Among 19th-century visitors to Petra was the man who popularized the limerick, and a clergyman who wrote one of the best-known lines in English verse.

After 150 years, the most enduring trace of Napoleon's occupation of Egypt is a monumental 20-volume Description of everything known about the ancient land to 1826.

Jordan's phosphate industry is a dusty business, but because of world demand for fertilizers—and soaring usage—it is taking on a golden hue.

Two thousand five hundred years ago the Persian Empire extended from southern Europe to the borders of India, and Darius built Persepolis as the symbol of its glory.

Arab cartoonists, like their brothers the world over, champion the "Little Man" in his constant struggle with bureaucracy, fads and the high cost of living.

An English family leaves the populous coast to walk through a high limestone wilderness where once, dense cedar forests hid the sanctuary of an ancient sylvan god.