ABSTRACT
South-west Arabia witnessed the beginning of the process of urbanization in the last centuries of the second millennium. At the beginning of the first millennium walled towns, temples, irrigation systems, monumental inscriptions tell us of established systems of state organization with the birth of the kingdoms of Saba, Qatab"an, Ma $ûn and Hadramawt. Agriculture, relying on complex systems of irrigation, was at the basis of the wealth of the kingdoms, where trade, first on caravan routes and later sea routes, played a major role, with the export of frankincense. Their history ended on the eve of Islam.
