With the text of all the early treaties with the rulers of the Gulf

Aitchison, C[harles] U[mpherston] (ed.). A Collection of Treaties, Engagements and Sanads relating to India and Neighbouring Countries [...]. Vol. XII containing the treaties, &c., relating to Persia, the Arab Principalities in the Persian Gulf, and Oman. Revised and continued up to the 1st June 1906.

€ 45,000.00

A rare official compilation of treaties and agreements between Britain and the countries and states of the Arabian Peninsula and the Gulf. Forming part of the fourth edition of this important government-issued series, this 12th volume records, most importantly, the treaties made with the tribes of the Gulf - the Wahhabis, the territory of Bahrain, and the so-called "Maritime Tribes" of the Arabian coast, or the "Trucial Arab Chiefs". A lengthy introduction (pp. 137-155) gives a detailed overview of the geopolitical situation in the Gulf area from the viewpoint of the British Government in the early 20th century, including an account of the "Kawasim, who have occupied the province of Sir from the earliest times", and their supposed previous involvement with piracy and the plunder of British vessels (which the editors, curiously, principally blame on the influence of the "turbulent sect" of the Wahhabis, who supposedly had drawn the Qawasim "into the[ir] piratical projects"). The treaties paint a vivid picture of the political relations between the increasingly dominant British Government and the independent tribes who ruled the Gulf coast. Significantly, the contemporary rulers and their territories (in then-current spelling: "Shargah", "Ras-ool-Kheimah", "Ummool-Keiwey", "Debay", "Ejman", and "Aboo Dhebbee") are noted by name. Of principal importance is the agreement of peace between "Sheikh-ul Mus Sheikh Ameer Sultan bin Suggur, bin Kashid, Joasmee", and the East India Company, signed at Bandar Abbas on February 6th, 1806, whereby the EIC and the Sultan declared to honour their respective flags, property, dependents and subjects. This is followed by the Preliminary Treaty with Sultan bin Saqer Al Qasimi, signed at Ras-al-Kaimah on January 6th, 1820 (following General Keir's controversial 1819 expedition to the Arabian Gulf), by which the Sultan agreed to surrender "towers, guns, and vessels which are in Shargah, Imam, Umm-ool-Keiweyn, and their dependencies"), and by similar treaties with the other Sheikhs of the coast. The General Treaty that followed established "a lasting peace between the British Government and the Arab tribes", a "cessation of plunder and piracy by land and sea" and - famously - the design of the "Blood-Red Arab Flag", as it has been called, "a red flag in a border of white, the breadth of the white in the border being equal to the breadth of the red, known in the British Navy by the title of white pierced red" (with a black-and-white printed illustration in the margin). Sultan bin Saqer Al Qasimi signed the treaty at midday on Friday, the 4th of February 1820. Also contained is the text of the agreements entered into by Sultan bin Saqer on April 17th 1838, July 3rd 1839, and April 30th, 1847 (for the prevention of the slave trade), of the ten-year Maritime Truce signed on June 1st 1843 by Sultan bin Saqer and the other Sheikhs of the Arabian coast, and the ensuing Treaty of Peace in Perpetuity which was entered into in 1853. Later documents include the translation of a letter from Salem bin Sultan Al Qasimi to the British monarch's resident in the Gulf (1873) and an agreement for the prohibition of traffic in arms signed by Sheikh Saqer bin Khalid of Sharjah in November 1902.

Issued by authority of the Foreign Department, but not as a confidential publication, the book would nevertheless have circulated chiefly within a limited official readership. The survival of such working copies in commerce is accordingly uncommon.