Philip Hitty, a renowned American scholar and professor at Princeton University, dedicated his book to the history of the Middle East. For many centuries, a variety of peoples lived on this vast part of the planet: Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Phoenicians, Jews, Turks, Persians, Arabs. For five millennia, this territory developed dynamically and was a source of material and spiritual culture, from which the inhabitants of Europe drew knowledge and skills.