The Tribe of Asher (אָשֵׁר "happy", Standard Hebrew Ašer, Tiberian Hebrew ʾĀšēr) is one of the Hebrew tribes, founded by Asher son of Jacob.

Sea Peoples

The tribe may be the same as the Weshesh mentioned in egyptian accounts (the W of Weshesh is a modern invention for ease of pronunciation, the egyptian records containing mention of the group refer to Uashesh). The Weshesh were part of a tribal confederation known as the Sea Peoples, which also included Peleset (the Philistines), Danua (possibly Dan), Tjekker (thought to mean of Acco, and thus may refer to Manessah ), Shekelesh (thought to mean men of Sheker, and thus may refer to Issachar).

Records only state that the Sea People attacked Egypt, and other nations, but not where they came from or where they went to. As such there has been much speculation, with some thinking they either invaded, or returned home to, coastal Canaan, and subsequently their federation for some unknown reason split, with some tribes joining the Israelite federation.

It must be stressed, however, that a majority of modern scholars think that the Sea Peoples (apart from the Peleset, whom they agree are the Philistines) were predominantly of Greek island origin, though this fails to explain why the Egyptians depict them as being circumcised or having semitic names. Contrasting with the majority opinion is the current fact that no supporters of the standard view have identified which location(s) the sea people actually originate from sucessfully, and as such the issue is one of the major outstanding problems of this period of history.