Phoenicia ( or ;
[Oxford English Dictionary] from the Φοινίκη,
Phoiníkē; فينيقية,
Finiqyah) was an ancient
Semitic civilization situated on the western, coastal part of the
Fertile Crescent and centered on the coastline of modern
Lebanon and
Tartus Governorate in
Syria. All major Phoenician cities were on the coastline of the Mediterranean, some colonies reaching the Western Mediterranean. It was an enterprising
maritime trading culture that spread across the
Mediterranean from 1550 BC to 300 BC. The Phoenicians used the
galley, a man-powered sailing vessel, and are credited with the invention of the
bireme.
[ ξ1 ] They were famed in Classical Greece and Rome as 'traders in purple', referring to their monopoly on the precious purple dye of the
Murex snail, used, among other things, for royal clothing, and for their spread of the
alphabet (or
abjad), from which almost all modern phonetic alphabets are derived.
Phoenicians are widely thought to have originated from the earlier inhabitants of the region. Although Egyptian seafaring expeditions had already been made to Byblos to bring back "cedars of Lebanon" as early as the 3rd millennium BC, continuous contact only occurred in the Egyptian New Empire period. In the Amarna tablets of the 14th century BC, people from the region called themselves Kenaani or Kinaani (either the same as the Canaanites, or the Kenanites/Cainanites spoken of the Septuagint version of Gen. 10:24), although these letters predate the invasion of the Sea Peoples by over a century. Much later, in the 6th century BC, Hecataeus of Miletus writes that Phoenicia was formerly called χνα (Latinized: khna), a name Philo of Byblos later adopted into his mythology as his eponym for the Phoenicians: "Khna who was afterwards called Phoinix".[Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica, Book 1 chapter 10 section 10 ( translation 1 translation 2)]
Phoenicia is really a Classical Greek term used to refer to the region of the major Canaanite port towns, and does not correspond exactly to a cultural identity that would have been recognised by the Phoenicians themselves. It is uncertain to what extent the Phoenicians viewed themselves as a single ethnicity and nationality. Their civilization was organized in city-states, similar to ancient Greece.[María Eugenia Aubet. The Phoenicians and the West: politics, lemons, colonies and trade. p17. Cambridge University Press 2001] However, in terms of archaeology, language, life style and religion, there is little to set the Phoenicians apart as markedly different from other Semitic cultures of Canaan. As Canaanites, they were unique in their remarkable seafaring achievements.
Each city-state was a politically independent unit. They could come into conflict and one city might be dominated by another city-state, although they would collaborate in leagues or alliances. Though ancient boundaries of such city-centered cultures fluctuated, the city of Tyre seems to have been the southernmost. Sarepta (modern day Sarafand) between Sidon and Tyre is the most thoroughly excavated city of the Phoenician homeland.
The Phoenicians were the first state-level society to make extensive use of the alphabet. The Phoenician phonetic alphabet is generally believed to be the ancestor of almost all modern alphabets, although it did not contain any vowels (these were added later by the Greeks). From a traditional linguistic perspective, they spoke Phoenician, a Canaanite dialect.[Glenn Markoe. Phoenicians. p108. University of California Press 2000][Zellig Sabbettai Harris. A grammar of the Phoenician language. p6. 1990] However, due to the very slight differences in language, and the insufficient records of the time, whether Phoenician formed a separate and united dialect, or was merely a superficially defined part of a broader language continuum, is unclear. Through their maritime trade, the Phoenicians spread the use of the alphabet to North Africa and Europe, where it was adopted by the Greeks, who later passed it on to the Etruscans, who in turn transmitted it to the Romans.[Edward Clodd, Story of the Alphabet (Kessinger) 2003:192ff] In addition to their many inscriptions, the Phoenicians are believed to have left numerous other types of written sources, but most have not survived.
Etymology
The name
Phoenicians, like
Latin Poenī (adj.
poenicus, later
pūnicus), comes from
Greek Φοίνικες (
Phoínikes), attested since Homer and influenced by
phoînix "
Tyrian purple, crimson;
murex" (itself from
phoinós "blood red").
[Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language Unabridged. Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, 1993.] The word stems from
Mycenaean po-ni-ki-jo,
po-ni-ki, ultimately borrowed from
Ancient Egyptian fnḥw (
fenkhu)
[Françoise Briquel-Chatonnet and Eric Gubel, Les Phéniciens : Aux origines du Liban (Paris: Gallimard, 1999), 18.] "Asiatics, Semites". The
folk-etymological association of
phoiniki with
phoînix mirrors that in
Akkadian which tied
kinaḫni,
kinaḫḫi "Canaan; Phoenicia" to
kinaḫḫu "red-dyed wool".
[Mireille Hadas-Lebel, Entre la Bible et l'Histoire : Le Peuple hébreu (Paris: Gallimard, 1997), 14.][B. Landesberger has shown that kinaḫḫu should be read as qinaḫḫu and was borrowed from Sumerian qìn (compare Akk uqnû, Ugarit iqnu, Syrian qʿnâʿ(a)/ qunʿ(a), and Gk kýanos 'dark blue').] The land was natively known as
knʿn (cf.
Eblaite ca-na-na-um,
ca-na-na), remembered in the 6th century BC by
Hecataeus under the Greek form
Chna (χνα), and its people as the
knʿny (cf.
Punic chanani,
Hebrew kanaʿani).
Origins: 2300–1200 BC
Herodotus' account (written c. 440 BC) refers to the myths of
Io and
Europa. (
History, I:1).
The Greek historian Strabo believed that the Phoenicians originated from Bahrain.[Arnold Heeren, p441] The people of Tyre in particular have long maintained Persian Gulf origins, and the similarity in the words "Tylos" and "Tyre" has been commented upon.[ ξ2 ] However, there is little evidence of occupation at all in Bahrain during the time when such migration had supposedly taken place.[ ξ2 ]
Later classicist theories were proposed prior to modern archaeological excavations which revealed no disruption of Phoenician societies between 3200 BC and 1200 BC.
High point: 1200–800 BC
Fernand Braudel remarked in
The Perspective of the World that Phoenicia was an early example of a "world-economy" surrounded by empires. The high point of Phoenician culture and sea power is usually placed c. 1200–800 BC.
Many of the most important Phoenician settlements had been established long before this:
Byblos,
Tyre,
Sidon,
Simyra,
Arwad, and
Berytus, all appear in the Amarna tablets. Archeology has identified cultural elements of the Phoenician zenith as early as the 3rd millennium BC.
The league of independent city-state ports, with others on the islands and along other coasts of the Mediterranean Sea, was ideally suited for trade between the Levant area, rich in natural resources, and the rest of the ancient world. During the early Iron Age, in around 1200 BC an unknown event occurred, historically associated with the appearance of the Sea Peoples from the north. They weakened and destroyed the and the Hittites respectively. In the resulting power vacuum, a number of Phoenician cities rose as significant maritime powers.
The societies rested on three power-bases: the king; the temple and its priests; and councils of elders. Byblos first became the predominant center from where the Phoenicians dominated the Mediterranean and Erythraean (Red) Sea routes. It was here that the first inscription in the Phoenician alphabet was found, on the sarcophagus of Ahiram (c. 1200 BC). Later, Tyre gained in power. One of its kings, the priest Ithobaal (887–856 BC) ruled Phoenicia as far north as Beirut, and part of Cyprus. Carthage was founded in 814 BC under Pygmalion of Tyre (820–774 BC). The collection of city-states constituting Phoenicia came to be characterized by outsiders and the Phoenicians as Sidonia or Tyria. Phoenicians and Canaanites alike were called Sidonians or Tyrians, as one Phoenician city came to prominence after another.
Decline: 539–65 BC
Persian rule
Cyrus the Great conquered Phoenicia in 539 BC. The Persians divided Phoenicia into four vassal kingdoms:
Sidon,
Tyre,
Arwad, and
Byblos. They prospered, furnishing fleets for the Persian kings. Phoenician influence declined after this. It is likely that much of the Phoenician population migrated to
Carthage and other colonies following the Persian conquest. In 350 or 345 BC a rebellion in Sidon led by
Tennes was crushed by
Artaxerxes III. Its destruction was described by
Diodorus Siculus.
