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The History of Persian gulf (Persian: تاریخ خلیج فارس) refers to a strategic, geopolitical, geographical, and historical place in the map called Persian gulf which is one of the most historical name of a place which one exist on the real Atlases. From Claudius Ptolemy's era until now, there are numerous maps, documents, pictures, books, antique artworks related to Persian gulf. The Persian gulf have one of the largest natural resources of oil, gas and fishery. With a numerous strategics ports, islands and tourist attractions. Qeshm Island is the greatest island of the gulf which belongs to Iran .

Persian Gulf surrounding Iran (Persia), Iraq, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Oman, with an area of 240,000 km, and a maximum depth of 90 meters, while the average depth is 50 meters. In Western countries it is normally referred to as the Persian Gulf.

The length of the gulf is 1,000 km, and the maximum width is 370 km. To the south, the coast line is low, while the coast on the Iranian side is mountainous. The temperatures are high, and the salt level is as high as 40%, which is the result of higher evaporation than supply of fresh water. The main fresh water resource is from Iraq, with the Shatt El Arab, the confluence of the rivers Euphrates, Tigris and Karun.

Through the Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf is connected to Gulf of Oman. There have been serious incidents that have affected the environment of the Persian Gulf from the beginning of the 20th century. While oil spills from the heavy traffic of oil tankers over years have been serious enough, oil spills from 1983, during the Iran-Iraq War, and in 1991, during the Persian Gulf War, have been catastrophic.

The Persian Gulf is a 600-mile-long arm of the Indian Ocean, which separates the Arabian peninsula from Iran (Persia).

Name history

President Obama mentioned the term Persian gulf in his Nowruz Message to the Iranian People at 2015.

A historical map of the Persian Gulf in a Dubai museum with the word Persian removed

Since the 1960s some Arab states have referred to this body of water as the Arabian Gulf. The Persian Gulf is surrounded by Iran (Persia), the predominant state in terms of population, and seven Arab states: Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman. The Persian Gulf is bounded by the Shatt al-Arab waterway in the north, which forms the frontier between Iran and Iraq, and the Strait of Hormuz in the south, which connects it to the Gulf of Oman and the Indian Ocean. The strait, which is 34 miles wide at its narrowest point, is the choke point of the Persian Gulf; through it pass the oil tankers which fuel the world economy.

Six of the eight littoral Arab states were created in the 20th century, and only Iran (Persia) and Oman have long histories as separate entities. The Persian Gulf countries today contain more than 118 million people, representing many ethnic, religious, linguistic and political communities. A major cleavage is that between Persian and Arab. Arabic, a Semitic language, is spoken in Iraq and the states of the peninsula. Iran (Persia) has an Aryan heritage, and its main language, Persian (Farsi), is an Indo-European language. Muslims of the Shiite sect predominate in Iran (Persia), Iraq and Bahrain, whereas Sunni Muslims form the majority in other Persian Gulf states.

In the Latin American geography books the Persian Gulf has been referred to as More Persicum or the Sea of Pars. The Latin term "Sinus Persicus" is equivalent to "Persischer Golf" in German, "Golf Persique", in French, "Golfo Persico" in Italian, that all mean "Persian Gulf". Prior to the stationing of the Aryan Iranians on Iran's Plateau, the Assyrians named the sea in their inscriptions as the "bitter sea" and this is the oldest name that was used for the Persian Gulf. An inscription of Darius found in the Suez Canal, used a phrase with a mention of river Pars which points to the same Persian Gulf. The Greek historian Herodotus in his book -History of Herodotus, 440 BCE- has repeatedly referred to the Red Sea as the "Arab Gulf". Straben, the Greek historian of the second half of the first century BCE and the first half of the first century AD wrote: Arabs are living between the Arabian Gulf and the Persian Gulf. Ptolemy, another renowned Greek geographer of the 2nd century has referred to the Red Sea as the "Arabicus Sinus", i.e. the Arabian Gulf. In the book `the world boundaries from the East to the West' which was written in the 4th century Hegira, the Red Sea was dubbed as the Arabian Gulf.

