Cultural Sites of Al Ain (Hafit, Hili, Bidaa Bint Saud and Oases Areas)
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How it came to be
Al Ain lies inland in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, on the border with Oman. At the foot of Jebel Hafeet to the south stand circular stone tombs of about 3200 to 2600 BC, which gave their name to the Hafit period. In 1959 the Danish archaeologist P. V. Glob, shown around by Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, began excavating them.
At Hili the settlement known as Hili 8, from around 3000 BC, has yielded some of the earliest evidence of oasis farming in southeastern Arabia, with wheat, barley and the date palm. The aflaj irrigation channels at Hili, dug in the first millennium BC, are among the oldest known examples of the technique. Bidaa Bint Saud also has Hafit-period tombs.
The property also includes wells, towers, palaces and adobe houses and administrative buildings, showing the shift from hunting and gathering to settled life in the desert. Al Ain Oasis covers more than 1,200 hectares with over 147,000 date palms. The sites were inscribed in 2011, the first World Heritage property in the United Arab Emirates.
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