a powerful people who dwelt in Arabia Petraea, between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea, or between Havila and Shur (1 Sam. xv. 7), sometimes in one country and sometimes in another. It does not appear that they had cities, for there is no mention of any but one in the Scriptures (1 Sam. xv. 5); they lived generally in hamlets, caves, or tents. They were the descendants of Amalek, the son of Eliphaz, by Timna his concubine, and the grandson of Esau. (Gen. xxxvi. 12, and 1 Chron. i. 36.) Amalek succeeded Gatam in the government of Edom.

The Israelites had scarcely passed the Red Sea on their way to the wilderness, before the Amalekites came to attack them in the deserts of Rephidim (Exod. xvii. 8, &c.), and cruelly put to the sword those who were obliged either through fatigue or weakness to remain behind. Moses, by Divine command, directed Joshua to take vengeance upon this people for their inhumanity. He accordingly fell upon them and defeated them with great slaughter (Exod. xvii. 13).

The ground of the enmity of the Amalekites against the Israelites is generally supposed to have been an innate hatred, from the remembrance of Jacob's depriving their progenitor both of his birthright and blessing. Their falling upon them, however, and that without any provocation, when they saw them reduced to so low a condition by the fatigue of their march and an excessive drought, was an inhuman action, and justly deserved the severe punishment inflicted on them by Joshua. Under the Judges (vi. 3), we see the Amalekites united with the Midianites and Moabites in a design to oppress Israel; but Ehud delivered the Israelites from Eglon, king of the Moabites (Judg. iii.), and Gideon (chap. viii.) delivered them from the Midianites and Amalekites. About the year of the world 2930, Saul marched against the Amalekites, advanced as far as their capital, and put all the people of the country to the sword; but he spared the best of the cattle and movables, contrary to a Divine command; which act of disobedience was the cause of his future misfortunes.

After this war the Amalekites scarcely appear any more in history. However, about the year of the world 2949, a troop of Amalekites came and pillaged Ziklag, which belonged to David (1 Sam. xxx.), where he had left his two wives, Ahinoam and Abigail; but on returning from an expedition which he had made in the company of Achish into the valley of Jezreel, he pursued, overtook and dispersed them, and recovered all the booty which they had carried off from Ziklag.

The Arabians maintain that Amalek was the son of Ham, and grandson of Noah; that he was the father of Ad, and grandfather of Schedad. Calmet thinks that this opinion is Amalek, by no means to be rejected, as it is not very probable that Amalek, the son of Eliphaz, and grandson of Esau, should be the father of a people so powerful and numerous as the Amalekites were when the Israelites departed out of Egypt. Moses, in the Book of Genesis (xiv. 7), relates, that in Abraham's time, long before the birth of Amalek the son of Eliphaz, the five confederate kings carried the war into Amalek's country, about Kadesh; and into that of the Amorites, about Hazazon-tamar. Moses also (Num. xxiv. 20) relates, that the soothsayer Balaam, observing at a distance the land of Amalek, said, in his prophetic style, "Amalek is the first, the head, the original of the nations; but his latter end shall be that he perish for ever." Our commentator observes that this epithet of the first of nations cannot certainly agree with the Amalekites descended from the son of Eliphaz, because the generation then living was but the third from Amalek. Besides, Moses never reproaches the Amalekites with attacking their brethren the Israelites; an aggravating circumstance which he would not have omitted had the Amalekites been descended from Esau, in which case they would have been the brethren of the Israelites. Lastly, we see the Amalekites almost always classed in Scripture with the Canaanites and the Philistines, and never with the Edomites; and when Saul made war upon the Amalekites, and almost utterly destroyed them, we do not find that the Edomites made the least attempt to assist them, or to avenge their cause afterwards. Thence it is thought probable that the Amalekites who are so often mentioned in Scripture were a free people descended from Canaan, and devoted to the curse as well as the other Amorites, and very different from the descendants of Amalek, the grandson of Esau.

The accounts which the Arabs give us of the Amalekites destroyed by Saul are as follows: Amalek was the father of an ancient tribe in Arabia, exterminated in the reign of Saul. This tribe contained only the Arabians who are called Pure, the remains whereof were mingled with the posterity of Joktan and Adnan, and so became Moabites or Mosta'rabes; that is to say, Arabians blended with foreign nations. They further believe that Goliath, who was overcome by David, was king of the Amalekites; that the giants who inhabited Palestine in Joshua's time were of the same race; and that at last part of the Amalekites retired into Africa while Joshua was yet living, and settled upon the coasts of Barbary, along the Mediterranean Sea. The son of Amalek was Ad, a celebrated prince among the Arabians. Some make him the son of Uz, and grandson of Aram the son of Shem. Be this as it may, the Mahometans say that Ad was the father of an Arabian tribe called Adites, who were exterminated, as they tell us, for not hearkening to the patriarch Eber, who preached to them the unity of God. Ad had two sons, Schedad and Schedid.