Pearling or genital beading is a form of body modification, the practice of permanently inserting small beads made of various materials beneath the skin of the genitals—of the labia, or of the shaft or foreskin of the penis.As well as being an aesthetic practice, this is usually intended to enhance the sexual pleasure of partners during vaginal or anal intercourse. Pearls from the Gulf Region -- then mistakenly called fish eyes -- have been traded throughout the world since the Mesopotamian civilization in 2000 B.C. Cultural Advice: Visitors should be aware that the exhibition and website may include names, images and voices of deceased people that may cause sadness or distress to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Siyadi Shops, owned by Siyadi family who were famous for pearl merchandise, were the centre for production and sale of pearl jewellery in Bahrain during the pearling era. Natural pearl necklaces and earrings are depicted in the works of the Renaissance masters, and the use of natural pearls as ornaments in crowns and tiaras, hair adornments and brooches through the ages illustrate their universal appeal. Especially in Muharraq, the storehouses developed a high level of specialisation. At Nickol Bay, decorative pearl shells (Riji) made by local Aborigines from Pinctada maxima, were noted by European explorers. History of Qatari Pearling. The departure of most of the men each diving season meant the Islamic rule that women shall remain in the company of a close male relative (mahram) could not be fulfilled. Through careful resource management, industry best practice and a respectful partnership with Nature, Australia is today recognised as the source of the world’s rarest and most valuable pearls. Pearl jewellery has been an object of intense desire since ancient times. Exploding demand for pearls beginning in the 19th century produced a single product economy in Bahrain, centred in its then capital and the capital of Arabian Gulf pearling, Muharraq. Beginning in 1868 in the Torres Strait, the industry had a boom and bust cycle, with high points being experienced in the 1870s and 1890s. Cultural customs stemming from the pearling era provide important avenues for celebrating and remembering the pearling era. By continuing to visit this site, you agree to the use of these cookies. During the long history of pearls, the principal oyster beds lay in the Persian Gulf, along the coasts of India and Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), and in the Red Sea. The main centres for the industry were Broome, Cossack, Onslow and Shark Bay, but it was Broome which emerged as the leader for pearling by the time of Federation. More than a ton were searched in order to find at least 3-4 quality beds. The few drugs that were kept on the dhows included senna (a laxative prepared from the dried pods of a cassia tree) which was mixed with raisins and tamarind (a sticky brown acidic pulp from the pod of the tamarind tree) to provide a sort of first aid. “This magnificent early 20th-century house was constructed as a family home,” she says. Before the beginning of the 20th century, the only means of obtaining pearls was by manually gathering very large numbers of pearl oysters or mussels from the ocean floor or lake or river bottom. Life on the dhows, as one hauler recounts, “was beautiful, and very nice” in spite of its hardship and strict discipline. The locally influenced styles are combined with the regional influences from Persia, India, the Arabian Peninsula, Iraq and East Africa. Three types of loans were made to the pearling crews. Pierced pearls as items of jewellery dating to around 5,000 BC have been found at coastal sites in the Arabian Gulf region. A private photographic collection of the Jardine-Vidgen Family has been uncovered and includes some never seen before images. For less wealthy women, however, everything changed. The millennia-long tradition of crafting fine jewellery with natural Bahrain pearls is still being continued in Bahrain by a handful of artisans. An important group of pearling songs is called Fijiri, which includes the genres of Sangini, Bahri, Adsani, Mkholfi, Haddadi, Hassawi, Zumayyah and Dan. The bivalves were then brought to the surface, opened, and the tissues searched. Copyright © 2018 Blackbird International Ltd, Pearling in Cape York and the Torres Strait. If a boat’s water supply became exhausted, fresh water could be obtained from one of the many underwater springs in the Gulf, or alternately be delivered, together with food resources, by special supply boats operated by local merchants. These connect the centre of each farij to the seashore and the market which were crucial elements in the pearling economy. A large pearling ship, however, typically carried 60-80 sailors, each of whom was associated with a different profession or rank, and had a special role and responsibility. For centuries, Muharraq was the Arabian Gulf’s pearling capital: it was the Gulf’s most active and prosperous pearling city; the largest number of pearl divers lived here; virtually everybody was involved directly in pearling activities or its supply industries; and Muharraq boasted the largest fleet of pearling vessels. A black flag flying from a dhow’s mast indicated a death had occurred on board and that the crew would not return complete. The surviving traces of Bahrain’s tangible and intangible pearling heritage are rare testaments to the Gulf’s trans-regional, socio-economic connections before the discovery of oil. “Pearling, Testimony of an Island Economy” is a serial nomination consisting of 15 property components: three vast oyster beds located in the northern territorial waters of Bahrain, one seashore site at the southern tip of Bahrain’s Muharraq