This large philosophical adventure and travel novel by Michael Roes takes the reader to distant lands and the past: A young ethnologist embarks on a dangerous journey to Yemen to explore the games of the Arab world. "Rub al-Khali - Empty Quarter" in a successful edition. The unusual journey of the ethnologist is narrated against the backdrop of a travel diary from the 18th century, which he begins to read before embarking on his own journey: At the end of the 18th century, four companions set out from Weimar to the largest desert in the world: Rub al-Khali. Their goal is to uncover the mystery of the Mosaic tablets. The chronicler of the expedition is Alois Schnittke. In his diary, he reports on stormy sea voyages, sandstorms, the plague, Bedouin raids, the Queen of Sheba, courtesans, sheikhs, and nocturnal grave robbing.