Jérémie Schiettecatte

Mounir Arbach

The political map of Arabia and the Middle East in the 3rd century AD revealed by a Sabaean inscription -a view from the South

An inscription in Sabaic recently discovered on the site of Jabal Riyām (Yemen) gives an account of a journey -probably a diplomatic mission -carried out by a Sabaean dignitary on behalf of the rulers of the tribe of Ḥumlān. He listed the territories he passed through in western and northern Arabia and in the Middle East, up to Palmyra and Mesopotamia. This text, assumed to date back to the 3rd century AD (more probably c.260-280), provides a unique picture of the political forces in the area and throws new light on the regional map of the time.

Introduction

The accuracy of the political map of ancient Arabia varies according to the period. From the 3rd century BC to the early 2nd century AD, the outlines of the political entities interacting within the Peninsula are documented in detail in classical sources: the Geography by Eratosthenes of Cyrene (3rd century BC), by Strabo (1st century BC), and by Claudius Ptolemy (early 2nd century AD); Pliny's Natural History and the Periplus Maris Erythraei [START_REF] Casson | The Periplus Maris Erythraei: Text with Introduction, Translation, and Commentary[END_REF]) by an unknown author (both from the 1st century AD). From the second half of the 4th to the mid-6th century AD, a detailed picture of the political powers is provided by both the classical sources (Roman History by Ammianus Marcellinus, Church History by Philostorgius, History of the Wars by Procopius of Caesarea) and the accounts of military deeds by the kings of Ḥimyar and their vassals in the Sabaic inscriptions.

The intermediate period (mid-2nd-mid-4th century), however, did not yield any document providing us with a global view of the political landscape, and it was only by comparing various sources (Nabataean, Palmyrene, South Arabian, Ge'ez, and Latin inscriptions) that a rough sketch of a political map of Arabia could be drawn. This shaded area now emerges from obscurity thanks to the discovery by one of the present authors, in 2006, of a rare document from the ancient kingdom of Sabaʾ (Yemen), inscription Jabal Riyām 2006-17 (hereafter Riyām 2006-17). This Sabaic inscription from a temple on Jabal Riyām and dated to the 3rd century AD, is an account of a diplomatic mission of the kingdom of Sabaʾ to the northern territories. This journey takes us to Central and North Arabia, the eastern Roman territories, Syria, and as far as southern Mesopotamia.

Through its unique content, this inscription enlightens the historical geography of Arabia in the 3rd century AD and provides an overview of the tribal and political map of the region at a little-known period.

Following a short presentation of the text, the nature of each of these twelve territories will be analysed and an attempt to locate them will be proposed in order to draw the political map of Arabia and the Near East as it was at the time of this text.

A unique geographical testimony in the 3rd century

Inscription Riyām 2006-17 was discovered on the site of Jabal Riyām, Sana'a governorate, Yemen (Fig. 1).

Figure 1: A political map of South Arabia in the mid-3rd century AD (© J. Schiettecatte, 2015).

There, the ruins of an ancient temple dedicated to the god Taʾlab had been freshly looted and 26 misappropriated inscriptions from this deliberate damage were stored in the courtyard of a house in the village of Riyām. Sixteen texts have been dated to the 7th-4th centuries BC and were recently published [START_REF] Arbach | Inscriptions inédites du Jabal Riyām des VII e -VI e siècles av[END_REF]. A second group comprises ten other texts dated to the 1st-3rd century AD according to palaeographical criteria. Inscription Riyām 2006-17 is one of these (Fig. 2). The philological analysis of this inscription and the discussion regarding its dating was recently completed by the authors (ARBACH & SCHIETTECATTE, in press) and will not be repeated here except for a few chronological features. Inscription Riyām 2006-17 reads:

(1) [… …] (2) dedicated (to their lord) [Taʾlab Riyām um ] (3) Master of Turʿat [… …] (4) grant them the goodwill [and the satisfaction of their lo] (5) rds Yarīm Yuharḥi[b and his sons/brothers A] (6) wsallāt and Barig of the (li)[neage of Bataʿ, lords] (7) of the palace Wakil um and h[… … their] (8) lord Taʾlab [… …] (9) and prosperous possessions and [good harvests] (10) in their fields and their [… …] (11) plantations. And praised Ḥay[…] (12) steward of Yarīm, Awsallāt, and Barig, the power and (13) the authority of Taʾlab Riyām um , as He brought him back from (14) the land of the North when his lords dispatched him on a (diplomatic) mission (15) and he reached the land of Asd ān , the land of (16) Nizār um , the land of Tanūkh, the land of Liḥyān, (17) the land of Tadmur um , the land of Nabaṭ um , the land (18) of Rūmān, the land of Lakhm um , the land of Gha (19) ssān, the land of Maʿadd um , the land of Ṭayy um , and the (20) land of Khaṣāṣat ān . And they entrusted (this inscription) to the protection of Taʾlab Riyām. 1 1 Transcription of Riyām 2006-17: (1) [… … …] (2) (h)qnyw (s²ym-)[hmw Tʾlb Rym m ] (3) bʿl Trʿt (ṯ)[… … s¹] (4) ʿdhmw ḥẓ(y)[ w-rḍw ʾmrʾ-h] (5) mw Yrm Yhrḥb [w-bny-hw ((ʾḫy-hw)) ʾ] (6) ws¹lt w-Brg (b)[nw Btʿ ʾbʿl] (7) bt n Wkl m wh[… … s²ym-] (8) hmw Tʾlb ʾw[... … … …] (9) w-qny m hnʾ m w-ʾ[fql m ṣd] (10) q m ʿdy ʿbrt-hmw w-[… h] (11) mw ʾʿrs² m w-ḥmd Ḥy[… m] (12) qtwy Yrm w-ʾws¹lt w-Brg ḫyl [w]- (13) mqm Tʾlb Rym m ḥgn ʾwl-hw (14) bn ʾrḍ S²ʾmt b-kn blt-hw ʾmrʾ- (15) hmw w-ʿdw ʾrḍ ʾs¹d n w-ʾrḍ N (16) zr m w-ʾrḍ Tnḫ w-ʾrḍ Lḥyn (17) w-ʾrḍ Tdmr m w-ʾrḍ Nbṭ m w-ʾ (18) rḍ Rm n w-ʾrḍ Lḫm m w-ʾrḍ Ḡ (19) s¹n w-ʾrḍ Mʿd m w-ʾrḍ Ṭy m w-ʾr (20) ḍ Ḫṣṣt n w-rṯdw b-Tʾlb Rym. The unknown authors of the text give thanks to Taʾlab Riyām, the main deity of the tribes of Ḥāshid and Ḥumlān in his sanctuary on the Jabal Riyām, in order to gain the favour of their lords of the lineage of Bataʿ as well as fruitful crops and harvests. They follow the common format of a dedication usually made to this deity.

There follows a more specific praise of one of the authors -whose name is only partly preserved (Ḥay[ū um ] or Ḥay [ūʿathtar]) -who has returned safely from lengthy travels in the northern territories: those of the tribes of West Arabia (Asd, Nizār, Ghassān, Khaṣāṣat), North Arabia (Liḥyān, Nabaṭ, Ṭayyiʾ), Central Arabia (Maʿadd), the Euphrates valley (Tanūkh), and the Near East (Lakhm, Tadmur/Palmyra, Eastern Provinces of the Roman Empire). This expedition was undertaken on behalf of his lords Yarīm Yuharḥib, Awsallāt, and Barig of the lineage of Bataʿ, princes of one of the main Sabaean tribe, Ḥumlān, a faction of the tribal confederacy of Samʿī.

Although neither king nor calendar year is given in this inscription, several clues -the palaeography, territories listed in the inscription, and names of the lords who can be identified to princes of the lineage of Bataʿ and Hamdān, leaders of the tribe of Ḥumlān and Ḥāshidallow us to date inscription Riyām 2006-17 quite confidently sometime between AD 223 and 300 (ARBACH & SCHIETTECATTE, in press). More hypothetically, it can be dated either from the beginning of this time span (c.225-235), when the rapid succession of several royal dynasties on the Sabaean throne made it possible for the lords of Bataʿ and Hamdān to become emancipated and dispatch a diplomatic mission, or -more probably -at the very end of the existence of the Sabaean kingdom (c.260-280), when the lords of Bataʿ and Hamdān conducted an armed resistance against the hostile kingdom of Ḥimyar.

A political map from the Euphrates to Yemen in the 3rd century AD

Riyām 2006-17 mentions twelve territorial and political entities. An assessment of their political role and their relations with South Arabian kingdoms, and an examination of their location in the 3rd century make it possible to draw the outlines of a political map of the Arabian Peninsula and beyond at that time (Fig. 3).

In the land of the North…

As a prelude to the list of the territories visited, an opening word indicates that the journey was carried out in the land of the North (ʾrḍ S 2 ʾmt). According to the context of the inscription, the interpretation is twofold.

The first option would be to consider the 'Land of the North' as a political entity, a possible hypothesis as an unpublished inscription from the temple Awām in Maʾrib mentions the dispatching of two emissaries to 'Caesar, king of the North' in AD 311. 2 In this inscription, the North (Shaʾmat) is identified as the Eastern provinces of the Roman Empire. In Riyām 2006-17 however, Romans (Rm n ) are explicitly mentioned by their name in the territories visited. We therefore consider the 'land of the North' as the wide area stretching north of South Arabia and encompassing the tribal territories and kingdoms listed later.

The land of Asd

The tribe of Asd (Sabaic: Asd ān /Asd/al-Asd; Arabic: al-Azd) is known from the early Christian era onwards from Sabaic and Ḥaḍramitic inscriptions. 3 The latest Sabaic mention is inscription ʿAbadān 1/16, dated to AD 360, stating that two factions of the Asd, Ṣudayy ān and Rasan, were defeated by the Ḥimyarite king.

A clue to the location of the land of Asd is provided by inscription Ja 635 where mention is made of a war led by the troops of Shaʿr um Awtar king of Sabaʾ and dhū-Raydān against the king of Kinda and Qaḥṭān and the inhabitants of Qaryat dhāt-Kahl (present-day Qaryat al-Fāw). The battle took place 'on the border of the territory of al-Asd, at the crossing-place by the two wells of dhū-Thumāl'. 4 There are two candidates for this location:

1) the wells of al-Thamāla, 51 km north-east of Bīsha and 252 km west-north-west of Qaryat al-Fāw;5 2) Wādī Thumāla, 31 km south-east of al-Ṭāʾif. This is 500 km west-north-west of Qaryat al-Fāw, however, and it is unlikely that Sabaean troops were engaged in a fight against Kindites and inhabitants of Qaryat at such a distance from the site.

The land of Asd ān would thus have extended west of Bīsha, in the south-western heights of Saudi Arabia, straddling the regions of al-Bāḥa and ʿAsīr. Their territory was probably comparable to that of the tribe of Azd Sarāt on the eve of Islam, stretching from Bīsha to the Tihāma shores, the southern limit being approximately al-Nimāṣ and the northern one the modern town of al-Bāḥa (STRENZIOK 1960: 834). It is worth noting that according to Ibn al-Kalbī, one of the main pre-Islamic deities of the Azd Sarāt -Dhū-l-Khalaṣa -had its sanctuary in Tabāla (FARIS 1952: 29;STRENZIOK 1960: 836;ROBIN 2012a: 51), c.40 km west of Bīsha and 75 km south-west of al-Thamāla.

2 MB 2004-I-123: Qys¹r m mlk S²ʾmt. Inscription presented by M. Maraqten on several occasions: 9th Rencontres Sabéennes, Sana'a, 2004;9ICAANE, Basel, 2014;19th Rencontres Sabéennes, Pisa, 2015. On the latter occasion, he corrected the reading of the date he had published incorrectly (MARAQTEN 2014: 100) from 404 Ḥimyarite era to 421 Ḥimyarite era, i.e. AD 311.

In the 3rd century AD, the tribe of Asd appeared as an autonomous kingdom ruled by a king (malik), and played a significant role in the South Arabian political landscape.

The rock of al-ʿUqla, near Shabwa, the place of investiture of the kings of Ḥaḍramawt in the 3rd century AD, is engraved with three inscriptions mentioning the presence of Asdites sojourning in the region.6 Among these, Ja 957 is of particular interest since the author, ʿAmr um son of ʿAwf um the Asdite, mentions Yadaʿʾīl Bayān king of Ḥaḍramawt (c.225-255)7 as his 'son-in-law' or 'ally'. 8 An alliance by marriage between Yadaʿʾīl Bayān and a noblewoman of Asd, daughter of ʿAmr um son of ʿAwf um , makes sense if we follow the translation proposed by Pirenne of a later inscription from al-ʿUqla which reads 'Rabbīshams nobleman of Asd, son of Yadaʿʾīl Bayān king of Ḥaḍramawt'.9 This Rabbīshams is possibly one of the two last kings of Ḥaḍramawt (c. AD 300). 10 The close proximity between the Arab tribe of Asd and the Ḥaḍrami power is obvious.

