2 - Literary texts

Summary

For many years the only basis on which scholars were able to attest to the existence and reality of the Ituraeans, and their principality known as Ituraea, was the early textual material. Based on the experience and preconceptions of the early writers, this historical/literary material has been subject to various interpretations by modern scholars. Analogous to this was, for many scholars, a long-accepted approach when dealing with the ancient Near East, to look for ‘something Greek – almost to the exclusion of the existing cultures’. How do we look to the ancient Near East without imposing preconceived ideas or misinterpreting the primary source material? A brief mention by Strabo, and more frequent mention by Josephus, reveal in their writings the existence of a people named Ituraean. More frequently than not this led scholars to make assumptions about a relatively unknown people in which they are consistently viewed within a negative framework. In one instance Ituraeans are considered as ‘belligerent’, in another as ‘wild border-men between Syria and Arabia’. In an attempt to address this fundamental misconception, and at the same time to help bring about a more objective interpretation, this textual material will be reconsidered. Recent scholarship has challenged the way we have, in the past, viewed the ancient Near East and the Greco-Roman world, yet, in spite of this enhancement, many outdated and ill-conceived ideas still prevail.