Sabaeans

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This article is not about Sabians.

The Sabaeans were ancient people who lived in what is today Yemen and north of Ethiopia and Eritrea and spoke a South Semitic language. Their Sabaean Kingdom lasted from 750 BC to 115 BC. Its was capital along the strip of desert called Sayhad by medieval Arab geographers.

The Sabaean people were one of four ancient Yemenite groups (Greek ethnos) classified by Eratosthenes. The others were the Minaean Himyarite, and Qatabanian people. Each of these had regional kingdoms in ancient Yemen, though the Minaean Kingdom held dominance from approximately 1200 BC until 650 BC, and the Sabaeans after them.

The Sabaeans, as were the other Arabian and Yemenite kingdoms of the same period, were involved in the extremely lucrative spice trade, especially frankincense and myrrh.[1]

Most archaeologists now believe them to be the same nation as the Biblical kingdom of Sheba. They left behind many inscriptions in the Musnad (Old South Arabian) alphabet.

They were polytheistic, and should not be confused with the Sabians mentioned in the Qur'an, whose name is written with the Arabic letter sad rather than sin.

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