Cerbani
Around the birth of Christ, according to historians, the Cerbani with Pliny and Carbæ with Diodor next to their allies Debæ and Dedebæ appear as the most powerful tribes in the area of the southern Hejaz of the so-called Arabian Peninsula (see also Ptolemy ). According to scholars, these Cerbani / Carbæ are identical to the Harb (Arabic Schrb or Tschrb ).
etymology
Samuel Bochart suspected that they were immigrant Phoenicians . Because they were very belligerent, it is also speculated that they can be brought together with the North Arabian Kedarites (Kedar). The Hebrew kerab for war, the karab for fighting or the Arabic harb for war show a connection, according to Charles Forster.
Localization
The capital or the main seat or the religious center was the ancient Mecca , the Macoraba of Ptolemy, which also occurs as Bakkah in the Koran. According to ancient Greek and Roman sources, the Cerbani had only one port and concentrated on the fertile inland, but were allied with the far more active seafaring Debae or Dedebae, who ruled almost the entire coast of the Hejaz. Pliny lists them as seafarers alongside the Sabeans and others.
Sources and individual references
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), William Smith, LLD, Ed. London
- The historical geography of Arabia Charles Forster, London 1844
- ^ Samuel Bochart according to Charles Forster, The historical geography of Arabia
- ^ The historical geography of Arabia Charles Forster, London 1844
- ↑ Pliny the Elder, 6.32, Naturalis historia