Canaan was, during the late 2nd millennium BC, a region in the Ancient Near East. The name Canaan (Kənā‘an כְּנָעַן) is used commonly in the Hebrew Bible, (Genesis 10 & Numbers 34). The term Canaanites is by far the most frequently used ethnic term in the Bible,[1] in which they are commonly described as a people who had been annihilated by the Israelites. Canaanites were described as living "by the sea, and along by the side of the Jordan" (Numbers 33:51; Joshua 22:9), and was especially identified with Phoenicia (Isaiah 23:11). The Philistines, while an integral part of the Canaanite milieu, do not seem to have been ethnic Canaanites, and were listed in the Table of Nations as descendants of Misraim; the Arameans, Moabites, Ammonites, Midianites and Edomites were also considered fellow descendants of Shem or Abraham, and distinct from generic Canaanites/Amorites. "Heth", representing the Hittites, is a son of Canaan. The later Hittites spoke an Indo-European language (called Nesili), but their predecessors the Hattians had spoken a little-known language (Hattili), of uncertain affinities.In the Bible, the renaming of Land of Canaan as the Land of Israel marks the Israelite conquest of the Promised Land. Canaan and the Canaanites are mentioned some 160 times in the Hebrew Bible, mostly in the Pentateuch and the books of Joshua and Judges. Canaan first appears as one of Noah's grandsons during the narrative known as the Curse of Ham, in which Canaan is cursed with perpetual slavery because his father Ham had "looked upon" the drunk and naked Noah. God later promises the land of Canaan to Abraham, and eventually delivers it to descendants of Abraham, the Israelites. The biblical history has become increasingly problematic as the archaeological and textual evidence supports the idea that the early Israelites were in fact themselves Canaanites. The Hebrew Bible lists borders for the land of Canaan. Numbers 34:2 includes the phrase "the land of Canaan as defined by its borders." The borders are then delineated in Numbers 34:3–12. The term "Canaanites" in biblical Hebrew is applied especially to the inhabitants of the lower regions, along the sea coast and on the shores of Jordan, as opposed to the inhabitants of the mountainous regions. By the time of the Second Temple, "Canaanite" in Hebrew had come to be not an ethnic designation, so much as a general synonym for "merchant", as it is interpreted in, for example, Job 40:30, or Proverbs 31:24.The Hebrew Bible describes the Israelite conquest of Canaan in the "Former Prophets" (Nevi'im Rishonim [נביאים ראשונים] ), viz. the books of Joshua, Judges, 1st & 2nd Samuel, 1st & 2nd Kings. These five books of the Old Testament canon give the narrative of the Israelites after the death of Moses and Joshua leading them into Canaan. In 586 BC, the Israelites in turn lost the land to the Babylonians.