Regarding the connections with Sabaʾ, Ilīsharaḥ Yaḥḍub king of Sabaʾ (c.235-255) sent an embassy 'to the kings of the tribes Ghassān, al-Asd, Nizār um and Madhḥig um '; 11 a few years later, the same Ilīsharaḥ Yaḥḍub and his brother Yaʾzil Bayān dispatched a 'mission to the kings of the north, al-Ḥārith son of Kaʿb um king of Asd, and Mālik um son of Baddāʾ king of Kinda and Madhḥig um and some (other) Arabs'. 12 In the early 4th century, another embassy was sent by the Ḥimyarite king Shammar Yuharʿish to Mālik um son of Kaʿb um king of Asd. 13 Two kings of Asd are thus known by name: al-Ḥārith son of Kaʿb um and Mālik um son of Kaʿb um . It is unlikely they were siblings as between 50 and 70 years separates one inscription from the other. 14 Throughout the 3rd century, the tribe of Asd fostered a friendship with the Sabaean kingdom and its ally, the kingdom of Ḥaḍramawt. 15 This close proximity between Asd, Sabaʾ, and Ḥaḍramawt did not last after the annexation of the two latter kingdoms by Ḥimyar. If Shammar Yuharʿish sent a successful embassy to the king of Asd two generations later, the genealogical reconstruction rules out the translation proposed by A. Jamme (1963: 59-60): "Rabbīshams, superintendent of the soldiers, son of Yadaʿʾīl Bayān, king of Ḥaḍramawt".

10 He is mentioned as a co-regent of Sharaḥʾīl in a text dated to the reign of Shammar Yuharʿish king of Sabaʾ, dhū-Raydān, Ḥaḍramawt and Yamanat (Ja 656/11-12: S²rḥ (12) ʾl w-Rbs²ms¹ m mlky Ḥḍrmwt). Since Shammar Yuharʿish bears the long title of the king of Ḥimyar, this text can be dated sometime between 300 and 312. This identification is also defended by Frantsouzoff (2015: 238, 246).

11 ZI 75: b-ʿbr ʾmlk ʾs²ʿb n Ḡs¹n w-l-ʾs¹d w-Nzr m w-Mḏḥg m . 12 CSAI's translation of Ja 2110/7-10: b-kn hblt b-ʿbr ʾmlk s²ʾm (8) t ʾl-Ḥrṯ bn Kʿb m mlk (ʾ)s¹d (w)-Mlk (9)m bn Bd mlk Kdt w-Mḏḥg m w-ḏ-bn (10) ʾʿrb n .

13 Sharaf 31/9-10: b-ʿbr Mlk m bn K (10) [ʿb] m mlk-l-ʾs¹d. Ḥimyarites and the Yazʾanides led an expedition against the tribal factions of Asd in AD 360 (ʿAbadān 1/16).

To sum up, the tribe of Asd appears to be:

-a political entity headed by a king at least in the mid-3rd-early 4th century AD and controlling the territory west of Bīsha, today in the south-western heights of Saudi Arabia straddling the regions of al-Bāḥa and ʿAsīr; -a long-standing ally of the Sabaeans, receiving their diplomatic missions and allowing the Sabaean army to cross their territories when they faced the kingdom of Kinda;

-a faithful ally of the Ḥaḍramawt, after the Sabaean king Shaʿr um Awtar, of the lineage of Hamdān, dismissed Ilīʾazz Yaluṭ king of Ḥaḍramawt (c. AD 225) and promoted the accession to the throne of Yadaʿʾīl Bayān son of Rabbīshams, of the freemen of Yuhabʾir. A noblewoman of Asd would have been given to him in marriage. A child from this marriage would have kept the title of noble of Asd and possibly ascended the throne of Ḥaḍramawt, just before the kingdom was annexed.

The land of Nizār

In Arabic tradition Nizār um in Sabaic is identified as the tribe of Nizār. In Ibn al-Kalbī's genealogy, Nizār b. Maʿadd b. ʿAdnān is the common ancestor of most of the Arab tribes of the North (CASKEL 1966, I: table 1;1966, II: 448;[START_REF] Della | Liḥyān et Liḥyānites. II. -Dans les sources islamiques[END_REF].

If the historical existence of this tribe has been previously denied, 16 several pre-Islamic inscriptions have proved otherwise. The tribe of Nizār is mentioned in three Sabaic inscriptions from the mid-3rd to the mid-4th century AD (Riyām 2006-17, ZI 75, and ʿAbadān 1) and in the funerary inscription of Maraʾ-l-Qays at al-Namāra, southern Syria dated AD 328.

The location of its territory is based on very little evidence. In the Old Arabic inscription of al-Namāra, King Maraʾ-l-Qays is said to have ruled 'the two Syrias', Nizār and Maʿadd (see below). Kropp insisted that these tribal names are those of the eponyms of Arab tribes of the North (KROPP 1990: 77), that is, in northern and Central Arabia. A much more significant element is given in the Sabaic inscription ʿAbadān 1 (AD 360): 'Barīl um son of [Ma]ʿ[dīkari]b participated in combat for the first time [... ...] Maʿadd um and [... ...] the nomad tribe ʿAbdqaysān at Siyyān, at the waters of the wells of Sigah, between the Land of Nizār um and the Land of Ghassān '. 17 According to this text, the wells of Sigah at Siyyān mark the border of the land of Nizār, at least in the mid-4th century. Robin recognized in these place names the wells of Sijā in the steppe area of al-Siyy, located in Central Arabia, c.330 km east-south-east of Medina and 380 km north-east of Mecca. 18 16 LEVI DELLA VIDA 1995: 84-85: 'the term Nizār corresponds to a political ideal rather than to a historical reality (…) it is evident that we cannot speak of Nizār as a tribe which had a real historical existence'. ROBIN & GAJDA (1994: 119) in the English version proposed by the CSAI. 18 ROBIN 1986: 183. Thilo (1958: 89) describes Sijā as 'Brunnen, nahe dem Ursprung eines der beiden Quellarme des W. Ğarīb/Ğerīr, südl. vom heutigen Mešāf Siǧā';and al-Siyy as a 'Steppe östlich vom südl. ʿAqīq, etwa der südwestliche Teil von Waǧra' (ibid.: 92).

Inscriptions mentioning Nizār in the 3rd-4th century AD mirror the political role it played at that time. It was then one of the four main tribes in the area stretching from Najrān to Yathrib (present-day Medina), headed by a leader who was given the title of king (mlk) by the Sabaean authority. This is illustrated by a diplomatic mission sent by Ilīsharaḥ Yaḥḍub king of Sabaʾ and dhū-Raydān (c.235-255) 'to the kings of the tribes Ghassān, al-Asd, Nizār um and Madhḥig um '. 19 Eighty years later, c. AD 328, the king Maraʾ-l-Qays son of ʿAmr, 20 in his epitaph from al-Namāra, bore the title of 'king of all ʿArab who bound on the crown 21 and ruled the two Syrias and Nizārū and their kings'. 22 The leader and the tribe of Nizār had then been subjugated to a king who ruled over an area stretching from Mesopotamia to northern and Central Arabia.

In AD 360, Nizār simply appears as a territory 23 the border of which is the setting of a confrontation between the tribe of ʿAbdqaysān and the coalition of Ḥimyar, Kinda, Madhḥig, and Murād, during Ḥimyar's military campaign against Maʿadd. At that time, Nizār could still have been part of the entity named Maʿadd. Subsequently, Nizār is no longer mentioned and one wonders whether the tribe might have been finally incorporated within Maʿadd; it would explain the filiation between Nizār and Maʿadd in the genealogy of Ibn al-Kalbī, as a memory of a forgotten past.

To sum up, the tribe of Nizār appears to be:

-a political entity headed by a ruler who is endowed with the title of king (mlk) by the Sabaean king at least in the 3rd and first half of the 4th century AD; -a tribe spreading in the steppe, somewhere east of Mecca; -a tribe subjugated to the rule of king Maraʾ-l-Qays who took control of a wide territory stretching from Mesopotamia to Central Arabia for an undetermined length of time.

The land of Tanūkh

Tanūkh can be easily identified as the tribe attested in the early centuries of Islam in Lower Mesopotamia and the upper Euphrates (CASKEL 1966, II: 544-545;[START_REF] Shahid I | Tanūkh. Encyclopédie de l'Islam X[END_REF]. The tribe is also known in pre-Islamic sources from the 3rd century onwards. Some scholars agree with the identification of the Thanouitai of Ptolemy (Geogr. VI.7.23) with Tanūkh (SPRENGER 1875: 208;WISSMANN 1964: 192-193). Ptolemy does not locate this ethnic group precisely; having listed tribes from North and Central Arabia, he just mentions that going to the south, one finds the Katanitai (Qaḥṭān) and then the Thanoutitai. 21 Louvre 205 = AO 4083/1: Mrʾlqys br ʿmrw mlk ʾl-ʿrb kl-h ḏw ʾsr ʾl-tg. The translation is Macdonald's (FIEMA et al. 2015: 405), 'ʿArab' referring to an area in Mesopotamia. It is adapted from the alternative translation proposed by M. ZWETTLER (1993): 'king of the entire territory of al-ʿArab'. 22 Louvre 205 = AO 4083/2-4: w-mlk ʾl-ʾsdyn/ʾsryn w-Nzrw w-mlwk-hm (…) w-mlk Mʿdw. Translation by Macdonald (FIEMA et al. 2015: 405). Regarding the reading of ʾl-ʾsryn or ʾl-ʾsdyn, it is uncertain since the same letter can be used for both R and D (KROPP 1990: 76). Kropp reads ʾl-ʾsdyn and translates it 'the two tribes of Asad' (i.e. Asd Shanūʾa and Asd ʿUmān). This hypothesis is highly unlikely for Robin, who sticks to the transcription ʾl-ʾsryn and suggests 'the two Syrias' (AVNER et al. 2013: 250, n. 32). This translation is also favoured by Macdonald (FIEMA et al. 2015: 405).

Qaḥṭān being the tribe that settled in Qaryat al-Fāw, it would thus indicate a territory somewhere in the south of Saudi Arabia, which is in contradiction with later data. The identification of the Thanouitai as Tanūkh remains questionable unless we give credence to historical traditions that speak of a migration of Tanūkh from Tihāma to the Gulf shores (SHAHID 2002: 206).

Later, inscription LPNab 41 found at Umm al-Jimāl, south of Buṣrā (Syria) mentions 'Gadhīmat king of Tanūkh'. 24 Whether at that time the territory of Tanūkh stretched across the Syrian Desert up to Umm al-Jimāl, south of Buṣrā, cannot be ascertained as the reasons for the presence of the funerary stela of the tutor of this king of Tanūkh at that location remain unclear. A date in the mid-3rd century has been proposed for this inscription, based on questionable arguments. 25 Thus, if this inscription reports the existence of a king of Tanūkh, neither his date nor the extent of his kingdom can be inferred.

Be that is it may, it is highly likely that the tribe of Tanūkh was settled in Lower Mesopotamia by the late 3rd-early 4th century, most probably in the region of al-Ḥīra on the right bank of the Euphrates, where it is well attested in late antiquity. This location would be consistent with the Sabaic inscription Sharaf 31 (c. AD 300-312), in which an envoy of the Ḥimyarite king 'reached Qaṭūṣif (Ctesiphon) and Kūk (Seleukia), the two Persian royal cities, and went to the land of Tanūkh'. 26From the mid-5th century onwards, the tribe of Tanūkh and its king were the target of at least two Ḥimyarite expeditions attempting to subjugate the Najd and north-east Arabia. 27In the 6th century AD, Tanūkh was still one of the most influential tribes of al-Ḥīra, together with the tribes of al-ʿIbād and al-Aḥlāf (ṬABARĪ/NÖLDEKE 1973: 24;SHAHID 2002: 206).

To sum up:

-it was a political entity headed by a king, possibly in the 3rd century and certainly in the 5th century; -Tanūkh appears as a tribe that had settled in southern Mesopotamia at the latest at the end of the 3rd century AD. Al-Ḥīra remained the central location of the tribe until the advent of Islam.

