I have a very clear memory from childhood of hiking with my family through a sandy desert wash in Anza-Borrego Desert State ...

(Read about out how Palmyra thrived in an infertile desert.) Palmyrene merchants grew wealthy through taxing and protecting caravans that made their way across the Syrian desert to the ...

But it was during the Roman Empire -- beginning in the first century BC and lasting another 400 years -- that Palmyra rose to prominence. Though surrounded by desert dunes, Palmyra developed into ...