Talk:Aram (region)

message: if the aram nahraim wasnt recorded in the assyrian and the babylonian tablets, than it didnt exist. because as far as i know at least the assyrians recorded everything, even the recepies for their food, and the maps of that time was reaching to greece in the west and to pesia and india to the east. and if the aram nahraim wasnt mentioned than i think it didnt exist. as far as i know many historicans goes back to assyrian records and the bible for information about that time.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 217.208.32.13 (talk • contribs) .
: Nahrima is an Egyptian term for the Mitanni found used in Egyptian campaign literature from the time of Seti I and his campaigns against the King of Kadesh. The Assyrians begin to mention Aram about half a millenia latter. Abdi Hiba of Jerusalem to the king, No. 4
EA#288 fc(66): mentions the East and the West; calls himself a shepherd; mentions paying tribute, his mother and father, servants; mentions 80 prisoners and the king's deputy Suta; mentions the lands of Seeri and Gintikirmil (Seir (Edom) and Gath-Carmel (Libnah?)), `Let the king care for hisland. The land of the king will be lost. All of it will be taken from me; there is hostility to me. As far as the lands of Seeri (and) even to Gintikirmi there is peace to all the regents, but to me there is hostility.'; writes, `Behold, Zimrida of Lakisi - servants, who have joined with the [H]a[b]i[r]u, have smitten him.'; uses metaphor of a `ship in the sea'; mentions Nahrima and Kapasi, the Habiru and the king's cities and regents; says that Turbazu has been killed in the gate of Zilu; mentions Zimrida of Lakisi and killer servants; mentions murder of Iaptih Adda in the city gate of Zilu; mentions archers, a deputy, scribe; Comments: See map `Nahrima is most likely Mitanni. Mercer had no information on the identity of Kapasi. Iaptih-Adda may be Iapti-Hada of EA#335,9. In EA 288, ER-Heba of Jerusalem declares, 'see! Zimrida—the town(smen) of Lachish have smitten him, servants who have become 'apiru. We may ask, `How can one become a Hebrew, since Hebrew is an ethnic group into which one would have to be born. What is even more fascinating is that one can become an 'Apiru for a period of time and then revert back to ones former social status.[288]Tušrata to Amenophis III, No. 5 EA #21 gc(41): written by Tušratta, king of Mitanni; mentions gods Samaš and Ištar; mentions messenger Mane and interpreter Hane; mentions Nahramašši; mentions 100,000 years; mentions `And may my brother be well for ever';
::Aram Nahara'im is a Hebrew term which refers to Mesopotamia. The word 'Nahara'im' 'is two rivers', Aramea, on the other hand is a term which refers to what known now days as Syria. These are two different terms, and merging them would be wrong.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.166.37.195 (talk • contribs) .
::: Nahrima[m] has a Hebrew ending slapped on the Egyptian word for noble. Its discussed above on the Amarna letters page and in Michael Roaf, the "Cambridge Atlas of Mesopotamia", Equinox. The Greek reference to Mesopotamia as two rivers that some people are confusing with Nahrimacomes from Josephus, the Zacharia Sitchen of his day.
:: [Aram Damascus]
::Hebrew doesn't exist as a language in the period most of the Biblical references refer to. Most of the Bible is written in much earlier semitic lnguages such as Egyptian, Akkadian and Aramaic then translated into Greek, Latin and Hebrew. Note the difference between the dates when Hebrew is spoken and when it is written. Most references to Aram in Syria are earlier rather than later during the period when the Mitanni were a power on the Orontes, and there was constant fighting between them and Egypt and the Amurru and Hittites c 1500 - 1200 BC
[Hebrew language] 
As a language, Hebrew belongs to the Canaanite group of languages. Hebrew (Israel) and Moabite (Jordan) are Southern Canaanite while Phoenician (Lebanon) is Northern Canaanite. Canaanite is closely related to Aramaic and to a lesser extent South-Central Arabic. Whereas other Canaanite languages and dialects have become extinct, Hebrew survived. Hebrew flourished as a spoken language in Israel from the 10th century BC until just before the Byzantine Period in the 3rd or 4th century AD. (See below, Aramaic displacing Hebrew as a spoken language.) Afterward Hebrew continued as a literary language until the Modern Era when it was revived as a spoken language in the 19th century.[1]
 
