Covering 75 Years of History
- History
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In today’s fast-paced, emergent and diverse world, it’s easy to forget how we got here in the first place. Some of the earliest civilizations, in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, nurtured various aspects of human development upon which later empires and nations built.
AramcoWorld over the years has explored ancient and more recent history through archeology, objects, pioneers and their journeys, with the aim of drawing connections between our past and present. And those stories were often featured on our covers.
Stories about history also have enabled us to educate readers through diverse narratives and perspectives of underrepresented voices across the world.
Archeological discoveries of artifacts in Saudi Arabia, as featured in “Discovery at al-Magar” (2012) and “Milestones to Makkah and Madinah” (2021) gave us an understanding of the lesser-known history of the Arabian Peninsula.
“Pieces of the Past: Mértola, Portugal Rediscovers its Islamic Roots” (2024) shows another dimension of Arab history in Europe and the intersection between civilizations.
AramcoWorld has also offered numerous details about the ancient world. “A Hidden Beauty” (1978) analyzed limestone, sandstone and granite that ancient Egyptians utilized in their grandiose structures. That same year “Ebla: City of the White Stones” explored one of the earliest kingdoms in Syria.
Our stories ask questions, like, “What were the beginnings of our professions?” In “Our Work: Modern Jobs, Ancient Origins” (2014) we find that Egyptians ca. 1600 BCE had policing similar to our world today, and Akkadians ca. 2220 BCE already had fashion designers.
Historical objects give us clues about those who lived before us. “The Game of Kings” (2009) explores the history of chess across cultures from Central and South Asia, the Middle East and Europe.
Explorers provided accounts throughout history. Ibn Battuta, the most traveled explorer in pre-modern history, was often featured in AramcoWorld. Originally from Tangier, North Africa, he began his 30-year journey with a pilgrimage to Makkah, as explained in “The Longest Hajj: The Journey of Ibn Battuta” (2000), and ended up in East Asia. He eventually provided some of the most important accounts of social, cultural and political history of the lands he visited.
The stories we have covered not only bridge the past and present but connect us to one another. As a publication we will continue our own journey of historical exploration.
Left to right: September 1953, “Assyria: An Empire in Stone” (Photo by Carl von Hoffman) Sculpted at the dawn of the Bronze Age some 5,000 years ago, this funerary stele found near Ha’il, Saudi Arabia, shows a man wearing a dagger in his waistband—a custom that can still be found in parts of the Arabian Peninsula today. March/April 2011, “Roads of Arabia” (Photo courtesy of SCTA) October 1954, “Egyptian Obelisks” (Photo by Carl von Hoffman)
Left to right: March/April 1976, “The French Description” (Engraving courtesy of Publishers of Splendor of Egypt) August/September 1955, “Thebes: Wonder City of Ancient Egypt” (Photo by T. F. Walters) September/October 1978, “A Hidden Beauty” (Photo by John Feeney) May/June 1995, “Who Were the Sea People?” (Photo by Andreas Wolfensberger)
Left to right: March/April 1980, “The New Historians” (Illustration by Michael Grimsdale) In 622 CE the Prophet Muhammad and his first followers rode some 450 kilometers from Makkah to Madinah for the journey of Hijra, along a segment of the caravan route that had long linked the Arabian Peninsula to North Africa and the Levant. In 2005 the discovery of an isolated monolith led to a 15-year archeological quest that has identified 55 stones that appear to pre-date the ninth century CE. November/December 2021, “Milestones to Makkah and Madinah” (Photos by Peter Sanders (7) and Abrar Alkadi (left, upper center)) March/April 2001, “New Doors to the Kingdom” (Photo by Brown W. Cannon III) May/June 2012, “Discovery at al-Magar” (Photo courtesy of SCTA)
Left to right: An old Dutch engraving depicts Nineveh as the Assyrian capital as it might have appeared in the eighth century BCE, near what is now the city of Mosul in northern Iraq. Nineveh was also the oldest and most populous city of the Assyrian empire. February 1962, “Ancient Nineveh” (Photo courtesy of Culver Pictures, Inc.) March/April 1978, “Ebla: City of the White Stones” (Photo by Tor Eigeland) July/August 2021, “Mesopotamia’s Art of the Seal” (Photo courtesy of The Morgan Library & Museum) September/October 1964, “Byblos: Middleman of History” (Photo by B. H. Moody and Khalil Abou El-Nasr)
