Riyadh History
An inconsequential oasis town of under 10,000 people only a century ago, Riyadh (more specifically, the neighboring town of Diriyah) is the ancestral home of the al-Sauds, The Saudi Royal Family. Driven out by the Rashids clan in 1891, King Abdulaziz bin Saud famously raided and recaptured the city in 1902. The city was made the capital of Saudi Arabia when the country was born in 1932, and has grown exponentially since then.
