Najd

Najd is a historical and geographic region comprising much of central Saudi Arabia, roughly bounded by the Hejaz to the west, the Nafud desert to the north, the ad-Dahna desert to the east, and the Rub' al Khali to the south. It forms a plateau ranging from about 762 to 1,525 meters in elevation that slopes downward from west to east, cut by mountains and wadis and bordered by desert. Najd is home to roughly 10.6 million people, about a third of Saudi Arabia's population, and today comprises the provinces of Riyadh, home to the capital city of the same name since 1824, Al-Qassim, and Ha'il. It is the ancestral homeland of the House of Saud, which began its expansion from Najd in the eighteenth century and went on to unify the Arabian Peninsula.