Philistia | |||||||||
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| 1175 BC–604 BC | |||||||||
 Philistia in red, and neighbouring polities, circa 830 BC, after the Hebrew conquest of Jaffa, and before its recapture by the Philistines circa 730 BC. | |||||||||
| Common languages | Philistine Canaanite Aramaic (from the 6th c. BC) | ||||||||
| Religion | Canaanite religion | ||||||||
| Demonym(s) | Philistine | ||||||||
| Government | Confederation | ||||||||
| Historical era | Iron Age | ||||||||
| 1175 BC | |||||||||
• Babylonian conquest of the Levant | 604 BC | ||||||||
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| Today part of |  Israel Palestine Egypt | ||||||||
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Philistia[a] was a confederation of five main cities orpentapolis in the Southwest Levant, made up of principallyGaza,Ashkelon,Ashdod,Ekron,Gath, and for a time,Jaffa (part of present-dayTel Aviv-Yafo).[1][2]
Scholars believe thePhilistines were made up of people of anAegean background that from roughly 1200 BC onwards settled in the area and mixed with the localCanaanite population,[3][4] and came to be known asPeleset, or Philistines. At its maximum territorial expansion, its territory may have stretched along the Canaanite coast fromArish in the Sinai (today's Egypt) to the Yarkon River (today's Tel Aviv), and as far inland as Ekron and Gath.Nebuchadnezzar II invaded Philistia in 604 BC, burned Ashkelon, and incorporated the territory into theNeo-Babylonian Empire; Philistia and its native population the Philistines disappear from the historic record after that year.
Ancient Egyptianhieroglyphic records from theNew Kingdom period record a group of theSea Peoples called thepwrꜣsꜣtj, generally transliterated as eitherPeleset orPulasti, as invading Egypt in the mid-13th century BC. About a century later,pharaohRamesses III boasted of having defeated thePeleset, and allegedly relocated them to the southern abandoned coast of Canaan,[5] recording this victory on aMedinet Habu temple inscription dated to c. 1150 BC. Thepwrꜣsꜣtj are generally identified as the Philistines.[6][7] TheGreat Harris Papyrus, a chronicle of Ramesses' reign written no later than 1149 BC, also records this Egyptian defeat of the Philistines.[8][9]
Despite Ramesses III's claim, archaeology has not been able to corroborate the existence of any such (re)settlement, and the lack of sense in granting an apparently barbarous invading people an expansive and richly fertile swath of land already under Egyptian control is noted by scholars.[10][11][12]
DuringIron Age I, the Philistines seem to have had a presence far outside of what was traditionally considered Philistia, as 23 of the 26 Iron Age I sites in theJezreel Valley, includingTel Megiddo,Tel Yokneam,Tel Qiri,Afula,Tel Qashish, Be'er Tiveon, Hurvat Hazin, Tel Risim, Tel Re'ala, Hurvat Tzror, Tel Sham,Midrakh Oz and Tel Zariq, yielded typical Philistine pottery dating from the 12th-to-10th century BC. However, given the minuscule quantity of said pottery finds, it is likely that even if the Philistines had by-and-large settled in the area, they remained a minority which had assimilated into the native Canaanite population by the 10th century BC.[13]
In its historical form, Philistia's northern boundary was theYarkon River, with theMediterranean Sea on the west, theKingdom of Judah atZiklag to the east, and theArish to the south.[14][15] Philistia consisted of the fivecity-states of the Philistines, known as the Philistinepentapolis, described in theBook of Joshua (Joshua 13:3) and theBooks of Samuel (1 Samuel 6:17), comprisingAshkelon,Ashdod,Ekron,Gath, andGaza, in the south-westernLevant.Tell Qasile and Aphek (seeBattle of Aphek) likely marked the nation's frontiers, as evidence from Tell Qasile especially indicates that non-Philistines constituted an otherwise unusually large portion of their respective populations.[16] The identity of the aforementionedZiklag, a city which according to the Bible marked the border between the Philistine and Israelite territory, remains uncertain.[17]
Philistia included Jaffa (in today's Tel Aviv), but it was lost to the Hebrews during Solomon's time. Nonetheless, the Philistine king of Ashkelon conquered Jaffa again circa 730 BC. FollowingSennacherib's third campaign in the Levant, the Assyrians reassigned Jaffa to thePhoeniciancity-state ofSidon, and Philistia never got it back.[1]
The Five Lords[18] of the Philistines are described in theHebrew Bible as being in constant struggle and interaction with the neighbouringIsraelites,Canaanites andEgyptians, being gradually absorbed into the Canaanite culture.[19]
Philistia was occupied byTiglath-Pileser III of theNeo-Assyrian Empire in the 8th century BC. Throughout the century, often at the incitement of neighboring Egypt, Philistia revolted against Assyrian rule, but each time they were defeated and forced to pay tribute. Gath disappears from history afterSargon II records its capture in 711 BC, which may indicate he destroyed the city rather than conquered it. The term "Philistia" is not used in Assyrian records describing their campaigns, only the names of individual cities, which may indicate that at this stage the Philistines had become increasingly divided, and that the confederation of the pentapolis which constituted Philistia had fractured into separate city-states.Sennacherib further reported that he had sacked (and possibly burned) a "royal city of the land Philistia that[Hezek]iah had taken away (and) fortified,"[20] but the city's name has not survived. The texts also mention that Ashkelon was also sacked due to its refusal to acknowledge Assyrian authority. Despite this Philistine sedition, Sennacherib records that he divided up the lands he had plundered from Judah amongst the kings of Ashdod, Gaza, and Ekron, even going as far as freeing Padi, the king of Ekron, from Judahite captivity and returning him to the throne.
The Philistines disappear from written records following the conquest of theLevant by theNeo-Babylonian emperorNebuchadnezzar II during the 6th century BC, when Ashkelon and many other cities from the region were destroyed.[21]
The area east of Gaza, particularly aroundNahal Besor that reaches into the hills as far asBeersheva, had a very substantial Philistine presence. This area is a part of theNegev desert. It also includesNahal Gerar to the north that joins Nahal Besor before flowing into theMediterranean Sea.[22]
This was a heavily populated area during the earlyIron Age. It includes archaeological sites such asTell Beit Mirsim,Tel Haror, Tel Sera (Ziklag) along Nahal Gerar, andTell Jemmeh andTell el-Far'ah (South) along Nahal Besor.[23] All these sites and others in the area had Philistine settlements.[24]
When the Neo-Assyrian Empire first invaded this area, the Philistine cities were given considerable autonomy in exchange for tribute. But having responded to various revolts, this policy hardened.[22]
I am willing to state flatly that the Sea Peoples, including the Philistines, were Mycenaean Greeks
SUMMARY Was there a Sea Peoples migration to the coast of the Levant? Yes. Was it a maritime migration? Possibly. Was there a massive maritime Sea Peoples invasion? Probably not. Did the Philistines settle en-masse in Philistia in the days of Ramesses III? No. Were the Iron I Philistine cities fortified? No. Were the Iron I Philistines organized in a peer-polity system? Probably not. Was there a Philistine Pentapolis system in the Iron I? No. Are the Iron I Philistines the Philistines described in the Bible? No.