Hellenistic rule
Alexander the Great took Tyre in 332 BC after the
Siege of Tyre. Alexander was exceptionally harsh to Tyre, executing 2,000 of the leading citizens, but he maintained the king in power. He gained control of the other cities peacefully: the ruler of Aradus submitted; the king of Sidon was overthrown. The rise of
Hellenistic Greece gradually ousted the remnants of Phoenicia's former dominance over the Eastern Mediterranean trade routes. Phoenician culture disappeared entirely in the motherland. Carthage continued to flourish in North Africa. It oversaw the mining of iron and
from Iberia, and used its considerable naval power and mercenary armies to protect commercial interests. Rome finally destroyed it in 146 BC, at the end of the
Punic Wars.
Following Alexander, the Phoenician homeland was controlled by a succession of Hellenistic rulers: Laomedon (323 BC), Ptolemy I (320), Antigonus II (315), Demetrius (301), and Seleucus (296). Between 286 and 197 BC, Phoenicia (except for Aradus) fell to the Ptolemies of Egypt, who installed the high priests of Astarte as vassal rulers in Sidon (Eshmunazar I, Tabnit, Eshmunazar II).
In 197 BC, Phoenicia along with Syria reverted to the Seleucids. The region became increasingly Hellenized, although Tyre became autonomous in 126 BC, followed by Sidon in 111. Syria, including Phoenicia, was seized and ruled by king Tigranes the Great of Armenia from 82 until 69 BC, when he was defeated by Lucullus. In 65 BC Pompey finally incorporated the territory as part of the Roman province of Syria. Phoenicia became a separate province ca. 200 AD.
Demographics
Genetic studies
In 2008 a study was published in
The American Journal of Human Genetics examining sites that had been influenced by Phoenicians in "the coastal Lebanese Phoenician Heartland and the broader area of the rest of the Levant (the "Phoenician Periphery"); then Cyprus and South Turkey; then Crete; then Malta and East Sicily; then South Sardinia, Ibiza, and Southern Spain; and, finally, Coastal Tunisia and cities like Tingris in Morocco". The study "found that haplogroup J2, in general, and six Y-STR haplotypes, in particular, exhibited a Phoenician signature that contributed > 6% to the modern Phoenician-influenced populations examined." This was part of the development of a methodology which would enable linking a documented historical expansion with a geographic genetic pattern. They also suggested "a common source of related lineages rooted in Lebanon."
In a 2013 interview the lead investigator, Pierre Zalloua, pointed out that genetic variation preceded religious variation and divisions:"Lebanon already had well-differentiated communities with their own genetic peculiarities, but not significant differences, and religions came as layers of paint on top. There is no distinct pattern that shows that one community carries significantly more Phoenician than another."
Economy
Trade
The Phoenicians were among the greatest traders of their time and owed much of their prosperity to trade. At first, they traded mainly with the Greeks, trading
wood,
,
glass and powdered
Tyrian purple. Tyrian purple was a violet-purple dye used by the Greek
elite to color garments. In fact, the word
Phoenician derives from the
ancient Greek word
phoínios meaning "purple". As trading and colonizing spread over the Mediterranean, Phoenicians and Greeks seemed to have split that sea in two: the Phoenicians sailed along and eventually dominated the southern shore, while the Greeks were active along the northern shores. The two cultures rarely clashed, mainly in
Sicily, which eventually settled into two spheres of influence, the Phoenician southwest and the Greek northeast.
In the centuries after 1200 BC, the Phoenicians were the major naval and trading power of the region. Phoenician trade was founded on the Tyrian purple dye, a violet-purple dye derived from the shell of the Murex sea-snail, once profusely available in coastal waters of the eastern Mediterranean Sea but exploited to local extinction. James B. Pritchard's excavations at Sarepta in present-day Lebanon revealed crushed Murex shells and pottery containers stained with the dye that was being produced at the site. The Phoenicians established a second production center for the dye in Mogador, in present day Morocco. Brilliant textiles were a part of Phoenician wealth, and Phoenician glass was another export ware. They traded unrefined, prick-eared hunting dogs of Asian or African origin which locally they had developed into many breeds such as the Basenji, Ibizan Hound, Pharaoh Hound, Cirneco dell'Etna, Cretan Hound, Canary Islands Hound, and Portuguese Podengo.
