Category:Nabateans (subject)

The Nabateans were a Semitic population living in Southern Jordan and the northern part of Arabia.

See also Nabatean Kings, and Nabatean Cities.

Overview

In the Greek and Roman Period the Nabateans created a powerful kingdom at the borders of the land of Israel. They had control of the Incense Route, the commercial route connecting the Arabian peninsula to Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean. The Nabatean capital Petra served as a strategic place of reloading, with one route crossing the desert of Negev to the Mediterranean port of Gaza, and another leading through Bosra and Damascus to Mesopotamia in the east and Phoenicia in the west.

Obscure are the origins of the Nabateans as a nomadic group of Arabic tribes. Only in the 2nd century a Nabatean kingdom was created in the area. The Nabateans supported the Maccabees in their fight against the Seleucids but then resisted to the expansion of the Hasmonean Kings. Eventually they fought back and Alexander Jannaeus experienced some devastating defeats. The conflict between John Hyrcanus II and Aristobulos II gave the Nabateans the opportunity to besiege Jerusalem in support to Hyrcanus, but Pompey was quick to take their place, sending his general Scaurus to help Hyrcanus but also to push the Nabatean army back to their land.

The Nabateans then switch alliance and in 40 BCE supported Aristobulus II and his Parthian allies. Herod the Great succeeded in regaining control of the land of Israel on behalf of the Romans and built a series of fortresses to protect the border with the Nabateans. The hostility with the Herods continued in spite of any attempt at a reconciliation, even when they were both allies of the Romans. Herod Antipas married the daughter of the Nabatean King Aretas IV. The divorce resulted in war; Herod Antipas was defeated in battle but the Roman Emperor immediately dispatched the governor of Syria to protect their ally.

The Romans made no attempt to subdue directly the Nabateans. They soon realized the origins of the Nabatean trade and gradually built an alternative route to Arabia from Egypt. When the Nabateans lost their monopoly, their economic and military power began to fade. In 106 CE the Nabatean kingdom was absorbed into the Roman Empire without a fight. As part of the new province of Arabia Petrae, the Nabatean Cities continued to flourished in the centuries to come.

The Nabateans in ancient sources

Diodorus Siculus (1st cent. BCE)

The land (of Arabia) is situated between Syria and Egypt, and is divided among many peoples of diverse characteristics. Now the eastern parts are inhabited by Arabs, who bear the name of Nabateans and range over a country which is partly desert and partly waterless, though a small section of it is fruitful” (Bibliotheca II,48,1-2).

“Consequently the Arabs who inhabit this country, being difficult to overcome in war, remain always unenslaved; furthermore, they never at any time accept a man of another country as their overlord and continue to maintain their liberty unimpaired” (II,48,4).

“They are exceptionally fond of freedom...” (XIX,94,1).

“Some of them raise camels, others sheep, pasturing them in the desert. While there are many Arabian tribes who use the desert as pasture, the Nabateans far surpass the others in wealth although they are not much more than ten thousand in number; for not a few of them are accustomed to bringing down to the sea frankincense and myrrh and the most valuable kind of spices, which they procure from those who convey them from what is called Arabia Eudaemon”, i.e. Arabia, the Blessed (XIX, 94, 4-5).

The Nabateans in Scholarship

The Nabateans in Fiction

External links

• Wikipedia

Major articles

• History of the Nabatean Kings / Schurer/Vermes / 1 (1973) 574-586