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( Arabia Felix)
The history of Yemen is especially important because Yemen is one of the oldest centers of civilization in the Near East.[1] Its relatively fertile land and adequate rainfall in a moister climate helped sustain a stable population, a feature recognized by the ancient Greek geographer Ptolemy, who described Yemen as Eudaimon Arabia (better known in its Latin translation, Arabia Felix) meaning "fortunate Arabia" or Happy Arabia. Between the 12th century BCE and the 6th century CE, it was dominated by six successive civilizations which rivaled each other, or were allied with each other and controlled the lucrative spice trade M'ain, Qataban, Hadhramaut, Awsan, Saba and Himyarite.[2] Islam arrived in 630 CE, and Yemen became part of the Muslim realm. The Yemeni desert regions (Rub'a Alkhali and Sayhad) were the core of the Nomadic Semites that will migrate to the North settling Akkad and later penetrating Mesopotamia[3] eventually conquering Sumer by 2300BC and assimilating the Amorites of Syria. Yemen remains the only region in the world that exclusively is Semitic, meaning that the Yemen didn't have any Non Semitic speaking people through history. Yemeni Semites derived their Musnad script by the 8th century BC, which explains why most Historians will date all the ancient Yemen kingdoms to 8th century BC. According to Arab tradition, the Semites of South Arabia integrated into Qahtan lineage 40 generations before the Qahtani Yemeni tribe of Jurhum adopted Ismail and 80 generations before Adnan was born, in the 23rd century BCE. After the fall of the Northern Semitic cultures, Qahtan revived the Semitic influence in the North though the famous Kahlan (Azd and Lakhm) and other Yemeni tribes migration into the north 3rd century AD after the first destruction of the Marib Dam.[4].
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