To Egypt, where grapevines would not grow, the 8th-century Phoenicians sold wine: the wine trade with Egypt is vividly documented by the shipwrecks located in 1997 in the open sea 30 miles west of Ascalon.[ ξ3 ] Pottery kilns at Tyre and Sarepta produced the big terracotta jars used for transporting wine. From Egypt, the Phoenicians bought gold.
From elsewhere, they obtained other materials, perhaps the most important being silver from the Iberian Peninsula and tin from Great Britain, the latter of which when smelted with copper from Cyprus created the durable metal alloy bronze. Strabo states that there was a highly lucrative Phoenician trade with Britain for tin. It was once thought that this was direct trade but it is now believed to have been indirect. Professor Timothy Champion, a specialist in this period found it likely that the trade of the Phoenicians with Britain was indirect and under the control of the Veneti of Brittany.
The Phoenicians established commercial outposts throughout the Mediterranean, the most strategically important being Carthage in North Africa, directly across the narrow straits. Ancient Gaelic mythologies attribute a Phoenician/Scythian influx to Ireland by a leader called Fenius Farsa. Others also sailed south along the coast of Africa. A Carthaginian expedition led by Hanno the Navigator explored and colonized the Atlantic coast of Africa as far as the Gulf of Guinea; and according to Herodotus, a Phoenician expedition sent down the Red Sea by pharaoh Necho II of Egypt (c. 600 BC) even circumnavigated Africa and returned through the Pillars of Hercules after three years. Using gold obtained by expansion of the African coastal trade following the Hanno expedition, Carthage minted gold staters in 350 BC bearing a pattern, in the reverse exergue of the coins, which some have interpreted as a map of the Mediterranean with America shown to the west.[ ξ4 ]
In the 2nd millennium BC, the Phoenicians traded with the Somalis. Through the Somali city-states of Mosylon, Opone, Malao, Sarapion, Mundus and Tabae, trade flourished.
Phoenician ships
The Greeks had two names for Phoenician ships:
hippoi and
galloi. Galloi means tubs and hippoi means horses. These names are readily explained by depictions of Phoenician ships in the palaces of Assyrian kings from the 7th and 8th centuries, as the ships in these images are tub shaped (
galloi) and have horse heads on the ends of them (
hippoi). It is possible that these
hippoi come from Phoenician connections with the Greek god
Poseidon.
Depictions
The
Tel Balawat gates (850 BC) are found in the palace of
Shalmaneser III, an Assyrian king, near Nimrud. They are made of bronze, and they portray ships coming to honor Shalmaneser.
[Markoe, G. E. 2000. Peoples of the Past: Phoenicians. Los Angeles: University of California Press][http://www.qsov.com/UK2006/718BM.JPG]
The
Khorsabad bas-relief (7th century BC) shows the transportation of timber (most likely cedar) from Lebanon. It is found in the palace built specifically for
Sargon II, another Assyrian king, at Khorsabad, now northern Iraq.
[Assyria: Khorsabad (Room10c). [3] (2 May 2009)]
Important cities and colonies
From the 10th century BC, the Phoenicians' expansive culture led them to establish cities and colonies throughout the Mediterranean. Canaanite deities like
Baal and
Astarte were being worshipped from Cyprus to Sardinia, Malta, Sicily, Spain, Portugal, and most notably at Carthage in modern Tunisia.
Modern Algeria
Cyprus
Modern Italy
Modern Libya
The islands of Malta
-
Maleth (modern Mdina)
[ History of Mdina]
-
Għajn Qajjet
-
Tas-Silġ
[http://members.ziggo.nl/bezver/romans.html A History of Malta]
-
Mtarfa
[Annual Report on the Working of the Museum Department 1926–27, Malta 1927, 8][ ξ5 ]
-
Qallilija
[Annual Report on the Working of the Museum Department 1916-7, Malta 1917, 9–10.]
