Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible (1898)
HIT'TITES, the posterity of Heth, the second son of Canaan. Their settlements were at first in the southern part of Judaea, near Hebron, Gen 23:3, and later, when the spies enter the land, they find them dwelling in the mountains. It was from the Hittites that Abraham purchased Machpelah for a sepulchre. Gen 23:3-13; and in this transaction they are represented as a commercial rather than a warlike people. Esau married two Hittite women. Gen 26:34-35; from all which we gather that they were on terms of intimacy with the family of Abraham.
Later in the history of Israel they seem to have lost their national integrity, although the name was not forgotten, Ezr 9:1-2.
✦ Scripture References 4 references