section_path: History/Pre-Islamic
section_name: Pre-Islamic
paragraph_text: Pre-Islamic
  
  The earliest sedentary culture in Saudi Arabia dates back to the Ubaid period at Dosariyah. Climatic change and the onset of aridity may have brought about the end of this phase of settlement, as little archaeological evidence exists from the succeeding millennium. The settlement of the region picks up again in the period of Dilmun in the early 3rd millennium. Known records from Uruk refer to a place called Dilmun, associated on several occasions with copper, and in later periods it was a source of imported woods in southern Mesopotamia. Scholars have suggested that Dilmun originally designated the eastern province of Saudi Arabia, notably linked with the major Dilmunite settlements of Umm an-Nussi and Umm ar-Ramadh in the interior and Tarout on the coast. It is likely that Tarout Island was the main port and the capital of Dilmun. Mesopotamian inscribed clay tablets suggest that, in the early period of Dilmun, a form of hierarchical organized political structure existed. In 1966, an earthwork in Tarout exposed an ancient burial field that yielded a large statue dating to the Dilmunite period (mid 3rd millennium BC). The statue was locally made under the strong Mesopotamian influence on the artistic principle of Dilmun.
  
  By 2200 BC, the centre of Dilmun shifted for unknown reasons from Tarout and the Saudi Arabian mainland to the island of Bahrain, and a highly developed settlement emerged there, where a laborious temple complex and thousands of burial mounds dating to this period were discovered.
  
  By the late Bronze Age, a historically recorded people and land (Midian and the Midianites) in the north-western portion of Saudi Arabia are well-documented in the Bible. Centred in Tabouk, it stretched from Wadi Arabah in the north to the area of al-Wejh in the south. The capital of Midian was Qurayyah, it consists of a large, fortified citadel encompassing 35 hectares and below it lies a walled settlement of 15 hectares. The city hosted as many as 12,000 inhabitants. The Bible recounts Israel 's two wars with Midian, somewhere in the early 11th century BC. Politically, the Midianites were described as having a decentralized structure headed by five kings (Evi, Rekem, Tsur, Hur, and Reba); the names appears to be toponyms of important Midianite settlements. It is common to view that Midian designated a confederation of tribes, the sedentary element settled in the Hijaz while its nomadic affiliates pastured and sometimes pillaged as far away as Palestine. The nomadic Midianites were one of the earliest exploiters of the domestication of camels that enabled them to navigate through the harsh terrains of the region.
  
  At the end of the 7th century BC, an emerging kingdom appeared in north-western Arabia. It started as a sheikdom of Dedan, which developed into the kingdom of Lihyan. During this period, Dedan transformed into a kingdom that encompassed a much wider domain. In the early 3rd century BC, with bustling economic activity between the south and north, Lihyan acquired large influence suitable to its strategic position on the caravan road. The Lihyanites ruled over a large domain from Yathrib in the south and parts of the Levant in the north. In antiquity, Gulf of Aqaba used to be called Gulf of Lihyan, a testimony to the extensive influence that Lihyan acquired.
  
  The Lihyanites fell into the hands of the Nabataeans around 65 BC upon their seizure of Hegra then marching to Tayma, and to their capital Dedan in 9 BC. The Nabataeans ruled large portions of north Arabia until their domain was annexed by the Roman Empire, which renamed it Arabia Petraea, and remained under the rule of the Romans until 630.