ABSTRACT
Abillion years ago there was no land to the north east of Africa for many hundreds of kilometres, except for a long chain of volcanic islands far offshore, recently emerged from the sea. These islands were entirely barren: no grass or trees covered their slopes, no living creature inhabited them; 500 million more years were to pass before the first living things began to invade the land from the sea. This volcanic wilderness, strung across the sea rather as Indonesia is today, was the first sign of the land that was eventually to form Arabia.
