NEGEB. - In the Hebrew language (from an ancient Semitic root ngb "to be dry, arid") it means an arid region, and, as a general term of orientation, it indicates the south.
As a geographical term, in opposition to the "mountain" har, the "low plain" sēphēlāh and the "depression" 'ārabhāh, it designates the region now flat now mountainous, monotonous, furrowed by broad beds of watercourses almost always dry, from Hebron as far as Kadesh-barnea, today 'Ajn Qudeis (cf. Gen. 18, 1; Num. 13, 20). Subsequently, it came to mean the south of Palestine (Gen. 12, 9; 13, 1; Ios. 15, 8; 18, 5).
In the Greek version of the Septuagint it is rendered by Ναγέβ or by ἔρημος in memory of the first etymology (Vulgate terra arens, Iudc. 1, 15), but more often by νότος (= south) or λίψ (= south-west).
In the distribution of the Promised Land, the N. fell by lot to the tribes of Judah and Simeon (Ios. 10, 40; 12, 8); but the boundaries, especially in the southern part, do not appear well delimited. The principal cities of the N. are listed in Ios. 15, 21-32 and among the principal ones are remembered Kadesh-barnea (Gen. 20, 1), Beersheba (Ios. 15, 28), Ziklag (ibid. 15, 31), Arad (Num. 21, 1).
According to the clans, the N. of the Cherethites was distinguished (I Sam. 30, 14), of Caleb (ibid.), of Judah (ibid. 27, 10; 30, 14), of the Jerahmeelites (ibid. 27, 10), and of the Kenites (ibid.).
Bibliography
Donato Baldi