Tabal

Tabal (c.f. biblical Tubal) was a Luwian speaking Neo-Hittite kingdom of South Central Anatolia. According to archaeologist Kurt Bittel, the kingdom of Tabal first appeared after the collapse of the Hittite Empire.[1]

Tabal Sura?
Unknown–713 BC
Tabal among the Neo-Hittite states
Common languages	Hieroglyphic Luwian
Religion	Luwian religion
Government	Monarchy
Historical era	Iron Age
• Established	Unknown
• Disestablished	713 BC
Preceded by Succeeded by Hittite empire Neo-Assyrian Empire
Today part of	Turkey

The Assyrian king Shalmaneser III records that he received gifts from their 24 kings in 837 BC and the following year. A century later, their king Burutash is mentioned in an inscription of king Tiglath-Pileser III. The kings of Tabal have left a number of inscriptions from the 9th-8th centuries BC in hieroglyphic-Luwian in the Turkish villages of Çalapverdi and Alişar.

Tabal and its people are often identified with the tribe of the Tibareni (Tibarenoi in Greek, Thobeles in Josephus) who lived near the Black Sea. They are mentioned in the works of Hecataeus of Miletus, Herodotus, Xenophon and Strabo. On this ground, the Georgian historian Ivane Javakhishvili (1950) considered Tabal, Tubal, Jabal and Jubal to be an early Kartvelian tribal designation. Whether there is really any connection between the Tibareni of the Black Sea coast and the Tabal kingdom of Southern Anatolia is uncertain, ancient authors may have already confused the two.

The known rulers of Tabal are:

• Tuwati I (Assyrian Tuatti), c. 837 BC[2]
• Kikki, son of Tuwati I, c. 837 BC[3]
• Tuwati II, mid 8th century BC[3]
• Wasusarmas (Assyrian Wassurme), son of Tuwati II, c. 740 - 730 BC[3]
• Hulli, 730 - 726 BC[4]
• Ambaris, son of Hulli, c. 721 - 713 BC[4]
• Hidi c. 690 BC[5]
• Iškallu c. 679 BC[6]
• Mugallu/Mukalli c. 670,[5] 663, 651 BC[7]
• x-ussi, son of Mugallu[7] (ca. 650[8]/640[7] BC)