Map of the Three Arabias Excerpted Partly from the Arab of Nubia Partly from Several Other Authors

Arabia Deserta (Latin meaning "Abandoned/Deserted Arabia"), also known as Arabia Magna ("Great Arabia"), signified the desert interior of the Arabian peninsula. In ancient times, this land was populated by

nomad A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the po ...

ic Bedouin tribes who frequently invaded richer lands, such as

Mesopotamia Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...

and

Arabia Felix Arabia Felix (literally: Fertile/Happy Arabia; also Ancient Greek: Εὐδαίμων Ἀραβία, ''Eudaemon Arabia'') was the Latin name previously used by geographers to describe South Arabia, or what is now Yemen. Etymology The term Arabia ...

. Arabia Deserta was one of three regions into which the

Romans Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

divided the Arabian peninsula: ''Arabia Deserta'' (or ''Arabia Magna''), ''Arabia Felix'', and ''

Arabia Petraea Arabia Petraea or Petrea, also known as Rome's Arabian Province ( la, Provincia Arabia; ar, العربية البترائية; grc, Ἐπαρχία Πετραίας Ἀραβίας) or simply Arabia, was a frontier province of the Roman Emp ...

''. As a name for the region, it remained popular into the 19th and 20th centuries, and was used in Charles M. Doughty's '' Travels in Arabia Deserta'' (1888).

Bibliography

* G.W. Bowersock, "The three Arabias in Ptolemy's geography" and "Arabs and Saracens in the ''Historia Augusta''" in G.W. Bowersock, ''Studies on the Eastern Roman Empire'', Goldbach, 1994. * F. Millar, ''The Roman Near East'', London, 1994, pp. 514 ff.

References

Historical regions in Saudi Arabia Arabia {{SaudiArabia-geo-stub