al-Dibdiba is an extensive gravel plain in northeastern Saudi Arabia, Dibdiba at iTouchMap.com.Ad Dibdiba, Saudi Arabia. at Satelliteviews.net.
Location It is at Latitude 27.887482 and Longitude 46.470322, south east of Hafr al-Batin, the nearest large town. The plain is bounded on the east by the western boundary of the Saudi Arabia-Kuwait neutral zone, on the west by the Wadi al-Batin and on the south by the gravel ridge of al-Warīʿa.
The plain extends northward from Saudi Arabia into Kuwait and has an area of c. 30,000 sq. km.
Etymology Nomadic tribes live there in the winter on occasion to graze their animals. The name Dibdiba (plural dabadid) is a name given by the Bedouins derived from the name of the noise their clogs make on hard ground. Mandaville, J., "al-Dibdiba." Encyclopaedia of Islam. Brill Online, 2015.
Geography The feature is remarkable for its firm, almost featureless surface, sprinkled with pebbles of limestone, quartz, and igneous rockal-Dibdiba at Brill references. and saline hydrology. Ground‐Water Chemistry of Dibdiba Formation, North Kuwait.Moutaz Al-Dabbas, Raad Al- Khafaji, Mohanad H. A. Al-Jaberi, IMPACT OF CLIMATE CHANGES ON THE HYDROGEOLOGICAL AQUIFERS- CASE STUDY DIBDIBA AQUIFER AT KARBALA – NAJAF AREA, IRAQ (IJRST) 2015, Vol. No. 5, Issue No. III, Jul-Sep. page 24 Mustafa A. Hassan, Laith A. Jawad, AL-Dibdiba Formation Basin Hydrological Aspects Extraction Using GIS techniques and Quantitative Morphometric Analysis (Iraqi Journal of Sciences, 2015). Despite its arid climate the area does support vegetationBy Daoud, Flora of Kuwait, Volume 1 (Routledge, 16 December 2013) page 113.Claire O'Neal, We Visit Iraq (Mitchell Lane Publishers, 2011) p 27. when it rains.April Fast, Iraq the Land (Crabtree Publishing Company, 2005) page 12.
The plain may have been created by the Wadi al-Batin river system which may have been active 3500-2000 BCEThe Pishon River - Found. by C.A. Salabach at Focus Magazine allowing for deposition of the Dibdiba Formation, similar to an alluvial fan deposit, both morphologically and sedimentologically). The sediments may be 500m deep.Wolfgang Wagner, Groundwater in the Arab Middle East (Springer Science & Business Media, 2011) p20.
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