Ceramics connection

"But the previous research couldn't establish the importance of these finds," Paluch says. "The collaboration with the team from the Palace Museum has resulted in a deeper understanding of the Chinese ceramics found.

"It is also very helpful in developing a broader understanding of the wider trade network in the Gulf and the Indian Ocean involving Chinese ceramics and the strategic role Ras al-Khaimah may have played."

He adds that a good sequence of Chinese ceramics in a very well-preserved stratified deposit in Ras al-Khaimah also provides information beyond porcelain ware. The ongoing joint excavation has unearthed a residential complex with courtyards, storage rooms and kitchens.

"The research is also helping in understanding the changing patterns of the settlement in the hinterland and a wider consumption of Chinese ceramics."

Because of its mountainous landscape in which a seasonal river provides irrigation, Ras al-Khaimah is the only emirate in the UAE with a long history of agriculture.

Even before Jurfa emerged as a major harbor, there was another port called Cush in Ras al-Khaimah whose boom time was during the Arabian Abbasid Dynasty (750-1258). It partially explains why Chinese ceramics produced in the Changsha kiln in today's Hunan province during Tang rule were also found in the emirate.

"They prove booming trade in general," Wang says. "However, as archaeologists, we care more about how exactly they went there: Were they taken to the Gulf region as antique artworks or as popular export products shipped overseas immediately after they were produced? This can only be answered by stratigraphic studies."

Wang has found the soil stratum from the reign of Ming emperor Zhengde (1505-21), which shows traces of human settlement with clear chronological information.