 One of the world's oldest Ashurian sites was found in the northern region of Hale in Saudi Arabia. The discovery of the oldest human habitation in the Arabian Peninsula was revealed in an article in Nature. Wait till you hear this. The site in question, Al Naseem, has paleo-environmental evidence for freshwater lakes and rivers. And geomorphological features associated with Middle Pleistocene materials. The Saudi Commission for Tourism and Natural Heritage began paleo-environmental and archeological surveys of the Green Arabian Project more than 10 years ago. And the survey reveals that the Arabian Peninsula had wetter conditions and a rainy climate in the central region. This led to the formation of lakes, rivers and valleys and vegetation that contributed to a better way of living for human beings. It also altered the spatial distribution of hominins within and between continents. Logical studies also suggest that the earliest living man inhabited south-west Asia and that the Akhulean civilization had one of the longest lasting tool-making traditions in the world. Some of the artifacts found here included hand axes and stone tools and this provides an insight into the inhabitants way of living. According to the report, Al Naseem represents one of the oldest documented Akhulean sites in Saudi Arabia. And this reveals regionally diverse stone tool-making assemblages used by the people of this area over 5,000 years ago. And this further indicates a pattern of repeated entry of inhabitants into the peninsula during the wet green Arabia phase. The site comprises a deep narrow basin where several Paleolithic artifacts were recovered which are similar to those previously found at Akhulean sites in the Nafud Desert. The similarities between the Akhulean discoveries in Al Naseem and those found in the Nafud Desert indicate that the Paleo Lakes of this region provided an important corridor for human beings to travel and meet others. Just last year, the Heritage Commission discovered traces of humans, elephants and other animals at a dry Paleo Lake dating more than 120,000 years ago in Tabuk. And this was the first discovery with scientific evidence of the oldest footprints of man and other animals in the Arabian Peninsula. Saudi experts at the Heritage Commission continue to work on the Green Arabian Project with those from the Max Planck Institute to study climate changes in the Arabian Peninsula over time and the history of ancient immigrations from other continents. Saudi Arabia is responsible for being home to some of the Earth's most spectacular structures from the time before time amid a vast enigmatic monumental landscape Forgotten Kingdoms and layers of history, archaeologists are only just beginning to reveal the secrets of this heritage jewel in northwest Saudi Arabia. As international travel resumes, archaeological work is resuming too in Al Yula, a historically rich region that has been relatively untouched in comparison to similar places. And what has become one of the world's most active archaeological explorations? Experts are beginning to fill in missing links in our understanding of the region's human history with new discoveries. Al Yula, in northwest Saudi Arabia, is a region of deserts and arid mountains, yet crucially, amid this hard landscape is a fertile Oasis valley that has long sustained life and the wider area has drawn people and civilizations here for more than 200,000 years. As a result, while Al Yula is best known for the Nabataean tombs of Higra, Saudi Arabia's first UNESCO World Heritage Site, some 27,000 other archaeological sites have been identified within its borders, with more set to be discovered and recorded. Dr. Rebecca Foote, director of archaeology and cultural heritage researcher at RCU, said about the place she says, North-West Arabia has been often overlooked as a place of cultural and civilizational importance in and of itself, for many years its importance has been eclipsed by the nearby fertile Crescent, Mesopotamia in Egypt and the marine civilizations along the Red Sea. Al Yula was seen as a region people just passed through, however, we're learning now that Al Yula was more than just a place to transit, it was a true nexus in a home for complex communities across many thousands of years, hundreds of thousands of years even. Archaeologists and other experts are now returning to Al Yula, following the lockdown to resume their fieldwork. Despite the geographical size of Al Yula and the scope of heritage contained within, it is only within the last few years that Al Yula has seen more than limited archaeological exploration. And that has changed thanks to archaeologists of the Royal Commission for Al Yula, the RCU, and they are the governmental body charged with developing and administering the region. Thanks to this recent work, this jewel in the heritage crown of Saudi Arabia is beginning to fill in these missing links in the region's development and the generations that have crossed it and those descendants still inhabit it. In the coming months, more of Al Yula's heritage treasures will be revealed to the world through televised documentaries, the touring wonders of the Arabia exhibition and the reopening of Al Yula itself. Visitors will soon be able to journey through time and across one of the world's largest archaeological sites, experiencing a landscape that has been inhabited for over 200,000 years. RCU's discoveries have established that prehistoric peoples of Al Yula hunted and grazed in Al Yula in a greener land than today. New findings in the mysterious, vast and previously unexplored monumental landscape, they and generations after left behind suggest their culture was far more complex than once thought. Using satellite imagery, aerial photography, ground survey and old fashioned digging, archaeologists can now appreciate the sheer number of stone structures built in the late prehistoric period over 5,000 years ago, across Al Yula's lowlands, uplands and haraq. The size, locations and number of these monuments point to a degree of community cooperation previously undetected, and evidence that some of these sites were used for ritual may change your view of these prehistoric peoples interior life altogether. One of these structures, which seems to be one of the oldest, has been named mustatil, which basically means rectangle and arabic, some of which are hundreds of meters long. Another style of structure is referred to as dependent. These usually feature a ringed cairn main burial with a tale of associated structures that resemble jewellery when viewed from the air, hence the name. Exact details of the use of these constructions remains elusive. The people of this time left behind no writing, only