The Old Jephthah Tale in Judges: Geographical and Historical Considerations It is widely accepted that the Book of Judges includes substantial North Israelite traditions that originated in the Iron Age. Fifty years ago Wolfgang Richter 1 described their first appearance in writing as The Book of Saviors, which is now embedded in the Deuteronomistic (with post-Deuteronomistic additions) Book of Judges 2. The portion of the early tale in each narrative that is considered part of this “book” dif- fers, and so, evidently, is the scope of the later additions and redactions. The role of the Jephthah story (Judges 10,6 – 12,7) in Judges has been debated. Richter 3 argued that it was not part of the Book of Saviors 4, and Noth 5 proposed that the original Jephthah story could have belonged to the account of the Minor Judges 6. As far as I can judge, the arguments for the exclusion of the Jephthah story from the Book of Saviors come from the massive Deuteronomistic and post- Deuteronomistic additions to (or omissions from) the original tale. In this article I wish to delineate an old North Israelite Jephthah tale that belongs to the Saviors genre — a tale which is veiled behind later additions and redactions. I would argue that this old story, though relatively short, contains enough material, including geographical de- tails that distinguish it from the short accounts of the Minor Judges. My main goal, therefore, is to isolate the old core of the tale, reconstruct its geographical setting and try to understand its historical background 7. My basic premises are as follows: 1 W. RIchTeR, Traditionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zum Richterbuch (BBB 18; Bonn 1966). 2 For a review of this idea and its reception in biblical research, see P. GuIl- lAuMe, Waiting for Josiah (JSOTSS 385; london 2004). 3 W. RIchTeR, “Die Überlieferungen um Jephtah: Ri 10,17 – 12,6”, Bib 47 (1966) 485-556. 4 Also J.A. SOGGIN, Judges: A Commentary (london 1981) 207; GuIllAuMe, Waiting for Josiah, 144-145; a different view in M. NOTh, Überlieferungs- geschichtliche Studien. Die sammelnden und bearbeitenden Geschichtswerke im Alten Testament (Darmstadt 1943) 48-49; u. BeckeR, Richterzeit und Königtum. Redaktionsgeschichtliche Studien zum Richterbuch (BZAW 192; Berlin 1990) 222. 5 NOTh, Überlieferungsgeschichtliche Studien, 48. 6 Recently R.D. NelSON, “Ideology, Geography, and the list of Minor Judges”, JSOT 31 (2007) 347-364. 7 Much of the discussion of Judges 10,6 – 12,7 has been devoted to the BiBlica 97.1 (2016) 1-15