The land of Liḥyān

The tribe of Liḥyān is attested in many Dadanitic inscriptions,28 in the expression 'king of Liḥyān', at the earliest in the mid-6th century BC and until at least the mid-4th century BC Nevertheless, it seems more appropriate to qualify these texts as Dadanitic (MACDONALD 2000: 33), according to the place they mainly come from (Dadan, present-day oasis of al-ʿUlā), rather than after the specific kingdoms of Dadan or Liḥyān. (ROHMER & CHARLOUX 2015: 300). Liḥyān was then a kingdom occupying the area of modern al-ʿUlā.

Outside the oasis of al-ʿUlā, south-west of Taymāʾ, four additional inscriptions in a local derivative of Imperial Aramaic were left by a certain Masʿudū king of Liḥyān 29 and 'Shahrū king of Liḥyān'. 30 The kingship of Masʿudū and Shahrū is questionable. 31 In South Arabia, the tribe of Liḥyān is mentioned in a Sabaic inscription, B-L Nashq, from al-Bayḍāʾ in the Jawf valley (Yemen), and probably dating back to the very early 6th century BC. 32 Its author undertook a commercial expedition in Gaza and Cyprus, and a mission for his king 'in the land of Dhakar um , Liḥyān, Abīʾôs and Ḥanak'. 33 The name later appears on the Minaic stela from Maʿīn in the Jawf valley (Yemen), where Minaean merchants listed their matrimonial alliances with women from cities or kingdoms located along the caravan trail. One of them married 'Ms¹qy, free woman of Liḥyān'. 34 This text is ascribed to the 5th-mid-4th century BC according to the place names mentioned (LEMAIRE 1996: 39-44).

Around the 3rd-2nd century BC, the Liḥyanites were outdone by competitive tribal groups. 35There is no further mention of them before the time of the Prophet Muḥammad, except by Pliny (Nat. Hist. VI.32.13: Lechieni), who is no doubt referring to an earlier source, 36 and in four undated Safaitic inscriptions from Syria and Jordan (see below). It is thus unexpected to find a mention of a land of Liḥyān in Riyām 2006-17.

Regarding the location of this territory, Liḥyān was established in the area of al-ʿUlā (northern Ḥijāz) and its immediate surroundings at least until the 3rd century BC [START_REF] Rohmer | From Liḥyān to the Nabataeans: Dating the End of the Iron Age in Northwest Arabia[END_REF]. Subsequently, its location remains conjectural. Three hypotheses can be put forward.

Firstly, the region of al-ʿUlā: although the kingdom of Liḥyān was brought to an end five or six centuries earlier than inscription Riyām 2006-17, a people who considered themselves to be Liḥyanites might still have been living in the surrounding area of al-ʿUlā and their land continued to be called by its former name. In this case, in Riyām 2006-17, Liḥyān was not the setting of a diplomatic meeting but a territory that was passed through, squeezed between Ghassān and Nabaṭ.

Secondly, somewhere between al-ʿUlā and Mecca: a tribe of Liḥyān, a branch of Hudhayl (CASKEL 1966, I: table 58), settled north-east of Mecca on the eve of Islam (LEVI DELLA VIDA 1986: 769). The banū Liḥyān were then custodians of the idol of Hudhayl at a place called Ruhāṭ, the location of which is thought to be either in the environs of Yanbuʿ (Red Sea coast west of Medina), or more probably close to Mecca (RENTZ 1971: 559-560). The banū 29 At al-Khabū al-gharbī: JSNab 334 and 335; at al-Khabū al-sharqī: JSNab 337. 30 At Sarmadāʾ: AL-THEEB 2014: 34-35. 31 ROHMER & CHARLOUX 2015: 302: 'Masʿūdū and Shahrū are self-proclaimed kings with doubtful ties to the historical core of the Liḥyanite kingdom. Even if we take their claim to kingship seriously, we have to bear in mind that the title of king often refers to tribal shaykhs in first-millennium BC Arabia'.

32 BRON & LEMAIRE (2009: 19-29) assumed that the mention of a war between Chaldea and Ionia might refer to events that happened c.600 or 557 BC. 33 B-L Nashq/18-19: ʿd ʾrḍ Ḏkr m w-L (19) ḥyn w-ʾbʾs¹ w-Ḥnk. 34 Maʿīn 93B/46-47: Ms¹qy ḥrt L (47) ḥyn.

Liḥyān were still established in the neighbourhood of the Holy City in the 19th century, in Ḥaddāʾ and Baḥra, halfway between Jeddah and Mecca (RENTZ 1971: 559-560; ABU AL-ḤASAN 2010: 272). Consequently, at the time of Riyām 2006-17, assuming that the tribe of Liḥyān mentioned in Arab tradition is not just a namesake but represents the descendants of the pre-Christian Liḥyanites, the land of Liḥyān may have been located further south, somewhere between al-ʿUlā and Mecca.

Thirdly, in the desert fringes of northern Arabia/southern Syria: two Safaitic inscriptions from Wādī Shām (southern Syria), dated between the 1st century BC and the 4th century AD,37 relate an incursion of Liḥyanites in the area (MACDONALD et al. 1996: 458-464). At the same time, three texts which have been discovered in north-eastern Jordan38 can be read in two different ways: 'the year ʿbdrb confronted the lineage group of Liḥyān' or 'the year ʿbdrbʾl confronted Liḥyān', Liḥyān in this case being the name of a person (M. Macdonald, pers. com.). The two inscriptions from Wādī Shām and possibly the three from Jordan could be interpreted as evidence of Liḥyanite incursions, perhaps even a relocation of groups stemming from the tribe of Liḥyān on the desert margins of southern Syria, north-eastern Jordan, and northern Arabia in the early Christian era. This scenario would be consistent with the hypothesis that the author of Riyām 2006-17 listed the territories he visited in chronological order. Liḥyān would then be located near Tanūkh, Tadmur (Palmyra), and Nabaṭ. In this case, the land of Liḥyān would overlap that of Lakhm (see below). Such a hypothesis, however, remains flimsy considering the scanty evidence to back it up.

To sum up:

-Liḥyān was a political entity headed by a king at least from the 6th to the 4th century BC, perhaps later, and established in the oasis of al-ʿUlā in northern Ḥijāz; -it was a tribe which might have existed in the early Christian era in the same area or which might have moved from northern Ḥijāz, either to the neighbourhood of Mecca or to a region straddling southern Syria, northern Arabia, and north-eastern Jordan.

The land of Tadmur (Palmyra)

Tadmur is the ancient name for the city of Palmyra, still used in modern Arabic. Acting as a buffer zone between the Roman and Parthian empires, the city rose to economic and military prominence from the 1st century BC to the 3rd century AD (EDWELL 2008: 31-62). This growth was driven by the caravan trade between Lower Mesopotamia and the Roman province of Syria. The bulk of caravan inscriptions is ascribed to the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus, and more particularly from AD 131 to 161, a period considered by many as the most flourishing one for the city [START_REF] Gawlikowski M | Palmyra and its caravan trade[END_REF]SARTRE 2001: 844-845;GOREA 2012: 471). At that time, the Palmyrene territory reached the Euphrates valley to the northeast, stretched to modern ʿĀnah (Irak) to the east, to a location somewhere between Homs and Palmyra to the west, and the Syrian desert to the south (EDWELL 2008: 52;GOREA 2012: 465). Admittedly slowed down after Lucius Verus' wars, during Septimius Severus' Parthian wars, or during Ardashir and Shāpur's campaigns against Rome, the Palmyrene trade remained active until Diocletian promoted Nisibis as the only authorized point of commercial exchange between the Roman and Sasanian empires, in AD 297/8 (GOREA 2012: 475). Under the rule of Odeinath (AD 263-267) and that of his widow Zenobia with his son Wahballat (267-272), the Palmyrene territory went through an unprecedented expansion towards Mesopotamia, Anatolia, and Egypt. The emancipation of Zenobia from Roman authority was followed by the repression of Emperor Aurelian and the sack of the city. If the proposed dating of Riyām 2006-17 is correct, the Sabaean diplomatic mission might have taken place during one of these reigns, at a time when Palmyra had reached its greatest expansion.

Echoing the growing importance of Tadmur in the early Christian era and its prominent role in long-distance trade, four documents -besides Riyām 2006-17 -show commercial and diplomatic connections between South Arabia and Palmyra in the 1st and 3rd centuries AD.

In the port of Qanīʾ (present-day Biʾr ʿAlī) was a Dressel 2-4 amphora bearing a Palmyrene graffiti (SEDOV 2010: 187, fig. 83). Its written form has been ascribed to the first half of the 1st century AD (BRIQUEL-CHATONNET 2010: 387) and the context of the discovery dates back to the late 1st century AD (SEDOV 2010).

Two Ḥaḍramitic inscriptions from the 3rd century are dedications left by Palmyreneans who defined themselves as 'Tadhmurites' staying in the Ḥaḍrami capital Shabwa, c. AD 220, and who are to be seen either as traders or ambassadors (ROBIN 2012b: 491-492). 39The last document is the wooden Palmyrene tablet 'De Geest' found in Hoq cave, Socotra Island, and dated AD 258 [START_REF] Robin | Les vestiges antiques de la grotte de Ḥoq (Suquṭra, Yémen)[END_REF]GOREA 2012: 447-457). It is not possible to confirm whether its author was a sailor, trader, or emissary.

With regard to Riyām 2006-17, this is the first evidence of contacts between Sabaeans and Palmyreneans; up to now, sources only mentioned contacts between Palmyra and the South Arabian kingdom of Ḥaḍramawt, most probably by sea. The author of Riyām 2006-17 reached Palmyra by land; it constituted the northern limit of his expedition.

To sum up:

-Palmyra was an autonomous city under Roman influence during the 1st-2nd century AD and a trading power with control over part of the Euphrates valley. It became integrated within the Roman province of Syria as a colony in the 3rd century AD. Its short emancipation in the reign of Zenobia and Wahballat was followed by the Roman sack of the city and its rapid decline; -its territory spread from the Euphrates to the north-east, present-day Ḥadītha lake (Irak) to the east, a location somewhere between Homs and Palmyra to the west, and the Syrian Desert to the south. In 270, it temporarily expanded towards Anatolia and Egypt;

-it sustained commercial and diplomatic links with South Arabian kingdoms, more specifically Ḥaḍramawt.

The land of Nabaṭ

The land of Nabaṭ um refers to the Nabataean area. Before it was taken over by the Roman Empire in AD 106, the Nabataean kingdom stretched to Buṣrā (southern Syria) to the north, to Hegra (modern Madāʾin Ṣāliḥ) to the south, and reached the Sinai Peninsula to the west and the oases of Taymāʾ and Dūmat al-Jandal to the east. The area named land of Nabaṭ in the inscription Riyām 2006-17 might be the whole region or only a part of it, but the text is not sufficiently accurate for us to be more specific.

Since the land of the Romans is mentioned later, we might be surprised at the mention of the land of Nabaṭ a century and a half after its annexation by the Romans, but this peculiarity may be explained. During the 2nd century, there is much evidence of the Roman presence as far as the southern end of the former Nabataean kingdom: in Hegra, inscription JSNab 159 is dated to the twentieth year of the Eparchy (AD 125/126); many Latin and Greek inscriptions have been unearthed on the south-eastern gate (VILLENEUVE 2014: 37-42); a detachment of the III Cyrenaica legion was stationed there in c. AD 175-177 and it is assumed there was a garrison for a Roman detachment (ala Getulorum) near the Jabal Ithlib (NEHMÉ 2009: 44-48). After the early 3rd century AD, however, no Roman presence is attested in Hegra [START_REF] Villeneuve F | The Rampart and the South-Eastern Gate (Area 35). Survey and Excavation Seasons[END_REF]. Therefore, a first hypothesis proposes that the Sabaean envoy of Riyām 2006-17 crossed a region that was under a Roman administration which left no trace, and which was inhabited by people who went on using the Nabataean script and were recognized as belonging to a group still identified as 'Nabataean'. 40 The memory of the Nabataean kingdom was vivid enough to cause the envoy to call this land by its former name, although reflecting an ethnonym rather than a political power. A second hypothesis proposes that at the time of Riyām 2006-17, the crisis happening in the Eastern provinces -and characterized among other things by the rise of a short-lived Palmyrenaean empire -made the Roman Empire relax the control of its southern margins. In this case, the land of Nabaṭ might have been a territory with its own local authorities.

