ABSTRACT
Of the peoples in Arabia mentioned in the Assyrian texts from Tiglath Pileser onwards, several appear in the Old Testament: Saba/Sheba, Ephah, meʕûnîm, Nebayot, Qedar, Adbeʔel and Massa’. As we have emphasized, the contemporary Assyrian sources do not indicate identity between Arabs and any of these tribes, except perhaps Qedar. We find the same picture in the Old Testament. Even though ʕarab are mentioned, they are never explicitly identified with any of the other entities mentioned as living in Arabia. In much later Jewish tradition, reflected in the works of Josephus, we find the identification between the sons of Ishmael and árabes. Among the former we find Qedar and Dumah which, as is plainly documented from Assyrian sources, are either Arabs or closely connected with them. But the extension of the concept to all other Ishmaelites, and even to everybody living on the peninsula, is not documented until Hellenistic times. We should thus not ohne weiteres apply the ideas of later centuries to ethnic conditions in Assyrian, Chaldaean and Achaemenid times. 1