Left to right: From Nimrud, in what is now Iraq, this openwork plaque with a striding winged sphinx and a solar disc crown elegantly exemplifies the diffusion and adaptation of Egyptian symbols north and east during the early first millennium BCE. It was around 600 BCE when a goldsmith migrated from Phoenicia, along the eastern Mediterranean coast, west to the metal-rich island of Sardinia, and there, he combined and reinterpreted several Egyptian symbols to make this plaque. Both his move and his craft were part of the flow of trade, arts and cultures that defined much in the pre-classical Mediterranean and Near East. March/April 2015, “Assyria to Iberia” (Photo courtesy of Metropolitan Museum of Art) Left to right: January/February 1993, “The Legacy of al-Andalus” (Photo by Roland and Sabrina Michaud) July/August 2024, “Pieces of the Past” (Photo by Tara Todras-Whitehill)
Left to right: Justice John B. Simon of the Illinois Appellate Court poses alongside a cast of a stele inscribed in 18th-century BCE Iraq. “Past and present are fused by the similarity of the Code of Hammurabi and the laws of today. Both make the law the sublimator of conflicts.“ January/February 2014, “Our Work: Modern Jobs—Ancient Origins” (Photo by Jason Reblando) In about 1450, the volcano Kuwae exploded in a cataclysmic Plinian eruption that blew some 35 cubic kilometers of rock and dust into the air. It is possible that South Pacific islanders were not the only ones affected: The aftermath of the eruption may have caused the ominous dark eclipse, flaming skies and frightening weather that “foretold” the fall of Constantinople, half a world away. November/December 1996, “1453: Kuwae and Constantinople” (Illustration by David A. Hardy) Painted by blowing ocher-based pigment over a hand, stencil paintings in more than 100 South Sulawesi caves vary in age from some 10,000 to nearly 40,000 years old, and alongside many of them are images of animals and fish that are just as old. May/June 2015, “Cave Artists of Sulawesi” (Photo by Meridith Kohut)
Left to right: July/August 2009, “The Game of Kings” (Illustration courtesy of Biblioteca Monasterio del Escorial/Index/Bridgeman Art Library) October 1956, “Cat-Goddess of Ancient Egypt” (Photo by Carl von Hoffman) This cover features an illustration depicting The Black Horse or The Flying Horse from Scheherezade’s Arabian Nights tales. It highlights the history of these famous stories that were featured on postage stamps in the United Arab Emirates. September/October 1977, “The Return of Scheherezade” January/February 1985, “The Treasures of Henri Moser” (Photo by Tor Eigeland)
Left to right: November/December 2001, “The Polish Quest for Arabian Horses” (Painting by Kazimierz Zwan, National Museum of Warsaw; Photo by Teresa Żółtowska-Huszcza) November/December 1980, “A Giraffe for Tamerlane” (Illustration by Neville Mardell) To American novelist John Dos Passos, materialism and hypocrisy were the great faults of his own society, and honesty, freedom and self-reliance the great virtues of desert life. When he joined a camel caravan to cross the Syrian desert in 1921, Dos Passos found his traveling companions “the finest people I had ever met,” and the desert itself he found harsh, cleansing, invigorating and inspiring. July/August 1997, “Dos Passos in the Desert” (Illustration by Norman MacDonald)
Left to right: September/October 2006, “Ibn Khaldun and the Rise and Fall of Empires” (Photo by Richard Doughty/Saudi Aramco World/PADIA) November/December 2004, “Humanitarian to a Nation” (Photo by Shahidul Alam/DRIK) November/December 1978, “The Expeditions of Chaillé-Long” (Photo by Vanessa Stamford) March/April 2003, “The Lost Portfolios of Robert Hay” (Illustration by Robert Hay, copied by Owen Carter and recopied on stone by J. C. Bourne, courtesy of the British Library)
Left to right: January/February 1965, “To Light a Flame” featuring King ‘Abd al-’Aziz, also known as Ibn Saud, who was the founder of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (Illustration by Sydney King) Though Ibn Battuta traveled some 120,000 kilometers and dealt with princes and pirates, he was by training and profession a scholar of Islamic law. As he roamed three continents, he earned his living, and a growing reputation, as a judge, advisor and diplomat in the service of local rulers; survived piracy, shipwreck and royal disfavor; and saw more of the world than anyone else in his time. When he finally returned to Morocco, the memoirs he dictated became a turning point in Arab literature. July/August 2000, “The Longest Hajj: The Journeys of Ibn Battuta” (Illustration by Norman MacDonald)
Left to right: July/August 2005, “The Indian Ocean and Global Trade” (Illustration by Bibliothéque Nationale/Bridgeman) September/October 2021, “Rust and Dreams on the Beirut-Damascus Railroad” (Photo by Train/Norbert Schiller) May/June 2005, “The World of His Choice” (Photo by Wilfred Thesiger/Pitt Rivers Museum) September/October 1986, “The Arab Immigrants” (Montage designed by Peter Keenan; Photo courtesy of Smithsonian Institution)
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