Arabian Peninsula Research Paper

The Arabian Peninsula is a harsh but beautiful desert landscape. Its location in the world in many ways influenced the unique culture that it came to be today. The amount of land suitable for farming and agriculture was difficult to find. This created a culture that split into two ways of life known as settler and nomadic.

Nomads, or ‘bedouins,’ were small tribes that would travel from place to place, seeking water and grazing land for their herds. Because there was so little land to farm in the desert, they would travel often because of rainfall or food for the herds they traveled with. Life as a bedouin was difficult and required adaptability and resourcefulness in the harsh desert environment. As time went on, many nomads banned together in close-knit groups called ‘clans.’ They relied on each other for support and protection against attacks from other nomadic clans that would sometimes raid and steal from them. Each clan had its own government and way of life. Some clans would grow so strong and well-known for their knowledge of the desert or fighting ability and become key components in what would later become the Muslim Empire. …show more content…
As time passed, these essential areas naturally attracted many settlers and caused these oases to become popular areas for trade. Merchants traded animals, textiles, metals, crops, and spices, such as pepper and saffron. Soon, market towns would blossom in these oases and would become common stops along trade routes that crossed the peninsula where bedouin, settlers, and foreign merchant alike could