AMPHIPOLIS

ANAJSr

AMPHIPOLIS. — A town in a part of Macedonia formerly reckoned to Thrace, on the river Strymon, about 3 miles from its mouth, where the harbour Eion was situated. It was a place of great strategic and mercantile importance. It underwent various vicis-situdes, but retained its importance based on its abundant supplies of excellent wine, figs, oil, and wood, its silver and gold mines, its woollen fabrics. The Romans raised it to the rank of a free town and the chief town of the first district of the province Macedonia; through it the Via Egnatia passed. The verb in the Greek (Ac 17') seems to indicate that St. Paul passed through it without preaching there. A. Souter.

AMPLIATUS (AV Amplias).— Greeted by St. Paul (Ro 16'), perhaps of the imperial household (Lightfoot on Ph 4^), and a prominent Christian (Sanday-Head-1am). The name, a common slave designation, is found inscribed in the catacombs. A. J. Maclean.

AMRAHI. — 1. A Levite, son of Kohath and grandson of Levi (Nu 3i'-is, 1 Ch e^- >■ 'S). He married Jochebed his father's sister, by whom he begat Aaron and Moses (Ex 6i8-i"i) and Miriam (Nu26", lCh6'). The Amramites are mentioned in Nu 3", 1 Ch 262'. 2. A son of Bani who had contracted a foreign marriage (Ezr 10").

AMRAPHEL.— The king of Shinar (Gn 14i). He has ^been identified (by Schrader and usually) with Hammu-rabi, king of Babylonia, but apart from the difficulties due to differences of spelling, there is no evidence that Hammurabi was ever allied with a king of Elam and a king of Larsa to invade the West. Boscawen suggests Amah-Pal, the ideographic writing of Sinmuballit, the father of Hammurabi, for whom such an alliance is more likely. See Chedorlaomer. C. H. W. Johns.

AMULETS AND CHARMS.— 1. The custom of wearing amulets (amvZetum from Arab . root = ' to carry ' ) as charms to protect the wearer against the malign influence of evil spirits, and in particular against 'the evil eye,' is almost as wide-spread as the human race itself. Children and domestic animals are supposed to be specially subject to such influence, and to-day 'in the Arabic border lands there is hardly a child, or almost an animal, which is not defended from the evil eye by a charm' (Doughty). The Jews were in this respect like the rest of the world, and in the Talmud it is said that ninety-nine deaths occur from the evil eye to one from natural causes (see Magic Divination and Sohcery).

2. RV has substituted 'amulets' for AV 'ear-rings' in Is 32", the Heb. word being elsewhere associated with serpent-charming. There is nothing to indicate their precise nature or shape. Our knowledge of early Palestinian amulets has been greatly increased by the recent excavations at Gezer, Taanach, and Megiddo. These have brought to light hundreds of amulets, bewildering in their variety of substance and form — beads of various colours (the blue variety is the favourite amulet at the present day), pendants of slate, pieces of coral, bronze beUs (cf. Ex 28'' 39^), a tiny ebony fish from the Maccabsean period, a yellow glass pendant with ' good luck to the wearer' in reoersed Greek letters (PEFSt, 1904, illust. p. 354), a small round silver box with blue enamel (ib. 1903, illust. p. 303), etc. The influence of Egypt, where amulets were worn by men and gods, by the living and the dead, is shown by the great number of scarabs and 'Horus eyes' unearthed at Gezer and Taanach.

3. The 'consecrated tokens' (2 Mac 12" RV) found by Judas Maccabaeus on the bodies of his soldiers were heathen charms against death in battle, the peculiar Gr. word being a tr. of the Aram, word for 'amulet.' The Mishna (c. a.d. 200) shows that in NT times a favourite charm (gemia' , whence our ' cameo ') consisted of a piece of parchment inscribed with sacred or ca-balistic writing, and suspended from the neck in a leather capsule. In this connexion it may be noted

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that 'phylactery' signifies an amulet, and like the mezuzah or door-post symbol, was often so regarded.

4. In antiquity jewels were worn quite as much for protective as for decorative purposes, being supposed to draw the attention of the spirit from the wearer. A popular form of jewel-amulet was the moon-shaped crescent in gold and silver, like those worn by the Jerusalem ladies (Is 3" RV), and the 'crescents and pendants' worn by the Midianite chiefs and hung from the necks of their camels (Jg 8"- " RV). The ear-rings of Gn 35', also, were evidently more than mere ornaments, so that AV and RV may both be right in their renderings — 'ear-rings,' 'amulets' — of Is 3^°.

For the amulets worn by the heathen Arabs see Wellhausen, Beste Arab. Heidenthums (1887), 143 ft., and for modern Jewish amulets the art. 'Amulet' in Hastings' DB. A. R. S. Kennedy.

AMUSEMENTS.— See Games.

AMZI.— 1. A Merarite (1 Ch 6"). 2. A priest in the second Temple (Neh 11'^).

ANAB.— A city of Judah in the Negeb hills (Jos lia 15'°), inhabited first by the Anakim. Now the ruin 'Anab near Debir.

ANAEL. — Brother of Tobit and father of Achiacharus (To 12').

ANAH. — 1. A daughter of Zibeon, and mother of Oholibamah, one of Esau's wives (Gn 362- "• >'• 26 (R)). Some ancient authorities (including LXX. Sam. Pesh.) read son instead of daughter, which would identify this Anahwith— 2. Asonof Zibeon(Gn362* (R), 1 Ch I"-"). 3. A Horite 'duke,' brother of Zibeon (Gn 362»- 2' (R), 1 Ch 1"). If we take Anah as an eponym rather than a personal name, and think of relationships between clans rather than individuals, it is quite possible to reduce the above three references to one. In regard to No. 2 the note is appended, 'This is Anah who found the hot springs (AV wrongly 'the mules') in the wilder-ness, as he fed the asses of Zibeon his father' (Gn 362<).

ANAHARATH (Jos 19"), mentioned with Shion and Rabbith on the east side of the Plain of Esdraelon in Issachar. It is perhaps the modern en^Na'urah in the Valley of Jezreel.

ANATAH CJ" hath answered').— 1. A Levite (Neh 8<), called Ananias in 1 Es 9". 2. One of those who sealed the covenant (Neh IO22).

ANAK, ANAKIM.— Eariy inhabitants of the high levels of Judah, whom tradition credited with colossal height. The word Anak is properly a race-name, and, being often used with the article, it is really an appel-lative, probably meaning ' the long-necked (people).' In the genealogizing narrative of Jos 15"- " there were three sons or clans of Anak; Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai. These were all driven out by Caleb (cf. Jg 12°). Jos 112' gives them a wider Jiabitat, as scattered over the hill-country of Palestine generally, whence they were exterminated by Joshua. In Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod some remnants were to be found after Joshua's time (1122). See also Arba. J. F. McCurdy.

ANAMIM. — A people, not yet identified, named in Gn 10" (1 Ch 1") among the descendants of Mizraim, and therefore to be found somewhere in Egypt.

J. F. McCdedy.

ANAMMELECH. — A god worshipped by captives transplanted from Sepharvaim to Samaria by the Assyrians (2 K 172*). As human sacrifice (v.") was the most prominent rite connected with the god's worship, the name, which might be interpreted as meaning 'Anu is prince,' in all probabihty owes its origin to a scribal endeavour to identify the god with Molech, in whose cult a similar practice existed. See also Adraaimelech. N. Koeniq.

ANAN. — 1. One of those who sealed the covenant (Neh 102»). 2. 1 Es 5'»=Hanan, Ezr 2", Neh 7".