Every modern city in the world has an old, ancient city in its heart, and you haven't travelled until you have passed through it and its heritage and until you have observed the pure meaning of the first creation.
The auction was also in the middle of a square exposed to light.
It was full of first-edition magazines and wrapped decades-old Arabic newspapers with headlines about the great war, which once occupied people's hearts but is now old and forgotten.
Regardless of the news they included, they were considered documents, which sellers hawked for people to read and buy.
Rich linguistic heritage
Najd is known for the linguistic, poetry, beauty, and creative geniuses it introduced to the world since ancient times.
A'sha Qais, who wrote "Al-A'sha Ode", one of the ten famous "Mu'allaqat" (long odes that were hung on the door of Kaaba), was born in Riyadh in 570 AD. This means he was born before Islam, which he realised and did not profess.
He was born in an urban village in Wadi Hanifa called "Manfouhat al-Yamamah", where he lived and died, and which is now one of the neighbourhoods of Riyadh.
The Kingdom's government gave the name "Al-A'sha" to one of Najd's streets, in memory of him and his ode, which began with a touching verse to a lover bidding farewell to a woman he loves called Huraira, who was pampered among her people:
Bid farewell to Huraira, as her convoy is leaving
Oh, poor man! Can you really endure the separation?
Al-A'sha's ode is linguistically very useful, as he used Najdi vocabulary that is no longer used today, such as "Al-Waji", which means a person who does not wear anything on his feet; "Nashar", which means the good smell, and "Al-Djan", which means the heavy rain that falls on the ground in abundance.
New city
My trip to Riyadh also included a visit to the new city, where I saw the features of the new architecture in the concrete towers.
I climbed to the top of the Faisaliah Tower to see the two characters of Riyadh: the Horizontal Riyadh, which consists of Arabic houses with trees, neighbourhoods, libraries, and services; and the modern city, with its towers, economy, savings, and treasuries.
In the end, Najd remains as Ibn Manzur described it in "Lisan al-Arab" when he spoke about its position in the world:
"An area between Najd and Tihama, that has the characteristics of both. And Najd is a special name given to the area beyond the Hijaz towards Iraq."