The narrative states that the location for this punishment of Achan, which lies between Jericho and Ai, became known as the
vale of Achor in memory of him. This narrative is probably an
etiological myth providing a
folk etymology for
Achor, at the point in the narrative where the vale of Achor is necessarily crossed. One item to note however is that the text describes the garment that Achor stole as
Babylonish; (from
Shinar) the time of the Israelite invasion is usually dated to the 15th or 12th century BC, but between 1595 BCE and 627 BCE
Babylon was under foreign rule. For this reason, a few
textual scholars believe that this part of the Achor narrative was written during the 7th century BC or later, but many
Biblical scholars believe the judge Samuel may have put together this account from historical books from that time. It is not certain, however, that the whole Achor narrative dates from this time, as textual critics believe that the Achor narrative may have been spliced together from two earlier source texts; the words in the first part of Joshua 7:25, "all Israel stoned
him with stones" (וי
רגמו את
ו) show a different style and tradition from those at the end of the verse: "and they burned them in fire, and they stoned
them with stones" (וישרפו אתם באש וי
סקלו את
ם באבנים). == Family tree ==