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tinued to be the southern frontier of the kingdom of Judah;
the expression “from Dan to Beer-Sheba” was then replaced by
“from Beer-Sheba to the hill-country of Ephraim” (II Chron.
19:4) or “from Geba to Beer-Sheba” (II Kings 23:8). Zibiah, the
mother of Jehoash, king of Judah, originated from Beer-Sheba
(II Kings 12:2). Elijah set out on his journey to Horeb from
Beer-Sheba, the gateway to the desert (I Kings 19:3, 8). The city
was settled by Jews after the return from Babylon (Neh. 11:27,
30). The biblical town of Beer-Sheba is to be sought at Tell al-
Saʿb (Tell Beer-Sheba, a unesco World Heritage site (2005)),
2½ mi. (4 km.) NE of the new town, where remains of a fortress
and potsherds from the Iron Age to the Roman period were
found in excavations begun in 1969 by Y. Aharoni.
After 70 C.E. Beersheba was included in the Roman frontier-line
defenses against the Nabateans and continued to be
a Roman garrison town after the Roman annexation of the
Nabatean kingdom. A large village existed then at its present
site, where many remains have been found including mosaic
pavements and Greek inscriptions (including a sixth-century
C.E. ordinance regarding tax payments, which was issued to
the south of the country, and a synagogue inscription). In the
fourth and fifth centuries C.E., Beersheba first belonged to the
district of Gerar and was later annexed to “Palaestina Tertia.”
The town was abandoned in the Arab period.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
Modern Beersheba
The modern settlement dates from 1900, when the Turkish
government set up an administrative district in southern Palestine
separate from that of Gaza and built an urban center
in this purely nomadic region. The Turks were motivated by
the need to strengthen governmental authority over the Bedouin
at a time when Turkey was struggling with Britain over
the delineation of the Egyptian border in Sinai. German and
Swiss engineers aided in laying out a city plan. Both a city and
a district council were set up, and Bedouin sheikhs held seats
on them. Until 1914, however, progress was slow, and Beersheba
had about 800 Muslim inhabitants and some Jewish
families, one of whom ran a flour mill. In World War I, the
town became the principal base for the Turko-German Army
fighting on the Suez and Sinai front. Fortifications were laid
out around the town and more settlers, including Jews, came
and provided services to the army. A branch of the Jerusalem-
Jaffa railway line was constructed and led beyond Beersheba
to the southwest. On Oct. 31, 1917, the town was taken by Allied
forces under General *Allenby’s command, with Australian
and New Zealand units prominent in the battle. Allied
losses were considerable; the British War Cemetery at Beersheba
has about 1,300 graves. When Beersheba’s strategic role
ended, its economy dwindled and the railway was dismantled.
In 1920, a few Jewish laborers planted a tree nursery and eucalyptus
grove there and experimented with cultivating vegetables
and other crops. In 1922, the population reached 2,356,
among whom were 98 Jews. By 1931, the number of Jews had
beersheba
decreased to 11. The last Jews left during the 1936–39 riots, but
efforts were intensified to purchase land for Jewish settlement
in the Negev. During the *War of Independence the invading
Egyptian army made Beersheba its headquarters for the Negev.
When the town was taken by Israel forces on Oct. 21, 1948, it
was totally abandoned by its inhabitants. Early in 1949, Jewish
settlers, mostly new immigrants, established themselves there.
The population, which totaled 1,800 at the end of 1949, reached
25,500 in 1956, 51,600 in 1962, and over 70,000 in 1968.
The vast majority of its inhabitants were originally new
immigrants, mainly from North Africa, Iraq, India, Romania,
Poland, Hungary, and South America. The first arrivals took
over the abandoned houses, but from 1951 large new suburbs
were built extending mainly to the north and northwest, while
to the east a large industrial area sprang up. Arab Beersheba of
Turkish times now became a small “old city” in a large modern
town. The municipal area of about 10 sq. mi. (26 sq. km.)
was doubled in 1967. Beersheba became the capital of Israel’s
Southern District, and a hub of communications linking up
with the main roads and the railway lines Lydda-Kiryat Gat
and Dimonah-Oron. A pumping station of the Eilat-Haifa
oil pipeline was located there. Its largest industries (ceramics,
sanitary ware, fire-resistant bricks, pesticides and other
chemicals, and bromide compounds) exploited Negev minerals.
There was also a large textile factory, flour mill, machine
garage, and smaller plants for building materials, diamonds,
metals, and other industries. The city had several academic,
scientific, and cultural institutions, of which the Soroka Medical
Center and the Municipal Museum were the first. In 1957,
the Negev Institute for Arid Zone Research was established,
which experiments with water desalination by electrodialysis,
exploitation of solar energy, cloud seeding, adaptation of
plants to aridity, hydroponics, and human behavior under desert
conditions. The Institute for Higher Education, opened in
1965, was formally recognized as the University of the Negev
in 1970 and had 1,600 students. Subsequently renamed Ben-
Gurion University after Israel’s first prime minister. It had
15,000 students in 2002. In 1973 the Beersheba Theater and
the Symphony Orchestra were established. Beersheba also
had a Biological Institute, mainly for the study of plant life
in the desert. The city also served as a market center for the
Negev’s tens of thousands of Bedouin and had several large
hotels. The traditional Thursday Bedouin market day was a
noted tourist attraction.
In the 1970s the population of Beersheba passed the
110,000 mark, making it the fourth largest urban concentration
in Israel after Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Haifa. The original
plan to make Beersheba an industrial center was not too successful,
though there were several large industrial plants, such
as Machteshim, which produced agricultural fertilizers and
employed over 1,000 workers, and an Israel Aircraft Industries
metal plant. The main sources of employment, however,
were the Soroka Medical Center, employing over 2,000, and
the university. The city thus continued to serve as a regional
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