Beth-Nimrah or Beth-nimrah ( he, בית נמרה), also called Nimrin and Bethennabris, was an ancient city in
Transjordan Transjordan may refer to:
* Transjordan (region), an area to the east of the Jordan River
* Oultrejordain, a Crusader lordship (1118–1187), also called Transjordan
* Emirate of Transjordan, British protectorate (1921–1946)
* Hashemite Kingdom of ...
, which features prominently the
history of ancient Israel and Judah
The history of ancient Israel and Judah begins in the Southern Levant during the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age. "Israel" as a people or tribal confederation (see Israelites) appears for the first time in the Merneptah Stele, an inscri ...
. Tell Nimrin has been identified by
Nelson Glueck
Nelson Glueck (June 4, 1900 – February 12, 1971) was an American rabbi, academic and archaeologist. He served as president of Hebrew Union College from 1947 until his death, and his pioneering work in biblical archaeology resulted in the disco ...
as the last of three sites successively occupied by the ancient city.
Etymology
Beth Nimrah means 'house of a leopard' in Hebrew, ''
beit
A Beit (also spelled bait, ar, بيت , literally "a house") is a metrical unit of Arabic, Iranian, Urdu and Sindhi poetry. It corresponds to a line, though sometimes improperly renderered as "couplet" since each ''beit'' is divided into ...
'' meaning 'house' and ''namer'' 'leopard' (cf. ''
Nimr (disambiguation)nimr'' in
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic languages, Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C ...
).
Later in antiquity, the city took on the name Nimrin,
[Glueck (1943), pp. 10-12.] until its demise in the first century CE.
[ In ]Talmudic
The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cente ...
literature, it is mentioned as Nimrin or Nimri.[
The name is preserved in the names Tell Nimrin (for the archaeological mound) and ]Wadi Nimrin
Wadi Shueib ( ar, وادي شُعَيب), Arabic for the Valley of Jethro and properly Wadi Shuʿeib but with many variant romanisations, is a wadi in Jordan.
The alluvial fan of the wadi where it enters the southern part of the eastern Jorda ...
(for the wadi
Wadi ( ar, وَادِي, wādī), alternatively ''wād'' ( ar, وَاد), North African Arabic Oued, is the Arabic term traditionally referring to a valley. In some instances, it may refer to a wet (ephemeral) riverbed that contains water onl ...
-type valley).[ Glueck suggests a possible connection between Wadi Nimrin and the biblical "Waters of Nimrim" ( and ), although he identifies "this stream" with Seil en-Numeirah (not clear if he refers by "this stream" to Seil en-Numeirah, or to Jeremiah's "Waters of Nimrim").][ Seil en-Numeira is a stream that flows into the Dead Sea at its southern end.][
]
Location
The city was located in the Jordan Valley
The Jordan Valley ( ar, غور الأردن, ''Ghor al-Urdun''; he, עֵמֶק הַיַרְדֵּן, ''Emek HaYarden'') forms part of the larger Jordan Rift Valley. Unlike most other river valleys, the term "Jordan Valley" often applies just to ...
, approximately north of the Dead Sea
The Dead Sea ( he, יַם הַמֶּלַח, ''Yam hamMelaḥ''; ar, اَلْبَحْرُ الْمَيْتُ, ''Āl-Baḥrū l-Maytū''), also known by other names, is a salt lake bordered by Jordan to the east and Israel and the West Bank ...
and east of Jericho
Jericho ( ; ar, أريحا ; he, יְרִיחוֹ ) is a Palestinian city in the West Bank. It is located in the Jordan Valley, with the Jordan River to the east and Jerusalem to the west. It is the administrative seat of the Jericho Gove ...
. Wadi Nimrin
Wadi Shueib ( ar, وادي شُعَيب), Arabic for the Valley of Jethro and properly Wadi Shuʿeib but with many variant romanisations, is a wadi in Jordan.
The alluvial fan of the wadi where it enters the southern part of the eastern Jorda ...
, on whose south (left) bank all the three sites identified by Glueck with Beth Nimra are located, marks the northern limit of the Plains of Moab
The Plains of Moab ( he, עַרְבוֹת מוֹאָב, translit=Arboth Mo'av, lit=Dry areas of Moab) are mentioned in three books of the Hebrew Bible (Numbers, Deuteronomy and Joshua) as an area in Transjordan, stretching along the Jordan "across ...
.[
The ancient city was believed by Glueck to have moved twice in its history, occupying successively three ]mounds
A mound is an artificial heap or pile, especially of earth, rocks, or sand.
Mound and Mounds may also refer to:
Places
* Mound, Louisiana, United States
* Mound, Minnesota, United States
* Mound, Texas, United States
* Mound, West Virginia
* Moun ...
