ABSTRACT
The Neo-Babylonian king Nabonidus (Nabuna'id), resided at Tema (Teima) during several years of his reign ($5$-$38 B.C.). He probably introduced the worship of the moon-god Sin, for the deity shown on the Tema Stone bears the horns of a bull, the moongod's symbol in Arabia; moreover, an Aramaic inscription on the stone, of the fifth century B.C., describes the introduction of a new god. 'I'he contact of Arabia with Neo-Babylonia ended with the fall of Babylon to the Persians in 538 B.C. Little is known of Aehaemenid or Parthian contacts with Arabia in the following centuries, but Nearchus, commander of Alexander's fleet, touched at Ras Masandam in the strait of Horrnuz on his voyage from the Indus to the Tigris in 324 B.C., and before his death in the following year Alexander sent out three naval expeditions to explore the Arabian coasts, one being commanded by Androsthenes (p. 207).
