*Includes pictures
*Includes ancient accounts of the Canaanites
*Includes online resources and a bibliography for further reading
*Includes a table of contents

“And the border of the Canaanites was from Sidon, as thou comest to Gerar, unto Gaza; as thou goest, unto Sodom, and Gomorrah, and Admah, and Zeboim, even unto Lasha.” - Genesis 10:19

“And I have said, I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt unto the land of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, unto a land flowing with milk and honey.” - Exodus 3:17

“And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them…” - Deuteronomy 7:2

Individuals who decide to take up learning about the Old Testament of the Bible are immediately faced with the difficult proposition of identifying the various peoples that the Hebrews met and sometimes came into conflict with when they entered the territory that eventually became Israel. The Moabites and Edomites were just two of the many Canaanite groups that the Hebrews dealt with, often violently, but there were dozens of other Canaanite groups, which were all for the most part identified through the names of their respective cities.

In fact, before the Hebrews established a kingdom and before the Phoenicians colonized much of the Mediterranean, the Canaanites were the most important group in the Levant for much of the Bronze Age and into the early Iron Age. Although the Canaanites never created a unified nation-state or kingdom, their importance in the ancient Near East cannot be understated. It was at least partially because of that fact that the Canaanites were unable to resist their larger and more powerful neighbors that the average person today knows so little about their history, but modern studies have revealed that they developed a unique religion that influenced non-Canaanite peoples and continued to be practiced in some form centuries after the Canaanites ceased to be an identifiable people. Furthermore, during the height of the Bronze Age the Canaanites provided important resources to the Egyptian and Hittite Empires and played a key role in the geopolitical game of chess between those two kingdoms. It also goes without saying that the Canaanites were also a factor in the establishment of the Kingdom of Israel, as the battles they lost to the Hebrews later became the foundation of the Jewish kingdom.

The Ancient Canaanites: The History of the Civilizations That Lived in Canaan Before the Israelites looks at the various groups and their impact on the region and subsequent cultures. Along with pictures depicting important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Canaanites like never before.