The Nabataeans and Sabaeans, both involved in the long-distance caravan trade, had been in contact during at least three centuries, but evidence is scanty. The oldest mention comes from : the army of AElius Gallus that came from Egypt and headed towards South Arabia in 26/25 BC consisted of '10,000 infantry of Romans in AEgypt, as also of Roman allies, among whom were five hundred Jews and one thousand Nabataeans under Syllaeus'. The Nabataeans joined the Romans in their military expedition against the South Arabian kingdoms as their allies, but also probably to gain ascendency over their competitors in the caravan trade, as Strabo suspects that Syllaeus, ministry of king Obodas III, guided the expedition through Arabia in such a way that he could 'spy out the country and, along with the Romans, destroy some of its cities and tribes, and then establish himself lord of all, after the Romans were wiped out by hunger and fatigue and diseases and any other evils which he had treacherously contrived for them.' Echoing the Roman expedition, two undated Sabaic rock inscriptions, Ph 103 and Ph 135a, were found in the valley of Najrān (PHILBY & TRITTON 1944: 123, 127;RYCKMANS 1947: 150, 152;BEESTON 1954: 311-313;JAMME 1956: 165-171). They describe a confrontation between South Arabians and Nabataeans (Ph 103) and the defeat of the Nabataeans (Ph 135a) (Müller's reading in MACDONALD 1994: n. 30). This episode cannot be compared to any historical event known so far. Admittedly a Nabataean contingent took part in the assault on Najrān by Gallus' expedition, but according to Strabo, Najrān was promptly seized by the army. This contradicts the defeat reported in Ph 135a. 40 At least one inscription dating after the Roman annexation refers to someone who identified himself as 'Nabataean'; the author of this Palmyrene inscription, dated AD 132, describes himself as 'the Nabataean, the Rawāḥaean' (CIS ii, 3973: nbṭyʾ rwḥyʾ). Several Safaitic inscriptions mention Nabataeans but there is no way of knowing whether they predate or postdate the annexation (e.g. CSNS 661 in CLARK 1979; see also MACDONALD et al. 1996: 444ff.).

Incidentally, in the 4th century, Ammianus Marcellinus mentions the Nabataeans (Nabathaei) (Roman Hist. XIV.8.13): 'Adjacent to this region is Arabia, which on one side adjoins the country of the Nabataei, a land producing a rich variety of wares and studded with strong castles and fortresses, which the watchful care of the early inhabitants reared in suitable and readily defended defiles, to check the inroads of neighbouring tribes. This region also has, in addition to some towns, great cities, Bostra, Gerasa and Philadelphia, all strongly defended by mighty walls. It was given the name of a province, assigned a governor, and compelled to obey our laws by the emperor Trajan, who, by frequent victories crushed the arrogance of its inhabitants' (translation by J.C. ROLFE, in the Loeb Classical Library edition, 1939Library edition, -1950)).

Twenty years after the military undertaking of AElius Gallus, an inscription from Ṣirwāḥ, near Maʾrib, testifies to peaceful relations between the Nabataeans and Sabaeans. This bilingual (Sabaic/Nabataean) inscription is a dedication to a Nabataean deity, Dushara, dated to the third year of the Nabataean king Aretas IV -i.e. 7/6 BC -deposited in the temple of Almaqah, the tutelary deity of Sabaʾ (NEBES 2006). Nebes does not preclude the establishment of a Nabataean trading post in the heart of the Sabaean kingdom at the turn of the Christian era (NEBES 2006: 10). Interestingly, it is also at that time that two people from the town of Maryamat (wādī Ḥarīb), in the neighbouring kingdom of Qatabān, made a journey to the Nabataean kingdom and its main city, Petra. 41 About 80 km north-east of Najrān, in the Shaʿīb Ṣammāʾ, another Nabataean inscription dated AD 88/89 testifies to the presence of a Nabataean possibly involved in the caravan trade [START_REF] Macdonald | Reflections on the linguistic map of pre-Islamic Arabia[END_REF]. Nearby, in al-Khushayba, two graffiti of Nabataean anthroponyms have been reported (KAWATOKO et al. 2005: 132). The reason for their presence is unknown.

To sum up:

-Nabaṭ was a region under Roman administration from the early 2nd century onwards; in the mid-3rd century, the presence of a community sharing common cultural traits and possibly a tribal identity was still recognized; this community might have experienced a political autonomy at the time of Riyām 2006-17, when the Roman Empire went through an unprecedented crisis.

-before its annexation, its territory stretched from southern Syria to Hegra in the Ḥijāz and from the Sinai Peninsula to Dūmat al-Jandal to the east. In the 3rd century AD, however, the extent of the 'land of Nabaṭ' cannot be confirmed; -before its annexation, the Nabataean kingdom was involved in a military expedition against the kingdom of Sabaʾ; it also sustained commercial activities with South Arabian kingdoms.

The land of the Romans

Taking into account the location of the territories mentioned in the inscription, all located in the Arabian Peninsula, Near East, and Middle East, and especially the passing through of the Nabataean and Palmyrene areas, the formula 'land of Romans' probably means the Roman provinces of Arabia, Palaestina, and/or Syria-Phoenicia.

The military expedition headed by AElius Gallus, prefect of Egypt, to Arabia Felix in 26/25 BC can be considered as the first political interaction between the South Arabian kingdoms and the Romans. Previously, Romans had been absent from local sources. Conversely, if South Arabia was well known as a provider of spices, it was until then a distant land, the products of which reached the Mediterranean through intermediaries. Therefore, the kingdom of Sabaʾ, though undefeated, might have been deeply distressed by the Roman foray that led to the destruction of the Sabaean city of Nashq and to the siege of its capital city, Marib. 42 41 The journey reported in Maraqten-Qatabanic 1 was made 'in the territories and the towns of the North/Bilād al-Shām, and of Nabaṭ um , Chaldea, Egypt, and Greece' (lines 9-10: ʾrḍtw w-ʾhgr S²ʾmt w-Nbṭ m w-Ks²d w-Mṣr w-Ywnm), and in 'the city of Petra' (line 12: hgrn Rqmm) (MARAQTEN 2014).

42 Strabo (Geogr. XVI.4.24): 'he [AElius Gallus] took the city called Asca [Nashq, present-day al-Bayḍāʾ], which had been forsaken by its king; and thence he went to a city called Athrula [Yathill, present-day Barāqish]; and, having mastered it without a struggle, he placed a garrison in it, arranged for supplies of grain and dates for his march, advanced to a city called Marsiaba [Maryab/Marib, present-day Maʾrib] (…). Now he assaulted and besieged this city for six days, but for want of water desisted'; Pliny (Nat. Hist. VI.32.17): 'Gallus destroyed the following towns, the names of which are not given by the authors who had written before his time, Negrana Two South Arabian inscriptions possibly refer to this event: a fragmentary Sabaic dedicatory inscription from the temple of Awām in Maʾrib mentioning the north (s²ʾmt) and the Romans (Rm n ), as well as the undertaking of an expedition probably against the Romans; 43 and a Qatabānic inscription from Tamnaʿ mentioning 'the day when Romans (?) undertook an expedition' possibly in the kingdom of Qatabān. 44 A Latin-Greek inscription has reportedly been found near Barāqish, the ancient city of Yathill, in the Jawf valley of Yemen; it reads: [P(ublius)] Corne[lius] … / eques … in Latin and Πουβλις Κορν… in Greek. 45 If we agree with the identification of the city of Άθρουλαmentioned by Strabo (Geogr. XVI.4.24) and which has had been changed into a Roman garrison during the expedition of Gallus -as Yathill, 46 the presence of a Latin inscription left by a Roman soldier would not be illogical, provided that it dates to the late 1st century BC. 47 Although Gallus' expedition was a failure, the tightening of the Roman presence in Arabia was felt both commercially and politically in the early Christian era. Both Strabo and the Periplus Maris Erythraei [START_REF] Casson | The Periplus Maris Erythraei: Text with Introduction, Translation, and Commentary[END_REF] describe the growth of maritime traffic in the 1st century between the Roman seaports of Egypt, Arabia, and India (SCHIETTECATTE 2012). In the 2nd century, Romans took over the northern and western fringes of the Arabian Peninsula. The annexation of the Nabataean kingdom had been mentioned previously (AD 106). The Latin inscription from the Farasān island, in the south of the Red Sea, dated c. AD 140-144, highlights the establishment of a detachment of the II Trajana Fortis legion and auxiliaries under the authority of a prefect of the portus of Ferresan (Farasān) and of the Sea of Hercules (the southern Red Sea) [START_REF] Phillips | A Latin inscription from South Arabia[END_REF][START_REF] Villeneuve | Une inscription latine de l'archipel Farasān (sud de la mer Rouge) et son contexte archéologique et historique[END_REF]). This extension of Roman presence in the Red Sea was probably driven either by a harsh customs policy or by the fight against piracy (VILLENEUVE et al. 2004: 169ff.).

During the 3rd century, there is no epigraphic mention of a connection between South Arabia and the Roman Empire except for Riyām 2006-17. A few decades later, in AD 311, another Sabaean diplomatic mission was dispatched to the Romans. 48 To sum up:

-the land of the Romans can be understood as one or several of the eastern provinces of the Empire (Arabia, Palaestina, and/or Syria-Phoenicia); -from the 1st century onwards, direct maritime trade between southern Arabia and the Roman ports of Egypt experienced an unprecedented growth; -the 2nd century AD is characterized by the tightening of Roman control over the Arabian fringes, be it the annexation of the Nabataean kingdom in AD 106 or the establishment of a prefect and a military contingent in the southern Red Sea; -the 3rd and early 4th centuries are only characterized by two diplomatic missions sent to the Roman territories by the lords of Bataʿ and Hamdān and then by a Ḥimyarite king.

The land of Lakhm

Riyām 2006-17 is the first of the South Arabian inscriptions to mention this tribe. Lakhm is an Arab tribe associated in Ibn al-Kalbī's genealogical tree to two sister-tribes, ʿĀmila and Judhām (CASKEL 1966, I: table 176). In early Islam, Lakhm had been absorbed by Judhām, fighting under the same leader and banner (LAMMENS & SHAHÎD 1986: 636). The fame of this tribe rests on the prominent role of the Lakhmids as kings of al-Ḥīra during the pre-Islamic period. Two documents refer to a certain ʿAmr king of Lakhm49 who is identified as ʿAmr b. ʿAdī b. Naṣr, founder of the Naṣrid dynasty of the kings of al-Ḥīra (ROBIN 2008: 190-191). His reign is dated c.293-302. This dynasty had been given the government of the Lower Euphrates by Sasanian rulers. Robin convincingly makes the assumption that they did not rule the territory of Lakhm -a tribe located elsewhere -but rather the main tribes of the Lower Euphrates area, including Tanūkh (ROBIN 2008: 193). 50Assuming that the situation in the 3rd and 6th centuries did not evolve very much, the location of the tribe of Lakhm is more likely to be found in the desert margins of southern Syria, eastern Jordan, and north-western Arabia. This is based on the fact that the tribe of Judhām, which was closely connected to that of Lakhm -before absorbing it -was 'settled in pre-Islamic times on the borders of Byzantine Syria and Palestine; they held places like Madyan, ʿAmmān, Maʿān, and Ad̲ h̲ ruḥ, and ranged as far south as Tabūk and Wādī ʾl-Ḳurā' (BOSWORTH 1965: 588;see also CASKEL 1966, II: 264).

Consequently, the Lakhmid territory as described from the late 3rd century onwards would have overlapped the territories previously belonging to the Nabataeans. It cannot be confirmed whether these peoples either shared a common land as neighbours, or that one was enclosing the others, or that one was progressively replacing the others.

To sum up:

-Lakhm was a tribe the past fame of which caused its rulers to be appointed by the Sasanian kings to rule the area of al-Ḥīra as well as the tribe of Tanūkh; -in the 3rd century AD, the heartland of Lakhm could be found in the desert fringes spreading from southern Syria to the Tabūk area, in north-western Arabia, in an area previously peopled with Nabataeans and possibly Liḥyanites, thus sharing their territory or superseding them; -closely connected to the tribes of ʿĀmila and Judhām, Lakhm was eventually incorporated within the tribe of Judhām on the eve of Islam.

