Philistines

• 1. Introduction

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  A bearded man stands without a headdress, carved on the base of a pillar in Egypt's Temple of Ramesses III. The hieroglyphs beside him name him as a captive chief of the Peleset. This is the earliest known picture of the Philistines, an ancient people who lived along the southern coast of Canaan during the Iron Age. They organized themselves into a confederation of city-states called Philistia. They spoke a language so poorly attested that scholars still argue about what it was.

  Who were these people, and where did they come from? Did they arrive as invaders, as hired soldiers, or as quiet settlers? What did they build, eat and worship? And how does a people that held a coastline for centuries vanish from the record entirely?

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• 2. Names and Namesakes

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  Egyptian scribes wrote Peleset. Assyrian scribes wrote Palastu, Pilisti or Pilistu. Hebrew writers wrote Peleshet. Scholars accept these as versions of one name. The English word Philistine took a long road from there, through Old French Philistin, Classical Latin Philistinus and two stages of Greek, back to a Hebrew form meaning people of Peleshet. What the Philistines called themselves is unknown.

  The Greek translators of the Septuagint avoided the name in the books of Judges and Samuel. They wrote allophiloi, which means other nations or foreigners. From this, Robert Drews argues that in the stories of Samson, Saul and David the word simply means non-Israelites of the Promised Land.

  In 1846, Edward Hincks and William Osburn Jr. linked the biblical Philistines to the Egyptian Peleset inscriptions. By 1873, scholars were comparing both to the Pelasgians of the Aegean. The evidence for these links is etymological, and it has been disputed ever since.

  In 1972 and 1975, Allen Jones proposed a more daring idea. He suggested that Philistine was a corruption of the Greek phyle-histia, meaning tribe of the hearth. Stephanos Vogazianos complained that Jones mostly speculated, though he allowed that the root phyle might not be out of place. Israel Finkelstein and Nadav Na'aman pointed out that hearth constructions had indeed been found at Tell Qasile and Ekron.

  In 2003, German archaeologist Kay Kohlmeyer excavated the Citadel of Aleppo and found a statue of a king named Taita. Its inscription was in Luwian. New readings of Anatolian hieroglyphs, proposed by Elisabeth Rieken and Ilya Yakubovich, suggested that Taita ruled a country called Palistin. In the 11th and 10th centuries BC, it stretched from the Amouq Valley in the west to Aleppo in the east, and south to Mehardeh and Shaizar.

  John David Hawkins, who translated the Aleppo inscriptions, suspects a connection between Palistin and the Philistines. Benjamin Sass and Kohlmeyer agree. Itamar Singer is not convinced. Apart from the name, he sees nothing in the finds to suggest an Aegean origin, and the king names and the capital at Tell Tayinat point to a Neo-Hittite state. Singer proposes that a branch of Philistines settled at Tell Tayinat and was replaced or absorbed by Luwians, who then took the name.

  Gershon Galil goes further. He suggests that King David halted Aramean expansion thanks to an alliance with the southern Philistine kings and with Toi, king of Hamath, whom he identifies with Tai(ta) II of Palistin.

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• 3. Washed Ashore

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  Around 1175 BC, Egypt faced a massive invasion by land and sea. The attackers were a coalition that Egyptian texts list as the Tjeker, the Shekelesh, the Deyen, the Weshesh, the Teresh, the Sherden and the PRST. Modern historians call them the Sea Peoples. Ramesses III defeated them in Djahy, the eastern Mediterranean coast, and at the mouths of the rivers in the Nile Delta. He recorded the victories on the walls of his mortuary temple at Medinet Habu. By then the invaders had already plundered Hattusa, Carchemish, Cyprus and the Southern Levant, in the chaos of the Late Bronze Age collapse.

  The Harris Papyrus covers the reign of Ramesses III, which ran from 1186 to 1155 BC. It says the Peleset were reduced to ashes. It also says that he brought captives to Egypt and, in his own words, "settled them in strongholds, bound in my name." Readers have taken this two ways. Either the captives stayed in Egypt while other Peleset carved out land in Canaan, or Ramesses himself placed them in Canaan as mercenaries. Israel Finkelstein suggests a gap of 25 to 50 years between the sacking of the old coastal cities and their reoccupation by the Philistines.