Today, the most common Arabic works refer to the sea in south Iran as the "Persian Gulf", including the world famous Arabic encyclopaedia `Al-Monjad' which is the most reliable source in this respect. There are undeniable legal evidences and documents in confirmation of the genuineness of the term Persian Gulf. From 1507 to 1560 in all the agreements that Portuguese, Spanish, British, Dutch, French and Germans concluded with the Iranian government or in any other political event everywhere there is a mention of the name Persian Gulf. Even in agreements with the participation of Arabs there is a mention of "Al-Khalij al-Farsi" in the Arabic texts and "Persian Gulf" in English texts, such as the document for the independence of Kuwait which was signed between the emir of Kuwait and representatives of the British government in the Persian Gulf. The document, which was signed on June 19, 1961 by Abdullah As-Salem As-Sabah, has been registered in the Secretariat of the United Nations according to article 102 of the U.N. Charter and can be invoked at any U.N. office. Since the beginning of the 20th century, the name "Persian Gulf" has been used in geography and history books with less reference to the "Fars Sea". Such a change has suggested the idea that the "Fars Sea" had been an old name substituted by a new term "Persian Gulf".

Persian Gulf naming dispute

a street in Cairo, Egypt with the Arabic name of the "Persian Gulf"

an Arabic document shows the term "Persian gulf" used by pan-Arabist leader of Egypt Jamal Abdel Nasser

Main article: Persian Gulf naming dispute

The Persian Gulf naming dispute is concerned with the name of the body of water known historically and internationally as the Persian Gulf, after the land of Persia (Iran). The name has been disputed by some Arab countries since the 1960s in a dispute with origins in the Muslim conquest of Persia and the emergence of pan-Arabism and Arab nationalism, resulting in the terms "Arabian Gulf" (used in some Arab countries), the Gulf, and other alternatives.

The beginning of 1930s was a turning point in the history of efforts for changing the name of Persian Gulf when Sir Charles Bellgrave, the British diplomatic envoy in Bahrain opened a file for the change in the name of the Persian Gulf and proposed the issue to the British Foreign Office. Even before the response of the British Foreign Office he used the fake name (in an attempt to retake Bahrain, the Tonbs, Abu Mosa, Sirri, Qeshm, Hengam and other islands belonging to Iran and to disclose and thwart the plot of disintegration of Khozestan).

Besides all the disputes that have been made over the name of the Persian Gulf, the United Nations with its 22 Arab member countries has on two occasions officially declared the unalterable name of the sea between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula as the Persian Gulf. The first announcement was made through the document UNAD, 311/Qen on March 5, 1971 and the second was UNLA 45.8.2 (C) on August 10, 1984. Moreover, the annual U.N. conference for coordination on the geographical names has emphatically repeated the name "Persian Gulf" each year.

National Persian Gulf Day

Main article: National Persian Gulf Day

Iran designated April 30 as the National Persian Gulf Day to highlight the fact that the waterway has been referred to by historians and ancient texts as 'Persian' since the Achaemenid Empire was established in what is now modern day Iran.

Prehistory era

Genesis

Persian Gulf is remaining from a big puddle in the past era of geology under the influence of pressure arising from volcanoes of Iran's Plateau and the resistant of Arabia's Plateau against these reactions have caused its creation and expansion. Geologists believe that at the Paleozoic of geology, about 500 million years ago, South Hemisphere's main lands had connected and formed a unit continent called Guadiana. This vast continent included from one side whole of Brazil and South Africa and from another side one part of India and one corner of Iran and Arabia and whole of Australia and South Pole.

About 140 million years ago, at the beginning of the Mesozoic, the split between Europe and America became wider and the split between India and Australia provided the situation for creation of Indian Ocean.45 million years ago, at the beginning of Cenozoic, Atlantic Ocean was discovered. Southern America was parted from Africa and Australia was laid away from South Pole too and moved toward East and then India Ocean was formed. The split between Asia and Africa brought about the elements of genesis of Oman Sea too. About 35million years ago, at the middle of the Cenozoic, the split of Macran was spread and India Peninsula shifted at the beginning toward East and then North and the tail of Macran split transformed to a thin gulf that prove the start of genesis of Pars sea.

