Amorite languageAmorite is an extinct early Semitic language, formerly spoken during the Bronze Age by the Amorite tribes prominent in ancient Near Eastern history. It is known from Ugaritic, which is classed by some as its westernmost dialect, and from non-Akkadian proper names recorded by Akkadian scribes during periods of Amorite rule in Babylonia (the end of the 3rd and the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC), notably from Mari and to a lesser extent Alalakh, Tell Harmal and Khafajah.
SyriaSyria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It is bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east and southeast, Jordan to the south, and Israel and Lebanon to the southwest. Cyprus lies to the west across the Mediterranean Sea. It is a unitary republic that consists of 14 governorates (subdivisions).
PhoeniciaPhoenicia (fəˈnɪʃə,_fəˈniːʃə), or Phœnicia, was an ancient Semitic thalassocratic civilization originating in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily located in modern Lebanon. The territory of the Phoenicians extended and shrank throughout history, with the core of their culture stretching from Arwad in modern Syria to Mount Carmel in modern Israel. Beyond their homeland, the Phoenicians extended throughout the Mediterranean, from Cyprus to the Iberian Peninsula.
PhilistiaPhilistia (Pəlešeṯ; Koine Greek (LXX): Γῆ τῶν Φυλιστιείμ, romanized: gê tôn Phulistieìm) was a confederation of five main cities or pentapolis in the Southwest Levant, made up of principally Hazat (Gaza), Isqaluna (Ascalon), Asdudu (Ashdod), Amqarruna (Ekron) and Gath, and for a time, Jaffa. Scholars believe the Philistines were made up of people of an Aegean background that from roughly 1200 BC onwards settled in the area and mixed with the local Canaanite population, and came to be known as Peleset, or Philistines.
UgariticUgaritic (ˌjuːgəˈrɪtɪk,_ˌuː-) is an extinct Northwest Semitic language, classified by some as a dialect of the Amorite language. It is known through the Ugaritic texts discovered by French archaeologists in 1929 at Ugarit, including several major literary texts, notably the Baal cycle. It has been used by scholars of the Hebrew Bible to clarify Biblical Hebrew texts and has revealed ways in which the cultures of ancient Israel and Judah found parallels in the neighboring cultures.
EkronEkron (Philistine: 𐤏𐤒𐤓𐤍 *ʿAqārān, עֶקְרוֹן, عقرون), in the Hellenistic period known as Accaron (Akkarōn) was a Philistine city, one of the five cities of the Philistine Pentapolis, located in present-day Israel. In 1957, Ekron was first identified with the mound of Tel Miqne (Hebrew) or Khirbet el-Muqanna (Arabic), near the depopulated Arab village of 'Aqir, on the basis of the large size of the Iron Age archaeological remains; the judgement was strengthened by the discovery in 1996 of the Ekron inscription.
Northwest Semitic languagesNorthwest Semitic is a division of the Semitic languages comprising the indigenous languages of the Levant. It emerged from Proto-Semitic in the Early Bronze Age. It is first attested in proper names identified as Amorite in the Middle Bronze Age. The oldest coherent texts are in Ugaritic, dating to the Late Bronze Age, which by the time of the Bronze Age collapse are joined by Old Aramaic, and by the Iron Age by Sutean and the Canaanite languages (Phoenician/Punic, Edomite, Moabite and Hebrew).
Phoenician languagePhoenician (fəˈniːʃən ) is an extinct Canaanite Semitic language originally spoken in the region surrounding the cities of Tyre and Sidon. Extensive Tyro-Sidonian trade and commercial dominance led to Phoenician becoming a lingua franca of the maritime Mediterranean during the Iron Age. The Phoenician alphabet spread to Greece during this period, where it became the source of all modern European scripts. Phoenician belongs to the Canaanite languages and as such is quite similar to Biblical Hebrew and other languages of the group, at least in its early stages and therefore mutually intelligible with them.
MoabMoab (ˈmoʊæb) is the name of an ancient Levantine kingdom whose territory is today located in the modern state of Jordan. The land is mountainous and lies alongside much of the eastern shore of the Dead Sea. The existence of the Kingdom of Moab is attested to by numerous archaeological findings, most notably the Mesha Stele, which describes the Moabite victory over an unnamed son of King Omri of Israel, an episode also noted in 2 Kings 3. The Moabite capital was Dibon.
Palestine (region)Palestine (Παλαιστίνη, Palaistínē; Palaestina; فِلَسْطِينَ, , , ; פלשתינה, Palestīna) is a geographic region in West Asia. It is usually considered to include Israel and the State of Palestine (i.e. West Bank and Gaza Strip), though some definitions also include part of northwestern Jordan. The first written records referring to Palestine emerged in the 12th-century BCE Twentieth dynasty of Egypt, which used the term "Peleset" for the neighboring people or land. In the 8th century BCE, the Assyrians referred to the region as "Palashtu" or "Pilistu".
