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Map of the Fertile Crescent A 15th century copy of Ptolemy's fourth Asian map, depicting the area known as the Fertile Crescent. The Fertile Crescent (Arabic: الهلال الخصيب) is a crescent-shaped region in the Middle East, spanning modern-day Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria, together with northern Kuwait, south-eastern Turkey, and western Iran.
The area pertaining to the hilly flanks is predominantly characterised as the foothills of the Zagros Mountains.Intercepting through the modern-day borders of Turkey, Iraq, and Iran, the region spans over 1000 miles from the lower central area of the Turkish peninsula, curling around the northern sector of the Tigris river, then running along the foothills of the Zagros Mountain range.
Terrains in the area can be divided into three main types: the large arid desert covering most of it, the fertile south and north, and finally the high mountains of the Atlas, Ahaggar, Zagros and the Anti-Lebanon Mountains, along with the Hijaz Mountain range.
[17] [18] [19] In the 20th century, "Western Asia" was used to denote a rough geographical era in the fields of archaeology and ancient history, especially as a shorthand for "the Fertile Crescent excluding Ancient Egypt" for the purposes of comparing the early civilizations of Egypt and the former. [20]
The distribution of Y-chromosome and mtDNA haplogroups suggests that during the Paleolithic and Mesolithic periods, the Levantine corridor was more important for bi-directional human migrations between Africa and Eurasia than was the Horn of Africa.
This glossary of geography terms is a list of definitions of terms and concepts used in geography and related fields, including Earth science, oceanography, cartography, and human geography, as well as those describing spatial dimension, topographical features, natural resources, and the collection, analysis, and visualization of geographic ...
It is because of this that the Fertile Crescent region, and Mesopotamia in particular, are often referred to as the cradle of civilization. [21] The period known as the Ubaid period (c. 6500 to 3800 BC) is the earliest known period on the alluvial plain, although it is likely earlier periods exist obscured under the alluvium.
Nicolas Sanson, Map of Eastern Mediterranean, 1651.. The eastern Mediterranean region is commonly interpreted in two ways: The Levant, including its historically tied neighboring countries, Balkans and islands of Greece.