And the sons of Cush; Seba, and Havilah, and Sabtah, and Raamah, and Sabtecha: and the sons of Raamah; Sheba, and Dedan.
The sons of Cush; Seba. Since Seba is associated (Isaiah 43:3) with Egypt and Ethiopia in such a manner as to indicate contiguity or affinity, this tribe is generally referred to Suba, a native name of the island of Meroe, on the borders of Egypt and Ethiopia.
Havilah - a district of Yemen, lying between the Arabian and Persian Gulfs. It was an extensive tract of country, populated by two tribes-the one of Cushite, the other of Shemite descent-but, from contiguity or by intermarriages, united into one. It was a fertile country; and the two original portions into which it was divided are probably traceable in the districts called Khawlans, which Niebuhr supposes to represent the ancient Havilahs; the one a town situated between Sanaa and Yemen, the other a district at a little distance, south-east of Sanaa (see the note at Genesis 11:11).
Sabtah. Winer and Bunsen identify Sabtah with Sabbatha, an important trading place on the southern coast of Arabia.
Raamah - [Septuagint, Regma.] This youngest son of Cush is sometimes associated with his sons Sheba and Dedan; at other times the two brothers are mentioned together (Ezekiel 27:21-23; Ezekiel 38:11-13). Ptolemy places the Rhabanites and the Sabeans, with their capital Marsuaba, in the present province of Sabbia, with a town of similar name. Strabo speaks of the Rhamanites as being near the Wady Duwahir; and according to Ptolemy, the present town of Rums, on the gulf in the northern part of the peninsula Awal Rhegma, is the same as Raamah.
Sheba and Dedan - both noted for their trade and opulence, were situated on the western districts of Arabia. The remarkable circumstance of two Shebas occurring in this genealogical chart has been illustrated by the discovery that there are two races of Arabs-one (the Joktanian) Semitic, the other (the Himyaric) Cushite or Ethiopian (Rawlinson's 'Bampton Lectures').
Dedan. The tribe which gave name to that region, and which was engaged in the pursuits of traveling merchants (Ezekiel 27:15), had their head-quarters in a district which lay along the shores of the Arabian Gulf (Red Sea); and in this name Bochart, followed by J.D. Michaelis and Gesenius, recognizes the important island of Daden, or Aden, in that sea. It is probable that this Cushite tribe formed intermarriages at a later period with the Keturahite tribe of Dedan, in the north of Arabia; and this theory, which was propounded by Winer, may serve to account for the fact, that the name Dedan is found in both lines. Cf. with this passage Genesis 25:3.