MAON, MAONITES: A place and people men
tioned in the Old Testament. The place-name oc
curs in
Josh. xv. 55
(see
Judea),
and there is mention
in
Judges x. 12
of a people called Maonites.
Modern critics, following the lead suggested by the
best Septuagint readings, correct this to Midianites
(cf. the commentaries on Judges of Moore, Budde
and Nowack).
Traces of a place or territory of the
name "Maon" are found in the Meunim (Mehunim)
of
I Chron. iv. 41
(Hebr. and R. V.);
II Chron. xx. 1
(R. V. margin), xxvi. 7. In these passages the
Meunim appear in company with nomads, for the
most part, and are located in mount Seir. The
data used by the chronicler, therefore, implied the
existence
of a stock of Meunim who about 860-700
B.c.
came from the south and assailed Judah. This
agrees with the fact of a modern site named Ma'an,
fifteen and a half miles southeast of Petra. In case
this is correct, it might be that the Meunim of
Ezra ii. 50
and
Neh. vii. 52
were the descendants of some
of these who had been made prisoners in the cam
paigns noted by the chronicler and had been assigned
to service in the temple (cf. Ezek. xliv.7). The fact
that the Meunim
are represented as parties to an
alliance with important peoples like the Moabites
and Ammonites suggests that they are to be con
nected with the early Arabic stock of the Minwans,
whose sway was overthrown by the Sabians (see
Arabia).
Winckler and Hommel connect the Mime
ans with the North Arabian Mu~ri (see
Assyria, VI., 2, ยง 1).
(H. Guthe.)
Bibliography:
E.
Glaser, Skizze der Geschichte und Geographic Arabiens, ii. 14-15, 21 sqq., 450-451, Berlin, 1890
and cf, another view by Sprenger, in ZDMG, xliv. 505
zqq.; F. Hommel, Ancient Hebrew
Traditions as Illustrated by the Monuments, pp. 251, 272, London, 1897;
idem, Aufatitze and Abhandlungen, iii. 273 sqq., Munich,
1892; F. Buhl, Geschichte der Edomiter, pp. 40 sqq., Leipsic, 1893; Winckler, in Schrader, KAY, pp. 140 sqq.;
DB, iii. 240; EB, iii. 2934-35.