-
Ras il-Wardija in Gozo
Modern Mauritania
Modern Portugal
-
Baal Saphon or Baal Shamen, later romanized as Balsa (modern Tavira, Algarve)
[ Luís Fraga da Silva (2008), THE ROMAN TOWN OF BALSA – An encyclopedic entry, Associação Campo Arqueológico de Tavira, Tavira, Portugal.][ Luís Fraga da Silva (2008), Povoado Fenício de Tavira (VII a VI a.C.) – Reconstituição conjectural, Associação Campo Arqueológico de Tavira, Tavira, Portugal. (in Portuguese).]
Modern Spain
Modern Tunisia
Modern Turkey
Modern Morocco
Other colonies
-
Calpe (modern Gibraltar)
-
Gunugu
-
Thenae
-
Tipassa
-
Sundar
-
Surya
-
Shobina
-
Tara
Culture
Language and literature
The Phoenician alphabet was one of the first (consonantal) alphabets with a strict and consistent form. It is assumed that it adopted its simplified linear characters from an as-yet unattested early pictorial
Semitic alphabet developed some centuries earlier in the southern Levant.
[ ξ6 ] It is likely that the precursor to the Phoenician alphabet was of Egyptian origin, since
Middle Bronze Age alphabets from the southern Levant resemble Egyptian hieroglyphs or an early alphabetic writing system found at
Wadi-el-Hol in central Egypt.
[ Ancient Scripts: Proto-Sinaitic] In addition to being preceded by proto-Canaanite, the Phoenician alphabet was also preceded by an alphabetic script of Mesopotamian origin called
Ugaritic. The development of the Phoenician alphabet from the Proto-Canaanite coincided with the rise of the Iron Age in the 11th century BC.
[ Phoenician alphabet and language]
This alphabet has been termed an abjad, — that is, a script that contains no — from the first four letters aleph, beth, jamal, and daleth.
The oldest known representation of the Phoenician alphabet is inscribed on the sarcophagus of King Ahiram of Byblos, dating to the 11th century BC at the latest. Phoenician inscriptions are found in Lebanon, Syria, Israel, Cyprus and other locations, as late as the early centuries of the Christian Era. The Phoenicians are credited with spreading the Phoenician alphabet throughout the Mediterranean world.[ ξ7 ] Phoenician traders disseminated this writing system along Aegean trade routes, to Crete and Greece. The Greeks adopted the majority of these letters but changed some of them to vowels which were significant in their language, giving rise to the first true alphabet.
The Phoenician language is classified in the Canaanite subgroup of Northwest Semitic. Its later descendant in North Africa is termed Punic. In Phoenician colonies around the western Mediterranean, beginning in the 9th century BC, Phoenician evolved into Punic. Punic Phoenician was still spoken in the 5th century AD: St. Augustine, for example, grew up in North Africa and was familiar with the language.
Art
Phoenician art lacks unique characteristics that might distinguish it from its contemporaries. This is due to its being highly influenced by foreign artistic cultures: primarily
Egypt, Greece and
Assyria. Phoenicians who were taught on the banks of the
Nile and the
Euphrates gained a wide artistic experience and finally came to create their own art, which was an amalgam of foreign models and perspectives.
In an article from
The New York Times published on January 5, 1879, Phoenician art was described by the following:
He entered into other men's labors and made most of his heritage. The Sphinx of Egypt became Asiatic, and its new form was transplanted to Nineveh on the one side and to Greece on the other. The rosettes and other patterns of the cylinders were introduced into the handiwork of Phoenicia, and so passed on to the West, while the hero of the ancient epic became first the Tyrian , and then the Herakles of Hellas.
Religion
Deities
Attested 1st millennium BC
Attested 2nd millennium BC
Foreign relations
Influence in the Mediterranean region
Phoenician culture had a huge effect upon the cultures of the Mediterranean basin in the early Iron Age, and had been affected by them in turn. For example, in Phoenicia, the tripartite division between
Baal,
Mot and
Yam seems to have influenced the Greek division between
Zeus,
Hades and
Poseidon. In various Mediterranean ports during the classical period, Phoenician temples sacred to
Melkart were recognized as sacred to Greek
Hercules. Stories like the
Rape of Europa, and the coming of
Cadmus also draw upon Phoenician influence.
