The History of the Ancient Civilizations. Duncker Max

Hence, with the Hebrews, the Sidonians passed for the oldest Canaanites. The name means Fishcatcher, and a tribe limited to a narrow strip of coast may soon have betaken themselves to the sea. The primogeniture of the Sidonians was afterwards explained to mean that the origin of their city, Sidon, belonged to the oldest period. That the second city of this tribe, Sor (Tyre), "the daughter of Sidon,"[486] was proud of her great antiquity, we learn from other sources. When Herodotus was there, and inquired about the erection of the most sacred temple in the city, the temple of Melkarth, he received the answer that this shrine had been built, together with the city, about 2,300 years before his time, i.e. about the year 2,750 B.C. Lucian also assures us that the temples of Phenicia and the temple of Melkarth at Tyre were founded not much later than the oldest Egyptian temples.[487]

      Northward of Sidon, at the mouths of the Nahr Ibrahim and the Nahr-el-Kelb (Adonis and Lycus), was settled the tribe of the Giblites, i.e. the mountaineers, whose cities were Gebal (Byblus) and Berothai (Berytus). Byblus claimed to be the oldest city in the land—older than Sidon—and to have been built by El, the supreme deity. At any rate, as we have already seen, it was in existence at the time of Tuthmosis III., whose inscriptions also mention the city of a third tribe, that of Arvadi, i.e. the Arvadites, whom the Hebrews mention among the sons of Canaan. This tribe was in possession of a considerable district to the north of Byblus, on the mouth of the Nahr-el-Kebir (Eleutherus), and of a rocky island off the coast, on which lay their city Arvad, the Aratu of the Egyptians, the Aradus of the Greeks.

The tradition of the Hebrews derived the Hittites from Heth, the second son of Canaan. The centre of their land, which stretched from the coast to the Jordan, was formed by the bare and stony mountains round Hebron. Here, according to Hebrew story, giants once dwelt—the Anakim—whose father and chief was Arba; after this prince, Hebron was formerly called Kirjath-Arba. To this city also the Hebrews ascribe a great antiquity; it was built seven years earlier than Zoan (Tanis) in Egypt.[488] We do not know the date of the building of Zoan, but the name occurs as early as the inscriptions of Sesurtesen I., whose reign we must place about the year 2,350 B.C.[489] With the Hittites of Hebron the Hebrew Scriptures represent their own forefathers as living in peaceful and friendly intercourse in the century 2100–2000 B.C. We have already seen what a sustained resistance the disciplined forces of the princes of the Hittites were able to make against the attacks of Egypt for two centuries—from the middle of the fifteenth to the middle of the thirteenth century B.C. War against the Cheta is a standing item in the inscriptions of the Ramessids.

Northward of the Hittites lay the tribes which the tradition of the Hebrews derives from Hivi and Amori, the younger sons of Canaan, the Hivites and Amorites—the former in the beautiful mountain valleys round Gibeon and Sichem, northwards as far as Mount Hermon; the latter, a numerous and powerful tribe, outside the land of Canaan, north-east of Jordan, from the Jabbok in the south to Hermon in the north.[490] The Amorites, as we may venture to assume, were the Amari of Egyptian inscriptions. Furthest to the north, in the valley of the Orontes, were the Hamathites, whom the Hebrews also reckon among the sons of Canaan.

On the other hand, the Damascenes, the northern neighbours of the Amorites, whose city is mentioned by the Egyptians with Hamath as early as the sixteenth century, and who in the ninth and eighth centuries B.C. were the centre of the most powerful community in the Syrian interior, were not reckoned by the Hebrews among the sons of Canaan; and the inscriptions of the Assyrians also place the Damascenes among the Arimi, i.e. Aramaeens. Nor are the old inhabitants of the valley of the Jordan included by Hebrew tradition among the Canaanites, which is here associated with the principalities of Sodom and Gomorrah, of Adamah, Zeboim, and Zoar, and the names of the princes who once fought against Kedor Laomer in the valley of Siddim. But Jehovah caused fire and brimstone to rain upon Sodom and Gomorrah owing to the sins of the inhabitants, and destroyed these cities and the whole region. The Philistines also, whom we find in possession of the coast from Gaza in the south to Carmel in the north, were not counted by the Hebrews among the sons of Canaan. It has been remarked that the name occurs for the first time in Egyptian inscriptions in the first half of the thirteenth century B.C. The Hebrews tell us that the Philistines marched from Caphtor and overcame the Avites, who dwell "in villages as far as Gaza." By Caphtor we should probably understand the eastern sea coast of Egypt, the north-east of the Delta, where a Semitic population may have established itself firmly from the time of the Hyksos, and may have been able to maintain themselves after their expulsion. Yet there is nothing to contradict the assumption that, at the time of their expulsion by Amosis and the Tuthmosis, a part of the Hyksos turned towards Syria, and that the Philistines were sprung from these. We may remember that Manetho terms the Hyksos Phenicians, or kinsmen of the Phenicians, and tells us that they retired in the direction of Syria, and Herodotus represents the shepherd Philitis as pasturing his flocks at Memphis.[491] In the eleventh century B.C. we find the Philistines under the dominion of the princes of the cities of Gaza, Ascalon, Ashdod, Gath, and Ekron. The princes had their palaces; the cities were protected by walls and towers, and possessed extensive temples, in which were images of wood and iron, and rich offerings. The five cities formed a federation, their princes (Seranim) sat in a common council, led out their armies in common, and in common offered thankofferings for the victories won. They could bring into the field a splendid army of chariots, horsemen, heavy-armed soldiers, and bowmen; the soldiers were divided into troops of hundreds and thousands.[492]

Towards the middle of the thirteenth century a considerable alteration took place in the interior of Canaan, between the coast of the Philistines and the valley of the Jordan. The Amorites advanced towards the south over the Jabbok, and subjugated the Moabites, who dwelt in this district to the east of the Dead Sea, as far as the Arnon. They spread westwards over the Jordan, and overthrew the ancient federation of the Hittites. These were either subjugated or driven out; only in some mountain cantons did the Hittites maintain themselves. In their place the Amorites ruled between the coast and the Dead Sea, and this district was now known as the "Mountain of the Amorites."[493]

Northwards also the Amorites pressed forward against the Hittites, and took possession of their land as far as Lake Merom.[494] It was only in Gibeon and the surrounding districts that the Hivites held their own;[495] and all the Hittites and Hivites who refused subjugation and slavery were compelled to retire to the coast. It must have been a heavy blow that could shatter the power of the Hittites; while the collection of a numerous population on the coast, which was caused by the new supremacy of the Amorites, was in its turn of important consequence for the cities of Phenicia. But the new masters of the southern land did not form a consolidated power, like the Hittites before them; they were broken up into separate tribes, so that among them, and the remnants of the Hittites and Hivites, there were about thirty small principalities. The ancient power of the Hittites must have been important enough to leave behind a very lasting impression. The Book of Joshua uses the expression "land of the Hittites," for the whole region from the sea to the Euphrates, and the Assyrian inscriptions of the ninth, eighth, and seventh centuries include beside the land of Arimi, i.e. of the Aramæans the whole of Canaan from Hamath to the sea and southwards as far as Egypt, under the name of the "land of Chatti."[496]

      FOOTNOTES:

      [477] Strabo, p. 756. "It is true that the whole land from Seleucis to Egypt and Arabia is also called