[German version]

Arabic, ‘steep track’, situated at the north-eastern end of the gulf of the same name, first mentioned by medieval geographers as aqabat ayla (steep track of Aila). Aila, 1 km north of the place today known as Aqaba, was, in the Nabataean-Roman-Byzantine era, the name of the settlement replacing the OT Elat. In 1 Kg 9,26-28 the Edomite city of Elat/A. serves as the topographical approximation for the site of the port Ezjon-Geber, from where King Solomon is supposed to have condu…