this oral tradition as follows: The Vedic texts were orally composed and transmitted, without

23564-420: The parts which they now inhabit, began at once, they say, to adventure on long voyages, freighting their vessels with the wares of Egypt and Assyria... The Greek historian Strabo believed the Phoenicians originated from Eastern Arabia. Herodotus also believed that the homeland of the Phoenicians was Eastern Arabia. This theory was accepted by the 19th-century German classicist Arnold Heeren who said that: "In

23736-416: The past by colonial powers such as the Portuguese and the British in their trade or as acquisitions for their empires. The Persian Gulf is connected to the Indian Ocean through the Strait of Hormuz. Writing the water balance budget for the Persian Gulf, the inputs are river discharges from Iran and Iraq (estimated to be 2,000 cubic metres (71,000 cu ft) per second), as well as precipitation over

23908-419: The present-day distribution of groups claiming descent from the tribe across North Africa and parts of the Middle East. The epic's development into a cohesive narrative was first documented by the historian Ibn Khaldūn in the 14th century. In his writings, Ibn Khaldūn describes collecting stories and poems from nomadic Arabs, using these oral sources to discuss the merits of colloquial versus classical poetry and

24080-538: The remembrance of life in the Arctic Circle during the last ice age, and stories involving a "deep crevice", which may refer to the Grand Canyon. Despite such examples of agreement between geological and archeological records on one hand and Native oral records on the other, some scholars have cautioned against the historical validity of oral traditions because of their susceptibility to detail alteration over time and lack of precise dates. The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act considers oral traditions as

24252-586: The same metrical conditions, to express a particular essential idea"). In the case of the work of Homer, formulas included eos rhododaktylos ("rosy fingered dawn") and oinops pontos ("winedark sea") which fit in a modular fashion into the poetic form (in this case six-colon Greek hexameter). Since the development of this theory, of oral-formulaic composition has been "found in many different time periods and many different cultures", and according to another source (John Miles Foley) "touch[ed] on" over 100 "ancient, medieval and modern traditions." The most recent of

24424-404: The sea which is around 180 mm (7.1 in)/year in Qeshm Island . The evaporation of the sea is high, so that after considering river discharge and rain contributions, there is still a deficit of 416 cubic kilometres (100 cu mi) per year. This difference is supplied by currents at the Strait of Hormuz . The water from the Persian Gulf has a higher salinity, and therefore exits from

24596-417: The second half of the 2nd century CE, reaching its greatest size. The kingdom of Hadramaut was eventually conquered by the Himyarite king Shammar Yahri'sh around 300 CE, unifying all of the South Arabian kingdoms. The ancient Kingdom of Awsān in South Arabia (modern Yemen), with a capital at Ḥagar Yaḥirr in the wadi Markhah, to the south of the Wādī Bayḥān, is now marked by a tell or artificial mound, which

24768-457: The seven re-tellings of the story of the Iblis and Adam , and the repeated phrases "which of the favours of your Lord will you deny?" in sura 55—make more sense addressed to listeners than readers. Banister, Dundes and other scholars (Shabbir Akhtar, Angelika Neuwirth, Islam Dayeh) have also noted the large amount of "formulaic" phraseology in the Quran consistent with " oral-formulaic composition " mentioned above. The most common formulas are

24940-416: The site of Greek athletic contests. The name Tylos is thought to be a Hellenisation of the Semitic, Tilmun (from Dilmun ). The term Tylos was commonly used for the islands until Ptolemy's Geographia when the inhabitants are referred to as 'Thilouanoi'. Some place names in Bahrain go back to the Tylos era, for instance, the residential suburb of Arad in Muharraq , is believed to originate from "Arados",

25112-408: The southwest, such as the so-called Samad population . From 106 CE to 630 CE, Arabia's most northwestern areas were controlled by the Roman Empire , which governed it as Arabia Petraea . A few nodal points were controlled by the Iranian peoples , first under the Parthians and then under the Sasanians . Religion in pre-Islamic Arabia was diverse; although polytheism was prevalent, monotheism

25284-402: The starting point for a trader's route, making the location within the archipelago of islands comprising the modern Kingdom of Bahrain , particularly the main island of Bahrain itself, another possibility. Various other identifications of the site have been attempted, Jean Baptiste Bourguignon d'Anville choosing Qatif , Carsten Niebuhr preferring Kuwait and C Forster suggesting the ruins at