::
Aram Damascus was an Aramean state centered around Damascus in Syria, from the late 12th century BCE to 734 BCE.
Sources for this state come from texts that can be divided into three categories: Assyrian annals, Aramean texts, and the Hebrew Bible.
The greatest portion of the textual sources come from Assyria. There are, however, often several copies of the same texts so the material of the texts is rather limited. Most of the texts are annals from the Assyrian kings Shalmaneser III, Adad-Nirari III, and Tiglath-Pileser III. The texts mention Aram-Damascus from an Assyrian perspective, but are in many ways informative of the strength of the state, and give us several names of its rulers.
Aramean royal inscriptions are rare, and only one royal stele from Aram-Damascus proper has been identified, the stele from Tel Dan. Among other sources in Aramaic that shed light on the history of Aram-Damascus are two “booty inscriptions” from Eritrea and Samos, and the Zakkur stele.
The Hebrew Bible gives more detailed accounts of Aram-Damascus' history, mainly in its interaction with Israel. The accounts, in their present form, are much more readable than the Aramaic and Assyrian ones. However, the texts in the Hebrew Bible are dated much later and even more ideologically colored then the other texts. Through penetrating the texts’ ideological purposes, it is, however, possible to glimpse at some relatively reliable historical information about Aram-Damascus.
The sources for the early history of Aram-Damascus are almost non-existent. In an annal dating to Tiglath-Pileser I we learn that Aramean people have begun settling in the southern half of Syria. The texts of the Hebrew Bible mentioning David's battles against Arameans are not very reliable, although we can assume that there were Arameans in southern Syria in the 10th century BCE.
The first reliable data can be found in the 9th century BCE when Aramean, Assyrian, and Hebrew texts all mention a state with its capital in Damascus. The state seems to have reached its peak in the late 9th century BCE under Hazael, who, according to Assyrian texts fought against the Assyrians, and according to Aramean texts had some influence over the north Syrian state Unqi, and according to Hebrew texts conquered all of Israel.
Archaeological evidence of Aram-Damascus is close to nothing. Excavations in Damascus are hard to perform due to the continuous settlement of the city. Other cities of Aram-Damascus have not been positively identified from textual sources, and excavations of Iron Age sites around Damascus are almost non-existent. The material culture at sites farther south (e.g. Tell-Ashtara, Tell er-Rumeith, et-Tell, Tel-Dan, Tell el-Oreme, to name but a few) do not show many features distinguishing from the material culture from northern Israel.
:You are correct that Aram-Damascus is a better term and that most of the cities mentioned in association are on the border between Egypt/Israel and the Hittites/Mitanni with Lebanon on one side and Syria on the other; Hazor, Kadesh, Dan, Argob, Bashan, Maccah, Zeobah, Kenneth in the lands of Dan, Asher, Naphtali, Zebulon and Manasses.Rktect 18:52, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: It is clearly WRONG to label modern Assyrians (aka Chaldo-Assyrians) as being Aramean, none of these people regard themselves as such, and so should not be labelled as such.
There is a pretty clear Geographic,Linguistic and to some degree Theological delineation between those regarding themselves as Aramean/Syrio-Aramean and those regarding themselves as Assyrian/Chaldean/Chaldo-Assyrian.
Geographically; those advocating an Assyrian identity are usually from Iraq, Iran, north east Syria (Hassakeh, Qamlishi etc) and south east Turkey (Harran, Hakkiri etc), and also diaspora communities who fled these places for Armenia, Russia, Georgia, Azerbaijan or the West. 
Linguistically; those people listed above actually speak, read and write dialects of Akkadian influenced Mesopotamian neo Aramaic, as distinct from the very different and almost extinct Western Aramaic
Theologically; the Assyrian identity is found among followers of the Chaldean Catholics, Assyrian Church of the East, Ancient Church of the East and some Syriac Orthodox (particularly in north east Syria).
Aramean identity is almost exclusive to central, western, southern and north west Syria and south central Turkey. Most of the people espousing this identity now speak Arabic, the Western Aramaic of these regions being almost extinct. Theologically, most are followers of the Syriac Orthodox, Syriac Catholic, Melkite and Maronite churches (though most Maronites are Lebanese, and reject this identity in favour of a Phoenician one).  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.106.116.120 (talk) 19:00, 15 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: The content in this section has been changed so many times, and vandalism has not been reverted. But really, this section has nothing to do here at all. Shmayo (talk) 11:13, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Modern Times 

message: Almost nothing written in these two sections has anything to do with the article. They should removed or rewritten. Especially the "Modern times"-section, which is only dealing with the Aramaic and Syriac languages, and some churches. Shmayo (talk) 11:03, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Did some clean up. Is it still to much offtopic? And how about the "Modern times"-section? To me, nothing in it fits here. Shmayo (talk) 13:35, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  "History" and "Modern times"-sections 

message: I noticed that a lot of edits were made by blocked socks during the last two years in this articles. I will probably review some of these edits and other major changes to the first section in this articles, during the coming days. Shmayo (talk) 13:27, 17 September 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Reverted these edits by blocked sock. Shmayo (talk) 09:16, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

text: Readding image (removed by sock mentioned above). Only one (not a WP:RS) of the sources in the lead actually discussed Aram as a region. 2020 versions of this article did that better. I updated with a new lead and added a source. Shmayo (talk) 10:16, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sock edits & lead