Arabia, the Arabs and the Persian Gulf. A Dissertation of Ancient Sources

Abstract

I will expone the point of view of a Historian of the Antiquity about this fascinating subject. I will not talk about the Prehistory of this territory, focussing my attention on Assyrian, Chaldean, Torian, Achaemenid kings and the Roman period, related to the arabs on South Arabia1. The first source we must consider are the inscriptions carved on Shalmanasar III monolith from Kurkh. The inscriptions narrate the first six years of Shalmanasar the third reign, telling us about the battle at Gargan on the sixth year of his reign, 835 BC2. This inscription mentions the leaders of the enemy army, including Hadadezer of Damascus, Ishuleni of Hamath, Ahab of Israel and Gindibu’ the arab and his one thousand camels. This source holds a great importance because it’s the only one left about the battle of Qargar, and mentions the list of the enemy armies and the names of their leaders. It’s important also because of the presence of an Arab leader, probably from the western region, because other sources mention vaguely the twelve kings of Hatti and the sea coast. On the inscriptions of Tiglath-Pileser III3 we may read mentions about the Arabs. These inscriptions are of two kinds, one following a cronological sequence and the non-annalistic inscriptions, called “Summary Inscriptions”. These “Summary Inscriptions”, which are related to the Annals, register the events according to their importance following a cronological order in the descriptions of wars and other events but they offer very little informarion about the Arabs.