Qalhāt () is a village in

Oman Oman, officially the Sultanate of Oman, is a country located on the southeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in West Asia and the Middle East. It shares land borders with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. Oman’s coastline ...

, over 20 km north of Sur. The residential area is to the northwest of Wādī Ḥilm (), and the ruins of the ancient city are located to the southeast. The ancient city is referred to as Calatu by

Marco Polo Marco Polo (; ; ; 8 January 1324) was a Republic of Venice, Venetian merchant, explorer and writer who travelled through Asia along the Silk Road between 1271 and 1295. His travels are recorded in ''The Travels of Marco Polo'' (also known a ...

and as Calha in the map of

Abraham Ortelius Abraham Ortelius (; also Ortels, Orthellius, Wortels; 4 or 14 April 152728 June 1598) was a cartographer, geographer, and cosmographer from Antwerp in the Spanish Netherlands. He is recognized as the creator of the list of atlases, first modern ...

Site description

visited Qalhat in the 13th century, referring to it as Calatu.

Ibn Battuta Ibn Battuta (; 24 February 13041368/1369), was a Maghrebi traveller, explorer and scholar. Over a period of 30 years from 1325 to 1354, he visited much of Africa, the Middle East, Asia and the Iberian Peninsula. Near the end of his life, Ibn ...

visited the city in the 14th century, noting that it had "fine bazaars and one of the most beautiful mosques." He further noted the mosque was built by

Bibi Bibi is a given name, nickname and surname. People with the nickname or stage name * Bibi Andersson (1935–2019), Swedish actress * Bibi (artist) (born 1964), French visual artist Fabrice Cahoreau * Bibi Baskin (born 1952), Irish former TV an ...

Maryam and included walls of qashani. Bibi Maryam continued to rule Qalhat and Hurmuz after the death of her husband Ayaz in 1311 or 1312.

Zheng He Zheng He (also romanized Cheng Ho; 1371–1433/1435) was a Chinese eunuch, admiral and diplomat from the early Ming dynasty, who is often regarded as the greatest admiral in History of China, Chinese history. Born into a Muslims, Muslim famil ...

visited the city in the 15th century, and his crew called it 加剌哈 ( Taihu Wu: ka-la-ha;

Hokkien Hokkien ( , ) is a Varieties of Chinese, variety of the Southern Min group of Chinese language, Chinese languages. Native to and originating from the Minnan region in the southeastern part of Fujian in southeastern China, it is also referred ...

: ka-lat-ha;

Cantonese Cantonese is the traditional prestige variety of Yue Chinese, a Sinitic language belonging to the Sino-Tibetan language family. It originated in the city of Guangzhou (formerly known as Canton) and its surrounding Pearl River Delta. While th ...

: gaa-laat-haa). Qalhat served as an important stop in the wider

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or approximately 20% of the water area of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia (continent), ...

trade network, and was also the second city of the Kingdom of Ormus. By 1507 when it was captured by

Afonso de Albuquerque Afonso de Albuquerque, 1st Duke of Goa ( – 16 December 1515), was a Portuguese general, admiral, statesman and ''conquistador''. He served as viceroy of Portuguese India from 1509 to 1515, during which he expanded Portuguese influence across ...

on behalf of the

Portuguese Empire The Portuguese Empire was a colonial empire that existed between 1415 and 1999. In conjunction with the Spanish Empire, it ushered in the European Age of Discovery. It achieved a global scale, controlling vast portions of the Americas, Africa ...

, the city was already in decline as trade shifted to

Muscat Muscat (, ) is the capital and most populous city in Oman. It is the seat of the Governorate of Muscat. According to the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI), the population of the Muscat Governorate in 2022 was 1.72 million. ...

. Covering more than , Qalhat was surrounded by fortified walls that contained houses and shops. Very little remains of the ancient city, save for the now dome-less

mausoleum A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be considered a type o ...

of Bibi Maryam. Artifacts from as far away as Persia and China were found on-site. Recently, a research conducted by geoarchaeologists of the

University of Bonn The University of Bonn, officially the Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (), is a public research university in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the () on 18 October 1818 by Frederick Willi ...

conclude that earthquake activity along the most prominent structural element, the Qalhat Fault, is a plausible reason for the decline of the medieval city.

World Heritage Site

This site was added to the

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

World Heritage World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

Tentative List on July 4, 1988 in the Cultural category. The ancient city became a

World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

in 2018.

Qalhat LNG Terminal

The Oman LNG LLC S.A.O.C. owned Qalhat LNG Terminal is situated at the Port of Qalhat.Gas Media Releases

References

{{Authority control Archaeological sites in Oman Populated places in Oman World Heritage Sites in Oman