Qatar’s modern history begins conventionally in 1766 with the migration to the peninsula of families from Kuwait, notably the Khalifah family. Their settlement at the new town of Al-Zubārah grew into a small pearl-diving and trade centre. In 1783 the Khalifah family led the conquest of nearby Bahrain, where they remained the ruling family throughout the 20th century. Following the departure of the Khalifah dynasty from Qatar, the country was ruled by a series of transitory sheikhs, the most famous of whom was Raḥmah ibn Jābir al-Jalāhimah, known particularly for his maritime warring with the Khalifah family and their associates.

Qatar came to the attention of the British in 1867 when a dispute between the Bahraini Khalifah, who continued to hold some claim to Al-Zubārah, and the Qatari residents escalated into a major confrontation, in the course of which Doha was virtually destroyed. Until the attack, Britain had viewed Qatar as a Bahraini dependency. It then signed a separate treaty with Mohammed ibn Thani in 1868, setting the course both for Qatar’s future independence and for the rule of the Thani dynasty, who until the treaty were only one among several important families on the peninsula.

Archaeological discoveries, excavations, inscriptions and collections of rare pottery pieces found in separate parts of the country indicate that the land of Qatar has been inhabited since the fourth millennium BC.

The Greek historian Herodotus mentioned in the fifth century BC that the first people to inhabit Qatar were the Canaanite tribes, which were famous for the arts of navigation and maritime trade, and that the Greek geographer Ptolemy included what he called (Qatar) in his map called (Arabia), which he believes is a reference to the fame of The Qatari city of Al Zubarah, which was once among the most important commercial ports in the Gulf region.

And as the sources of Arab-Islamic history tell, Qatar played an important role when its inhabitants participated in preparing the first naval fleet to transport armies during the Islamic conquests.

Qatar witnessed a period of economic prosperity under the Abbasid state, during the eighth century AH (the fourteenth century AD), as evidenced by the records written in the (Morob) castle located on the western coast, which represents the Abbasid architectural character.

And in the tenth century AH (the sixteenth century AD), the Qataris and the Turks allied to expel the Portuguese, then all regions in the Arabian Peninsula, including Qatar, were subject to the rule of the Ottoman Empire, and this continued for about four consecutive centuries.

The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 and its results led to the demise of Turkish rule from the country, and Qatar signed a treaty with Britain in 1916 that provided for the protection of Qatar’s lands and nationals, as the British influence in the country did not exceed the supervision of some administrative aspects.

Qatar was ruled by the Al-Thani family, which took its name from its dean, Thani bin Mohammed, the father of Sheikh Mohammed bin Thani, who was the first sheikh to exercise his actual authority in the Qatari peninsula during the mid-nineteenth century.

The Al-Thani family had settled around the oasis of “Jibreen” in southern Najd, before migrating to Qatar in the early eighteenth century. It is a branch of the Bani Tamim tribe, whose lineage goes back to Mudar bin Nizar. It initially settled in the north of the Qatari peninsula, then It moved to Doha in the middle of the nineteenth century under the leadership of Sheikh Mohammed bin Thani.