=The East-Jordan Tribes.= In the east-Jordan territory the Reubenites settled just north of the Arnon. They were the first to occupy their lands and the first to disappear from history. The territory was rich and productive, but exposed to attack from the Moabites on the south, from the Arabs on the east, and from the Ammonites on the northeast. In the days of Mesha, the Moabite king (the ninth century B.C.), they had evidently disappeared, only the Gadites being mentioned. The Gadites were equally exposed to attack from every side, but they were more strongly intrenched among the hills and deep wadies that lie south of the Jabbok. They were also more closely in touch with their kinsmen across the Jordan and protected on the north by the strong east-Jordan tribes of Manasseh and Machir, whose territory extended to, if not beyond, the Yarmuk and eastward to the borders of the desert. =The Tribes in Southern Canaan.= West of the Jordan the tribe of Simeon guarded the southern outpost, but in time almost completely disappeared from Hebrew history. The strong tribe of Judah, from its mountain heights spread westward to the borders of the Philistine Plain and at a later period absorbed the territory of the Canaanite cities, which extended from Gezer to Jerusalem. The little tribe of Benjamin was wedged in between the great tribes of the north and the south. The southern boundary of its territory ran close to Jerusalem and on the east it touched the Jordan. Northward to the Plain of Esdraelon and from the Jordan to the Plain of Sharon extended the rich, fruitful territory of Ephraim and Manasseh. =The Tribes in the North.= The tribe of Issachar, profiting most by the results of the great battle beside the Kishon, in which it had played a central rôle, entered into possession of the fertile territory lying south of the Sea of Galilee, probably spreading across the Plain of Esdraelon to Mount Gilboa and the boundaries of northern Samaria. Zebulun occupied the territory extending up into the hills of lower Galilee. Upper Galilee was divided between the tribe of Napthali on the east and Asshur, whose territory extended to that of the Phœnicians on the west. In the upper Jordan valley, at the foot of the southern slope of Mount Hermon, the warlike energetic tribe of Dan was strongly intrenched.