The land of Ghassān

Ghassān is a tribe that enjoyed great fame in late antiquity. The fate of Ghassān has been recently reported in detail in several studies [START_REF] Avner | A rock inscription mentioning Thaʿlaba, an Arab king from Ghassān[END_REF][START_REF] Robin | Les Arabes de Ḥimyar, des "Romains" et des Perses (III e -VI e siècles de l'ère chrétienne)[END_REF][START_REF] Robin C | Two silver vases of Greco-Roman style from the 'treasure of wādī Ḍuraʾ' (Yemen)[END_REF]. The most significant elements are summarized below. Ptolemy (Geogr. VI.7.6) points to Kassanitôn chôras between Kinaidokolpitôn chôras on the Red Sea coast, north of the Farasān islands, and Elisarôn choras on the Red Sea coast of Yemen. The identification of Kassanitôn with Ghassān is likely but not certain (ROBIN 2008: 191). Ghassān can also be compared to the gentes Casani mentioned by Pliny (Nat. Hist. VI.32.8) in the same area. 51 According to Arab tradition, the name Ghassān stems from a watering place where clans who had freed themselves from the tribe of al-Azd (IBN ḤAZM, Jamharat ansāb al-ʿArab: 472) came to quench their thirst (IBN ḤAZM, Jamharat ansāb al-ʿArab: 462; IBN AL-KALBI, Nasab Maʿadd: 362). It is worth noting that al-Hamdānī locates the place Ghassān in the Yemeni Tihāma (CASKEL 1966, II: 273), not far from the location of Ptolemy's Kassanitôn and Pliny's Casani; moreover the tribe al-Azd from which the clans of Ghassān would have proceeded, is located in the ʿAsīr region, which towers above the Tihāma plain.

Considering the reserve which is shown about the tale of the origins of Ghassān in medieval accounts (CASKEL 1966, II: 273;ROBIN 2015: 83-84), and the chronological gap between classical sources and Arab tradition, however, a location of Ghassān on the Red Sea coast at the turn of the Christian era remains hypothetical, all the more since in the following centuries this tribe is precisely located further north.

In the 3rd-4th century, the territory of Ghassān was clearly spreading in the Ḥijāz, from Qaṭīʿa, c.60 km south-east of al-ʿUlā, 52 down to the wells of Sijā, 380 km north-east of Mecca53 (ROBIN 2008: 191;2015: 99-102). The oasis of Yathrib (modern Medina) lies in the very heart of this area and could have been the capital of Ghassān (ROBIN 2015: 102). 54Two documents indicate that Ghassān was a tribal kingdom ruled by a king in the 3rd century:

-the Sabaic inscription ZI 75, c. AD 240-255, where Ilīsharaḥ Yaḥdub king of Sabaʾ and dhū-Raydān dispatched an embassy to the kings of the tribes of Ghassān, al-Azd, Nizār um , and Madhḥig um ; -the transitional Nabataean inscription of 'Ḥārithat son of Zaydmanōtū king of Ghassān' (inscription 'Dhuyayb 2005 no. 65'). 51 Another identification of the Casani with the toponym Jīzān, opposite the Farasān islands in the Tihāma plain, has been suggested elsewhere (VILLENEUVE et al. 2004: 159 n. 78). 52 At Qaṭīʿa, the rock inscription 'Dhuyayb 2005 no 65' is written in a transitional script, between Nabataean and Arabic. Dated to the 3rd century AD according to palaeography (L. Nehmé, pers. com.), it mentions 'Ḥārithat son of Zaydmanōtū king of Ghassān' (Ḥrtt br Zydmnwtw mlk ʿsn) (AL-DHUYAYB 2005: 65). It is highly likely that the inscription was carved in a location where the authority of the king was acknowledged.

Around the 5th century AD, the tribe of Ghassān broke up into small groups, dispersing from Yathrib to the Euphrates valley. 55 By the end of this century, some of its chiefs, descending from the lineage of Thaʿlaba (banū Thaʿlaba) and from that of Jafna (banū Jafna) entered Byzantium's service [START_REF] Robin | Les Arabes de Ḥimyar, des "Romains" et des Perses (III e -VI e siècles de l'ère chrétienne)[END_REF]2015: 103-107;[START_REF] Avner | A rock inscription mentioning Thaʿlaba, an Arab king from Ghassān[END_REF]. The dignity of phylarch and king had been bestowed on them after treaties were negotiated; they had military and financial responsibilities and their authority was exerted on Arab groups settled in the Byzantine territory (province of Arabia, Phoenice Libanensis, Palaestina I, II, and III), which no longer corresponded to the old tribe of Ghassān (AVNER et al. 2013: 252-253).

At the start of the Islamic period, Ghassān was no more than a broken-up tribal group with no continuous territory.

To sum up:

-classical sources and Arab tradition point to an origin of the tribe of Ghassān in southern Tihāma, which is far from certain; -in the 3rd century AD, Ghassān was a tribe ruled by a king, which spread over the central Ḥijāz, from Sijā to the south of al-ʿUlā; diplomatic relations were exchanged with the Sabaean kingdom; -in the late 5th and almost all the 6th century AD, while the tribe of Ghassān had no more territorial hold, some of the leaders of prestigious lineages from this tribe were appointed kings or phylarchs by Byzantium and were in charge of buffer territories between the core of the empire and external threats, primarily the Persians.

The land of Maʿadd

Maʿadd designates a population living in Central Arabia, regarded either as a wide tribal confederacy (ROBIN 2008: 174) or as a 'general population of predominantly camel-herding Arab bedouins and bedouin tribal groups -irrespective of lineage or place of origin -who ranged, encamped, and resided throughout most of the central and northern peninsula' (ZWETTLER 2000: 285). The sources, history, and extent of this tribe have been collected and synthesized [START_REF] Zwettler | Maʿadd in Late-Ancient Arabian Epigraphy and Other Pre-Islamic Sources[END_REF]ROBIN 2008: 173-176). It emerges that from the 4th to the 6th century, Maʿadd was rarely politically independent but was rather contingent on surrounding powers.

On his funerary inscription from al-Namāra (AD 328), Maraʾ-l-Qays 'king of all ʿArab' is said to have 'ruled Maʿaddū' (line 3). One can presume that since it was submitted in the early 4th century AD, Maʿadd was previously independent, a status that Riyām 2006-17 does not contradict.

Later, Maʿadd was at the heart of successive conflicts. From AD 340 to 360, Ḥimyarite expeditions were carried out against Maʿadd and its territory. 56 A century later, the Ḥimyarite kings Abīkarib Asʿad and his son Ḥaśśān Yuhaʾmin took possession of the land of Maʿadd, with the help of the tribe of Sabaʾ, Ḥaḍramawt, and the Arabs of Kinda, celebrating the event 55 ROBIN 2015. This break-up might have taken place as early as the late 4th century: in AD 363, Ammianus Marcellinus reports that Persians and 'a man named Malechus Podosaces, the chief of the Assanite [Ghassanite] Saracens [Arabs]' laid an ambush for the Roman army along the Euphrates river (Roman Hist. XXIV.2.4). 56 The Sabaic inscription ʿAbadān 1 reports four campaigns in Central Arabia, two of them aiming explicitly at Maʿadd, one in c. AD 340 reached Yabrīn (lines 6-10); a second in c. AD 345 (lines 12-16); a third in c. AD 350 was carried out against nomad tribes (ʿs²r m ) of Maʿadd and reached Khargān (the valley of al-Kharj) and Gawwān (city of Jaw al-Yamāma in this valley) (lines 17-21); a fourth c. AD 360 was an expedition against Maʿadd and groups of the tribe of ʿAbd al-Qays. For the transcription and translation see [START_REF] Robin | L'inscription du wādī ʿAbadān[END_REF]. On the identification of toponyms and their insertion within the territory of Maʿadd see ROBIN & GAJDA 1994: 123;ROBIN & ARBACH, in press. at Maʾsal Jumḥ, c.200 km west of Riyadh. 57 In AD 521, the Ḥimyarite king Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur launched an expedition from the same location of Maʾsal Jumḥ against al-Mundhir (III) king of al-Ḥīra, thus highlighting the maintenance of the Ḥimyarite control of Maʿadd, through the princes of Kinda. 58 Following the death of the Kindite al-Ḥārith (c. AD 528), Maʿadd sided with al-Mundhir (III), king of al-Ḥīra (CAUSSIN DE PERCEVAL 1847-1848, II: 301-302), together with tribes from north-east Arabia including Ṭayy (see below). Eventually Maʿadd, the government of which had been bestowed on ʿAmr son of al-Mundhir (III), was defeated in AD 552 at Ḥalibān by the troops of Abraha, the Aksumite-born king of Ḥimyar. 59 By the end of the 6th century AD, Maʿadd had disappeared, giving way to the tribal confederacy of Rabīʿa (ROBIN 2008: 174). 60 A revolt by the Banū ʿĀmir/ʿAmr 61 led to an expedition by Abraha against Maʿadd and the princes of Kinda. If we are to identify the Banū ʿĀmir/ʿAmr as the tribe of the banū ʿĀmir b. Ṣaʿṣaʿa, their territory -which spread somewhere between Mecca and Maʾsal al-Jumḥwas then part of Maʿadd. This hypothesis, generally accepted, has been recently disputed by Robin who is rather inclined to identify the Banū ʿAmr with the lineage of the banū ʿAmr b. Muʿāwiya, given by the Arab tradition to the princes of Kinda descended from Ḥujr b. ʿAmr (ROBIN 2012c: 81). If this is correct, the western limit of Maʿadd cannot be deduced from Ry 506. Be that as it may, in the mid-6th century, this territory might have stretched as far as the coast of the Red Sea according to Procopius of Caesarea. 62 At the time of Riyām 2006-17 (3rd century), because of the presence of the tribes of Ghassān, Asd, and Nizār west of Maʿadd, such an extent cannot be conceived; it was probably limited to Central Arabia.

To sum up:

-Maʿadd is a 'socio-ethnic label applied to a specific category of Arab bedouins' (ZWETTLER 2000: 289) or perhaps a tribal principality, which could have enjoyed independence in the 3rd century AD; 57 The Sabaic inscription Ry 509, re-edited in ROBIN 1996: 675-685. Maʾsal Jumḥ was most probably the central place of Maʿadd (ROBIN 2008: 187-189). 58 The government of Maʿadd had been conferred by Abīkarib Asʿad and his son Ḥaśśān Yuhaʾmin to the prince of the tribe of Kinda, Ḥujr bin ʿAmr -known in Arab tradition as Ākil al-Murār -and then passed on to his descendants, the banū Ḥujr: his son ʿAmr, his grandson al-Ḥārith (Arethas in the Byzantine sources) and then to Qays (Kaïsos in the Byzantine sources) probably a grandson of al-Ḥārith [START_REF] Gajda I | Ḥuǧr b. ʿAmr roi de Kinda et l'établissement de la domination ḥimyarite en Arabie centrale[END_REF][START_REF] Robin | Les Arabes de Ḥimyar, des "Romains" et des Perses (III e -VI e siècles de l'ère chrétienne)[END_REF]2008: 173-176;2012c). 59 Reported in Sabaic inscriptions Ry 506 = Murayghān 1 and Murayghān 3 [START_REF] Robin | Soixante-dix ans avant l'islam : l'Arabie toute entière dominée par un roi chrétien[END_REF]. Ḥalibān is located 90 km west-south-west of Maʾsal al-Jumḥ. 60 Incidentally, it is worth noting that the genealogical tree of Arab tribes mentions Rabīʿa as descending from Nizār b. Maʿadd (CASKEL 1966, I: table 1). 61 The bny ʿmr m mentioned in the Sabaic inscription Ry 506 from Murayghān. -from the 4th century AD onwards, willingly or by force, it entered different political spheres: after it was subjugated by Maraʾ-l-Qays king of all ʿArab, it became a trust territory of Ḥimyar governed by the princes of Kinda, and temporarily acted as a buffer zone between Ḥimyar and the kingdom of al-Ḥīra, under the latter's authority;

-the territory of Maʿadd was primarily a region of Central Arabia. In the 6th century AD it was centred on Maʾsal al-Jumḥ and stretched to the west, possibly as far as the Red Sea coast.

The land of Ṭayy

Ṭayy um is identified as the Arab tribe Ṭayyiʾ from the northern Najd.

Caskel proposed the hypothesis that this tribe might be the one mentioned in Pliny's description of North Arabia under the name Taveni (CASKEL 1966, II: 555), a people said to have settled next to the Nabataeans, and listed together with the Taymanites, the inhabitants of Arra, and the cities of Dūmat al-Jandal and Hegra, all in northern Arabia. 63 If the identification is not certain, it would be consistent with the location proposed subsequently. Some of the oldest secure references to Ṭayyiʾ appear in the corpus of Safaitic inscriptions. 64 Safaitic script does not seem to have been used after the 4th century AD (MACDONALD 2000: 45); it provides us with a terminus ante quem for these references.

In Sabaic inscriptions, Riyām 2006-17 apart, Ṭayyiʾ appears only once in inscription Murayghān 3, dated to the reign of the Ḥimyarite king Abraha (mid-6th century AD). It commemorates a successful expedition of Ḥimyarite armies against the tribe of Maʿadd as well as the submission of the Arab tribes from Ḥijāz, North and East Arabia, among these the Ṭayyiʾ (ROBIN & TAIRAN 2012). 65 This expedition follows a request by the Byzantine emperor Justinian to Abraha who was summoned to attack the Persians (Procopius, Hist. of the Wars I.XX.9-10.). A few years earlier, the tribe of Ṭayyiʾ had sided with al-Mundhir (III) king of al-Ḥīra, under the umbrella of the Persians (CAUSSIN DE PERCEVAL 1847-1848, II: 301-302).

