The Persian Gulf in History—the product of a conference of the same name held in Limassol, Cyprus, in October 2004—is an important and unique book. It deals with a region that draws a lot of attention from analysts dealing with oil and geopolitics in the modern Middle East: the Persian Gulf. Historians have also dealt with the Persian Gulf, but their studies have largely been political histories of individual states within narrowly defined time periods. Lawrence Potter's edited volume provides a fresh and original examination of the history of this region by employing a different lens and an interdisciplinary approach. In his introduction, Potter encourages the reader to view the Gulf not as a collection of individual states but rather as a “civilizational unit” based on a shared culture, extensive trade networks, and the fluid movement of people inside and outside the region, which should be studied over a long period of time.

The volume brings together a collection of essays of outstanding importance and quality, each written by a leading authority in his or her respective field. The essays provide in-depth historical analyses of the Persian Gulf, and some of the authors utilize multidisciplinary approaches, drawing on archaeology, anthropology, and political science. Much of the scholarship is based on a wide variety of sources such as archival documents in addition to pioneering and detailed studies in Persian, Arabic, Portuguese, and Ottoman that alone could inform the reader and encourage him or her to set a different research agenda for the Persian Gulf's history.

The book is divided into three sections. The first section, “Gulf History and Society,” delves into the history of the Gulf from antiquity (D. T. Potts) through late antiquity (Touraj Daryaee) and the early Islamic period (Donald Whitcomb); it also focuses on the development of focal centers of economic exchange and marine trade in the 16th and 17th centuries, such as the Kingdom of Hormuz (Mohammad Bagher Vosoughi) and the port of Basra (Rudi Matthee). The section traces the evolution and way of life of Arabs in the khalīj (William Beeman) and provides a much needed analysis of Arab communities in the Iranian coastal region (Shahnaz Razieh Nadjmabadi).

The second section, “The Gulf and the Indian Ocean,” suggests that any consideration of what distinguishes Arabs in the khalīj from others in the Middle East must highlight the Gulf's historic ties with India (Patricia Risso). For thousands of years, seafarers, merchants, artisans, and missionaries traded their goods, ideas, and faiths between these two regions. India has been the Persian Gulf's primary trading partner and source of supplies such as foodstuffs and wood, which were critical to the survival and prosperity of people in the khalīj. This section focuses on the Gulf's outward orientation toward the Indian Ocean (M. Redha Bhacker) and important aspects of the relations between the peoples of the East African coast and those of the Persian Gulf (Abdul Sheriff). Providing examples of events and incidents from the Indian Ocean, the Gulf, South Asia, and East Africa, this section shows how people conceptualized and practiced a “pluralistic” notion of civilization. The raison d'être for such interaction and communication across the Indian Ocean was trade. The diverse essays in this section provide the reader with a fascinating and very informative picture of the economic and social relations and intercultural exchanges that took place between the Persian Gulf, the Indian Ocean, and the Swahili Coast over the longue durée.

The third section, “The Role of Outsiders,” highlights the role that outsiders—including the Portuguese (Joāo Teles e Cunha), Dutch (Willem Floor), Ottomans (Frederick Anscombe), British (J. E. Peterson), and Americans (Gary Sick)—have played in the Gulf. The book in general and this section in particular are very informative and analytical with regard to the Iranian element in the Gulf. The book encourages an understanding of Gulf history that does not undervalue Iran's influence throughout the different periods. It suggests, however, that in reconstructing the history of the Gulf, one should leave behind polemics such as whether the region's proper name should be the “Persian Gulf” or the “Arabian Gulf,” since the area has always been ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse. The Gulf should not be considered a mere annex of either Iran or the Arab world.

The Persian Gulf in History represents a signal achievement in the study of the Gulf as a single unit of analysis. The book's distinctive combination of perspectives, approaches, and topics represents an unprecedented collaborative effort that helps to reframe our understanding of the Gulf and that leaves scholars with fruitful inspiration for new inquiries. What does “cultural pluralism” or “multiculturalism” mean? How did it develop in the Gulf? Who contributed to its development? How is it relevant to contemporary society? What are the unique markers of khalījī culture?

The Persian Gulf in History is a very timely volume. It challenges the methods scholars have used to understand and represent the Persian Gulf. The inability to conceptualize the Gulf's history as a unified whole has resulted in limited and partial historical representations of the Gulf. This book instead focuses on the society of the entire Gulf littoral and emphasizes the connections between the Arab and Persian coasts. It will be indispensable reading for anyone interested in a region whose strategic, political, economic, and financial importance has grown spectacularly in the last four decades. The book is well put together and extremely readable. It should be required for any university-level course on Gulf history and deserves to be on the bookshelf of any serious Gulf scholar.