In the fourth century B.C. we find the Arab tribe of the Nabatæans to the south of Palestine, and the same tribe soon afterwards formed a settled state which extended eastwards from the ancient territory of Israel as far as to Damascus, rose to a considerable height of civilisation, and maintained a position of lax dependence upon Rome until Trajan destroyed it in the year 106; certainly not to the real advantage of the empire. In the first century of our era we meet with princes and nobles with Arabic names in Edessa, Palmyra, Emesa, and Hatrá. The abundant store of inscriptions at Palmyra shows that the greater part of the population of this Aramaic-speaking trading city, encompassed on all sides by the desert, was of Arab origin. It seems that during the gradual decay of the Seleucid kingdom, Arabs in several cases acquired dominion over these districts, just as at a later period members of various Bedouin tribes rose to eminence in Syria and Mesopotamia, during the decadence of the caliphate dynasty. Thus numerous settled Arab tribes lived in many parts of Syria as Roman subjects. In process of time all these Arabs who dwelt in towns or villages grew to be Aramæans; even before that they had always used the Aramaic language in their inscriptions--where they did not write in Greek--because Arabic was not then regarded as a suitable language for use in writing. At this time two new names for the Arabs came into existence, “Saracens” and “Taits.” Ptolemy (5, 16) mentions Σαρακηνή as a district in the Sinaitic peninsula.[5] The inhabitants of this district, who are unknown to Arab tradition, must have made themselves notorious in the Roman provinces in their vicinity; we can hardly suppose by other means than predatory incursions by hindering the march of caravans or levying heavy tolls upon them. Thus in that region all Bedouins came to be called Saraceni (Σαρακηνοί), in Aramaic Sarkaje, usually with no very favourable meaning. We meet with the latter form in a dialogue concerning Fate, written about 210 A.D. by a pupil of Bardesanes.[6] The designation then became general; thus it occurs very frequently in Ammianus Marcellinus. The name “Saracen” continued to be used in the West in later times probably rather through the influence of literature than by oral tradition, and was applied to all Arabs, and even to all Moslems, without distinction.