Thus, in late antiquity, Ṭayyiʾ is one of the main tribal entities in the Peninsula. In this respect, it is significant that Syriac sources of the late pre-Islamic period used the word Ṭayəyê to designate all the Arabs, which clearly derives from the name of the tribe Ṭayyiʾ and highlights the prominent role it played in North Arabia. 66 (WRIGHT 1968: 15;AVNER et al. 2013: 245;ROBIN 2008: 170).

In the Arab tradition, the tribe of Ṭayyiʾ would have settled in Jibāl Ajāʾ, Jibāl Salmà, and in the plain in between, at the latest in the 6th century AD. 67 These two mountains, also called 'the two mountains of Ṭayyiʾ' are known today as Jabal Shammar. Jibāl Salmà are a basaltic formation located 60 km south-east of the modern city of Ḥāʾil; Jibāl Ajāʾ are a granitic mountain range immediately west of this town. Ibn al-Kalbī said Ṭayyiʾ had an idol called al-Fals in Jibāl Ajāʾ (FARIS 1952: 51). The western extent is only known in the 10th century AD, at a time when Taymāʾ was part of its territory (AL-HAMDĀNĪ Ṣifa, I.131; ABŪ AL-FIDĀʾ Géogr., II.117).

To sum up:

-Ṭayyiʾ is an Arab tribe from northern Najd, possibly attested from the 1st century AD onwards if it corresponds to the Taveni mentioned in North Arabia by Pliny; -it was soon an important tribe in North Arabia (Riyām 2006-17) and people from Ṭayyiʾ made incursions into southern Syria according to a Safaitic inscription; -in the 6th century AD, it played a prominent role in the political landscape, either in Sabaic inscriptions, Syriac sources, or the Arab tradition.

The land of Khaṣāṣat

Documentation is lacking on the land of Khaṣāṣat ān . Besides Riyām 2006-17, the only mention is found in the Sabaic inscription Ja 576+577, from the temple of Awām in Maʾrib. The text, dated to the reign of Ilīsharaḥ Yaḥdub and Yaʾzil Bayān kings of Sabaʾ and dhū-Raydān (c. AD 235-255), mentions a certain Maraʾ-l-Qays (Mrʾlqs¹) son of ʿAwf um king of Khaṣāṣat ān , who is seen as a subordinate of the kingdom of Kinda (BEESTON 1973: 450) and who was surrendered to the Sabaean king.

M. Rodinson speculated about a North Arabian origin of Khaṣāṣat ān after the name of its king (RODINSON 1957: 115). This statement is unfounded and the close political proximity with the kingdom of Kinda -then centred on the city of Qaryat al-Fāw -favours a location nearby.

In Ibn al-Kalbī's genealogical tree of the Arab tribes, al-Khaṣāṣa descends from Duhmān, a branch of the tribe of Zahrān, a faction of al-Azd (CASKEL 1966, I: table 217). According to Robin, Duhmān is known today as Dahm (ROBIN 2013: n. 23), a tribe from the northern Jawf (Yemen); Zahrān is a tribe from western ʿAsīr (south-west Saudi Arabia), c.200 km south-east of aṭ-Ṭāʾif and 120 km west of Bīsha. Therefore, the land of Khaṣāṣat ān was probably located somewhere next to the land of Asd and the Kindite area, most probably in the ʿAsīr heights.

To sum up:

-Khaṣāṣat ān was an autonomous entity ruled by a king and closely connected to the kingdom of Kinda in the 3rd century AD; -it is a land probably located in what is now the al-Bāḥa or ʿAsīr province of Saudi Arabia.

Unquoted political entities: Ḥimyar, Ḥaḍramawt, Aksum, and Kinda-and-Madhḥij

The account of the diplomatic mission carried out on behalf of the Sabaean lords of Bataʿ and Hamdān, rulers of the tribe of Ḥumlān and Ḥāshid, does not mention the great powers which 67 On the settling of Ṭayyiʾ in this area, see YĀQŪT, Muʿjam al-buldān I.122-130; CAUSSIN DE PERCEVAL 1847-1848, I: 102. See also the mention of 'Ṭayyiʾ of the twin mountains' in the pre-Islamic poem by Bishr ibn Abū Khāzim (LYALL 1918-1924, II: 279, verse 24). directly surrounded Sabaʾ: the kingdom of Ḥimyar to the south, the kingdom of Ḥaḍramawt to the east, the kingdom of Aksum to the west, and the tribe of Kinda-and-Madhḥij to the north.

If the inscription is dated to the end of, or just after, the reign of Nashaʾkarib Yuʾmin Yuharḥib -a position defended by the present authors (ARBACH & SCHIETTECATTE, in press) -this absence could be explained by the fact that the kingdom of Sabaʾ was at war against these immediate neighbours some time during that reign or just afterwards.

An expedition is reported against the Abyssinians west of the kingdom of Sabaʾ. 68 Three inscriptions mention one or several conflicts against the kingdom of Ḥaḍramawt. 69 A war is reported against the tribe of Khawlān Gudādum and several tribes from the north of modern Yemen (i.e. the tribes of Dawʾat, ʾbʾs¹, Aydāʿān, Ḥakam um , Ḥidginat, Ghāmid um , Kahl um , Ahl-Nāh, Gadīlat, Sibbis um , Ḥarīm um , Ḥagūr Lmd, Awām um , and Rḍḥt n b. Ḥurrat). 70 Eventually, the rivalry between the kingdom of Sabaʾ and that of Ḥimyar ended in the annexation of the first by the second and to a war of resistance led by the lords of Bataʿ and Hamdān. 71 A conflict between Sabaʾ and the tribe of Kinda-and-Madhḥij at the time of Nashaʾkarib Yuʾmin Yuharḥib cannot be confirmed. It can only be stated that during the reign of his father Ilīsharaḥ Yaḥḍub, an expedition against Malik um king of Kinda and his capture is reported (Ja 576+577/1-2). The reason for the silence of Riyām 2006-17 about this tribe could be either that the king of Sabaʾ was then the overlord of this tribe, or that a conflict set the Sabaeans and this tribe against each other; both these hypotheses rule out the prospect of a diplomatic mission.

Be that as it may, the obvious conflictual situation of the Sabaean kingdom in the late 3rd century would easily explain the ambitious diplomatic mission initiated by the lords of Bataʿ and Hamdān.

Conclusion

Thanks to the discovery of Riyām 2006-17, the political map of Arabia in the 3rd century can be quite confidently drawn. The Peninsula appears then as a composite territory surrounded by the great powers of the Sasanian and Roman empires to the north, and by the kingdom of Aksum to the south-west.

The southern part of the Peninsula, the Arabia Felix of the classical sources, was divided between three kingdoms made up of a confederation of sedentary tribes: Sabaʾ to the northwest, Ḥimyar to the south-west, and Ḥaḍramawt to the east. 68 Ir 20/1: 'Hʿn [... ...] officer of Nashaʾkarib Yuʾmin Yuharḥib, king of Sabaʾ and dhū-Raydān (…) carried on an expedition to the west, by the order of their lord, the king, and they came back with spoils and prisoners and booty (taken) from the Abyssinians' ( (1) Hʿn [... ...] mqtwy Ns²ʾkrb Yʾmn Yhrḥb mlk S¹bʾ w-ḏ-Rydn (…)s¹bʾ mʿrbn b-qht mrʾ-hmw mlkn w-ʾtww b-ʾḥllm w-s¹bym w-ġnmm bn ʾḥbs²n) -CSAI's translation. 69 Ir 21/1-2: 'Almaqah Thahwān, Lord of Awwam, granted His servant Karibʿathat Azʾad of the family of Saḥr to kill a man and to seize his horse, (2) when they performed service with their lord Nashaʾkarib Yuʾmin Yuharḥib, king of Sabaʾ and dhū-Raydān, when he came to the rescue against the army of the Ḥaḍramawt' (ʾlmqh Ṯhwn bʿl-ʾwm ʿbd-hw Krbʿṯt ʾzʾd ḏ-S¹ḥr hrg ʾs¹m w-ʾḫḏ frs¹-hw (2) b-kn s²wʿw mrʾ-hmw Ns²ʾkrb Yʾmn Yhrḥb mlk S¹bʾ w-ḏ-Rydn b-kn hʿn b-ʿly mṣr Ḥḍrmwt) -CSAI's translation. Ja 612/1-10: 'Aḥmad Yughnim son of Nashaʾy, lieutenant (2) of Nashaʾkarib Yuʾmin Yuharḥib, king (3) of Sabaʾ and dhū-Raydān (…) (8) (…) undertook (9) the military expedition and followed the qayls and the army force to the land of (10) Ḥaḍramawt' ( (1) ʾḥmd Yġnm bn Ns²ʾy mqt (2) wy Ns²ʾkrb Yʾmn Yhrḥb m (3) lk S¹bʾ w-ḏ-Rydn (…) (8) b-kn s¹ (9) bʾ w-s²wʿn ʾqwln w-ḫms¹n ʿdy ʾrḍ (10) Ḥḍrmt) -CSAI's translation. FB-al-Bayḍāʾ 1/7-8: 'during the war between the kings (8) of Sabaʾ and Ḥaḍramawt' (b-ḍr kwn bn ʾml (8) k S¹bʾ w-Ḥḍrmt) -after Bron's translation (BRON 2010: 166).

In between, the vast area of the Najd and Ḥijāz -the Arabia Deserta of the classical sources -was peopled with at least eight autonomous tribal groups comprising sedentary and nomadic populations, from north to south: Ṭayy, Liḥyān, Ghassān, Maʿadd, Nizār, Asdān, Khaṣāṣatān, and Kinda-and-Madhḥij. In the 3rd century, the title of king (malik) was bestowed on the rulers of most of these tribes. This is certain for Ghassān, Nizār, Asdān, Khaṣāṣatān and Kinda-and-Madhḥij, and probable for Maʿadd.

North of the Peninsula, the desert margins of the Roman and Sasanian empires were occupied by tribal groups and client kingdoms (Nabaṭ, Lakhm, Tadmur/Palmyra, Tanūkh). The crisis of the Roman Empire in the 3rd century made it possible for some of its territories to claim a kind of political autonomy. This was the case in Palmyra for a decade (263-272), it might have been the case for the land of Nabaṭ.

Be that as it may, the map of Arabia that is presented here remains a snapshot of a given time (possibly c. AD 260). The tribe outlines are volatile according to changing alliances of tribal groups, allegiances, or annexations. The expansion of Ḥimyar in the Arabian Peninsula from the 4th century AD onwards was a decisive agent in the rapid transformation of the political landscape in the Peninsula from then on. This explains why the political map in the 3rd century differs from that of the early 2nd century AD drawn by Claudius Ptolemy (KENNEDY 2002: map 15A) or from that of the 5th-6th century AD (ROBIN 2008: fig. 1). It also explains why it is important to define this missing link.

Jérémie

Figure 2 :

 2 Figure 2: Inscription Jabal Riyām 2006-17 (© J. Schiettecatte, 2006).

Figure 3 :

 3 Figure 3: A political map of Arabia and the Middle East showing the tribes and kingdoms mentioned in inscription Jabal Riyām 2006-17 (© A. Émery & J. Schiettecatte, 2015).

14

  Ibn al-Kalbī's genealogy mentions Mālik b. Kaʿb b. al-Ḥārith b. Kaʿb b. ʿAbdallah b. Mālik b. Naṣr b. al-Azd (CASKEL 1966, I: table 210). Here, Mālik b. Kaʿb is a grandson of al-Ḥārith b. Kaʿb. If it were chronologically coherent, drawing a parallel between the 3rd-4th-century testimonies and al-Kalbī's genealogy is of course dubious. 15 Yadaʿʾīl Bayān king of Ḥaḍramawt son of Rabbīshams, of the freemen of Yuhabʾir, acceded to the throne of Ḥaḍramawt after the overthrow of Ilīʿazz Yaluṭ king of Ḥaḍramawt by the Sabaean king Shaʿr um Awtar (c. AD 225). Yadaʿʾīl Bayān's accession could hardly have taken place without the support of the Sabaeans.