Later in consequence of great central motions of Earth, has happened fractures and splits in this continent, India Ocean has extended and has joined to a very vast sea called Tetis. Scientists believe that this very vast and widespread sea had covered the whole of an extensive zone that nowadays is the location of Malaysia Islands and countries like India, Pakistan, Turkey, Iran and Caucasia. After thousands years (in Cenozoic) Alp, Alborz and Himalaya appeared by massive wrinkles on the earth and the vast sea cut to pieces and formed Black Sea, Caspian Sea, Oral Sea and etc. Following these transformations, 35 millions years ago, in the Cenozoic of geology, India Peninsula moved at the first toward East and then North and in consequence of motions in the tail of Macran split, Pars Sea was appeared. Red Sea and Aden Gulf and the mountains of vast Plateau of Iran are the product of other fractures and motions.

Pars Sea has been very wide and large at the beginning, as the major part of plains of Borazjan, Behbahan and Khuzestan of Iran to Zagross Mountains have been under the water till the end of the Cenozoic of geology and Tigris and Euphrates poured to this sea separately. South of Asia was threatened by aggressions and overrunning of India Ocean’s water after fractures in Cenozoic and decomposing of Guadiana for many times. Saran dib dissented from India by horrible tides and Malaya, India and Arabia formed a peninsula in the sequence of water transgression and Red Sea was linked to India Ocean by Babolmandab while it had only connected to Mediterranean after the decomposing of Tetis Sea .Nowadays Pars Sea with the latitude about 237473 KMM is the third vastest gulf of the world after Mexico Gulf and Hudson Bay. It must be said that studies of Parser in Persian Gulf shows more than six levels which it’s effects has detected in the depth of 100meters of Persian Gulf. He’s proved based on Morphologic examples that Persian Gulf has retreated to proximity Hormoz strait and dried at least 3 times so far. But this has occurred before 17-20 thousands years ago.

Pre-Elamete

The first Iranians may have lived much longer ago than widely believed because their towns and villages have long been lost 40 meters under the Persian Gulf.

A once fertile area, now submerged beneath the Persian Gulf, may have been home to some of the earliest human populations outside Africa, according to an article published last week in Current Anthropology.

Jeffrey Rose, an archaeologist with the University of Birmingham in Britain, says the area in and around this mid-Persian Gulf oasis may have been host to humans for over 100,000 years before it was flooded when the Indian Ocean poured in to form the Persian Gulf around 8,000 years ago.

Rose's hypothesis introduces a "new and substantial cast of characters" to the human history of the Near East, and suggests that humans may have established permanent settlements in the region thousands of years before current migration models suppose.

In recent years, archaeologists have turned up evidence of a wave of human settlements along the shores of the Persian Gulf dating back 7,500 years.

"Where before there had been but a handful of scattered hunting camps, suddenly, over 60 new archaeological sites appear virtually overnight," Rose said. "These settlements boast well-built, permanent stone houses, long-distance trade networks, elaborately decorated pottery, domesticated animals, and even evidence for one of the oldest boats in the world."

But how could such highly developed settlements pop up so quickly, with no precursor populations to be found in the archaeological record? Rose believes the evidence of those preceding populations is missing because it's under the Persian Gulf.

"Perhaps it is no coincidence that the founding of such remarkably well developed communities along the shoreline corresponds with the flooding of the Persian Gulf basin around 8,000 years ago," Rose said. "These new colonists may have come from the heart of the Gulf, displaced by rising water levels that plunged the once fertile landscape beneath the waters of the Indian Ocean."

These well-developed societies would then have moved away from the rising waters onto what is now the shore of the Persian Gulf.

Historical sea level data show that, prior to the flood, the Persian Gulf basin would have been above water beginning about 75,000 years ago. And it would have been an ideal refuge from the harsh deserts surrounding it, with fresh water supplied by the Tigris, Euphrates, Karun, and Wadi Batin Rivers, as well as by underground springs.

When conditions were at their driest in the surrounding hinterlands, the oasis would have been at its largest in terms of exposed land area. At its peak, the exposed basin would have been about the size of Great Britain, Rose says.

Evidence is also emerging that modern humans could have been in the region even before the oasis was above water. Recently discovered archaeological sites in Yemen and Oman have yielded a stone tool style that is distinct from the East African tradition.