  The Peleset appear in just four Egyptian texts. Besides the Medinet Habu inscriptions and the Harris Papyrus, they are named in the Rhetorical Stela at Deir al-Medinah and in the Onomasticon of Amenope. The stela pairs them with the Teresh, who sailed in the midst of the sea and are thought to have come from the Anatolian coast. The Onomasticon is the only Egyptian source to place the Peleset beside any of the biblical five cities, in a sequence that begins with Ashkelon, Ashdod and Gaza.

  The reliefs give a picture of the warriors. Soldiers are shown tall and clean-shaven, in breastplates and short kilts, with chariots drawn by two horses. They carry small shields, straight swords and spears. Scholars cannot say for certain which figures in the two great battle scenes belong to which people.

  The ground itself tells a quieter story. Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath and Ekron show almost no sign of a destructive event at this time. Canaan is never named as a target in any text about the Sea Peoples. Tell Keisan, Acco, Tel Dor, Tel Batash and other sites show no destruction around 1200 BC. At Aphek, an Egyptian garrison was destroyed late in the 13th century. A Canaanite phase followed, and only then did Philistine pottery arrive, peacefully. Pottery is where the next argument begins.

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• 4. Pots and Cemeteries

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  Philistine Bichrome ware, painted in black and red on a white slip, is the best-known pottery of the Iron Age I. It grew out of an earlier, locally made version of Mycenaean Late Helladic IIIC pottery, painted in brown and black. Pottery of this Philistine type begins to appear in Canaan in the 12th century BC. Excavations at Ashdod, Ekron, Ashkelon and more recently Gath have turned up the Mycenaean connection again and again.

  At Ekron, archaeologists found a building of 240 square metres. Its broad walls could carry a second story, and a wide entrance opened onto a large hall with a row of roof columns. In the floor sat a circular hearth paved with pebbles, just as in Mycenaean megaron halls. Three small bronze wheels with eight spokes lay among the finds. Similar wheels carried cult stands in the Aegean, so the building is assumed to have served religious purposes. An inscription there reads PYGN or PYTN, which some suggest refers to Potnia, a title of a Mycenaean goddess. Butchered dog and pig bones at Ashkelon, Ekron and Gath point to the diet, and loom weights resemble those at Mycenaean sites in Greece.

  Not everyone reads pots as people. Gloria London, John Brug, Shlomo Bunimovitz, Helga Weippert and Edward Noort have all noted the difficulty of associating pots with people. They stress continuity with the local coastal world. The saying runs that kings come and go, but cooking pots remain. Louise A. Hitchcock replies that Philistine language, art, technology, architecture, rituals and administrative practices are rooted in Cypriot and Minoan civilizations.

  The links are old. Cretans traded with Levantine merchants from the Neolithic Minoan era, and the trade grew by the Early Bronze Age. Minoan style shaped the palaces of Middle Bronze Age Canaan, such as Tel Kabri. Assaf Yasur-Landau of the University of Haifa says the rulers made a conscious choice, because "the Canaanites were living in the Levant and wanted to feel European."

  At Tel Ashkelon, the Leon Levy Expedition has worked since 1985, with archaeologists from Harvard University, Boston College, Wheaton College and Troy University. It excavated a Philistine cemetery with more than 150 burials from the 11th to 8th century BC, and announced its results in July 2016. Most graves were oval, some were ashlar chamber tombs, and four people were cremated. These arrangements are common in the Aegean but not in Canaan. Lawrence Stager of Harvard believes the Philistines arrived by ship before the Battle of the Delta. The graves also held perfume placed near the bodies so the dead could smell it in the afterlife, which undercuts the old image of the Philistines as uncultured.

  In 2019, researchers from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History and the Leon Levy Expedition analysed DNA from the Ashkelon skeletons. The remains associated with Iron Age Philistines drew most of their ancestry from the local Levantine gene pool. They also carried a Southern-European-related component, which points to an influx of people in the 12th century BC. The DNA resembled that of ancient Cretans, with a 20 to 60 per cent similarity to ancient skeletons from Crete and Iberia and to modern people in Sardinia. Too few ancient genomes exist to name the exact homeland. Within two centuries the southern European markers were swamped by local ancestry, which suggests intensive intermarriage. Yet Philistine culture and peoplehood stayed distinct for six centuries.

  Laura Mazow of East Carolina University said the findings support a picture of a "complex, multicultural process" that resists any single historical model. Aren Maeir of Bar-Ilan University called the Philistines an entangled, transcultural group. The foreign components, he said, were "not of one origin," and they mixed with local Levantine populations from the early Iron Age onward.

