Endnote 15 – Finding Historical Memories in the Patriarchal Narratives

In referring to this region as Syro-Mesopotamia, I follow Giorgio Buccellati’s emphasis that during the Bronze Age there was a cultural continuum in this region encompassing the rural Syrian steppeland west of the Euphrates (see Buccellati, “The Kingdom and Period of Khana,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 270 [1988], pp. 43–61; see also his article, “From Khana to Laqé: The End of Syro-Mesopotamia,” in O. Tunca, ed., De la Babylonie à la Syrie, en passant par Mari: Mélanges offerts à J.R. Kupper [Liège, 1990], pp. 229–253). For the Biblical data, see the still valuable treatment by Roland de Vaux, The Early History of Israel (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1978), pp. 193–200.)