Dothan (

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

: ) (also Dotan) was a location mentioned twice in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Palestinian Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...

town of

Bir al-Basha Bir al-Basha ( ar, بئر الباشا ) is a Palestinian village in the West Bank, located 15 km southwest of the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the town had a population o ...

, and ten kilometers (driving distance) southwest of

Jenin Jenin (; ar, ') is a State of Palestine, Palestinian city in the northern West Bank. It serves as the administrative center of the Jenin Governorate of the State of Palestine and is a major center for the surrounding towns. In 2007, Jenin had ...

, near Dotan Junction of Route 60.Robinson, Edward
Biblical Researches in Palestine and the Adjacent Regions
second edition, page 122; "footnote 434: We learned afterwards from Mr Van de Velde, that he too had unexpectedly lighted upon Dothan a few days earlier."

Identification

1940s Survey of Palestine map of Tel Dothan

The modern consensus is that the archaeological site of Tel Dothan corresponds to ancient Dothan.

Eusebius Eusebius of Caesarea (; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος ; 260/265 – 30 May 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilus (from the grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος τοῦ Παμφίλου), was a Greek historian of Christianity, exegete, and Chris ...

places Dothan 12 miles to the north of Sebaste; broadly consistent with the modern location.

Other proposed locations

Van de Velde noted that the

Crusaders The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were in ...

and later mediaeval travellers had located Dothan at the village of Hittin.

Hebrew Bible

Dothan is first mentioned in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Book of Genesis The Book of Genesis (from Greek ; Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית ''Bəreʾšīt'', "In hebeginning") is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its first word, ( "In the beginning" ...

) in connection with the history of

Joseph Joseph is a common male given name, derived from the Hebrew Yosef (יוֹסֵף). "Joseph" is used, along with "Josef", mostly in English, French and partially German languages. This spelling is also found as a variant in the languages of the m ...

, as the place in which the sons of

Jacob Jacob (; ; ar, يَعْقُوب, Yaʿqūb; gr, Ἰακώβ, Iakṓb), later given the name Israel, is regarded as a patriarch of the Israelites and is an important figure in Abrahamic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. ...

(Israel) had moved their sheep and, at the suggestion of Judah, the brothers sold Joseph to the Ishmaelite merchants (). It later appears as the residence of

Elisha Elisha ( ; or "God is my salvation", Greek: , ''Elis îos'' or , ''Elisaié,'' Latin: ''Eliseus'') was, according to the Hebrew Bible, a prophet and a wonder-worker. His name is commonly transliterated into English as Elisha via Hebrew, Eli ...

(

Second Book of Kings The Book of Kings (, '' Sēfer Məlāḵīm'') is a book in the Hebrew Bible, found as two books (1–2 Kings) in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. It concludes the Deuteronomistic history, a history of Israel also including the book ...

, ) and the scene of a vision of chariots and horses of fire surrounding the mountain on which the city stood. Northern views

The plain near Dothan is also mentioned in the

apocrypha Apocrypha are works, usually written, of unknown authorship or of doubtful origin. The word ''apocryphal'' (ἀπόκρυφος) was first applied to writings which were kept secret because they were the vehicles of esoteric knowledge considered ...

Book of Judith The Book of Judith is a deuterocanonical book, included in the Septuagint and the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christian Old Testament of the Bible, but excluded from the Hebrew canon and assigned by Protestants to the apocrypha. It tel ...

History and archaeology

Northern kingdom of Israel (Samaria)

The city served as an

Israelite The Israelites (; , , ) were a group of Semitic-speaking tribes in the ancient Near East who, during the Iron Age, inhabited a part of Canaan. The earliest recorded evidence of a people by the name of Israel appears in the Merneptah Stel ...

administrative centre, and archaeologist have discovered a large complex and

inscriptions at the site. A bronze bull has been found in an Israelite sanctuary east of Tell Dothan, in the mountains of Samaria, dated to around the 11th century, which may be related to the episode of the golden calf.

Crusader period

Castellum Beleismum (Latin) or Chastiau St Job (medieval French) was the Frankish name of a tower built by the

on the ancient tell in 1156 and given to the

Hospitallers The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic Church, Catholic Military ord ...

in 1187.

Modern discovery

Charles William Meredith van de Velde Charles William Meredith van de Velde (born December 4, 1818 in Leeuwarden, died 20 March 1898 in Menton) was a Dutch lieutenant-at-sea second class, painter, cartographer, honorary member of the Red Cross and missionary. Van der Velde attende ...

visited the site in 1851, and was considered the first modern traveller to visit it. He described the discovery in his 1854 book:

...I saw a huge tell at the distance of only a few hundred yards from our way, covered over with ruins, and the fragment of an ancient aqueduct, that had been supported on arches. I asked Abu Monsur the name of the tell, and the answer was, "Haida Dothan" (that is, Dothan). "Dothan," I asked, "Dothan?" "Nahm; Dothan, Dothan, Dothan!" exclaimed the testy old shech, as if hurt at my not believing him at the instant. My object in reiterating the question was to get him to repeat the name; for the discovery of Dothan was a very special circumstance, with respect to which I was anxious to assure myself, by having the name properly pronounced.

Van de Velde's visit had taken place a few days before Edward Robinson's; Robinson credited van ve Velde with the discovery.

Modern use of the name

The

Israeli settlement Israeli settlements, or Israeli colonies, are civilian communities inhabited by Israeli citizens, overwhelmingly of Jewish ethnicity, built on lands occupied by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. The international community considers Israeli se ...

of Mevo Dotan (lit. ''Approach to Dothan'') is named for the city, as is

Dothan, Alabama Dothan () is a city in Dale, Henry, and Houston counties and the Houston county seat in the U.S. state of Alabama. It is Alabama's eighth-largest city, with a population of 71,072 at the 2020 census. It is near the state's southeastern corner ...

in the US.

References

Bibliography

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External links

*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 11
IAAWikimedia commonsDothan: Remains from the tel (1953-1964), Daniel M. Master
Book of Genesis Torah cities Canaanite cities Archaeological sites in Samaria Archaeological sites in the West Bank Joseph (Genesis)