Gold Souk

In front of you opens the Gold Souk, one of Dubai’s most famous sights. Behind these windows work several hundred jewellers, most of them run by traders of Indian and Iranian origin, just as in the 1940s, when a few shops near the Creek began to specialise in gold, taking advantage of the city’s free trade.

1From pearls to gold

Before gold, Deira’s wealth was pearls. When the pearl trade collapsed in the 1930s, merchants looked for other business, and in the 1950s and 1960s gold became one of the port’s great pillars: it was imported legally and much of it was re-exported to India, where it was tightly restricted. Today the souk sells mainly by weight, and prices change daily with the metal.

2Mirages and moonlit rain

The sea left behind two glittering legends. One is Khattaf Rafai, who according to tradition was a spirit of mirages: he showed fishermen heaps of gold or diamonds on the water and drew them further and further from the shore until they were lost.

The other is an old Gulf belief: pearls were said to be born from raindrops, lit by the moon, swallowed by oysters as they opened.

Science explains it differently, with a foreign body and layers of nacre, but the image says a great deal about the almost magical value of pearls for those who risked their lives for them.

3What to look for

• The wooden lattice roof shading the main street.
• The wedding jewellery, huge pieces for brides’ dowries.
• Gulf pearls, still seen in some windows.