Abstract The article examines the validity of the rendering בתדוד in Line 31 of the Mesha Stele (“And as for Ḥāwrônên, בתדוד dwelt in it”). Examination of the corpus of West Semitic royal inscriptions reveals only one parallel to a kingdom's name that functions as the operative agent in a royal inscription. Evidently, the suggested restoration בתדוד that is governed by the verb ישב in the badly eroded Line 31 should be rejected. Rather, the best proposal thus far for the controversial line is the recently posited restoration, “And as for Ḥāwrônên, there dwelt Ba[lak]”.

中文翻译：

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Mesh Stele 中所谓的“Beth David”：反对它的案例

摘要 本文考察了 Mesh Stele 第 31 行中渲染 בתדוד 的有效性（“至于 Ḥāwrônên，בתדוד 居住在其中”）。对西闪族王室铭文的语料库的检查发现，只有一个与王国名称相似的名称，在王室铭文中充当操作代理。显然，在严重侵蚀的第 31 行中由动词 ישב 支配的建议恢复 בתדוד 应该被拒绝。相反，迄今为止对有争议的路线最好的建议是最近提出的修复，“至于 Ḥāwrônên，那里居住着 Ba[lak]”。