That raises the possibility that humans were established on the southern part of the Arabian Peninsula beginning as far back as 100,000 years ago or more, Rose says. That is far earlier than the estimates generated by several recent migration models, which place the first successful migration into Arabia between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

The oasis in the middle of what is now the Persian Gulf would have been available to these early migrants, and would have provided "a sanctuary throughout the Ice Ages when much of the region was rendered uninhabitable due to hyper-aridity," Rose said. "The presence of human groups in the oasis fundamentally alters our understanding of human emergence and cultural evolution in the ancient Near East."

It also hints that vital pieces of the human evolutionary puzzle may be hidden in the depths of the Persian Gulf.

History era

Modern era

British Empire appearance

1600-1914: Ottoman Empire: The Arab people who live in what is now Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, and Kuwait were part of the Turkish Empire. This empire, which expanded into Europe and in 1683 almost took Vienna, had become stagnant and weak in the 19th century. The opening of the Suez Canal by the British and French (1869) and Germany's Berlin-to-Baghdad railroad (1903) were important new challenges to the 300-year-old Empire. But European empire builders soon fell to fighting each other.

1914-1918: GREAT WAR or WORLD WAR I: Turkey, an ally of Germany, was attacked from the south by the British. Besides holding the Suez Canal, the British had a new and strong interest in the Persian Gulf because their navy converted from coal to oil in 1913 and now depended on huge oil concessions in Persia (now Iran). Britain attacked the Turks from bases in Egypt and drove north through Palestine (now Israel). Guerilla war organized in the desert to the east by a British officer, Lawrence of Arabia. He helped the tribes to unite to expel the Turks and then build an Arab nation.

1916: The French and British governments negotiated the Sykes-Picot agreement dividing the Middle East between them. Thus during and immediately following the war Britain and France seized and consolidated their colonial bounty. Britain thus created Iraq, Kuwait, and Jordan; much of Palestine was offered to the Zionists. France took the northwest corner and created Syria and Lebanon. Arabia to the south was considered useless desert. Its vast oil potential was unknown.

1919-1945: BRITISH and FRENCH EMPIRES: Britain controlled Iraq while British, French and American oil companies secured valuable concessions throughout the country. France in Syria favoured the Christian minority on the coast, but were strongly resisted by the 80% Moslem population. Arab rebellions in 1925-6 were crushed by the French using artillery and tanks against Damascus. Palestine saw major Arab-Jewish clashes in '29 and '37; martial law under 30,000 British troops '38, in move to cut Jewish immigration. 1939-1945: WORLD WAR II: Weakens Britain and France.

1945: Policy planners in the State Department, referring to situation in the Middle East, report that the US has won "one of the greatest material prizes in the history of war."

1946: French troops leave Syria and Lebanon. Britain maintains a strong hold on the Suez Canal and Gulf oil with major bases. (After the '56 Suez crisis when Nasser of Egypt nationalized the Canal and the conspiracy by France, Britain, and Israel to attack Egypt failed through lack of US support, Britain withdrew most of her military from the Middle East.) President Truman threatened to drop "superbomb" on Moscow unless it immediately withdrew from two provinces of northern Iran occupied during the war with US permission.

1956-PRESENT: US EMPIRE: Growing US oil assets in the Gulf had been protected by British force since 1919, but in the '50s the US began to take over. In 1951 Dr. Mossadegh elected to power in Iran, announced the nationalization of the highly profitable British oil industry. Mossadegh overthrown '53 by a CIA-engineered coup (run by Norman Schwarzkopf, Sr.). Shah Pahlevi, backed by US, held power for next 26 years, while Iran became main US Cold War base in the Gulf. Under the US puppet Shah, "Iran had the highest rate of death penalties in the world, no valid system of civilian courts, and a history of torture which is beyond belief" (Martin Ennals, Secretary General, Amnesty International).

1958: Civil war in Lebanon sparked by CIA intervention in national elections. Iraq's prowestern govt. ousted by army under Kassim; oil industry is nationalized. Ostensibly seeking to contain conflict in Lebanon, US lands tactical nuclear weapons in Beruit as part of the effort to contain the Iraqi revolution.

