AHAB, son of Omri, king of Israel from c. 875 to c. 852 B.C. (I Kings xvi. 29–xxii. 4o). The more important aspects of his reign, which in some respects marks the high water mark of the success of the northern kingdom, may be summarized as follows : (I) Foreign relations.—In the reigns of Omri and Ahab the ern kingdom for the first time took an important part in national politics. Omri left to his son an empire which comprised not only territory to the east of Jordan, in Gilead and probably Bashan, but also the land of Moab, whose king was tributary, while Judah (and probably Edom also) if not actually subject to Omri, was certainly a subordinate ally. Ahab's marriage with Jezebel, daughter of Ethbaal of Sidon, revived an alliance which had been in abeyance since the time of Solomon. But out the reign of Ahab a fierce border war was waged with cus, in which Israel, in spite of occasional victory, proved the weaker, while Mesha, king of Moab, successfully revolted and occupied the southern portions of the territory of Gad. Yet the forces of Israel retained strength enough to contribute the second largest contingent of soldiers (the largest force of chariots) to the combined armies which, under the leadership of Benhadad of Damascus, checked the westward movement of Shalmaneser III. of Assyria at Karkar in 853 B.c. After the Assyrian repulse, ever, the alliance broke up, and Ahab met his death fighting the Syrians in a vain attempt to recover Ramoth Gilead. (2) tic affairs.—Contact with a wider world, and especially the ance with Phoenicia, had far-reaching results for the kingdom of Israel itself. Jezebel attempted to introduce into religion and government elements which were common enough elsewhere in the ancient world but strange in Israel. She endeavoured to set up the worship of the Tyrian Baal in Samaria, and to maintain the familiar oriental principle of the absolute despotic power and authority of the sovereign. This roused the bitter hostility of that conservative party which clung to the sole worship of the national God, Yahweh, and at the same time held to those cratic conceptions of society which the Hebrews had brought with them from the wilderness and had consistently maintained through their history. The spirit of this party found expression in the prophet Elijah (q.v.), who protested alike against the tablishment of the Baal priests and the judicial murder of Naboth. He and those who came after him seem to have been successful in eliminating the foreign worship, though in the end their pose was only achieved by a bloody revolution ; but they were powerless to stem the tide of social and moral deterioration. (See Amos.) It is to the reign of Ahab that we may trace the beginning of that sapping of the national life which led to the tions of the 8th century prophets and to the downfall of Samaria. (T. H. R.) AHAGGAR, general name for a large plateau region of the north centre of the Sahara, culminating about Boom. due S. of Algiers and I,2oom. due N. of the mouth of the Niger. The highest peaks do not greatly exceed 8,000ft. above sea-level. (See also SAHARA.)