Hooked on history as a boy, 'Ned' roamed the fields and riverbanks behind his home in Oxford, England, on the lookout for artifacts from Britain’s age of chivalry. At about age ten, he learned the unhappy truth about his own family: He and his four brothers were illegitimate, his parents unmarried, and the family name, Lawrence, fictitious.
—From “Lawrence of Arabia: A Hero’s Journey,” January 1999, National Geographic magazine
Peer behind the veil and enter the lives of Saudi Arabian women in this photo gallery that explores how these women of tradition are adapting as their society modernizes.
Flush with wealth from its oil fields, Oman has catapulted from an Arabian Peninsula backwater to a modern nation while managing to keep many of its traditions alive.
See the cultural and architectural legacy of this Turkish sultan who shook the world of the 16th century as he raised the Ottoman Empire to the height of its glory.
Travel to the Egypt of Ramses II, whose monuments stud the Nile in timeless testament to a civilization that endured for three millennia and continues to amaze the world today.