Island, and nine clusters of historic buildings consisting of seventeen architectural structures embedded in the urban fabric of … Aboriginal peoples along the northern coast harvested and traded pearl shell more than 20,000 years ago. Men, women and children were forcibly removed from their camps. On Muharraq Island, however, there was no organised social institution for medical care. The popular story of pearling begins in the 1860's however Indigenous use of pearl shell goes back 20,000 years. The Chinese thought the moon gave them their power to glow. In contrast, around the turn of the twentieth century several of the Gulf’s smaller pearling centres, such as Dubai, were almost entirely barasti settlements (temporary houses made of palm material). The London Missionary Society set out to convert people of the Southwest Pacific to Christianity from the 1840s. Pearl diving may have been happening more than 7,000 years ago The history of pearl diving in the UAE is ancient, with archaeologists finding evidence of this tradition dating back more than 7,000 years ago. Pearls were treasured in the ancient world, especially by Arabs, Romans, and Egyptians. History 1987-1989. Fortunately, the performance of the songs which accompanied pearling activities on board the dhows lives on in the surviving music houses (dur) of Bahrain. The loans system was closely regulated by customary law, as were the returns due to the creditor. An Islamic scholar widely followed in Bahrain allowed an exception, saying the women could be left behind provided their safety could be guaranteed. Tahitian pearl's rich history helps explain their allure and ever-increasing demand in today’s market. Nearly all the pearls in commerce originated from those few sources. With an innate instinct and extraordinary gift to peel away outer imperfections, TB could take a seemingly worthless pearl and reveal the priceless treasure inside. The house will host an exhibition presenting its prototypical design features conveying the extraordinary role of women within the pearling society. In 1868 on the Brig Julia Percy, Captain William Banner and his South Sea Islander crew harvested the first commercial quantity of pearl shell from the reefs of Tudu. For centuries, Muharraq was the Arabian Gulf’s pearling capital: it was the Gulf’s most active and prosperous pearling city; the largest number of pearl divers lived here; Yousif Abdulrahman Fakhro and Mahmood Mohammed Al-Alawi were among those, who gained economic strength through the supply trade. Pearling was enormously important to the economy of northern Australia. Several music genres and numerous songs are directly connected with pearling. The responsibilities of these youthful assistants included serving, collecting water from the springs, fetching coals, and washing the clothes of the crew. By 1900 the town supported a whole fleet of pearl luggers(the number of boats peaked at 403 in 1913) and a population of 1000 whites and 3000 people of Asians/South-East Asian origin: Malays, Chinese, Japanese, Filipinos and others mixed with Europeans and Aborigines... Chinatown was a chaotic place, especially when the luggers were i… Many of the men among the dhow crews started out in pearling as young tabbab. Thus began the boom times, but a massive decline in production occurred during World War II when Broome’s foreign labour was sent to indentured camps and much of the pearling fleet was torched to save it falling into enemy hands. The wealthiest women would have noticed little real difference, as they were continuously attended to by their female servants. On land, storehouses (‘amarat) offered a wide range of merchandise, including hardware, equipment for boat building and, in later years,  general goods such as building materials, textiles and groceries. They would spend the money to maintain th… For millennia, pearling and its associated trades shaped the economy and culture of Bahrain’s island society. One of the largest and most elaborate buildings on the trail, the two-story Bin Matar House, reflects the importance of that family in the pearl business, explains its director, Melissa Enders-Bhattia. In that year a ship, the Flying Foam sailed from Fremantle to Nickol Bay, not far from Roeburn. The pearling industry changed rapidly in the late 1880s with the introduction of hardhat divers wearing copper helmets and canvas dive suits. The Modern History of Pearling 1860-1890s Commercial pearling commences in Australia With the discovery of the world's richest pearling beds off the Western Australian coast, Broome quickly rises to become a main source for one of the most important industries in … Home > Culture & History > Settlement History > Pearling The Shark Bay pearl oyster, Pinctada albina, spawned a rush not unlike the gold rushes of the 1800s. Al-Alawi House, an urban component of the World Heritage site, depicts how the wealth deriving from supply trade impacted the architecture of a middle class merchant’s house. Unavoidably, the social status influenced the way women experienced this annual mass exodus of males from Muharraq Island. In the same street, don’t miss the Pearl Luggers Museum (pearlluggers.com.au), which gives an evocative account of the divers’ lives and displays rigged pearling luggers. Muharraq developed into a city from a number of core settlements, each based on tribal and family alliances and centred around a mosque or tribal gathering place (majlis). The history of pearling in the gulf can be traced back to the first century AD. At the outset of war in 1914, the pearling industry in Broome was severely affected as many of the town’s inhabitants enlisted to go and fight. As a result, music and oral stories remain uniquely centred in the pearling memory of Bahrain.