Various forms of h-b-r names occur early, but as the root means "to cross over" (Indo-European cognates Greek huper, Latin super, English over) many of the early usages are probably in a generic sense of "nomad" or "merchant" (as someone who frequently travels). In Egyptian, the name Habiru or Hapiru seems to have the meaning "rebel" (one who has crossed over to the enemy) throughout the Amarna Letters (a large archive of luckily well-preserved diplomatic correspondence from the reign of Akhenaton in the 14th century BCE); the period was one of disintegrating royal authority in Canaan. The more specific name "Israel" first appears in the Merneptah Stele 1208 BCE (at this point the Israelites are still a minor group, listed way down among the enemies Merneptah is supposed to have triumphed over; it only says "they are in waste, their crops are not" perhaps describing the wandering-in-the-desert phase). From the reign of king Jehu of the northern kingdom of Israel, who killed off all of bad king Ahab's children, we have an Assyrian tribute stele showing Jehu of Israel among the other kings bowing and giving tribute, and a stele from Tell Dan apparently by king Hazael of Damascus, in which he describes the coup d'etat against Ahab's family as a triumph for Damascus; Ahab is mentioned by an Assyrian chronicler in a list of enemies who stood off the Assyrians in an inconclusive battle at Qarqar (a battle not mentioned in the Bible); and king Mesha's stele in Moab describes the Moabites' generations-long campaign to regain independence from Israel. The southern kingdom of Judah is called simply "Beth Dawid" (house of David) in the Tell Dan stele, but the name Judah (Yehudah) appears in Sennacherib's "Pyramid Stele" describing his campaign about 720 BCE.
