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Concept
Dhofar Governorate
Summary
The Dhofar Governorate (Muḥāfaẓat Ẓufār) is the largest of the 11 Governorates in the Sultanate of Oman in terms of area. It lies in Southern Oman, on the eastern border with Yemen's Al Mahrah Governorate and the southern border with Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province. It is a rather mountainous area that covers and had a population of 416,458 as of the 2020 census. The largest city and capital is Salalah. Historically, the region was a source of frankincense. The local dialect of Arabic is Dhofari Arabic, which is distinct from that of the rest of Oman and from Yemen.
At Aybut Al-Auwal ("First Aybut") in Wadi Aybut (west-central Nejd), a site was discovered in 2011 containing more than 100 surface scatters of stone tools belonging to a regionally specific lithic industry, the late Nubian Complex, known previously only from Northeast Africa. Two optically stimulated luminescence age estimates place the Arabian Nubian Complex at 106,000 years old. This provides evidence for a distinct Middle Stone Age technocomplex in southern Arabia around the earlier part of the Marine Isotope Stage 5. Bronze Age sites of the Dhofar Survey include tomb complexes found at Hodor (al-Hudfir).
Venetian merchant Marco Polo wrote of Dhofar in The Travels of Marco Polo (c. 1300), stating:
Dufar is a great and noble and fine city. The people are Saracens [Muslims] and have a Count for their chief who is subject to the Soldan [Sultan] of Aden. Much white incense is produced here, and I will tell you how it grows. The trees are like small fir trees; these are notched with a knife in several places, and from these notches the incense is exuded. Sometimes it flows from the tree without any notch; this is by reason of the great heat of the sun there. This Dhafar is supposed to be the Sephar of Genesis, x. 30.
Dhofar was a major exporter of frankincense in ancient times, with some of it being traded as far as China.
Al-Baleed (also spelled Al Blaid), an area near Salalah which contains numerous archeological finds, used to serve as the home of the Manjawi Civilization from the 12th-to-16th centuries.
Official source
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