106 | Great Geologists
Ziad Beydoun
The Arabian Plate covers an area of almost 4.5 MM
sq km and encompasses very diverse geology. Given
this size and diversity, not to mention the difficulties of
travel through mountainous or desert terrain, it is not
surprising that the early pioneers of Middle Eastern
geology focused on the outcrop mapping of relatively
small areas within political boundaries. George Lees,
Max Steinke, Richard Bramkamp, Rene Wetzel, Harold
Dunnington, Mike Morton, Brock Powers and Ken
Glennie, amongst others, published key descriptive
works, the quality of which are remarkable, even
by modern standards, and placed the stratigraphic
description of the region on a firm footing. However,
it was not until 1988 that the first true synthesis of all
Middle Eastern geology was published — The Middle
East: Regional Geology and Petroleum Resource.
The author of this important book was Ziad Beydoun,
a towering figure in Middle Eastern geology in the
late 20th century. Beydoun’s skills encompassed
field geology, subsurface interpretation, integration
and perhaps above all, great diplomacy, essential to
synthesize the geology of the region.
Beydoun was born in Beirut in 1924, the eldest son of
a district governor in Palestine. His family had a long
history of political service in the Ottoman Empire.
Therefore, it was not surprising that after a school
education in Jerusalem and Haifa, he earned a degree in
political science and history at the American University
of Beirut (AUB). However, an interest in geology must
have been sparked in him, perhaps by the spectacular
scenery of the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon Mountains,
and he subsequently undertook a degree in geology at
University of Oxford, attached to St Peter’s College,
graduating in 1946.
The post-war years of the late 1940s and 1950s were
exciting times to be a geologist in the Middle East.
Oil companies sought to build on the extraordinary
discoveries of the previous decades in the Zagros
Mountains, and in Saudi Arabia and neighbouring
Ziad Beydoun, photographed circa 1960.
countries. In 1948, Beydoun joined the Iraq Petroleum
Company (IPC). With associate companies exploring
many other parts of the Arabian Plate, a geologist
working for IPC could expect to be posted almost
anywhere across the Middle East. Beydoun seized the
opportunity and, between 1948 and 1953, he worked in
Syria, Iraq, Qatar and the Trucial Coast (now the United
Arab Emirates). Beydoun had a gift for languages,
speaking fluent Arabic, English, French and Turkish,
which must have been of great value as he moved
around the region.