One of a line of queens, Zabibe (also transliterated Zabibi, Zabiba, Zabibah) was a queen of Qedar (in the area of modern-day southern Iraq) who ruled between 738 and 733 BCE. Both she and her successor Samsi tangled with the Assyrian prince Tiglath Pileser IV, who sought to expand his domain in Arabia. He first sought to intimidate the Queens into submission, but each of them in their turn were unimpressed.
To appreciate the enormous skill and courage of the resistance offered by both Zabibe and Samsi, we must remember that the Assyrians possessed the greatest military machine to date. Their tens of thousands of troops were well-supplied with metal armor and fine quality bladed weapons. Some of the finest generals in the world commanded engineers, catapults, battering rams and a variety of missile weapons. When Queen Zabibe refused to accede to Pileser’s demands for tribute, the Assyrians brought the war machine to bear on her. According to Assyrian historians, she rode at the head of her army, which included large numbers of women.
Although she was not victorious against Pileser and was forced to accept vassalage and pay tribute, she had a long string of other military victories during her 5 year reign. The title accorded her is queen of both the Qidri (“Qedarites”) and the “Aribi” (“Arabs”). Israel Eph’al writes that until the time of Assurbanipal the title “queen of the Arabs” in Assyrian manuscripts was a general one accorded to nomad leaders in the Syrian desert. Zabībah is an ancient Arabic name, likely derived from zabīb, meaning “raisin.”
-excerpted from David E Jones “Women Warriors” ISBN# 1-57488-106-X and the blog of https://amonamon2.wordpress.com/2010/08/02/arabian-queens/