The recovery of the Mediterranean economy after the late Bronze Age collapse (ca. 1200 BC) seems to have been largely due to the work of Phoenician traders and merchant princes, who re-established long distance trade between Egypt and Mesopotamia in the 10th century BC.
There are many countries and cities around the world that derive their names from the Phoenician Language. Below is a list with the respective meanings:
-
Altiburus: City in Algeria, SW of Carthage. From Phoenician: "Iltabrush"
-
Bosa: City in Sardinia: From Phoenician "Bis'en"
-
Cádiz: City in Spain: From Phoenician "Gadir"
-
Dhali (Idalion): City in Central Cyprus: From Phoenician "Idyal"
-
Erice: City in Sicily: From Phoenician "Eryx"
-
Malta: Island in the Mediterranean: From Phoenician "Malat" ('refuge')
-
Marion: City in West Cyprus: From Phoenician "Aymar"
-
Oed Dekri: City in Algeria: From Phoenician: "Idiqra"
-
Spain: From Phoenician: "I-Shaphan", meaning "Land of Hyraxes". Later Latinized as "Hispania"
-
Carthage: City in Tunisia: From Phoenician "Qart Hadašt" meaning "New City",
-
Cartagena: City in Spain ( Greek Νέα Καρχηδόνα; Latin Carthago Nova; Spanish Cartagena) A colony of Carthage, which also gave rise to Cartagena, Colombia.
Relations with the Greeks
Trade
Towards the end of the Bronze Age (around 1200 BC) there was trade between the Canaanites (early Phoenicians), Egypt, Cyprus, and Greece. In a shipwreck found off of the coast of Turkey, the Ulu Bulurun wreck, Canaanite storage pottery along with pottery from Cyprus and Greece was found. The Phoenicians were famous metalworkers, and by the end of the 8th century BC, Greek city-states were sending out envoys to the Levant (the eastern Mediterranean) for metal goods.
[ 1999. Canaan and Ancient Israel]
The height of Phoenician trade was around the 7th and 8th centuries. There is a dispersal of imports (ceramic, stone, and faience) from the Levant that traces a Phoenician commercial channel to the Greek mainland via the central Aegean.
Al Mina is a specific example of the trade that took place between the Greeks and the Phoenicians.[Boardman, J. 1964. The Greeks Overseas. London: Thames and Hudson Limited] It has been theorized that by the 8th century BC, Euboean traders established a commercial enterprise with the Levantine coast and were using Al Mina (in Syria) as a base for this enterprise. There is still some question about the veracity of these claims concerning Al Mina.[Markoe, G. E. 2000. Peoples of the Past: Phoenicians. Los Angeles: University of California Press p.174] The Phoenicians even got their name from the Greeks due to their trade. Their most famous trading product was purple dye, the Greek word for which is phoenos.[Moscati, S. 1965. The World of the Phoenicians. New York: Frederick A. Praeger, Inc., Publishers]
Alphabet
The Phoenician phonetic alphabet was adopted and modified by the Greeks probably at the 8th century BC (around the time of the
hippoi depictions). This most likely did not come from a single instance but from a culmination of commercial exchange.
This means that before the 8th century, there was a relationship between the Greeks and the Phoenicians. Though there is no evidence to support the suggestion, it is probable that during this period there was also a passing of religious ideas. Herodotus cited the city of Thebes (a city in central Greece) as the place of the importation of the alphabet. The legendary Phoenician
hero Cadmus is credited with bringing the alphabet to Greece, but it is more plausible that it was brought by Phoenician emigrants to
Crete,
[L.H.Jeffery.(1976). The archaic Greece.The Greek city states 700–500 BC.Ernest Benn Ltd&Tonnbridge.] whence it gradually diffused northwards.
