【Persian Gulf】Looking Back at the History of Natural Pearls: A Market That Enriched the Persian Gulf Region Long Before Oil

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Editor’s Note

This article explores the fascinating historical “pearl war” of the early 20th century, a geopolitical contest over the prized pearls of the Persian Gulf, as highlighted in a new exhibition in Paris.

N. Maduro face au juge :
A “Pearl War” in the Early 20th Century
“We can speak of a geopolitics of pearls and even a pearl war at the beginning of the 20th century,”

says Léonard Pouy, an art historian from the School of Jewelry Arts, who is behind the exhibition “Paris, Capital of the Pearl” at the Hôtel de Mercy-Argenteau. This was a war that notably pitted France against England, who long disputed the pearls of the Persian Gulf, the most beautiful in the world.
The region, long a British protectorate, gradually began to escape the control of the powers present. While a few “unsavory” French adventurers went to fish for these natural pearls along the Emirates, then called the “Pirate Coast,” the British protectorate worked relentlessly to secure the area for its own trade. But soon, the modern era and oil would change everything…

Paris as the Global Pearl Capital
“Today, the Emirates have become independent, sovereign nations. But in the 20th century, what we have completely forgotten is that, for several decades, Paris would become the world capital of the pearl trade, after a certain Léonard Rosenthal, in 1906, simply seized this market, right under the noses of the English.”
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But pearls for Europeans are very ancient. We remember, for example, the famous Flemish painting “Girl with a Pearl Earring.”
What is fantastic about pearls is that you can open a book of history or art history and, in any era, there are pearls. We speak of baroque pearls like baroque music. The term “baroque” was used at the time to define misshapen, irregular pearls. Few elements have had such an influence in human history.
Pearls have always fascinated due to their rarity. Of course, you cannot force nature. You have to wait for these generous oysters to offer us this precious treasure, which is absolutely not the result of a grain of sand. We must immediately dispel this cliché. It is a completely different phenomenon. It is the epithelial cells that produce nacre in oysters that detach from the upper part to create nacre inside; in fact, all mollusks create pearls, not just oysters, there are mussels, clams, all bivalves.
Statistically, about one oyster in 100 may contain a pearl. When we eat them, we sometimes feel like we’re chewing something, like sand. In reality, you are chewing nacre. So, one oyster in 100 would contain a pearl, but only one pearl in 100 would potentially be of sufficient quality to be used in jewelry.

Pearls as the Former Oil
“Yes, because pearls supported 99% of the inhabitants of the Gulf at that time. It was really the entirety of the economy or almost. Oil arrived and indeed changed things. Nevertheless, the potentially imminent end of oil in the Gulf has led people to turn back to pearls, so it is becoming a reality again. In fact, it never ceased to be a reality insofar as it is truly a constituent element of the culture of the Persian Gulf civilization. It is what unites all these territories. It is something that has always been there, which also settled families along the shores of the Gulf. So for them, it is an absolutely major cultural element.”
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And which seduced European civilization as a whole?
Exactly. From Pliny the Elder and his Natural History, we see that, even though there are pearls from India, Sri Lanka, he says that the pearls of the finest quality are those from the Gulf, the famous pearls of Cleopatra and Mark Antony.
And, beyond Antiquity?
The Portuguese and Spanish would leave the shores of the Old Continent, also in search of pearls. We always talk about the gold of Peru, the emeralds of Colombia. There are also pearls from Venezuela. “Venezuela” means “Little Venice.” And Venice evokes the place where all these pearls came to Europe from the East. And we suddenly discover pearls on the island of Margarita, “Margarita” means “pearl” in Latin, the pearl of South America. Christopher Columbus also returned to Venezuela for pearls.

The Oldest Known Pearl

Today, Léonard Pouy, what is the oldest pearl that exists? Do we know it?

Vague de froid : des habitants privés de chauffage (France 2)

There is a lively debate about where the oldest preserved pearl would be. Some theories push for Mexico, others for Abu Dhabi, for the Emirates. And we think it’s around 7,000 years BCE.
The exhibition “Paris, Capital of the Pearl” at the School of Jewelry Arts runs until June 1st.

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⏰ Published on: April 19, 2025