The Bahārna (Arabic: بحارنة) are the indigenous Arab inhabitants of Bahrain. They inhabited the area even before the arrival of the Banu Utbah in the 18th century which the Bahraini royal family descends from.^[1] They are generally regarded by scholars and Bahraini people to be the original inhabitants of the Bahrain archipelago.^[2] Most Bahraini citizens are Baharna. Regions with most of the population are in Eastern Arabia (Bahrain, Qatif, al-Hasa), with significant populations in Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Oman and Iraq. Some Bahranis historically immigrated to other parts of the world.^[3][4]

Origin

The Baharna are of various Arab tribes. The majority of the Baharna are from the Abd Al-Qays tribe, as-well as the Anizah tribe which is a cousin tribe the Abd Al-Qays and are both part of the greater Rab’ia tribe. Many are also from the Bani Tamim tribe, such as the ruler of Bahrain during the early islamic era, and Al-Azd.^[5] This has also been confirmed by countless authenticated DNA tests.^[6][7][8]

The Baharna with the surname Al-Jamri(الجمري) trace their lineage to the Jamarat Al-Arab tribes (جمرات العرب) from the Qahtan tribe.^[9]

Etymology

The term Bahrani serves to distinguish the Bahrana from other Bahraini ethnic groups, such as the ethnic Persian Bahrainis who fall under the term Ajam, as well as from the Sunni Arabs in Bahrain who are known as Al Arab ("Arabs"), such as Bani Utbah.^[10] In the United Arab Emirates, the Baharna make up 5% of Emiratis and are generally descended from Baharna coming around 100–200 years ago.^{[citation needed]}

In Arabic, bahrayn is the dual form of bahr ("sea"), so al-Bahrayn means "the Two Seas". However, which two seas were originally intended remains in dispute.^[11] The term appears five times in the Qur'an, but does not refer to the modern island—originally known to the Arabs as "Awal".

Today, Bahrain's "two seas" are instead generally taken to be the bay east and west of the island,^[12] the seas north and south of the island,^{[citation needed]} or the salt and fresh water present above and below the ground.^[13] In addition to wells, there are places in the sea north of Bahrain where fresh water bubbles up in the middle of the salt water, noted by visitors since antiquity.^[14]

An alternate theory offered by al-Ahsa was that the two seas were the Persian Gulf and a peaceful lake on the mainland Near Al-Ahsa, known as Al-Asfar Lake;still another provided by Ismail ibn Hammad al-Jawhari is that the more formal name Bahri (lit. "belonging to the sea") would have been misunderstood and so was opted against.^[13]