Arabian Peninsula
The Arabian Peninsula[1] (/əˈreɪbiən ... /; Arabic: شِبْهُ الْجَزِيرَة الْعَرَبِيَّة, shibhu l-jazīra l-ʿarabiyya, "Arabian Peninsula" or جَزِيرَةُ الْعَرَب, jazīratu l-ʿarab, "Island of the Arabs"),[2] or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated northeast of Africa on the Arabian Plate. At 3,237,500 km2 (1,250,000 sq mi), comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world.[3][4][5][6][7]
"Arabia" and "Arabian" redirect here. For other uses, see Arabia (disambiguation) and Arabian (disambiguation).Area
3,237,500 km2 (1,250,000 sq mi)
95,000,000 (2023 estimate )
29.0/km2
0.788 (2018)
high
Geographically, the Arabian Peninsula includes Bahrain,[a] Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Yemen, as well as southern Iraq and Jordan.[8] The largest of these is Saudi Arabia.[9] In the classical era, the Sinai Peninsula was also considered a part of Arabia.
The Arabian Peninsula formed as a result of the rifting of the Red Sea between 56 and 23 million years ago, and is bordered by the Red Sea to the west and southwest, the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman to the northeast, the Levant and Mesopotamia to the north and the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean to the southeast. The peninsula plays a critical geopolitical role in the Arab world and globally due to its vast reserves of oil and natural gas.
Before the modern era, the region was divided into primarily four distinct regions: the Central Plateau (Najd and Al-Yamama), South Arabia (Yemen, Hadhramaut and Oman), Al-Bahrain (Eastern Arabia or Al-Hassa), and the Hejaz (Tihamah for the western coast), as described by Ibn al-Faqih.[10]
In antiquity, the term "Arabia" encompassed a larger area than the current term "Arabian Peninsula" and included the Arabian desert and large parts of the Syrian-Arabian desert. During the Hellenistic period, the area was known as Arabia or Aravia (Greek: Αραβία). The Romans named three regions with the prefix "Arabia".
The Arab inhabitants used a north–south division of Arabia: Al Sham-Al Yaman, or Arabia Deserta-Arabia Felix. Arabia Felix had originally been used for the whole peninsula, and at other times only for the southern region. Because its use became limited to the south, the whole peninsula was simply called Arabia. Arabia Deserta was the entire desert region extending north from Arabia Felix to Palmyra and the Euphrates, including all the area between Pelusium on the Nile and Babylon. This area was also called Arabia and not sharply distinguished from the peninsula.[12]
The Arabs and the Ottoman Empire considered the west of the Arabian Peninsula region where the Arabs lived 'the land of the Arabs' – Bilad al-'Arab (Arabia), and its major divisions were the bilad al-Sham (Levant), bilad al-Yaman (Yemen), and Bilad al-'Iraq (Iraq).[13] The Ottomans used the term Arabistan in a broad sense for the region starting from Cilicia, where the Euphrates river makes its descent into Syria, through Palestine, and on through the remainder of the Sinai and Arabian peninsulas.[14]
The provinces of Arabia were: Al Tih, the Sinai peninsula, Hejaz, Asir, Yemen, Hadramaut, Mahra and Shilu, Oman, Hasa, Bahrain, Dahna, Nufud, the Hammad, which included the deserts of Syria, Mesopotamia and Babylonia.[15][16]
Ain Zubaydah was built to water the pilgrims in Mecca, Saudi Arabia by order of Zubaidah bint Ja'far
Qasr al Farid, tomb in Archeological site Mada'in Saleh, Al-`Ula, Saudi Arabia
