The London Games will go down in history for being the first to which every participating country has sent women. Though three countries — Brunei, Qatar and Saudi Arabia — are sending female athletes to the Olympics for the first time this year, it's Saudi Arabia that has made headlines; while Qatar and Brunei did not actively prevent women from prior participation, Saudi Arabia has put up barriers at every step, holding out until the International Olympic Committee threatened the country with a ban.  Now, the Gulf nation has sent two women: US-born runner Sarah Attar and judo competitor Wojdan Shahrkhani.

Women were first allowed participation in the 1900 Summer Olympics: That year, just six countries — France, Great Britain, Italy, the United States, Switzerland and Bohemia — sent female competitors.  Over the course of the next 36 years, most of the 24 countries that were present at the 1900 Games had sent women to compete; the longest holdout was Cuba, which didn't send women until 1956.  Even fewer than twenty years ago, at the 1996 Atlanta Games, 26 countries didn’t send women.

By 2008, 43% of Olympic competitors were women, and only two sports were closed to women: baseball and boxing (at the same time, one sport — softball — and one discipline, synchronized swimming, were open only to women).  In 2012, that gap closed even further, as baseball and softball were taken off the agenda and women’s boxing was included for the first time. Notably, two Tunisian women and one Moroccan woman are participating in the inaugural competition.

The diverse countries of the Middle East and North Africa vary greatly in terms of women’s participation. Iran under the Pahlavi dynasty sent four women to the 1964 Tokyo Games — three athletes and one gymnast — but after the Islamic Revolution of 1979 did not allow women to participate again until 1996.  Israel sent women Games in 1952. Turkish women have participated consistently since 1936.  Morocco, which gained independence in 1956 and began participating in the Olympics in 1960, took only twelve years to send women, and another twelve for a woman to win a gold medal for the country.