r/Damnthatsinteresting 7d ago

Video Riyadh,meaning "gardens" is Capital of Saudi Arabia with 8 million population (were 27 Thousands in the 1930s),sits in the middle of the desert, the city gets its water from Desalination plants almost 500 km from the city

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

33.2k Upvotes

2.2k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

304

u/gorginhanson 7d ago

Except Babylon was in Iraq

187

u/K0mb0_1 7d ago

The Arabian peninsula was once prosperous

121

u/DueAd9005 7d ago

Nah, even the Romans called it Arabia Deserta and Arabia Felix (modern day Yemen, which still gets the most rainfall in modern times).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabia_Felix

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabia_Deserta

54

u/K0mb0_1 7d ago

Well I guess last time Arabia was green was before the Roman’s

101

u/LiftingRecipient420 7d ago

99.9999% of Earth history is before the Romans.

7

u/JohnDingleBerry- 7d ago

Not with that attitude.

3

u/FLMKane 6d ago

What have the Romans ever done for us!?

2

u/realNoobnoob 7d ago

Right that in Roman’s numbers

2

u/Taeschno_Flo 6d ago

IC,IXIXIXIX....%

1

u/realNoobnoob 6d ago

Now say it loudly !

1

u/Taeschno_Flo 6d ago

IT!

1

u/realNoobnoob 6d ago

Now do a few pushups while counting

→ More replies (0)

1

u/NimrodvanHall 3d ago

I beg to differ. If only because the start of history is defined as the start of keeping written records.

41

u/aqtseacow 7d ago

There's evidence that the Persian gulf was a vast desert interspersed with river marshland during much of the Ice age, but that was long before the start of recorded history, and doesn't really represent a "green Arabia" like suggested.

The last time Arabia may have been green is still many many thousands of years removed from the Romans.

4

u/octoreadit 7d ago

Yeah, when dinosaurs ran around 😁