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Canaan

Canaan, a geographical term (Eg., kn'n; Akk., ki-na-ah-nu; Heb.,  kn'n) for the area broadly encompassing the Eastern Mediterranean  lands that are to the west of the Jordan River, Phoenicia, and part of southern Syria during the second millennium BCE. The term Canaan is frequently used in the scholarly literature as a conventional reference for that region during the entire Bronze Age (occasionally referred to as the Canaanite period), although no certain mention of Canaan or Canaanites  has survived  in any  texts of  the  third millennium BCE. There are few references  to  Canaan  outside the  Bible  in the  first millennium BCE, although in that period  the Phoenicians along  the  Lebanese  coast  continued to think of themselves as living in the land of Canaan. The etymology of the  word  Canaan is uncertain: one suggestion is to derive the name from a Semitic  root  meaning  "to  bend";  another  relates  it  to  a  Human word meaning "blue cloth."

Map of the Ancient Near East during the Amarna Period
Map of the Ancient Near East during the Amarna Period

Canaan first appears  in Near Eastern texts in the fifteenth century BCE in the autobiography  of  Idrimi,  a  ruler  of  the  north  Syrian kingdom of Alalakh. The earliest reference to Canaanites is  on  an  eighteenth-century  BCE  cuneiform  tablet  from  Mari  on  the  Euphrates River  in  Syria.  New Kingdom Egyptian  texts  contain  more than a dozen references to Canaan. Canaan was the name that  the  Egyptians  applied  to  the  territory  of  the  Near  East  (Western Asia) that was under their control, and for which they often had to  contend  with  the  empires  of  Mitanni  and  the  Hittites.  Ramessid  period documents refer to both Canaan and "the (town of) Canaan  (py kn'n)": the latter was an appellation for Gaza, the administrative  headquarters  of  the  Egyptian  empire  in  Canaan.  It  is  not  always  clear whether the mention of "Canaan" in a particular text (especially a topographical list) refers to the land of Canaan or to the  town of Gaza.

The oldest reference to Canaan in Egyptian texts is in the annals  recording Amenhotpe Us (1454-1419 BCE) campaign of his seventh  regnal year to the land of Retenu; the booty list from that campaign included 640 Canaanite prisoners.  "The (town of) Canaan" (i.e., Gaza) appears in Sety I's (1321-1304  BCE) campaign report for his first regnal year in the hypostyle hall  at Kamak. There is also a mention in the famous Israel Stela from  regnal Year 5 of Merenptah (1237-1226 BCE) of the plundering of  "the  Canaan":  that  citation  is  thought  by  most  scholars  to  be  a  reference to Egypt's Near Eastern province, but by a few as another  mention of Gaza. Papyrus Anastasi I (line 27.1) from the reign of Ramses II (1279-1212 B.C) mentions  the  "end  of  the  land  of  Canaan"  (i.e.,  the  route leading eastward across Sinai to Gaza). Papyrus Anastasi III  A  (lines  5-6)  and  its  duplicate.  Papyrus  Anastasi  IV  (line  16.4),  belonging  to  the  reign  of  Sety II  (1221-1215  BCE),  mention  Canaanite slaves from Kharu. The land of Canaan shows up in two  cuneiform letters sent by Ramses II to his Hittite  contemporary, Hattusili III, at the Hittite capital Hattusha (present- day Bogazkoy). The latest phara-onic period reference to Canaan is on a Middle Kingdom statuette  reinscribed in the Third Intermediate Period for Pediese, son of a Near Easterner named  'Apy,  who  evidently  was  a  messenger  of  "[the]  Canaan  and  Philistia."

Canaan  appears  on  eleven  cuneiform  tablets  (Letters  8,  14,  30,109-110, 131, 137, 148,151,162, 367) and the Canaanites on one  (Letter  9),  from  the  diplomatic  archive  found  at  Tell el-Amama.  Letter  8  is  notable  for  the  Babylonian  king  Burnaburiash's  acknowledgment to Amenhotpe IV that "Canaan is your country,"  while  in  Letter  30  the  kings  of  Canaan  are  addressed  as  the  "servants" of the king of Egypt.  Middle and Late Bronze Age Canaan was divided politically and  territorially into perhaps several dozen small city-states of varying  size and importance. Each city-state normally consisted of an urban  capital as well as a number of smaller towns and villages and the  supporting agricultural land. Generally independent, and not infre- quently  feuding  with  one  another,  the  city-states  occasionally  banded  together  (especially  in  the  Late  Bronze  Age)  to  oppose  Egyptian  and  other  foreign  conquerors;  perhaps  the  best-recorded  case  of  such  cooperation  is  that  of  the  towns  that  gathered  at  Megiddo to oppose Thutmose Ill's Near Eastern campaign of regnal  Year 22.

Egyptian contacts with Canaan  in  the  early twelfth dynasty apparently  focused  on  sites  along the Levantine coast (especially  Byblos). Later on, in the twelfth and continuing into the thirteenth  dynasties, Egypt's foreign  interests  expanded  considerably: the Execration Texts of  the  period  mentioned  many of  the principal towns of both northern and southern Canaan.



The fifteenth dynasty (c. 1664-1555 BCE)  was the one time in  antiquity when a line of kings of Canaanite origin ruled in Egypt. The capital of those sovereigns, whose non-Egyptian  names  included Sheshy, Khayan, and Apophis, was established at Avaris  (i.e.. Tell ed-Dab'a) in the eastern Nile Delta. The origins of those  Canaanite  rulers  is  to  be sought in the movement of Near Easterners into the Delta during the late twelfth and early thirteenth dynasties.  The  political  and  military connections  of  the  Hyksos  kings with the Canaanite city-states of the late Middle Bronze Age  is  unclear  and  much  debated:  some  scholars  feel  that  a  Hyksos  "empire"  included  much  of  southern  Canaan,  while  others  deny  Hyksos control over any part of the Levant.

During the Late Bronze Age, the Egyptian military,  political, and economic activity in the Near East was focused on the major  Canaanite  towns  that  lay  along  the  principal  routes  (e.g., Gaza, Gezer, Megiddo, Hazor), had  ports  to  facilitate  maritime  trade  and/or  Egyptian  naval activity  (e.g.,  Joppa,  Acco,  Byblos,  Tyre),  and/or  could  support  Egyptian  political  and  military  control  of  Canaan (e.g., Gaza and Beth Shan in Palestine, Kumidi and Sumur  in Lebanon). The annals of the New Kingdom pharaohs repeatedly  mentioned  such  towns,  often  as  military  adversaries  of  the  Egyptians. There is substantial archaeological and textual evidence  from  the  nineteenth  and  early  twentieth dynasties (Late  Bronze  IIB-Iron  IA  periods)  of  Egyptian  garrisons  or  administrative centers in Canaan, especially in the Gaza region, as well as at sites  such as Tel Mor, Joppa, Megiddo, Beth Shan, and Kumidi. Finally,  in  the  first  millennium  BCE,  Egypt's relations with Canaan  were  largely  of  a  commercial  and  political  nature,  the  occasional Egyptian military  forays  into  the  region  (most  notably  that  of  Sheshonq I in the late tenth century BCE) usually had only short- term consequences for the region.

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