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• 5. Five Cities

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  Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ekron and Gath made up the pentapolis. Joshua 13:3 and 1 Samuel 6:17 describe this Philistia as running from Wadi Gaza in the south to the Yarqon River in the north, with no fixed border to the east. Gath is now identified with Tell es-Safi, not far from Ekron. The location of Ziklag, which the Bible names as the border town between Philistine and Israelite land, remains uncertain.

  Tell Qasile, described as a port city, and Aphek lay on the northern frontier. Tell Qasile may have held both Philistine and non-Philistine residents. Most scholars see two stages of settlement. First, under Ramesses III, the Philistines held only the coastal plain, beginning at Ashkelon, Ashdod and Ekron. About 1150 BC they pushed north into the Yarkon region around modern Jaffa, with farmsteads at Tel Gerisa and Aphek and a larger settlement at Tel Qasile. Their influence spread inland once Egyptian power in southern Canaan collapsed. Between the 10th and 7th centuries BC, their distinct material culture was absorbed by that of their neighbours.

  In the western Jezreel Valley, 23 of 26 Iron Age I sites yielded typical Philistine pottery. The list includes Tel Megiddo, Tel Yokneam, Tel Qiri and Afula. Scholars have explained this as the work of Philistine mercenaries serving the Egyptians in the 12th century BC, or as later expansion, or as trade with the Israelites. The quantities are small, so any Philistines there were a minority who blended into the Canaanite population.

  The whole population of the Philistine area is estimated at about 25,000 in the 12th century BC, rising to a peak of 30,000 in the 11th century. Because place names and material culture look Canaanite, much of that population was probably native. Migrants likely made up less than half, and perhaps far less.

  Ekron had about 200 olive oil installations. Engineers estimate its output may have topped 1,000 tons, which is 30 percent of Israel's present-day production. Excavated cities show careful town planning, with industrial zones. Breweries, wineries and shops selling beer and wine have been found, and beer mugs and wine kraters are among the commonest pottery. Philistine sites have also yielded complex gold, bronze and iron wares from as early as the 12th century BC, along with skilfully made weapons.

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• 6. Gods and Tongues

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  The Philistine word for a captain was seren. It may be related to the Greek tyrannos, a word linguists think the Greeks borrowed from an Anatolian language such as Luwian or Lydian. That is about as much as anyone can say with confidence. Pottery fragments from roughly 1500 to 1000 BC carry inscriptions in non-Semitic languages, including one in a Cypro-Minoan script. Some Philistine-related words in the Bible look unrelated to other Semitic languages, which gives limited support to the idea that the Philistines first spoke an Indo-European language, either from Greece or from the Luwian-speaking coast of Asia Minor.

  Most Philistine names are Semitic, such as Ahimelech, Mitinti, Hanun and Dagon. Goliath, Achish and Phicol look non-Semitic, and Indo-European origins have been suggested for them. The Bible notes no language barrier between Israelites and Philistines, though it does for other groups up to the Assyrian and Babylonian occupations. Under the Persian Achaemenids, Nehemiah 13:23-24 records Judean men marrying women from Moab, Ammon and Philistine cities. Half the children of marriages with women from Ashdod could speak only their mother's language, not Judean Hebrew. By then that tongue may have been an Aramaic dialect.

  The gods of the Philistine area were Baal, Ashteroth, who is Astarte, Asherah and Dagon. All had appeared earlier in the Canaanite pantheon. Qudshu and Anat may also have been worshipped. The Hebrew Bible calls Beelzebub the patron deity of Ekron, but no direct evidence of such a god has turned up. The Israelites may have distorted the name Baal-zebub on purpose. The Ekron Royal Dedicatory Inscription names PT-YH, a form found only in the Philistine sphere and possibly a goddess, though her identity is debated.

  The Bible presents Dagon as the chief Philistine god, yet no sign of Dagon worship has been found at any Philistine site. Not even a personal name invoking him survives in the small body of known Philistine names. He was probably not unknown there, since Assyrian, Phoenician and Egyptian sources mention a city called Beth Dagon. In the 6th century BC, the sarcophagus inscription of Eshmunazar II called Jaffa, a Philistine city, one of the "mighty lands of Dagon."

  The most common religious objects from Philistine sites are figurines and chairs of a goddess, often called Ashdoda. They suggest a dominant female figure, which fits the religion of the ancient Aegean.

