DIBON (Hebr. Dibbân). — Moabite city, a stopping-place or station of the Israelites on their journey toward the Promised Land (Num. 33:45), conquered and rebuilt by Gad, hence the name D.-Gad (Num. 32:34; 33:45), and subsequently assigned by lot to the tribe of Reuben (Jos. 13:9, 17).
Mesha, king of Moab, freed it in the 9th century from the yoke of the kings of Israel (II Reg. 3:4), and the prophets Isaiah (15:2) and Jeremiah (48:18-22) accordingly treat it as a Moabite city. Eusebius (Onomasticon, 76, 17) describes it as a large settlement near the Arnon, identified today with the heap of medieval and Arab ruins covering earlier strata, known as Dibân, 5 km northeast of Arâ'ir. On the acropolis, in 1868, the stele known as the Mesha Stele was discovered; it is now in the Louvre. The king erected it at D. to boast of his victorious territorial claims against Israelite rule.