Yemen borders Saudi Arabia to the north, Oman to the east, the Red Sea to the west, and the Gulf of Aden to the south. The Greek geographer Ptolemy called it “Happy Arabia,” and so did the Romans. In ancient times, it comprised several kingdoms: Hadhramaut to the east, Haymar to the west, and Saba to the northwest. Saba was also the supposed origin of the Queen of Sheba, and the site of the famous Marib Dam, which irrigated much of the country and catastrophically collapsed between 558 and 578, causing a grave economic crisis in the peninsula.

Architecturally, Yemen is stunning. It has ancient stone structures, ruins, mud-brick “skyscrapers”, white-gypsum buildings, and royal palaces, and it grew wealthy from control of the production and trade of frankincense, myrrh, spices, and other luxury goods. But after the last Himyarite king converted to Judaism and began to persecute Christians, the Christian kingdom of Aksum of Ethiopia was prompted to intervene, followed by the Sasanians (Persians) and, in 628, by the Arabs.

Arabic became the dominant language in the area, but several ancient South Arabian languages survived. The population remained largely rural and worked the land, but over time major cities such as Sana and Aden expanded considerably. As before, people continued to cultivate a variety of agricultural products, including coffee, for which they are famous, and more recently qat, a mildly narcotic leaf chewed socially throughout much of the country.

Since the Arab conquest, Yemen’s history has been shaped by geographic and sectarian divisions. The northern highlands became the domain of the Shia Zaydi Imamate. The Ottomans first sought to control Yemen in the sixteenth century, occupying the highlands before the Zaydis expelled them in 1636. For roughly a millennium, a succession of Zaydi religious leaders, or imams, ruled northern Yemen, and its relative isolation fostered a deeply conservative and fiercely independent identity. From the 16th century onward, the north remained contested between the Ottoman Empire and local Zaydi imams. Ottoman authority repeatedly advanced and receded because of Yemen’s difficult terrain and strong local resistance. In 1872, the Ottomans captured Sanaa and held it until their empire collapsed after the First World War, when an independent Zaydi imamate was restored in the north. In 1962, military officers overthrew the Zaydi monarchy and established a republic, triggering a brutal civil war. The new government’s marginalization of the Zaydi elite helped sow the seeds of future rebellion.

The south became firmly entrenched in Sunni Islam and was ruled by several dynasties from the thirteenth century onward. Each promoted trade, scholarship, agriculture, and architecture. The area became a major port linking Egypt and the Mediterranean with India and Southeast Asia. Britain took over Aden in 1839 and gradually extended its influence to surrounding sultanates and tribal territories to what became known as the Aden Protectorate. It became a major port linking Egypt and the Mediterranean with India and Southeast Asia, remaining a British possession until after World War II. In 1963, however, a nationalist insurgency began against British rule, and Britain withdrew in November 1967. The south became a Marxist state, and the north remained tribal-republican; they went to war against one another, but unified after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, with Sanaa becoming the political capital and Aden the economic center.

Unification, however, did not bring stability. Southern Yemenis felt politically and economically marginalized by the North and, in 1994, tried unsuccessfully to secede; Al-Qaeda became involved; then, in 2014, a Houthi-Zaydi group from northern Yemen captured Sanaa and took control of much of northern and western Yemen. It triggered a Saudi-led coalition intervention in support of the internationally recognized government, causing a severe humanitarian crisis. Shortages of doctors, nurses, and medicines remain, along with fuel shortages that disrupt electricity, transport, and refrigeration alongside inadequate access to water and sanitation services. There is a resurgence of communicable diseases—cholera, measles, diphtheria, dengue fever, malaria, and polio—as well as deteriorating maternal and childcare services, compounded by the effects of war, bereavement, displacement, hunger, and psychological distress. Sadly, so far, there is no remedy in sight.