Connections with Greek mythology
-
Kadmos - In both Phoenician and Greek mythologies, Kadmos is a Phoenician prince, the son of Agenor, the king of Tyre. Herodotus credits Kadmos for bringing the Phoenician alphabet to Greece
[Markoe, G. E. 2000. Peoples of the Past: Phoenicians. Los Angeles: University of California Press p.112] approximately sixteen hundred years before Herodotus' time, or around 2000 BC,[Herodotus. Histories, Book II, 2.145.4.] as he attested.
-
Phoenician gods of the sea - Due to the number of deities similar to the "Lord of the Sea" in classical mythology, there have been many difficulties attributing one specific name to the sea deity or the "Poseidon–Neptune" figure of Phoenician religion. This figure of "Poseidon-Neptune" is mentioned by authors and in various inscriptions as being very important to merchants and sailors,
[Ribichini, S. 1988. " Beliefs and Religious Life." In The Phoenicians, edited by Sabatino Moscati, 104–125. Milan: Gruppo Editoriale Fabbri.] but a singular name has yet to be found. There are, however, names for sea gods from individual city-states. Ugarit is an ancient city state of Phoenicia. Yamm is the Ugaritic god of the sea. Yamm and Baal, the storm god of Ugaritic myth and often associated with Zeus, have an epic battle for power over the universe. While Yamm is the god of the sea, he truly represents vast chaos.[Habel, N.C. 1964. Yahweh Versus Baal: A Conflict of Religious Cultures. New York: Bookman Associates] Baal, on the other hand, is a representative for order. In Ugaritic myth, Baal overcomes Yamm's power. In some versions of this myth, Baal kills Yamm with a mace fashioned for him, and in others, the goddess Athtart saves Yamm and says that since defeated, he should stay in his own province. Yamm is the brother of the god of death, Mot.[Ringgren, H. 1917. Religions of the Ancient Near East. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press] Some scholars have identified Yamm with Poseidon, although he has also been identified with Pontus.[ ξ8 ]
According to Plato
In his
Republic, Plato contends that the love of money (
φιλοχρήματος) is a tendency of the soul found amongst Phoenicians and Egyptians, which distinguishes them from the Greeks who tend towards the love of knowledge (
φιλομαθής).
[Plato Republic IV (435e-436a)] In his Laws, he asserts that this love of money has led the Phoenicians and Egyptians to develop skills in cunning and trickery (
πανουργία) rather than wisdom (
σοφία).
[Plato Laws V (747c)]
Sources on Phoenicia
In the Bible
Hiram (also spelled Huran) associated with the building of the temple.
This is the architect of the Temple, Hiram Abiff of Masonic lore. They are vastly famous for their purple dye.
Later, reforming prophets railed against the practice of drawing royal wives from among foreigners: Elijah execrated Jezebel, the princess from Tyre who became a consort of King Ahab and introduced the worship of her gods Baal.
Long after Phoenician culture had flourished, or Phoenicia had existed as any political entity, Hellenized natives of the region where Canaanites still lived were referred to as "Syro-Phoenicians", as in the Gospel of Mark 7:26: "The woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by nation".
In Acts 15 Paul and Barnabas travel through Phoenicia in route to Jerusalem. Acts 15:3 (NIV) "The church sent them on their way, and as they traveled through Phoenicia and Samaria, they told how the Gentiles had been converted. This news made all the brothers very glad."
The word Bible itself derives from Greek biblion, which means "book" and either derives from, or is the (perhaps ultimately Egyptian) origin of Byblos, the Greek name of the Phoenician city Gebal.[ Online Etymology Dictionary, s.v. "Bible". Retrieved November 27, 2012.]
Legacy
The legacy of the Phoenicians are many and varied and include:
-
The spread of the alphabet throughout the Mediterranean extended literacy beyond a narrow caste of hierarchical priests.
-
They re-opened the trade routes in the Eastern Mediterranean that connected the Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilisations after the long hiatus of the Bronze Age collapse recovered, beginning the "Orientalising" trend later seen in Greek art.
-
They invented a more democratic and flatter oligarchic social structure than any people prior to the Athenian revolution, and in this were an inspiration to Greek constitutional government.
-
They pioneered the development of multi-tiered oared shipping throughout the Mediterranean region, being the first people exploring beyond the Straits of Gibraltar.
