But it is becoming a question whether it was not from south Arabia that Phoenicia first borrowed it, and whether it would not be more truthfully called Arabian.
The religion of southern Arabia was highly polytheistic.

Each district and tribe had its special god or gods, and the goddesses were almost as numerous as the gods.

Along with Babylonian culture had come the adoption of several Babylonian divinities;--Sin, the Moon-god, for instance, or Atthar, the Ashtoreth of Canaan.

How far westward the worship of Sin was carried may be judged from the fact that Sinai, the sacred mountain whereon the law of Israel was promulgated, took its name from that of the old Babylonian god.
In the tenth chapter of Genesis Sheba is one of the sons of Joktan, the ancestor of the south Arabian tribes.

Foremost among them is Hazarmaveth, the Hadhramaut of to-day; another is Ophir, the port to which the gold of Africa was brought.