1961: Kuwait, an oil-rich sheikdom protected by the UK which drew its borders, is given independence by the British.

1967: US threatens to initiate nuclear war to ensure Israel's victory in the Six Day War.

1968: Saddam Hussein seizes power in Iraq.

1970: Richard Nixon places US forces on nuclear alert during Jordan's civil war.

1973: Henry Kissinger places US forces on nuclear alert in the last hours of the October War.

1979, Jan. 16: Shah flies from Iran after defeat by the one power that he and US could not crush: the Moslem Mullahs led by Ayatollah Khomeini. Nov. 4: Teheran: US Embassy seized; 46 hostages taken. No US/British base in Gulf for first time in 65 years.

1980: Carter Doctrine that the US will use "any means necessary" to maintain dominance in the Middle East. Iraq attacks Iran with the covert support of US, Britain, and USSR. Over one million killed in this war. No UN action.

1981: Reagan reiterates the Carter Doctrine, moves to create the Rapid Deployment Force (now Central Command) and founds regional infrastructure of military bases.

1984-85: US sells Iraq chemical and biological warfare agents to tip the balance in the Iraq-Iran War.

1988, Aug.: Cease-fire, patrolled by UN (including Canadian) troops.

1990, Aug. 2: Iraq seizes Kuwait. Aug. 6: Major US troop deployment in Gulf.

1991, Jan. 16: Desert Storm. US/British forces return to the Gulf, threatening nuclear attack and using depleted uranium shells

Importance

The Persian Gulf, while important as an international trade route connecting the Middle East to Africa, India and China, has its own distinct cultural identity. The Persian Gulf has historically been an integrated region characterized by constant interchange of people, commerce and religious movements. Before the modern era, peoples of the region shared a maritime culture based on pearling, fishing and long-distance trade, and many tribes moved freely back and forth. The Persian Gulf's orientation was outward, and its seamen maintained close ties with the Indian subcontinent and East Africa. As in many parts of the Middle East, society in the Arabian peninsula was tribally organized and tribes were the key to forming modern states. Until the 20th century, tribes also played an important political role in Persia and Ottoman Iraq.

The modern strategic importance of the Persian Gulf dates from the mid-19th century, when three great empires confronted each other there: British India, Tsarist Russia and Ottoman Turkey. The British established political control over much of the Persian Gulf in the early 1800s and kept it for 150 years, establishing a tradition of outside involvement that persists today. Britain did not establish formal protectorates (as in the case, for example, of Egypt), but did enter into treaties with local shaikhs offering them protection in return for control over their foreign policy. In 1899 Kuwait, then considered a dependency of the Ottomans, was brought into this system. After World War I, the political map of much of the Middle East was redrawn as the Ottoman Empire was replaced by modern states, including Turkey, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The small Arab shaikhdoms on the western shore of the Persian Gulf were under British protection until 1971 (in the case of Kuwait, 1961). Iran (Persia) was never a colony, and for much of the 19th and 20th century Britain competed with Russia for influence there.

The present importance of the Persian Gulf stems from its massive energy deposits. Sixty-five percent of the world's known oil reserves are located in the Persian Gulf countries, which produce over a third of the world's daily output. (By comparison, North America holds 8.5 percent of the world's reserves.) Saudi Arabia ranks first in reserves, with 261 billion barrels, followed by Iraq (100 billion), the U.A.E. (98 billion), Kuwait (96.5 billion), and Iran (89 billion). The Persian Gulf is also rich in natural gas, with Iran and Qatar holding the world's second and third-largest reserves, respectively.

Over the past century, the traditional way of life in the Arab states has been irrevocably changed, due in large measure to the British intervention and the rise of the oil industry. The common bonds of the Persian Gulf peoples have been overshadowed by political differences between the new states. The modernization process, which lasted for centuries in the West, has been compressed into decades, putting great stress on traditional societies. Because of the way in which the modern states were formed and boundaries arbitrarily delimited, in many cases tribal and family loyalties, and religious, linguistic and ethnic identities are more important than state citizenship. These factors, along with economic disparities, the rise and fall of oil prices, political Islam and the influence of revolutionary Iran (Persia), as well as the disruptive policies of Iraq, have contributed to the present-day tensions in the region.