-
They were the first Eastern Mediterranean people to colonise the Western Mediterranean in any significant way (The Shardana may have preceded them in Sardinia), opening up urban development and trade in this region.
-
Greeks, Etruscans, and Romans freely admitted what they owed to the Phoenicians, and Phoenician influence can be traced in the Iberian and Celtic worlds from the 8th century onwards.
-
The first generation of Greek Philosophers of the Milesian school (Thales, Anaximenes, Anaximander, Anaxagoras, and Pythagoras) all had Phoenician ancestry.
-
It is possible that Zeno of Citium, the founder of Stoicism, was of Phoenician heritage. Diogenes Laërtius writes that Crates once chastised Zeno, crying out, "Why run away, my little Phoenician?"
[Diogenes Laërtius, vii. 3]
The extent of Phoenician influence on civilization has been unheralded for many centuries, partly because much of their records have been destroyed in successive invasions, and partly because their successors (Greek and Roman) usurped some of their achievements, being their mortal enemies in their heyday.
Episcopal sees
Ancient episcopal sees of the late Roman province of Phoenicia Prima that are listed in the
Annuario Pontificio as
include:
[ Annuario Pontificio 2013 (Libreria Editrice Vaticana 2013 ISBN 978-88-209-9070-1), "Sedi titolari", pp. 819–1013]
Ancient episcopal sees of the late Roman province of Phoenicia Secunda that are listed in the Annuario Pontificio as include:[
]
Sources
-
Assyria: Khorsabad (Room10c). http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/galleries/middle_east/room_10c_assyria_khorsabad.aspx. (2 May 2009
-
Boardman, J. 1964. The Greeks Overseas. London: Thames and Hudson Limited
-
Bondi, S. F. 1988. "The Course of History." In The Phoenicians, edited by Sabatino Moscati, 38–45. Milan: Gruppo Editoriale Fabbri.
-
Elayi, J. 2013. Histoire de la Phénicie. Paris: Perrin
-
Gordon, C. H. 1966. Ugarit and Minoan Crete. New York: W.W. Norton & Company
-
Habel, N.C. 1964. Yahweh Versus Baal: A Conflict of Religious Cultures. New York: Bookman Associates
-
Heard, C. Yahwism and Baalism in Israel & Judah (3 May 2009).
-
Herodotus. 440 BC. The Histories. Translated by Andrea L. Purvis. New York: Pantheon Books
-
Homer. 6th century BC (perhaps 700 BC). The Odyssey. Translated by Stanley Lombardo. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.
-
Markoe, G. E. 2000. Peoples of the Past: Phoenicians. Los Angeles: University of California Press
-
Mikalson, J.D. 2005. Ancient Greek Religion. Malden: Blackwell publishing
-
Moscati, S. 1965. The World of the Phoenicians. New York: Frederick A. Praeger, Inc., Publishers
-
Ovid. 1st century AD. Metamorphoses. Translated by Rolfe Humphries. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
-
Rawlinson, George, 1989, "History of Phoenicia"; Google Archives
-
Ribichini, S. 1988. "Beliefs and Religious Life." In The Phoenicians, edited by Sabatino Moscati, 104–125. Milan: Gruppo Editoriale Fabbri.
-
Ringgren, H. 1917. Religions of the Ancient Near East. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press
-
1999. Canaan and Ancient Israel. http://www.museum.upenn.edu/Canaan/index.html
-
Urquhart, David, "Mount Lebanon"; Google Archives
Further reading
-
Aubet, Maria Eugenia, The Phoenicians and the West: Politics, Colonies and Trade, tr. Mary Turton ( Bryn Mawr Classical Review, 2001: review)
-
The History of Phoenicia, first published in 1889 by George Rawlinson is available under Project Gutenberg at: http://digital.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=2331 Rawlinson's 19th-century text needs updating for modern improvements in historical understanding.
-
ξ9 , for a critical examination of the evidence of Phoenician trade with the South West of the U.K.
-
ξ10
-
Thiollet, Jean-Pierre, Je m'appelle Byblos, foreword by Guy Gay-Para, H & D, Paris, 2005. ISBN 2-914266-04-9
See also
External links
References
