Bidaa Bint Saud

, 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 aflaj (systems of underground and surface waterways). 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 aflaj (singular falaj) waterways 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. 3 miles) 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...