This work offers a photographic record, along with an accompanying commentary, of the seven shaikhdoms of Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Umm all Quwain, Fujairah, Ras al Khaima and Ajman before they combined to form the modern sophisticated state of the United Arab Emirates. Up to the exploitation of oil in the 1960s, the traditional pattern of life had remained largely undisturbed for hundreds of years.