  17

  ʿAbadān 1/29: w-tbkr Brl m bn Mʿ[dkr]b [... ...] Mʿd m w-hw[...]w ʿs²rt n ʿbdqys¹ n b-S¹yn ʿly mw bʾr n S¹gh bynn ʾrḍ Nzr m w-ʾrḍ Ḡs¹n. Translation by

  19 ZI 75: b-ʿbr ʾmlk ʾs²ʿb n Ḡs¹n w-l-ʾs¹d w-Nzr m w-Mḏḥg m . 20 Possibly the son of ʿAmr b. ʿAdī, king of Lakhm in al-Ḥīra (ROBIN 2008: 182).

  Sources regarding the extent of the territory of Maʿadd are mainly relevant for the 4th-6th century AD. It was then centred on Maʾsal al-Jumḥ and reached Yabrīn to the south-east, Ḥalibān to the south-west, Baṭn ʿĀqil and the wādī al-Ruma to the north, where Ḥujr b. ʿAmr pitched camp, and included the valley of al-Kharj to the east (ROBIN 2008: 174; ROBIN & ARBACH, in press: fig. 80).

  62 Procopius, Hist. of the Wars I.XIX.14: 'Adjoining this people [the inhabitants of the Palm Groves = the main oases of the Ḥijāz] there are other Saracens [Arabs] in possession of the (Red Sea) coast, who are called Maddeni[Maʿadd] and who are subjects of the Homeritae [Ḥimyarites]'.

63

  Pliny, Nat. Hist. VI.32.14: 'Adjoining the Nabataei [Nabataeans] the old authorities put the Timanei [Taymanites], but now there are the Taveni [Ṭayyiʾ?], Suelleni, Araceni [Saracens], Arreni [Arre Kóme mentioned by Ptolemy Geogr. VI.7.30, next to Salma which is identified as Jibāl Salmà next to Ḥāʾil] with a town which is a centre for all mercantile business, Hemnatae, Avalitae [Ḥawlat] with the towns of Domata [Dūmat al-Jandal] and Haegra [Hegra, present-day Madāʾin Ṣāliḥ]'.

  64 M.C.A. Macdonald points out the existence of at least 13 Safaitic inscriptions which mention encounters with Ṭayyiʾ (M.Macdonald, pers. com.), e.g. CIS V 2795, from az-Zalaf area, 18 km south-east of Tulūl al-Ṣafā (southern Syria), where a man called Tm… is grieving for his companions who were raiding the tribe of Tayyiʾ (Ṭyʾ)(MACDONALD 2004: 527). 65 Murayghān 3/3-4: ' (3) quand il s'empara des Arabes de Maʿadd um enlevés à [Mu]dhdhirān, chassa ʿAmr um fils de Mudhdhirān et (4) s'empara de tous les Arabes de Maʿadd um , [Ha]gar um -et-Khaṭṭ, Ṭayy um , Yathrib et Guzā(m)' (translation by ROBIN & TAIRAN 2012: 528). 66 See the Chronicle of Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite and the use of the formula 'the Arabs of the Persians' (Ṭayəyê də-Pûrsoyê) and 'the Arabs of the land of Romans' (Ṭayəyê də-bêt Rəhûmoyê)

  , USR 3141 Centre français d'archéologie et de Sciences sociales Riyadh, Arabie Saoudite mounirof@yahoo.fr

century AD revealed by a Sabaean inscription », ArabianArchaeology and Epigraphy, 2016, 2: 176-196.

The earliest reference can be found in a Sabaic inscription that mentions 'an expedition in the Land of Asd' (YM 10703/4: mṭwt ʾrḍ ʾs¹d). This text comes from Wādī al-Shuḍayf (north of the Jawf valley, Yemen). It is dated to the 1st-2nd century AD byROBIN & VOGT 1997: 123.

Inscription Ja 635/36-37: b-knf ʾrḍ(37) ʾl-ʾs¹d mgzt mwn-hn ḏ-Ṯml. It comes from the temple of Awām in Maʾrib, and dates to the reign of Shaʿr um.

This location was proposed by Wissmann who identified the place with Tomala mentioned by Pliny (Nat. Hist.,VI, 28, 154): WISSMANN 1964: 184; WISSMANN & MÜLLER 1977: 38. See also[START_REF]Die Ortsnamen in den altsüdarabischen Inschriften (mit dem Versuch ihrer Identifizierung und Lokalisierung)[END_REF]: 21. For SPRENGER (1875: 156), Tomala (var. Thomala) in Pliny can be equated with Θουμάτα ofPtolemy (Geogr. VI.7.33) located halfway between the Jawf valley (Yemen) and Mecca.

Ja 938 + 939/3 and Ja 962/2: nisba ʾs¹dy n ; Ja 957/1-2: nisba ʾs¹dy hn .

On the date of Yadaʿʾīl Bayān king of Ḥaḍramawt and his place in the royal succession, see ANTONINI & ROBIN 2015: 9.

Sabaic ḫtn. See JAMME 1962: 56.

Ja 997/1-3: Rbs²ms¹ ḫyr ʾs¹d n bn Ydʿʾl Byn mlk Ḥḍrmt. The translation is adapted fromPirenne (1990: 120). This

The inscription reads 'This is the memorial of Fihr son of Sullay, tutor of Gadhīmat king of Tanūkh' (LPNab 41:(1) dnh npšw Fhrw[START_REF] Al-Fidāʾ | Géographie d[END_REF] br Šly rbw Gdymt (3) mlk Tnḥ). Translation: MACDONALD 2015: 28-30.

ROBIN (2008: 181) made the assumption that Gadhīmat king of Tanūkh mentioned in inscription LPNab 41 at Umm al-Jimāl is the king of al-Ḥīra, Jadhīma al-Abrash, mentioned in Arab tradition; the dating of his reign to the mid-3rd century rests on the association of Queen al-Zabbāʾ with Jadhīma al-Abrash in Arab tradition and the identification of this queen with Zenobia of Palmyra. Macdonald has called this hypothesis into question(MACDONALD 2015: 30).

Sharaf 31/11-12: w-wzʾ mẓʾ ʿdy Qṭwṣf w-Kwk m(12) mlkty Frs¹ w-ʾrḍ Tnḫ. After Müller's translation(MÜLLER WW 1974: 157).

The first is mentioned in the Sabaic inscription al-ʿIrāfa 1, c. AD 445[START_REF] Gajda I | Ḥuǧr b. ʿAmr roi de Kinda et l'établissement de la domination ḥimyarite en Arabie centrale[END_REF] re-edited by ROBIN 2008: 200f.). The second is mentioned in the Sabaic inscription Maʾsal 3, c. AD 473(Wādī Maʾsal, Central Arabia). The text reports the defeat of a king of Tanūkh.

[START_REF]Dédan et Lihyan. Histoire des Arabes aux confins des pouvoirs perse et hellénistique, ive-iie s. avant l'ère chrétienne[END_REF]. This corpus has been labelled 'Dedanite', 'Liḥyanite', or 'Dédano-Liḥyanite'.

If it has been generally believed that the Nabataeans played a significant role in Liḥyān's collapse, an alternative hypothesis has been voiced recently byROHMER & CHARLOUX (2015: 313), according to whom the emergence of the tribe of Thamūd in the region of Hegra (Madāʾin Ṣāliḥ) and Dadān (al-ʿUlā) might have followed the collapse of the Liḥyanite kingdom and preceded the settling of the Nabataeans.

On the dating of Safaitic script, see MACDONALD 2000: 45.

KRS 2287, 2327, 2342 (KING 1990: 61-62).

The first text comes from Shabwa, the capital city of Ḥaḍramawt, and mentions the nisba 'the two Tadhmurites' (RES 4691/1: Tḏmryhn); the second is a rock inscription found in the open-air sanctuary of al-ʿUqla, near Shabwa; it mentions the same nisba with a different spelling (Ja 931/1-2: Tḏmryyhn).

The bilingual Pehlevi/Parthian inscription from Paikūlī (Kurdistan), dated after AD 293 and mentioning 'ʿAmr king of Lahmay [Lakhm]' (Pehlevi: ʿm[rw] Lhmʾdyn ML(KA); Parthian: ʿmrw Lhmyšn MLKA); a Manichaean text in Coptic mentioning 'Amarō, king of the sons of Lahim [Lakhm]' (Amarō p-r[ro n-n-sēre n-L]ahim) (TARDIEU 1992; see also ROBIN 2008 with references).

The same situation occurs in the 6th century AD when the government of the tribe of Maʿadd is given to the princes of the tribe of Kinda by the Ḥimyarite kings; or when the Byzantine emperors made the leaders of the tribe of Ghassān rulers of Muḍar(ROBIN 2008: 189).Version auteurs (pre-print) -J. Schiettecatte & M. Arbach, 2016. « The political map of Arabia and the Middle East in the third century AD revealed by a Sabaean inscription », ArabianArchaeology and Epigraphy, 2016, 2: 176-196.

We have already mentioned the Sabaic inscription ʿAbadān 1/29, dated to AD 360, where the border between the land of Nizār um and that of Ghassān is said to go through the wells of Sijā (cf. the land of Nizār).

The presence of a Ghassānid lineage in Yathrib (the banū Thaʿlaba) on the eve of Islam(ROBIN 2008: 189; 2015: 93) tallies with this hypothesis.

Version auteurs (pre-print) -J. Schiettecatte & M.Arbach, 2016. « The political map of Arabia and the Middle East in the third century AD revealed by a Sabaean inscription », ArabianArchaeology and Epigraphy, 2016, 2: 176-196.

Ja 616+622/12-26. Recent translation and comment byROBIN 2014: 170-172, 191-194.

Acknowledgements

The authors are indebted to Astrid Emery, Helen Knox, Michael Macdonald (University of Oxford), Laïla Nehmé (CNRS, Paris), and Christian Robin (CNRS, Paris) for reading a draft of the article and providing valuable comments and suggestions. Any error remains our sole responsibility.

Sigla

For the bibliographic references of the South Arabic inscriptions mentioned in the text, see KITCHEN 2000 and the on-line corpus of the South Arabian inscriptions displayed in the Digital Archive for the Study of Pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions (http://otto.sns.it/dasi_web).


Ann-Louise Andersen
email: annlou.andersen@gmail.com

Nicolai Praestholm

Kjeld Nielsen

Thomas D Brunoe

Planning Nervousness in Product Segmentation: Literature Review and Research Agenda

Keywords: Planning, Nervousness, Product Segmentation

Differentiated planning is one of the means for today's companies to accommodate the increasing needs for product variety, delivery responsiveness, and cost-efficiency. Even though, product segmentation is the foundation for such planning, planning nervousness has not yet been addressed from this perspective. This paper seeks to establish a relation between planning nervousness and segmentation by analyzing the current body of literature with the objective of identifying overlaps between the two areas. The literature characteristics are assessed and directions for future research are provided.

Introduction

In today's business environment, one of the means to achieving competitive advantage is to offer a wide range of differentiated products in a cost-efficient and responsive manner, as customers have increasingly different needs [START_REF] Fisher | What is the right supply chain for your product?[END_REF]. As a result, companies need to design supply chains that can cope with conflicting demand, e.g. the need for providing both low-cost and customized product solutions, which means that supply chains must operate different setups simultaneously. The key to this is differentiated planning and control, where products are assigned to relevant product segments, which are subject to different planning methods, e.g. make-to-stock or make-to-order. The underlying foundation for practicing differentiated planning is the segmentation of products and items flowing in the supply chain. When this process is managed properly, a stable basis for securing product and item availability at the right levels of inventories is secured. In contrary, if the segmentation process contains instability, uncertainty is likely to ramify throughout the supply chain and through planning levels.

Thus, the purpose of this paper is to identify current state-of-art knowledge and unravel critical points on planning nervousness, in order to identify possible relations to item segmentation that can broaden knowledge of how to manage uncertainty in differentiated planning.

Literature Review Methodology

The objective of this literature review is to identify major tendencies in current literature on planning nervousness and possible connections to segmentation. Relevant research concerning nervousness was identified by searching the Web of Knowledge, Science Direct, Scopus, and Google Scholar databases. In order to ensure that relevant studies were not missed, four rather broad search terms were used: nervousness, planning nervousness, scheduling nervousness, and re-scheduling. Publications for the review were included if a) the study included one of the search terms in the title or abstract and if b) planning nervousness was included as a central element in the research. Through a qualitative assessment of these criteria, studies that primarily use nervousness as a term for uncertainty in general was excluded, as well as studies in which a specified planning level was not the primary context for the research or planning nervousness was only a minor parameter addressed. A total of 21 publications from 1979 to present were included and used as primary research in the review. In the following section, a brief review of the concept of planning nervousness is presented, followed by an assessment of the nervousness influencers that have been identified in literature.

