Editing History of literature (section)

=== Levant ===
{{main|Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions}}
Ancient literature of the Levant was written in the [[Northwest Semitic languages]], a language group that contains the [[Aramaic|Aramaic language]], as well as the [[Canaanite languages]] such as [[Phoenician language|Phoenician]] and [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]]. A corpus of [[Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions]] (or "Northwest Semitic inscriptions") are the primary extra-Biblical source for the writings of the ancient [[Phoenicians]], [[Ancient Hebrews|Hebrews]] and [[Arameans]]. These inscriptions occur on stone slabs, pottery [[ostraca]], ornaments, and range from simple names to full texts.<ref name="Woolmer">{{Cite journal |url=https://www.academia.edu/30935044 |title=Phoenician: A Companion to Ancient Phoenicia |journal=A Companion to Ancient Phoenicia, ed. Mark Woolmer |editor-last=Mark Woolmer |page=4 |quote=Altogether, the known Phoenician texts number nearly seven thousand. The majority of these were collected in three volumes constituting the first part of the Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum (CIS), begun in 1867 under the editorial direction of the famous French scholar Ernest Renan (1823–1892), continued by J.-B. Chabot and concluded in 1962 by James G. Février. The CIS corpus includes 176 "Phoenician" inscriptions and 5982 "Punic" inscriptions (see below on these labels). |access-date=2022-01-17 |archive-date=2022-01-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220117145143/https://www.academia.edu/30935044 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="PR">{{Cite book |last1=Parker |first1=Heather Dana Davis |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1163/j.ctvrxk44t.14 |title=Teaching Epigraphy in the Digital Age |last2=Rollston |first2=Christopher A. |work=Ancient Manuscripts in Digital Culture: Visualisation, Data Mining, Communication |publisher=Brill |others=Alessandra Marguerat |year=2019 |editor-last=Hamidović |editor-first=D. |location=LEIDEN; BOSTON |pages=189–216 |chapter=9 |volume=3 |jstor=10.1163/j.ctvrxk44t.14 |isbn=9789004346734 |quote=Of course, Donner and Röllig's three-volume handbook entitled KAI has been the gold standard for five decades now |editor-last2=Clivaz |editor-first2=C. |editor-last3=Savant |editor-first3=S. |access-date=2022-01-17 |archive-date=2022-01-18 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220118200124/https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1163/j.ctvrxk44t.14 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Suder1984">{{Cite book |last=Suder |first=Robert W. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZqqxDwSwe5UC&pg=PA13 |title=Hebrew Inscriptions: A Classified Bibliography |publisher=Susquehanna University Press |year=1984 |isbn=978-0-941664-01-1 |pages=13}}</ref><ref name="Doak2019">{{Cite book |last=Doak |first=Brian R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m6CgDwAAQBAJ |title=The Oxford Handbook of the Phoenician and Punic Mediterranean |date=2019-08-26 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-049934-1 |page=223 |quote=Most estimates place it at around ten thousand texts. Texts that are either formulaic or extremely short constitute the vast majority of the evidence.}}</ref>

The books that constitute the [[Hebrew Bible]] developed over roughly a millennium, with the oldest texts originating from about the eleventh or tenth centuries BCE.{{cn|date=March 2025}} They are edited works, being collections of various sources intricately and carefully woven together. The Old Testament was compiled and edited by [[Authorship of the Old Testament|various authors]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Lim |first=Timothy H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zekRDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA41 |title=The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Very Short Introduction |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2005 |isbn=9780192806598 |location=Oxford |page=41 |access-date=2022-09-14 |archive-date=2022-09-14 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220914212133/https://books.google.com/books?id=zekRDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA41 |url-status=live }}</ref> over a period of centuries, with many scholars concluding that the Hebrew canon was [[Development of the Hebrew Bible canon|solidified]] by about the 3rd century BC.<ref>{{cite book |title= The Bible: A Very Short Introduction|last= Riches|first= John|year= 2000|publisher= Oxford University Press|location= Oxford|isbn= 978-0-19-285343-1|page= 37}}</ref><ref name="Philip R page 50">Philip R. Davies in ''The Canon Debate'', page 50: "With many other scholars, I conclude that the fixing of a canonical list was almost certainly the achievement of the [[Hasmonean dynasty]]."</ref> The [[New Testament]] was an additional collection of books that supplemented the Hebrew Bible, consisting of the [[gospel]]s that described [[Jesus]] and the [[epistle]]s written by notable figures of early [[Christianity]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Bible |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity/texts/bible.shtml |access-date=2022-09-14 |website=BBC |language=en-GB |archive-date=2022-10-10 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221010020350/https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity/texts/bible.shtml |url-status=live }}</ref>