25456-408: The stories with local characters or rulers to give the stories a local flavor and thus connect with the audience, but making the historicity embedded in the oral tradition unreliable. The lack of surviving texts about the Greek and Roman religious traditions have led scholars to presume that these were ritualistic and transmitted as oral traditions, but some scholars disagree that the complex rituals in

25628-419: The storyteller's objective at the time. One's rendition of a story was often considered a response to another's rendition, with plot alterations suggesting alternative ways of applying traditional ideas to present conditions. Listeners might have heard the story told many times, or even may have told the same story themselves. This does not take away from a story's meaning, as curiosity about what happens next

25800-437: The surface of the water, as the corals are to biological health of the Persian Gulf in deeper waters. Mangroves' ability to survive the salt water through intricate molecular mechanisms, their unique reproductive cycle, and their ability to grow in the most oxygen-deprived waters have allowed them extensive growth in hostile areas of the Persian Gulf. However, with the advent of artificial island development, most of their habitat

25972-426: The teachings of Jesus Christ were initially passed on to early Christians by "the Apostles who, by their oral preaching, by example, and by observance handed on what they had received from the lips of Christ, from living with Him, and from what He did". The Catholic Church asserts that this mode of transmission of the faith persists through current-day bishops , who by right of apostolic succession , have continued

26144-409: The time when such migration had supposedly taken place. With the waning of Seleucid Greek power, Tylos was incorporated into Characene or Mesenian, the state founded in what today is Kuwait by Hyspaosines in 127 BCE. A building inscriptions found in Bahrain indicate that Hyspoasines occupied the islands, (and it also mention his wife, Thalassia). From the 3rd century BCE to arrival of Islam in

26316-599: The use of script, in an unbroken line of transmission from teacher to student that was formalized early on. This ensured an impeccable textual transmission superior to the classical texts of other cultures; it is, in fact, something like a tape-recording ... Not just the actual words, but even the long-lost musical (tonal) accent (as in old Greek or in Japanese) has been preserved up to the present. Ancient Indians developed techniques for listening, memorization and recitation of their knowledge, in schools called Gurukul , while maintaining exceptional accuracy of their knowledge across

26488-550: The value of oral histories in written historical works. The Torah and other ancient Jewish literature, the Judeo-Christian Bible and texts of early centuries of Christianity are rooted in an oral tradition, and the term "People of the Book" is a medieval construct. This is evidenced, for example, by the multiple scriptural statements by Paul admitting "previously remembered tradition which he received" orally. Australian Aboriginal culture has thrived on oral traditions and oral histories passed down through thousands of years. In

26660-425: The west side of the Persian Gulf . More accurately, the ancient city of Gerrha has been determined to have existed near or under the present fort of Uqair . This fort is 50 miles northeast of al-Hasa in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia . This site was first proposed by Robert Ernest Cheesman in 1924. Gerrha and Uqair are archaeological sites on the eastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula . Prior to Gerrha,

26832-440: The world". Modern archaeology has been unveiling evidence of the human efforts to preserve and transmit arts and knowledge that depended completely or partially on an oral tradition, across various cultures: The Judeo-Christian Bible reveals its oral traditional roots; medieval European manuscripts are penned by performing scribes; geometric vases from archaic Greece mirror Homer's oral style. (...) Indeed, if these final decades of

27004-406: The world's major religions, Islam claims two major sources of divine revelation—the Quran and hadith —compiled in written form relatively shortly after being revealed: The oral milieu in which the sources were revealed, and their oral form in general are important. The Arab poetry that preceded the Quran and the hadith were orally transmitted. Few Arabs were literate at the time and paper

27176-403: The writings of Aristotle , Ptolemy , and Pliny . Before the rise of Islam , approximately between 400 and 600 CE, the Thamud completely disappeared. Arab oral traditions Oral tradition , or oral lore , is a form of human communication in which knowledge, art, ideas and culture are received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another. The transmission

27348-401: The year 570 CE. Eastern Yemen remained allied to the Sassanids via tribal alliances with the Lakhmids , which later brought the Sassanid army into Yemen, ending the Aksumite period. The Persian king Khosrau I sent troops under the command of Vahriz ( Persian : اسپهبد وهرز ), who helped the semi-legendary Sayf ibn Dhi Yazan to drive the Aksumites out of Yemen. Southern Arabia became

27520-464: The years 550 to 330 BC, coinciding with the sovereignty of the Achaemenid Persian Empire over the Middle East area, especially the whole part of the Persian Gulf and some parts of the Arabian Peninsula , the name of "Persian ( Pars ) Sea" is widely found in the compiled written texts. At the same period, there is the inscription and engraving of Darius the Great, which belongs to the fifth century BC: King Darius says: I ordered to dig this ( Canal of

