Nabataean kingdom

History

Nabataeans

The Nabataeans were among several Arab tribes that originally led a nomadic existence in the Arabian Desert, migrating with their herds along established routes in search of pasture and water. Their survival depended on intimate knowledge of seasonal resources, especially in years of drought or insufficient rainfall.

The origin of the specific tribe of Arab nomads remains uncertain. One hypothesis locates their original homeland in today's Yemen, in the southwest of the Arabian Peninsula, but their deities, language and script share nothing with those of southern Arabia.

Another hypothesis argues that they came from the eastern coast of the peninsula.

It has also been suggested that they came from the Hejaz area, which is considered to be more convincing, as they share many deities with the ancient people there; nbṭw, the root consonant of the tribe's name, is found in the early Semitic languages of Hejaz.

Linguistic similarities between the late Nabataean Arabic dialect and those attested in Mesopotamia during the Neo-Assyrian period, along with Assyrian records listing a group called "Nabatu" among rebellious Arab tribes in the region, indicate another possible connection. This evidence suggests that the Nabataeans may have originated in Mesopotamia and migrated westward between the 6th and 4th centuries BC, eventually settling in northwestern Arabia and much of present-day Jordan.

Nabataeans have been falsely associated with other groups of people. A people called the "Nabaiti", who were defeated by the Assyrian King Ashurbanipal, were associated by some with the Nabataeans because of the temptation to link their similar names. Another misconception is their identification with the Nebaioth of the Hebrew Bible, the descendants of Ishmael, Abraham's son.

Emergence

The literate Nabataeans left no lengthy historical texts. However, thousands of inscriptions have been found in their settlements, including graffiti and on minted coins. The Nabataeans appear in historical records from the 4th century BC. Up to that time, the Qedarites dominated the area and likely controlled the lucrative frankincense trade. Aramaic ostraca finds indicate that the Achaemenid province Idumaea must have been established before 363 BC, after the failed revolt of Hakor of Egypt and Evagoras I of Salamis against the Persians. The establishment of the province meant a significant loss of territory for the Qedarites who had joined the failed revolt and consequently also lost their privileged position in the frankincense trade, where they were presumably replaced by the Nabataeans. It has been argued that either the Nabateans lived mainly outside Idumea and functioned as middlemen to the Persian incense trade, or that the Persians lost interest in Idumea after 400 BC, allowing the Nabataeans to gain prominence in that area. These changes would have allowed the Nabataeans to control the frankincense trade from Lihyan to Gaza.

The first historical reference to the Nabataeans of significant length is by Greek historian Diodorus Siculus who lived around 30 BC. Diodorus refers accounts made 300 years earlier by Hieronymus of Cardia, one of Alexander the Great's generals, who had a first-hand encounter with the Nabataeans. Diodorus relates how the Nabataeans survived in a waterless desert and managed to defeat their enemies by hiding in the desert until the latter surrendered for lack of water. The Nabataeans dug cisterns that were covered and marked by signs known only to themselves. Diodorus wrote about how they were "exceptionally fond of freedom" and includes an account about unsuccessful raids that were initiated by Greek general Antigonus I in 312 BC.

neither the Assyrians of old, nor the kings of the Medes and Persians, nor yet those of the Macedonians have been able to enslave them, and... they never brought their attempts to a successful conclusion. - Diodorus.

After Alexander the Great's death in 323 BC, his empire split among his generals. During the conflict between Alexander's generals, Antigonus conquered the Levant, and this brought him to the borders of Edom, just north of Petra. According to Diodorus, Antigonus sought to add "the land of the Arabs who are called Nabataeans" to his existing territories of Syria and Phoenicia. The Nabataeans were distinguished from the other Arab tribes by wealth. The Nabataeans generated revenues from the trade caravans that transported frankincense, myrrh and other spices from Eudaemon in today's Yemen, across the Arabian Peninsula, passing through Petra and ending up in the Port of Gaza for shipment to European markets.

Political state

The Nabataean Arabs did not emerge as a political power suddenly; their rise instead went through two phases. The first phase was in the 4th century BC (ruled then by an elders' council), which was marked by the growth of Nabataean control over trade routes and various tribes and towns. Their presence in Transjordan by the end of the 4th century BC is guaranteed by Antigonus' operations in the region, and despite recent suggestions that there is no evidence of Nabataean occupation of the Hauran in the early period, the Zenon papyri firmly attest the penetration of the Hauran by the Nabataeans in the mid-3rd century BC, and according to Bowersock it "establish[es] these Arabs in one of the principal areas of subsequent splendor". Simultaneously, the Nabataeans had probably moved across the 'Araba to the west into the desert tracts of the Negev. In their early history, before establishing urban centers the Nabataeans demonstrated on several occasions their impressive and well organized military prowess by successfully defending their territory against larger powers.

The second phase saw the creation of the Nabataean political state in the mid-3rd century BC. Kingship is regarded as a characteristic of a state and urban society. The Nabataean institution of kingship came about as a result of multiple factors, such as the indispensabilities of trade organization and war; the subsequent outcomes of the Greek expeditions on the Nabataeans played a role in the political centralization of the Nabatu tribe. The earliest evidence of Nabataean kingship comes from a Nabataean inscription in the Hauran region, probably Bosra, which mentions a Nabataean king whose name was lost, dated by Stracky to the early 3rd century BC. The dating is significant, since the available evidence does not attest the existence of Nabataean monarchy until the 2nd century BC. This nameless Nabataean king perhaps could be linked with a reference from the Zenon archive (the second historical mention of the Nabataeans) to deliveries of grain to "Rabbel's men", Rabbel being a characteristically royal Nabataean name, it is thus possible to link Rabbel of the Zenon archive with the nameless king of Bosra's inscription, though it is highly speculative.

