And the firstborn bare a son, and called his name Moab,.... As if it was "Meab", from the father, as Aben Ezra, and so Josephus, that is, which she had by her father; and she was so far from being ashamed that it might be known in time to come, she gave him this name. Hillerus w makes it to be a compound of אב and מובא, and to signify "going into", or "lying with a father", which still more notoriously points to her own action. Drusius has another derivation of the word, at least proposes it, and renders it "aqua patris"; "mo" in the Egyptian language signifying "water", which is sometimes used for seed, see Isaiah 48:1:
the same [is] the father of the Moabites unto this day; a people that lived on the borders of the land of Canaan, often troublesome to the Israelites, and frequently spoken of in the Old Testament.
w Onomastic. Sacr. p. 414.