Arpachshad was a son of Shem, who moved north and then west after the Tower of Babel, first building Arpachiya (near Nineva) on the Tigris, then Urfa (15 miles southwest of the Canaanites’ Gobekli Tepe) at the headwaters of the Balikh river (which flows south into the Euprhates), and Arpa (Tel Rifaat), just to the north of Aleppo (Halub) which was known as the kingdom of Armi in the Ebla Tablets, where settled Aram (another son of Shem) whose sons though moved far to the east, among them Uz having settled in Uzbekistan, and Mash who settled where today is Mashhad of northeastern Iran.
