Canaanite

Canaanites refer to ancient peoples who inhabited the Levant in the Bronze and Iron Ages, centered in the land called Canaan. The term is scholarly and describes related cultures and languages rather than a single contemporary ethnonym.

Geographically, the core area covers parts of present-day Israel, the Palestinian territories, Lebanon, and western Syria. Canaanite culture flourished from the third millennium BCE and persisted into the Persian period, with city-states and inland communities.

Linguistically, Canaanite languages are a branch of Northwest Semitic within Afroasiatic. Major languages include Phoenician, Hebrew, Moabite, Ammonite, and Edomite; Ugaritic is closely related. The Phoenician script, developed by Canaanite-speaking communities, gave rise to the Greek and Latin alphabets.

Society: many communities were independent city-states with temple-centered economies; religion was polytheistic, with deities such as El and Baal. They participated in long-distance trade across the Mediterranean, and urban centers show evidence of fortifications, craft production, and monumental architecture.

History: Tyre, Sidon, and Byblos were major centers; other towns included Hazor and Gaza. Canaanites interacted with Egypt, the Hittites, Assyria, and Babylon. By late antiquity, independent Canaanite polities declined as empires absorbed the region.

Legacy: The term supports studies of Levantine archaeology and language development. The Phoenician alphabet, a Canaanite script, spread and influenced later writing systems, making the Canaanites foundational to alphabetic writing in the Western world.