Dhahaban ( ar, ذهبان ), also Dhahban, is a town in
Yemen
Yemen (; ar, ٱلْيَمَن, al-Yaman), officially the Republic of Yemen,, ) is a country in Western Asia. It is situated on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, and borders Saudi Arabia to the north and Oman to the northeast an ...
, located on the outskirts of the capital
Sanaa
Sanaa ( ar, صَنْعَاء, ' , Yemeni Arabic: ; Old South Arabian: 𐩮𐩬𐩲𐩥 ''Ṣnʿw''), also spelled Sana'a or Sana, is the capital and largest city in Yemen and the centre of Sanaa Governorate. The city is not part of the Go ...
in
Bani al-Harith District
Bani Al Harith District ( ar, مديرية بني الحارث ''Mudayrīyah Bani Al Ḥarith'') is a district of the Amanat Al Asimah Governorate, Yemen founded by a sub-clan of Banu Harith
The Banu al-Harith ( ar, بَنُو الْحَارِث ...
of
Amanat al-Asimah Governorate
Sanaa ( ar, صَنْعَاء, ' , Yemeni Arabic: ; Old South Arabian: 𐩮𐩬𐩲𐩥 ''Ṣnʿw''), also spelled Sana'a or Sana, is the capital and largest city in Yemen and the centre of Sanaa Governorate. The city is not part of the Govern ...
.
It is on the Sanaa plain, a bit south of the point where the
Wadi Zahr
Wadi Zahr ( ar, وادي ظهر ), also spelled Wadi Dahr ( ar, وادي ضهر ), is a wadi in Yemen, located just north of Sanaa on the western edge of the Sanaa plain. It is watered by a perennial stream whose source is the large catchment area ...
opens out onto the plain.
Before 2015, Dhahaban's power station was the main source of power in the Sanaa metro area, although the city's main supplier of electricity was the power plant in
Ma'rib
Marib ( ar, مَأْرِب, Maʾrib; Old South Arabian: 𐩣𐩧𐩨/𐩣𐩧𐩺𐩨 ''Mryb/Mrb'') is the capital city of Marib Governorate, Yemen. It was the capital of the ancient kingdom of ''Sabaʾ'' ( ar, سَبَأ), which some scholar ...
.
Name and history
According to the 10th-century writer
al-Hamdani, Dhahaban was named after Dhahabān b. Nawf Dhī Thaʽlabān b. Sharaḥbīl, of the tribe of
Himyar
The Himyarite Kingdom ( ar, مملكة حِمْيَر, Mamlakat Ḥimyar, he, ממלכת חִמְיָר), or Himyar ( ar, حِمْيَر, ''Ḥimyar'', / 𐩹𐩧𐩺𐩵𐩬) (fl. 110 BCE–520s CE), historically referred to as the Homerit ...
.
In 1989,
Robert T.O. Wilson
The name Robert is an ancient Germanic given name, from Proto-Germanic "fame" and "bright" (''Hrōþiberhtaz''). Compare Old Dutch ''Robrecht'' and Old High German ''Hrodebert'' (a compound of '' Hruod'' ( non, Hróðr) "fame, glory, honou ...
described Dhahaban as a small village and wrote that, while the name was vocalized as ''Dhahbān'' by al-Hamdani, as well as by the modern writers
Muhammad al-Akwa and
Hermann von Wissmann Hermann von Wissmann may refer to:
* Hermann Wissmann (1853–1905), German explorer and administrator in Africa
** ''Hermann von Wissmann'' (steamship), a German steamer
** Hermann von Wissmann (ship, 1940), became in 1950 the Belgian Kamina
* He ...
, "the pronunciation of this name is now closer to Dhahabān."
Energy
Dhahaban's power station, located 10 km northwest of Sanaa, was supplied by power lines from the Ma'rib power plant.
It is also capable of generating its own electricity, with an original capacity of 20
megawatt
The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. The watt is named after Jame ...
s, with an additional 30 megawatts added in the 2000s.
References
{{Reflist
Populated places in Sanaa Governorate