A pan-Arab political union of Egypt and Syria under President Gamal Abdel Nasser, formed 1 February 1958 as the first genuine merger of two sovereign Arab states in the modern era; Egypt continued to use the name 'United Arab Republic' officially until 1971 even after the union itself dissolved.
Syria seceded following the 28 September 1961 coup d'état, ending the union in practice; Egypt alone retained the official name United Arab Republic until Anwar Sadat formally renamed it the Arab Republic of Egypt in September 1971.
Scholarly history focused specifically on the UAR's formation, Nasser's pan-Arabism, and the union's 1961 collapse.