27692-411: Was 2 miles from the Persian Gulf near current day Hofuf . The researcher Abdulkhaliq Al Janbi argued in his book that Gerrha was most likely the ancient city of Hajar, located in modern-day Al Ahsa , Saudi Arabia . Al Janbi's theory is the most widely accepted one by modern scholars, although there are some difficulties with this argument given that Al Ahsa is 60 km inland and thus less likely to be

27864-420: Was a powerful and highly organized ancient Arab kingdom that played a vital cultural and economic role in the north-western region of the Arabian Peninsula and used Dadanitic language. The Lihyanite kingdom went through three different stages, the early phase of Lihyan Kingdom was around the 7th century BC, started as a Sheikdom of Dedan then developed into the Kingdom of Lihyan tribe. Some authors assert that

28036-406: Was an important trading center which at the height of its power controlled the Persian Gulf trading routes. The Sumerians regarded Dilmun as holy land . Dilmun is regarded as one of the oldest ancient civilizations in the Middle East . The Sumerians described Dilmun as a paradise garden in the Epic of Gilgamesh . The Sumerian tale of the garden paradise of Dilmun may have been an inspiration for

28208-399: Was described by Strabo as inhabited by Chaldean exiles from Babylon , who built their houses of salt and repaired them by the application of salt water. Pliny the Elder (lust. Nat. vi. 32) says it was 5 miles in circumference with towers built of square blocks of salt. Gerrha was destroyed by the Qarmatians in the end of the 9th century where all inhabitants were massacred (300,000). It

28380-424: Was diminished by the arrival of Islam in Eastern Arabia by 628. In 676, the bishops of Beth Qatraye stopped attending synods; although the practice of Christianity persisted in the region until the late 9th century. The dioceses of Beth Qatraye did not form an ecclesiastical province , except for a short period during the mid-to-late seventh century. They were instead subject to the Metropolitan of Fars . Oman and

28552-453: Was formed when sea level rose during the early Holocene , from around 12,000 to 6,000 years ago. The flooding of the Gulf may have stimulated the development of Neolithic farming cultures in regions of the Middle East adjacent to the Gulf. The world's oldest known civilization ( Sumer ) developed along the Persian Gulf and southern Mesopotamia . The oldest evidence in the world for seagoing vessels has been found at H3 in Kuwait, dating to

28724-412: Was known for his justification of the oral tradition and criticism of the written word. Stories are used to preserve and transmit both tribal history and environmental history, which are often closely linked. Native oral traditions in the Pacific Northwest, for example, describe natural disasters like earthquakes and tsunamis. Various cultures from Vancouver Island and Washington have stories describing

28896-434: Was less of a priority than hearing fresh perspectives on well-known themes and plots. Elder storytellers generally were not concerned with discrepancies between their version of historical events and neighboring tribes' version of similar events, such as in origin stories. Tribal stories are considered valid within the tribe's own frame of reference and tribal experience. The 19th century Oglala Lakota tribal member Four Guns

29068-451: Was likely passed down through oral storytelling for centuries before being recorded in literature. Although Flower critiques the lack of ancient evidence supporting Wiseman's broader claims, Wiseman maintains that dramatic narratives fundamentally shaped historiography. In Asia, the transmission of folklore, mythologies as well as scriptures in ancient India, in different Indian religions, was by oral tradition, preserved with precision with

29240-475: Was made so to facilitate the "preservation and remembrance" of the work. Islamic doctrine holds that from the time it was revealed to the present day, the Quran has not been altered, its continuity from divine revelation to its current written form insured by the large numbers of Muhammad's supporters who had reverently memorized the work, a careful compiling process and divine intervention. (Muslim scholars agree that although scholars have worked hard to separate

29412-434: Was not available in the Middle East. The written Quran is said to have been created in part through memorization by Muhammad's companions , and the decision to create a standard written work is said to have come after the death in battle ( Yamama ) of a large number of Muslims who had memorized the work. For centuries, copies of the Qurans were transcribed by hand, not printed, and their scarcity and expense made reciting

29584-451: Was still a notable practice among some of the region's inhabitants, such as the Jewish tribes . In addition to Arabian paganism, other religious practices in the region included those of the ancient Semitic religions , the Abrahamic religions (of which the emerging Islam would become a part), and the Iranian religions . The ʿĀd nation were known to the Greeks and Egyptians . Claudius Ptolemy 's Geographos (2nd century CE) refers to

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