: Tell el-Mustaḥ during the Early Bronze I, Tell Bleibil in Iron Age I-II, and Tell Nimrin in the Roman through to the Early Muslim period, with similar large historical sedentary habitation gaps as those encountered elsewhere across the Jordan Valley.[ Glueck based his dates on sherds found at the surface and, in the case of Tell el-Mustah and Tell Nimrin, in cuts caused by modern roads.][
Tell el-Mustah rises south of Wadi Sha'ib (Wadi Shu'ayb in more recent spelling), which is the name of an easterly section of the same wadi which takes on the name Wadi Nimrin when it reaches Tell Nimrin.][ Tell Bleibil is just across the wadi from Tell el-Mustah, so on the north side of Wadi Sha'ib.][ Tell el-Mustah stands c. 1.75 km ENE of Tell Nimrin, both being located on the south side of the wadi.][ The tells of Mustah and Bleibil are in the foothills flanking the plain of Nimrin from the east, while Nimrin is further down the slope.][ Glueck describes Tell Nimrin in 1943 as being situated very close to the east of the Arab village of Shuneh][ (now Ash-Shunah al-Janubiyah or South Shuneh). About Tell Nimrin, see also Alexander Ahrens' Wadi Shuʿayb Archaeological Survey (2018).][Alexander Ahrens]
"From the Jordan Valley Lowlands to the Transjordanian Highlands: Preliminary Report of the Wadi Shuʿayb Archaeological Survey Project 2016, in: Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 59 (2018): 631-648"
/ref>
Hebrew Bible
It was assigned to the Tribe of Gad
According to the Bible, the Tribe of Gad () was one of the Twelve Tribes of Israel who, after the Exodus from Egypt, settled on the eastern side of the Jordan River. It is one of the ten lost tribes.Tribe still originated from the original Hebre ...
(). In the Book of Joshua
The Book of Joshua ( he, סֵפֶר יְהוֹשֻׁעַ ', Tiberian: ''Sēp̄er Yŏhōšūaʿ'') is the sixth book in the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament, and is the first book of the Deuteronomistic history, the story of Isra ...
it was said to have belonged formerly to the kingdom of Sihon
Sihon was an Amorite king mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, who refused to let the Israelites pass through his country.
Biblical accounts
The Book of Numbers recounts that as the Israelites making their Exodus journey came to the country east of th ...
().
History
Persian period
In the 4th century BCE, the city was settled by Israelites
The Israelites (; , , ) were a group of Semitic-speaking tribes in the ancient Near East who, during the Iron Age, inhabited a part of Canaan.
The earliest recorded evidence of a people by the name of Israel appears in the Merneptah Stele o ...
who had returned from the Babylonian exile
The Babylonian captivity or Babylonian exile is the period in Jewish history during which a large number of Judeans from the ancient Kingdom of Judah were captives in Babylon, the capital city of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, following their defeat ...
and marked the furthest extent eastward of Jewish settlement in Transjordan.
Roman and Byzantine periods
In c. 65 CE, the village was the site of a fierce battle during the First Jewish-Roman War
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...
under Vespasian
Vespasian (; la, Vespasianus ; 17 November AD 9 – 23/24 June 79) was a Roman emperor who reigned from AD 69 to 79. The fourth and last emperor who reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors, he founded the Flavian dynasty that ruled the Empi ...
, which saw the defeat of the town's defenders. The non-combatants were exterminated, the able-bodied fled, the houses were ransacked by the soldiery, and the village set on fire.Josephus
Flavius Josephus (; grc-gre, Ἰώσηπος, ; 37 – 100) was a first-century Romano-Jewish historian and military leader, best known for ''The Jewish War'', who was born in Jerusalem—then part of Roman Judea—to a father of priestly d ...
, ''De Bello Judaico
''The Jewish War'' or ''Judean War'' (in full ''Flavius Josephus' Books of the History of the Jewish War against the Romans'', el, Φλαυίου Ἰωσήπου ἱστορία Ἰουδαϊκοῦ πολέμου πρὸς Ῥωμαίους ...
'' (The Jewish War
4.7.4
(4.419)
4.7.5
(4.426)
The town is also mentioned in the Mosaic of Rehob
The Mosaic of Reḥob, also known as the Tel Rehov inscription and Baraita of the Boundaries, is a late 3rd–6th century CE mosaic discovered in 1973, inlaid in the floor of the foyer or narthex of an ancient synagogue near Tel Rehov, south of ...
, which was laid sometimes between the late 3rd and the 6th/7th centuries CE.
References
Bibliography
*
{{Coord, 31.909, 35.638, display=title
External links
Photos of Tall Nimrin
at the American Center of Research
The American Center of Research (ACOR) is a private, not-for-profit scholarly and educational organization. Based in Alexandria, Virginia, with a facility in Amman, Jordan, ACOR promotes knowledge of Jordan and the interconnected region, past and ...
Populated places disestablished in the 1st century
Former populated places in Jordan
Archaeology of Jordan
Jews and Judaism in Jordan
Hebrew Bible places
Transjordan (region)