Against Moab
Interrogating the Archaeology of Iron Age Jordan

Simultaneously examines recent research on Moab as well as illustrating the challenges of reconstructing an ancient society with a problematic textual and archaeological record.

Benjamin W. Porter (Author)

9781009547840, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 10 April 2025

96 pages
23.5 x 16 x 1.2 cm, 0.286 kg

Known as a place, a people, and a kingdom at various points in the second and first millennia BCE, Moab has long sustained the attention of archaeologists, philologists, and historians, in part because of its adjacent location to ancient Israel. The past 150 years of research in what is today west-central Jordan has proffered a significant corpus of evidence from the region's archaeological sites. However, a critical analysis of this evidence reveals significant gaps in knowledge that challenge attempts to narrate Moab's political, economic, and social history. This Element examines the evidence as well as the debates surrounding Moab's development and decline. This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core.

Introduction
1. The Landscape of West-Central Jordan
2. Society and Subsistence across the Second Millennium
3. Searching for Sihon, Seeking Balak and Eglon
4. King Mesha's Vision of Moab
5. Locating the Kingdom of Moab
6. Beyond the Kemosh Cult
7. Responding to Assyrian Imperialism
8. The End of Moab?
Conclusion
Bibliography.

Subject Areas: Middle & Near Eastern archaeology [HDDC]