Omani Empire

The Omani Empire was a maritime power that flourished from 1696 to 1856, contesting Portuguese and British control of trade routes across the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean. At its height in the nineteenth century it extended through the Strait of Hormuz into parts of present-day Iran and Pakistan and south along the African coast to Cape Delgado in Mozambique, restoring Arab dominance over regional trade after Portugal's earlier disruption of it. It maintained diplomatic ties with Western powers, including an 1833 treaty with the United States that was only the second such trade treaty between the US and an Arab state. The empire fractured after the death of its ruler Said bin Sultan in 1856, splitting into the African Sultanate of Zanzibar under Majid bin Said and the Asian Sultanate of Muscat and Oman under Thuwaini bin Said.