petroglyphs, and excavations have unearthed surprisingly few tools, pottery or other small items that might indicate their specific usage. The purpose of the pendants is unknown, possibly astronomical, possibly funerary, but with the graves having been disturbed long ago, probably only soon after the burials took place, the identities and significance of those who once lay there remains unknown as does the purpose of the structures themselves. Who once lay here religious figures, local leaders, or were these structures simply reused at a later time? The bones found within the large main ringed burial moved out to the smaller structures with each new generation, and we may never know for sure what took place here, but the location of many of these funerary complexes on mountaintops overlooking the lands of Alula does suggest that the people interacting with and appreciating the world around them, perhaps these places were details of events witnessed in the sky. Could these be a documentation of what was seen, planets in the solar system exchanged in plasma, later used as a burial when the bombardment had long passed? By affording their ancestors such vaulted locations, they may have been appreciating the natural beauty of their home territories, not just a landscape through which they were passing, in the view of God in fact, the God that they once saw in the sky. For the mustatils, the findings from the first excavations are currently being analysed, and this information is leading experts to believe that they held rituals for the people of Alula, but just what those rituals were remains a mystery, and Urals may simply have been marking the boundaries of territories, but the search for evidence does continue. Dr. Foote explains that. Our investigations into these mustatiles, pendants and other prehistoric structures are giving us a tantalising glimpse into the region around 7000 years ago and for several millennia thereafter. We could be looking into early expressions of ownership and property, if indeed the structures actually functioned or were simply boundary markers, and keeping with a people grazing herds in addition to people hunting wild animals. We are only just beginning our own journey through time by identifying, recording and collecting data samples from these sites to gain a chronology of this prehistory. By conducting intensive survey and targeted excavations at some of the most significant among these numerous sites, we are gaining great insights about these functions. And this broad targeted approach has never been undertaken before in Alula, so we are raising even more questions as we do so. But what is certain is that we can now recognise Alula as one of the oldest monumental landscapes in the entire world. For its inhabitants, Alula was a home, a place of ancestors of natural resources and of beauty, and these people's lives were more complex than they had previously imagined. Over 4000 years after the people built the Moustatil, and yet still over 2000 years ago to us today, the ancient North Arabian Kingdom of Dadan controlled Alula from 900 BC. It was the crossroads of trading routes, bringing incense from Saudi Arabia to Egypt, Syria and Mesopotamia. Alula was vital, both as a place where traders and travellers could replenish food and water, and also as a gateway for the precious aromatics to reach beyond Arabia. Teams of archaeologists are currently excavating several key areas within the site of Dadan, including tombs in a newly discovered residential area, and this could help answer a number of questions about these mysterious vanished kingdoms. How and when precisely did each kingdom rise to power? What were their major achievements? What was the relationship between the two? Were the people only one land but ruled by separate consecutive kingdoms? Or were they separate peoples and kingdoms all together, and perhaps the most fascinating of all, what caused the kingdoms to abruptly disappear, and when did this happen? Perhaps it was an earthquake or another natural disaster, but we don't have any confirmed evidence. Perhaps the left to integrate with another peoples elsewhere? Or this may have been a political shift begun or exasperated by the arrival of the Nabateans, possibly from the north. But if this was due to the Nabatean arrival, then this raises even more questions. We do know that some of these peoples did continue to live under Nabatean rule, their dialects come through in inscriptions and design details from funerary architecture as repeated in the Nabatean monuments. Yet the Nabateans detailed chronicles of their history and saying nothing at all about this kingdom. Ultimately, learning more about this long-lasting and far-reaching civilisation, one of the forgotten jewels of Arabia, could change our understanding of the entire region altogether. As gateways and gatekeepers, these kingdoms held power and influence across the entire region, and all of the evidence that we have accumulated so far points to these kingdoms being regional powers. The Dan is mentioned in the bible, and an unmade inscription attests to it being an equal to the powerful kingdom of Sheba in the south of the Arabian Peninsula. The kingdom was one of the largest for its time, stretching from Medina in the south to Aquava in modern-day Jordan to the north. Other regional kingdoms maintained embassies there, and people made offerings to the kingdoms gods and temples beyond its borders. The two kingdoms lasted for about 900 years, almost three times as long as the Nabatean culture in Alula, and yet we know almost nothing at all about these two great kingdoms, in particular their rise and fall, we're really just taking our first steps towards learning more. After the fall of the kingdom, Alula became the principal southern city of the Nabatean kingdom. Inscriptions attesting to the movement of families and individuals from Petra to Alula, and this also gives the proper name of Hegra. Before the arrival of the Romans, who named the region Arabia Petria Rocky Arabia, in 622 AD and the birth of Islam brought another sea change. Arabia suddenly became the cradle of a new religion and a new culture rose with it. Alula's history was already a part of this through its place in the pre-Islamic evolution of the Hajazi Arabic script, itself influenced by the Nabatean script that later carried Islam's message. But its present and future rapidly became a vital part of the new Islamic world, as a stopping point on the pilgrimage to Mecca. Thanks to this importance on Pilgrim's roots, the city of Alula was an important part of the early Islamic empire. But what do you guys think about this lost history in this region? Comments below and as always, thank you for watching.