Planning Nervousness

Planning nervousness is a term that has existed in research since the late 70's and was initially established for describing instability of plans on MRP level. MRP nervousness is defined as instability and frequent rescheduling of orders in terms of timing and quantity [START_REF] Blackburn | A comparison of strategies to dampen nervousness in MRP systems[END_REF] [3] [START_REF] Carlson | Less nervous MRP systems: a dynamic economic lot-sizing approach[END_REF]. Later studies extend the concept of nervousness to MPS level, highlighting that nervousness propagates in the planning hierarchy [START_REF] Sridharan | The Impact of Safety Stock on Schedule Instability, Cost and Service[END_REF] [6] [START_REF] Sahin | Master production scheduling policy and rolling schedules in a two-stage make-to-order supply chain[END_REF]. Most recently, the concept of planning nervousness is broadened and covers multiple planning levels as well as multiple entities within supply chains [START_REF] Genin | Improving the robustness of a supply chain tactical plan[END_REF] [9] [START_REF] Moscoso | The Planning Bullwhip: A Complex Dynmaic Phenomenon in Hierarchical Systems[END_REF]. In this sense, planning nervousness can be defined as the counterpart to planning stability, which is defined as the situation where plans do not change and equal the actual requirements imposed on the system [START_REF] Pujawan | Schedule nervousness in a manufacturing system: a case study[END_REF]. Moreover, recent studies point out that nervousness has both vertical propagation in the planning hierarchy and horizontal propagation within the supply chain, which makes the phenomena highly critical to multiple performance aspects [START_REF] Kaipia | Planning nervousness in a demand supply network: an empirical study[END_REF] [9] [START_REF] Tunc | A simple approach for assessing the cost of system nervousness[END_REF]. In connection to this, planning or system nervousness can be defined as a specific planning performance parameter, which magnitude should be evaluated when determining planning policy, e.g. inventory control policy or lot size policy [START_REF] Jonsson | Inventory management practices and their implications on perceived planning performance[END_REF] [15] [START_REF] Kazan | New lot-sizing formulations for less nervous production schedules[END_REF].

Nervousness can be described as a consequence of planning flexibility and the ability to continuously respond to changing customer requests, where an essential trade-off between responsiveness and nervousness exists [START_REF] Schönberger | Schedule Nervousness Reduction in Transport Re-Planning[END_REF] [START_REF] Ganeshan | The impact of inventory and flow planning parameters on supply chain performance: An exploratory study[END_REF]. However, this trade-off is primarily dealt with in the discussion of how often to re-plan, where frequent re-planning results in more updated parameters and ability to respond to urgent and changing customer needs, while nervousness increases in relation to the transition from the original plan to the updated plan. This relation emphasizes that planning nervousness cannot be approached in a vacuum, as it is a direct consequence of the applied planning policy and decisions within the planning system and therefore is interrelated with other planning outcomes e.g. service, responsiveness, and cost.

As the definition of planning nervousness has broadened, so has the discussion of its impact. In early works the consequence of MRP nervousness is primarily described as being confusion in shop floor priority, fluctuations in capacity utilization and incurring high rescheduling cost [START_REF] Ho | Evaluating the impact of operating environments on MRP system nervousness[END_REF]. However, gradually the outcome of nervousness has been related more and more to the bullwhip effect, resulting in the two phenomena being used virtually as synonyms [START_REF] Moscoso | An empirical study on reducing planning instability in hierarchical planning systems[END_REF] [10] [START_REF] Kaipia | Planning nervousness in a demand supply network: an empirical study[END_REF]. The bullwhip effect can basically be described as demand amplifications throughout the supply chain, where upstream links experience more fluctuating demand than downstream links, even when actual sales is rather stable [START_REF] Lee | The bullwhip effect in supply chains[END_REF]. The results of this are increased inventory buffers throughout the chain, fluctuating inventory levels, low capacity utilization, and delivery problems [START_REF] Kaipia | Planning nervousness in a demand supply network: an empirical study[END_REF]. The similarities with nervousness are evident, as both the bullwhip effect and planning nervousness result from uncertainty generated by actions and policies applied within the planning system. However, when relating planning nervousness and the bullwhip effect, only the horizontal propagation of nervousness is considered, even though planning nervousness propagates both horizontally in the supply chain and vertically through planning hierarchies and product structure levels [START_REF] Moscoso | The Planning Bullwhip: A Complex Dynmaic Phenomenon in Hierarchical Systems[END_REF] [START_REF] Kaipia | Planning nervousness in a demand supply network: an empirical study[END_REF]. Therefore, planning nervousness is in this paper considered as the broadest applicable term for system and planning uncertainty, defined as instability of plans in terms of timing and quantities requiring frequent rescheduling activities. Some of the currently most addressed consequences of planning nervousness are disruptions in production plans and deliveries, increased inventory buffers, and increased planning cost [START_REF] Ho | Evaluating the impact of operating environments on MRP system nervousness[END_REF] [11] [START_REF] Kaipia | Planning nervousness in a demand supply network: an empirical study[END_REF]. Moreover, as plans become more and more unstable and predictability decreases, both planners and operators have reduced confidence in the planning system [START_REF] Blackburn | A comparison of strategies to dampen nervousness in MRP systems[END_REF]. When the planning system does not reflect actual requirements on the operating system, humans are compelled to make manual adjustments in order not to damage customer service. However, such human planning adjustments and manipulations have actually proved to reinforce rather than mitigate planning nervousness, which creates a vicious circle of increased nervousness [START_REF] Moscoso | The Planning Bullwhip: A Complex Dynmaic Phenomenon in Hierarchical Systems[END_REF].

Planning Nervousness Influencers

Planning nervousness is addressed in various different planning contexts, which implies that various different influencers of nervousness are addressed as well. In Table 1, nervousness influencers addressed in central research are listed and divided as being either operational or environmental. The operational variables are directly controllable as they are internally generated and can be managed through planning policies, while the environmental variables are set by the operating environment and incontrollable by the planning system [START_REF] Ho | Evaluating the impact of operating environments on MRP system nervousness[END_REF]. Some of the influencers included here are discussed primarily as means to dampen nervousness in the specific papers. However, recognizing a variable's dampening effect on nervousness is highly related to recognizing it as an influencer on nervousness.

In Figure 1, the influencers are classified under relevant groups that cover the meaning of the specifically mentioned influencers in Table 1. The aim of this is to unravel critical points in current knowledge and identify potential connection with product segmentation. In line with this, the findings suggest that there are currently two major tendencies in nervousness literature. The first is the discussion of how demand uncertainty and demand characteristics, e.g. in the timing and quantity of orders, influence the degree of nervousness experienced in the planning system. However, despite the inevitable impact of demand uncertainty, research in this area focuses solely on parameters that are difficult to control by companies. The second tendency in nervousness literature is the discussion of the impact of planning horizon, planning frequency, and lot-sizing rules on planning nervousness. The great main part of current research focuses on these parameters in inventory or MRP contexts. Despite the relevancy of such research, it has limited relevancy to product segmentation processes, where nervousness is believed to have as severe consequences as in the already treated planning contexts. Planning Frequency, ease of representation (e.g. complexity of planning system), intervention/adjustments made by human planners, planning horizon Number and structure of (organizations) planning levels, planning inertia (e.g. time to react), degree of interrelations in planning system Planning hierarchy [START_REF] Pujawan | Schedule nervousness in a manufacturing system: a case study[END_REF] Changes in customer orders, availability of raw materials, capacity/production uncertainty MPS From the literature discussed above, it can be concluded that planning nervousness has received only limited attention in literature even though the term has existed for more than three decades. Moreover, research is limited to specific contexts, even though planning nervousness is considered a relevant property of planning system in general and undoubtedly has severe consequences in planning contexts other than those already addressed in literature. This also indicates a lack of explicit connection between planning nervousness and product segmentation.

The lack of connection between the two areas is critical, as product segmentation is an underlying process that secures a solid foundation for various planning activities both within single companies and integrated supply chains. Determining whether products are make-to-order or make-to-stock highly impacts how products are planned, replenished, and controlled. As nervousness propagates throughout planning levels, it is important to assess how this segmentation process impacts planning stability throughout the entire system. As in inventory management systems, where nervousness already has been well-addressed and quantified, decisions within the segmentation process and their impact on planning nervousness need to be assessable and measurable as well. This will constitute a highly improved foundation for decision-making, rather than merely relying on subjective intuition when addressing and handling nervousness issues in companies.

Nervousness in Product Segmentation

In order to broaden the context of planning nervousness and establish a connection with product segmentation, the definition, causes, and consequences of nervousness needs to be assessed from a segmentation context, as this will increase the In terms of defining segmentation nervousness, the trade-off between planning nervousness and responsiveness applies, as it is not related to a specific planning level or context. In this definition, nervousness is essentially planning uncertainty and shocks created by shifts and changes in plans, while responsiveness covers the ability to reflect the reality and react timely to changes in the requirements imposed on the system.

Thus, in the context of segmentation, nervousness can be defined as shifts in the assigned groups for specific products, while responsiveness relates to immediately and continuously updated segmentations based on changes in segmentation criteria e.g. demand variability, demand volume, etc. With this definition, planning nervousness in the context of segmentation is directly assessable, as it can be quantified by the number of shifts made in the segmentation between to successive runs. As a result, planning nervousness can be approached as a parameter under planning performance. It is a topic for further research, to investigate and empirically test if this relation between nervousness and segmentation holds. Moreover, studying the exact consequences of nervousness in segmentation should be on future research agendas, as literature on neither nervousness nor segmentation explicitly addresses this issue. It is expected that segmentation nervousness has both direct consequences as well as ramifications to other planning levels. A direct consequence is that stocking strategies for specific products change frequently, which causes either excess inventories or material unavailability. Olhager [START_REF] Olhager | Strategic positioning of the order penetration point[END_REF] describes both the negative and positive effects of shifting customer-order-decoupling point (CODP), which is related to the overall segmentation. However, he discusses CODP shifts solely from the perspective of strategic positioning and not from the perspective of frequent shifting caused by the planning processes. The strategic CODP shift effects are reduced or prolonged lead-times, increased or decreased production efficiency, and reduction or increases in WIP and inventory levels. In the context of frequent shifting, uncertainty in all of these areas is expected, which should be subject to further research.

In the literature review, rolling horizons were identified as one of the major sources of planning nervousness. The rolling horizon can be assessed through planning frequency and planning horizon, which are directly controllable parameters within the planning system. As the impact of these is highly acknowledged and they are both directly related to how segmentations are carried out, investigating their impact on nervousness is considered a viable first step in making a quantitative connection between the two areas. This will constitute a useful quantification and operationalization of key segmentation parameters in relation to planning nervousness.

Conclusion

Even though planning nervousness has existed as a research term for more than three decades, it is still limited to a few research contexts, being primarily MRP and inventory systems. However, planning nervousness is a relevant attribute of planning performance in general, meaning that other planning contexts should be considered in relation to nervousness as well.

In this paper, attention is drawn to the area of differentiated planning where a theoretical and tentative relationship to planning nervousness is established. The importance of such relation is based on the notion that companies are required to offer an increased variety of products, where differentiated planning and control is the key in terms of operating different supply chain setups simultaneously. Currently, there is no explicit connection between the two areas, which has two consequences. First of all, with no directly assessable connection, companies have to rely on subjective intuition when battling nervousness in planning systems. Secondly, as the connection between nervousness and segmentation is currently not emphasized sufficiently in research, companies are likely to treat symptoms rather than the root causes of nervousness, as nervousness ramifies through planning levels where segmentation is the overall differentiated planning foundation. Therefore, a quantification and verification of the relationship between nervousness and item segmentation should be subject to further research.

Fig. 1 .

 1 Fig. 1. Grouping of Nervousness Influencers

Frequency

  operationalization of the nervousness concept. In the following, tentative connections between the two areas are proposed, which indicate future research directions as well.

Table 1 .

 1 Overview of Nervousness Literature

		Operating Variables	Environmental Variables	Context
	[2]	Lot-sizing, planning horizon		MRP
	[15] Lot-sizing, order releases	Demand Variability	MRP/LRP
	[4]	Planning frequency, planning horizon,	Demand Uncertainty	MRP
		lot-sizing	Cost Structure
	[21]	Rolling horizon (planning frequency		Inventory
	[22]	and planning horizon), lot-sizing,		Control
		reordering method
	[19] Lot-sizing, length of lead-time, length	Demand variability, capacity	MRP
		of planning horizon, component	utilization, cost structure in
		commonality	regards to delivery performance
	[12]	Planning horizon, planning frequency,	Demand variability, supply	Supply
	[23]	varying planning processes	chain integration/collaboration,	chain
			delay in information flow	planning
	[9]
	[10]