Moabite stone, ancient slab of stone erected in850 B.C. by King Mesha of Moab; it contains a long inscription commemorating a victory in his revolt against Israel. It was discovered at Dibon, Jordan (1868), by F. A. Klein, a German clergyman. Although it was later broken when Klein tried to purchase it from the Arabs, most of the fragments were recovered. They are in the Louvre. The language of the Moabites is a Phoenician dialect that represents an early form of Hebrew.