Talk:Ashteroth Karnaim

Merger proposal

I propose that Ashteroth Karnaim be merged into Al-Shaykh Saad. This article is a stub, with hardly any chance of it being improved. It would only make sense to merge it with the site of the modern settlement, and expand there. The page has been here since 2005 and it had 13 edits. It makes no sense to create a separate page for each! Not to mention that the sources for it are so dated, they are factually wrong. Modern scholarship holds that Ashteroth Karnaim was located at the site of Al-Shaykh Saad. [1] [2] Yazan (talk) 16:09, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

Sorry if I rv'd too hastily, but why is it that the article info names two other locations but not that one? If other sources do disagree about the purported location, perhaps we cannot speak of 'scholarship' so monolithically. We should look into this more. If it turns out you are right, I suppose there is no harm in merging the info into that article, but note some Biblical locations are split into separate articles like Harran and Haran (biblical place), so if anyone gets more copy to expand the subject, it might be big enough to stand alone. Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 16:27, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

The source being used is well over its expiration date when it comes to archaeological information. If you search for ""Ashteroth Karnaim" modern" on GBooks, you'll find references almost exclusively to Shaykh Saad or Tell Ashtarah, some 20 mi. (32 km.) east of Sea of Galilee, which are the same place. Fell free to look into it more yourself though. I only came here because I was writing about Al-Shaykh Saad and noticed that most sources refer to it as ancient Ashteroth Karnaim. If we decide to merge, I think we can make a sizable subsection for the biblical place, and we can redirect there. Yazan (talk) 16:36, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

I agree, and if I saw any chance of the article being expanded in situ, I would leave it (I actually split modern Tadmur from Palmyra). But 13 edits in 7 years, is a little discouraging. Yazan (talk) 16:38, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

Okay, what I'm finding is near-universal agreement that Ashteroth Karnaim is the same as Tell-Ashtara, a site actually a few m. south of Al-Shaykh Saad. So a merge to there might be more appropriate. Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 16:49, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

I saw several sources that mentioned that after the city of Ashteroth (Tell Ashtara) declined, Karnaim (al-Shaykh Saad) became the capital of Bashan, and was called Ashteroth Karnaim. Whether the biblical reference is to the older one, or the newer one; that I have no experience in. Yazan (talk) 16:55, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

After looking at several other sources, I agree, there seems to be a consensus that the actual site is Tell Ashtara. I would support moving it there. Yazan (talk) 17:04, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

We have TWO sites in ONE article: Ashtaroth, and Karnaim (later Ashteroth Karnaim)

BIG problem! Arminden (talk) 09:47, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

We need an article on "Ashtaroth (Biblical city)"

... to help disentangle this one, and because that one has its own story, archaeological site etc., too. Arminden (talk) 16:47, 13 July 2018 (UTC)