Shasu
Sign in to savethumb|right|200px|Shasu prisoner as depicted in Ramesses III's [[reliefs at Medinet Habu.]] The Shasu (, possibly pronounced šaswə) were Semitic-speaking pastoral nomads in the Southern Levant from the late Bronze Age to the Early Iron Age or the Third Intermediate Period of Egypt. They were tent dwellers, organized in clans ruled by a tribal chieftain and were described as brigands active from the Jezreel Valley to Ashkelon, in the Transjordan and in the Sinai. Some of them also worked as mercenaries for Asiatic and Egyptian armies.
Article
9 sectionsContents
- Etymology
- History
- Late Bronze
- Shasu of ''Yhw''
- See also
- References
- Notes
- Citations
- Sources
thumb|right|200px|Shasu prisoner as depicted in Ramesses III's [[reliefs at Medinet Habu.]] The Shasu (, possibly pronounced šaswə) were Semitic-speaking pastoral nomads in the Southern Levant from the late Bronze Age to the Early Iron Age or the Third Intermediate Period of Egypt. They were tent dwellers, organized in clans ruled by a tribal chieftain and were described as brigands active from the Jezreel Valley to Ashkelon, in the Transjordan and in the Sinai. Some of them also worked as mercenaries for Asiatic and Egyptian armies.
==Etymology== The name's etymon may be Egyptian šꜣsw, which originally meant "those who move on foot". Levy, Adams, and Muniz report similar possibilities: the Egyptian word šꜣs that means "to wander", and an alternative Semitic triliteral root, , with the meaning "to plunder".