ABSTRACT
In 1822 an English traveller described Dubai (or Debai as it was known then) as follows:
A map from that time, titled Trigonometrical Plan of the Backwater of Debai, confi rms the above (fi gure 4.1). The city was indeed a miserable collection of mud huts, in what is now known as Bur Dubai, specifi cally the Shindagha area. This is the earliest record of Dubai – although some historical accounts have suggested that a settlement existed there at the end of the eighteenth century. The population in the fi rst quarter of the nineteenth century was estimated at 1,200 inhabitants – a small insignifi cant fi shing village whose inhabitants were viewed by the outside world as primitives in awe of the English. A series of events in the area, however, were to transform this backwater, setting the stage for a modern, contemporary metropolis.
