Hadhramaut

Hadhramaut was a South Arabian kingdom whose heartland lay in the wadis and desert fringe of what is now eastern Yemen. It enters the record in the early first millennium BC, and Sabaean inscriptions from around 700 BC already name the country and its moon god Sin. For centuries it acknowledged the kings of Sheba, but around 330 BC it broke free in alliance with Ma'in and Qataban. Its capital, Shabwa, stood at the north-western edge of the realm on the caravan road that carried frankincense and myrrh from Dhofar toward the Mediterranean; Greek writers knew the city as a metropolis and the people as Chatramotitai. Wealth from taxing and protecting that trade paid for temples, irrigation works and fortified towns such as Libna. Hadhramaut fought repeatedly with Himyar over the incense routes, and by the end of the 3rd century AD it had been annexed by the Himyarite kingdom, though its name survived in the titles of the kings of Saba and Dhu Raydan. The later sultanates of the same region, and the modern Yemeni governorate, preserve the ancient name.