Brewer's: Happy Arabia

A mistranslation of the Latin Arabia felix, which means simply on the right handi.e. to the right hand of Al-Shan (Syria). It was Ptolemy who was the author of the threefold division Arabia Petraea, miscalled “Stony Arabia,” but really so called from its chief city Petra; Arabia Felix (or Yemen), the south-west coast; and as for Arabia deserta (meaning the interior) probably he referred to Nedjaz.

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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