A recent papyrological discovery, the Milan Papyrus published in 2001, provides further evidence. The relevant part of the Lithika section of the papyrus describes an Arabian cavalry of a certain Nabataean king, providing an early 3rd century BC reference to a Nabataean monarch. The word Nabataean stands alone beside a missing word that start with the letter M; one of the suggested words for filling the gap is the traditional name of Nabataean kings, Malichus. Furthermore, the anonymous Nabataean coins dated by Barkay to the second half of the 3rd century BC, found mainly in Nabataean territory, support such an early date of the Nabataean Kingdom. This is in line with Strabo's account (whose description of Arabia derives ultimately from reports by 3rd century BC Ptolemaic officials) that the Nabataean kingship was old and traditional. Rachel Barkay concludes "the Nabataean economy and political regime were in existence by the 3rd century BC". The kingship of the Nabataeans was, in the view of Strabo, an effective one, where the Nabataean kingdom was "very well governed" and the king was "a man of the people". For more than four centuries the Nabataean kingdom dominated, politically and commercially, a large territory and was arguably the first Arab kingdom in the area.

Relationship with Hasmoneans

The Nabataeans were allies of the Maccabees during their struggles against the Seleucid monarchs. They then became rivals of their successors, the Judaean Hasmonean dynasty, and a chief element in the disorders which invited Pompey's intervention in Judea. Gaza City was the last stop for spices that were carried by trade caravans before shipment to European markets, giving the Nabataeans considerable influence over the Gazans. Hasmonean King Alexander Jannaeus besieged and occupied Gaza in 96 BC, murdering many of its inhabitants. Jannaeus then captured several territories in Transjordan north of Nabataea, along the road to Damascus, including northern Moab and Gilead. These territorial acquisitions threatened Nabataean trade interests in Gaza and in Damascus. Nabataean King Obodas I regained control of these areas after his forces defeated Jannaeus in the Battle of Gadara around 93 BC.

After the Nabataean victory over the Judaeans, the Nabataeans were at odds with the Seleucids, who were concerned about the increasing influence of the Nabataeans to the south of their territories. During the Battle of Cana in 84 BC, the Seleucid king Antiochus XII waged war against the Nabataeans. Antiochus was slain during combat, and his army fled and perished in the desert from starvation. After Obodas's victories over the Judaeans and the Seleucids, he was worshipped as a god by his people. He was buried in the Temple of Oboda in Avdat, where inscriptions have been found referring to "Obodas the god".

The kingdom seems to have reached its territorial zenith during the reign of Aretas III (87 to 62 BC). In 62 BC, a Roman army under the command of Marcus Aemilius Scaurus besieged Petra. The defeated Aretas paid tribute to Scaurus and recognized Roman supremacy over Nabataea. The Nabataean Kingdom was slowly surrounded by the expanding Roman Empire, which conquered Egypt and annexed Hasmonean Judea. While the Nabataean kingdom managed to preserve its formal independence, it became a client kingdom under the influence of Rome.

Roman annexation

In 106 AD, during the reign of Roman emperor Trajan, the last king of the Nabataean kingdom Rabbel II Soter died, which may have prompted the official annexation of Nabatea to the Roman Empire. The event is attested in three contemporary sources: two papyri from 107 AD, as well as a Safaitic inscription.

Some epigraphic evidence suggests a military campaign, commanded by Cornelius Palma, the governor of Syria. Roman forces seem to have come from Syria and also from Egypt. It is clear that by 107 Roman legions were stationed in the area around Petra and Bosra, as is shown by a papyrus found in Egypt.

The kingdom was annexed by the empire to become the province of Arabia Petraea. Trade seems to have largely continued thanks to the Nabataeans' undiminished talent for trading. Under Hadrian, the limes Arabicus ignored most of the Nabatæan territory and ran northeast from Aila (modern Aqaba) at the head of the Gulf of Aqaba. A century later, during the reign of Alexander Severus, the local issue of coinage came to an end. There was no more building of sumptuous tombs, apparently because of a sudden change in political ways, such as an invasion by the neo-Persian power under the Sassanid Empire. The city of Palmyra, for a time the capital of the breakaway Palmyrene Empire, grew in importance and attracted the Arabian trade away from Petra.

Geography

The Nabataean Kingdom lay across the southernmost reaches of the Levant, the northwestern Arabian Peninsula, and Sinai, encompassing parts of what are now Jordan, Israel, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt. To its north lay Hasmonean Judea (later the Roman province of Judaea), while to the west was Ptolemaic Egypt. Its capital was Raqmu (Petra). Nabataean towns included Bosra in the Hauran; Hegra (Mada'in Saleh) in the Hejaz; Leuke Kome on the Red Sea, and, in the Negev along the Judaean frontier, Nitzana (Nessana), Elusa, Mamshit (Mampsis), and Avdat (Oboda).

Raqmu was a wealthy trading town, located at a convergence of several important trade routes. One of them was the Incense Route which was based around the production of both myrrh and frankincense in southern Arabia, and ran through Mada'in Saleh to Petra. From there, aromatics were distributed throughout the Mediterranean region.