A Sequence of Iranīan Ports: Islamic Archaeology in the Persian Gulf

The historical geography of the Persian Gulf has benefited from archaeological research to the extent that patterns of occupation begin to be evident. This is more dramatic in the Islamic and pre-Islamic periods, when some writings of the Arabic geographers come to testify to the settlements along this littoral and amplify the archaeological evidence. The following paper will examine this evidence and the implications for political domination from the northern, Iranian coasts, or more properly, from Fars province, and the economic or better the environmental instability which lead to shifting of primacy among these ports