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• 7. Enemies in Scripture

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  More than 250 times, the Hebrew Bible mentions the Philistines. Most mentions fall in the Deuteronomistic history, the run of books from Joshua to 2 Kings. There they appear as arch-enemies of Israel and a recurring threat until David subdues them. Rabbinic sources insist the Philistines of Genesis were a different people. According to the Talmud, Chullin 60b, those earlier Philistines intermingled with the Avvites.

  Genesis 10:13-14 lists the descendants of Mizraim and ends with the Caphtorim, "whence the Philistines came forth." Interpreters disagree on whether this means the Caphtorim or the Casluhim. Amos 9:7 says God brought the Philistines from Caphtor, possibly Crete. Friedrich Schwally, Bernhard Stade and Cornelis Tiele argued for a third, Semitic origin.

  The Torah treats them oddly. In Genesis 15:18-21 they are missing from the ten nations Abraham's descendants will displace. In Genesis 21:22-27, Abraham makes a covenant of kindness with Abimelech, the Philistine king, and Isaac later makes a treaty with the same people in chapter 26. Exodus 13:17 says God steered the Israelites away from the Philistines after leaving Egypt. Unlike most peoples in the Bible, they are almost always named in the Torah without the definite article.

  Judges 13:1 says the Philistines dominated Israel in the days of Samson, who fought them and killed over a thousand. In 1 Samuel 5 they capture the Ark of the Covenant and hold it for several months, and in 1 Samuel 6 it is returned to Beth Shemesh. 1 Samuel 13:19-21 says they allowed no Israelite blacksmiths, so Israelites had to go to them to sharpen weapons and farm tools.

  The battles run on. Israel loses at Aphek and the Philistines win at Mount Gilboa, killing King Saul and his three sons Jonathan, Abinadab and Malkishua. Philistines are routed at Eben-Ezer and at Michmash by Jonathan and his men. Near the Valley of Elah, David defeats Goliath in single combat. Hezekiah later drives the Philistines back as far as Gaza. Not every relationship was hostile, since the Cherethites and Pelethites, who were of Philistine origin, served as David's bodyguards. How much of this is accurate history is debated among scholars.

  The prophets Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Amos and Zephaniah all speak of the Philistines' destruction. Jeremiah 47:4 calls them the remnant of the Caphtorim, whose own earlier destruction is left mysterious.

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• 8. Falling to Empires

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  In the middle of the 8th century BC, Tiglath-Pileser III of Assyria marched into the Levant and occupied Philistia, along with Aram-Damascus and Phoenicia. Until then the Philistines had largely kept their independence. Egypt later pushed its neighbours toward rebellion. Sargon II crushed a revolt in Israel in 722 BC and destroyed the kingdom entirely.

  In 712 BC, a Philistine named Iamani took the throne of Ashdod and organized another uprising with Egyptian help. It failed. Sargon invaded and effectively annexed Philistia, though the kings of the five cities, Iamani included, stayed on their thrones as vassals. In his annals, Sargon singled out his capture of Gath in 711 BC.

  Ten years later, Egypt incited another rebellion. Ashkelon, Ekron, Judah and Sidon rose against Sennacherib, Sargon's son and successor. Sennacherib crushed the revolt, defeated the Egyptians and destroyed much of the cities in southern Aramea, Phoenicia, Philistia and Judah. He could not take Jerusalem and forced it to pay tribute instead. His annals list tribute from the kings of Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gaza and Ekron. Gath is never mentioned, which may mean Sargon had already destroyed it.

  In 609 BC, Egypt under Necho II occupied the Philistines. In 604 or 603 BC, after a Philistine revolt, Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon destroyed Ashkelon, Gaza, Aphek and Ekron. Archaeological evidence and contemporary sources confirm it. Some Philistine kings asked Egypt for help and were ignored. Inhabitants were killed or exiled to Mesopotamia. The exiles kept calling themselves men of Gaza or Ashkelon for roughly 150 years before their identity faded. Meanwhile the region itself was resettled in the Persian period, and its people were then identified as Phoenicians, although evidence of continuity from Iron Age traditions is scarce.

  Babylonian ration lists from the early 6th century BC mention the offspring of Aga, the last ruler of Ashkelon. Documents from the latter half of the 5th century BC in the Murasu Archive at Nippur still link individuals to Gaza and Ashkelon. They are the last known mentions of the Philistines, and how far the exiles had truly assimilated by then remains a matter of debate.

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