Ancient Canaanites

Canaan is an ancient term for a region roughly corresponding to the present-day Israel (plus the West Bank), western Jordan, southern Syria and southern Lebanon. The Canaanite town Ugarit was rediscovered in 1928 and much of our modern knowledge about the Canaanites stems from excavation in this area.

Canaan before the arrival of the Israelites

The name is of obscure origins but is extremely ancient, the first known references having appeared in the 3rd millennium BC. In the 18th century BC it is mentioned in a document found in the ruins of the Sumerian city of Mari, apparently existing as a distinct political entity (probably a loose confederation of city-states).

During the 2nd millennium BC the name was used for a province of the Egyptian empire which is described as having been bounded to the west by the Mediterannean Sea, to the north by the Pass of Hamath in southern Lebanon, to the east by the Jordan valley and to the south by a line from the Dead Sea to the Gaza area. This corresponds closely to the description of the region given in the Hebrew Bible, in Numbers 34.1�12.

Canaan was evidently an ethnically diverse land before the arrival of the Hebrews; its inhabitants, the Canaanites are said in Deuteronomy 7.1 to have been one of seven nations driven out before the Israelites. Other passages describe regional ethnic divisions, of which the Canaanites were the coastal component. The term "Canaanites" in this context corresponds exactly to "Phoenicians".

Whoever the Canaanites were, they acquired a reputation as traders across a wide area of the Near East. Tablets found in the Mesopotamian city of Nuzi use the term "Kinahnu" (translated as "Canaan") as a synonym for red or purple dye, apparently a renowned Canaanite export commodity.

The dyes were most probably named after their place of origin (much as "champagne" is both a product and the name of the region in which it is produced). Similarly, there are occasional instances in the Hebrew Bible in which "Canaanite" is used as a synonym for "merchant", presumably indicating the aspect of Canaanites with which the anonymous author was most familiar.

In linguistic terms, Canaanite refers to the common ancestor of closely related Semitic languages such as Hebrew, and Ugaritic, and was the first language to use a Semitic alphabet, from which the others derived their scripts; see Canaanite.

Biblical Canaanites

In the Pentateuch, Canaan, Kush, Punt and Mizraim were grouped together as "sons of Ham". The Canaanites are initially identified as divided into eleven tribes or areas: Sidon; Heth; Jebusites; Amorites; Girgasites; Hivites; Arkites; Sinites; Arvadites; Zemarites; Hamathites.

Ham discovered Noah "undressed naked" while Noah was sleeping off some wine (Genesis 9:22). To "undress" a sibling's or parent's or grandparent's "nakedness" is a biblical term for committing a sexual act with a sibling's spouse, or with a parent's spouse/children/grandchildren, or with a parent's sibling or their spouse respectively (see Leviticus 18).

It was Noah's youngest "son" (grandchildren being included under this title in Biblical Hebrew) Canaan who was directly connected to this event since as a result it was he and not Ham who was cursed to go into servitude even to his Hamite brethren as well as his Shemite & Japhethic cousins by his grandfather Noah (Genesis 9:25).

As a result of their eponymous ancestor's crime the bible indicates that Canaanites in Israel's eyes were seen as an increasingly sexually very depraved people (Leviticus 18:27). Thus the land of the Canaanites (specifically the Amorites, Hivites, Hethites, Girgashites and Jebusites) was deemed suitable for conquest by the Israelites on moral grounds. To this day, based upon Deut. 20:16-17, it remains one of the fundamental 613 Jewish Commandments not to keep alive any individual of the Canaanite nations specified in the Torah.

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Ancient Canaanites

Canaan before the arrival of the Israelites

Biblical Canaanites

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