Amorites

One of the peoples inhabiting the land of Palestine since before the Israelite conquest of it under Joshua. They are listed together with the "Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites," whose lands God promised to give to Abraham's descendants (Gen 15:18-21), and among the "seven nations larger and stronger than you" that Israel had to overcome to conquer the land (Deut 7:1).

The Amorites and the Canaanites are the two catch-all labels for the peoples of the land that Israel was to conquer (Deut 1:7). The relationship between the two is difficult to discern, though Num 13:29 distinguishes them by observing that "the Hittites, Jebusites and Amorites live in the hill country," while "the Canaanites live near the sea and along the Jordan."

The limited material on the Amorites in the Old Testament obscures the importance of the Amorites as a people. Their existence was already attested in Sumerian and Akkadian literature by the latter half of the 3rd Mill, which describes them as a people of the desert. They migrated out of their native homeland and for centuries would change indelibly the socio-political landscape of the Fertile Crescent. At the beginning of the 2nd Mill they conquered Babylon, helped bring an end to the famous 3rd Dynasty of Ur, and established a kingdom made famous by the wisdom of Hammurabi. In the centuries afterwards they continued to move south and westwards, establishing other kingdoms and city-states, including that of Sihon and Og whose Trans-Jordan kingdoms became the first of the territories to be conquered by the Israelites.

The archaeological evidence is reviewed by W. H. Stiebing, Jr., "When Was the Age of the Patriarchs? — Of Amorites, Canaanites, and Archaeology," Biblical Archaeological Review 1.2 (1975). For a recent summary of the discussion, see Keith Schoville, "Canaanites and Amorites," in Peoples of the Old Testament World, ed. A. J. Hoerth, G. L. Mattingly, & E. M. Yamauchi (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1994), 157-182.