page_title: Bidaa Bint Saud
section_title: Bronze Age tombs
hierarchical_section_title: Bidaa Bint Saud / Bronze Age tombs
caption_attribution_description: English: A Hafit period entombment, one of a number littering the Eastern slopes of Bidda Bint Saud.
context_page_description: Bidaa Bint Saud is an archaeological site in Al-Ain Region, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, notable for its Hafit Period tombs, Iron Age irrigation systems and rare remains of an Iron Age building thought to have been a distribution centre for water from two falajes. It is a listed UN World Heritage site. Finds from the site are displayed at Al Ain National Museum.
  The dating of pottery from the falaj irrigation systems found at the site demonstrates a south-eastern Arabian origin for this distinctive system of irrigation, previously thought by many scholars to have been Persian in origin. The dating of aflaj in Bidaa bint Saud, Al Ain and Buraimi, both of which are in the historical region of Tawam, has been placed several centuries prior to the Achaemenid Empire, which had previously been credited with the innovation.
  The site, located some 15 kilometres north of Al Ain, is thought to have been a stopping place on a long-established caravan route from settlements at Al Ain to the Northern Emirates. The rocky outcrop of Garn bin Saud looms some 40 m above the site and is dotted with burial remains.
context_section_description: A number of distinctive Hafit Period (3200 to 2600 BCE) tombs litter the eastern face of Garn bint Saud, similar to those found at sites such as Jebel Hafit, Jebel Al-Buhais and Al-Buraimi. These have collapsed and would originally have had domed roofs. It is likely the location of the Hafit remains, the Hafit people being nomadic and pastoral, is because of a source of groundwater, a pattern supported by other Hafit era inland finds, including those at Jebel Hafit and Jebel Al-Buhais.
caption: A Hafit period beehive tomb at Bidaa Bint Saud
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