Phoenicia

Phoeni'cia (Φοινίκη), a country whose inhabitants necessarily held important and intimate relations, not only to the Hebrews, but to all antiquity. The latest and most complete authority on this subject is Rawlinson's History of Phelnicia (London, 1889).

I. The Land. —

1. Name. — "Phoenice" was not the name by which its native inhabitants called it, but was given to it by the Greeks, who called those merchants who came from that coast of the Mediterranean Sea which runs parallel with Mount Lebanon Φοινικες. In Cicero (De Fin. 4:20) there occurs the doubtful reading Phoenicia (comp. the Vulgate in Nu 33:51).

However, this latter form of the name has come into general use (comp. Gesenii Monumenta Phenicia [Leips. 1837], page 338; Forbiger, Handbuch der alien Geographie [ibid. 1842-1844], page 659 sq.). This name has been variously derived. It is possibly from Phoenix the son of Agenor and the brother of Cadmus. It perhaps arose from the circumstance that the chief article of the commerce of these merchants was φοινός, purple. The word φοινός means blood-red, and is probably related to φόνος, mzurder. This derivation of the name is alluded to by Strabo (1:42). Others imagine as naturally that the color does not give name to the people, but is named after them: as our damask, from Damascus; or our "calico," from Calicut. The term, as an epithet of color, may also apply, as Kenrick supposes, to the sunburnt complexion of the people. But after all, in the opinion of others, a Greek derivation may not be admissible, for the name may be original or Shemitic — though it is ridiculous in Scaliger, Fuller, and Glassius to identify it with פנג, "to live luxuriously," in allusion to the results of Phoenician wealth and merchandise. Strabo, however, maintains that the Phoenicians were called Φοίνικες , because they resided originally on the coasts of the Red Sea. Bochart, in his Canaan (1:1), derives the name from the Hebrew בני ענק, sons of Anak. Reland, in his Palcestina ex Monumentis Veteribus IIlustrata, derives it from φοίνιξ, palm-tree; and this is the etymology now generally acquiesced in. The palmtree is seen, as an emblem, on some coins of Aradus, Tyre, and Sidon; and there are now several palm-trees within the circuit of modern Tyre, and along the coast at various points; but the tree is not at the present day one of the characteristic features of the country. The native name of Phoenicia was Kendan (Canaan) or Kna, signifying Lowland, so named in contrast to the adjoining Aram, i.e., Highland, the Hebrew name of Syria. The name Kenaan is preserved on a coin of Laodicea of the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, whereon Laodicea is styled "a mother city in Canaan," ללארכא אם בכנען Kna or Chnd (Χνᾶ) is mentioned distinctly by Herodian the grammarian as the old name of Phoenicia. Hence, as Phoenicians or Canaanites were the most powerful of all tribes in Palestine at the time of its invasion by Joshua, the Israelites, in speaking of their own territory as it was before the conquest, called it "the land of Calnaan." SEE CANAAN.

In the O.T. the word Phoenicia does not occur, as might be expected from its being a Greek name. In the Apocrypha it is not defined, though spoken of as being, with Coele-Syria, under one military commander (2 Macc. 3:5, 8; 8:8; 10:11; 3 Macc. 3:15). In the N.T. the word occurs only in three passages, Ac 11:19; Ac 15:3; Ac 21:2; and not one of these affords a clew as to how far the writer deemed Phoenicia to extend. On the other hand, Josephus possibly agreed with Strabo; for he expressly says that Csesarea is situated in Phoenicia (Ant. 15:9, 6); and although he never makes a similar statement respecting Joppa, yet he speaks, in one passage, of the coast of Syria, Phoenicia, and Egypt, as if Syria and Phoenicia exhausted the line of coast on the Mediterranean Sea to the north of Egypt (War, 3:9, 2).

The Phoenicians in general are sometimes called Sidonians (comp. Gesenii Monumenta Phoenicia, 2:267 sq.; Thesaurus Linguce Hebraicae, under the word צידון). Justinus (18:3) alludes to the etymology of this name: "A city being built which they called Sidon, from the abundance of fishes; for the Phoenicians call a fish sidon." This statement is not quite correct. But the root צוד, which in Hebrew means only to catch beasts and birds, can also be employed in Arabic when the catching of fishes is spoken of. This root occurs also in the Aramaic, in the signification of both hunting and fishing ( SEE ZIDON ).

2. Extent. — Phoenicia in general is the name applied to a country on the coast of Syria, bounded by the Mediterranean Sea on the west and Lebanon on the east; Syria and Judaea forming its northern and southern limits respectively, situated between about 34° to 366 N. lat., and 45° to 36° E. long. Yet the extent of its territory varied so considerably at different times that the geographical definitions of the ancient writers differ in a very remarkable manner. Thus, while in Ge 10:19 Canaan does not reach northwards beyond Sidon-a place which in early times gave the name to the whole people (יושבי צידון צידנים, Deuteronomy, Judges) — and Byblus and Berytus are considered as lying beyond it (Ge 10:15 sq.; Jos 13:5), it comprised in the Persian period (Herod. 3:91) Posidium, as high as 35° 52'. Later still (Pliny, Strabo, Ptolemy) the Eleutherus (340 60'), and subsequently (Mela, Stephanus) the island of Aradus (34° 70'), were considered its utmost northern, limits. To the south it was at times Gaza (Ge 10:19; Zep 2:5; Herod., Philo, Eustath.), at others Egypt (Nu 24:5; Jos 15:4,47; Strabo, Procop., etc.); and, from the Macedonian period chiefly, Csesarea is mentioned as its extreme point. Eastward the country sometimes comprised parts of Syria and Palestine, beyond the mountain-ridges of the former and the hill-chains of the latter.

It will thus be seen that the length of coast to which the name Phoenicia was applied varied at different times, and may be regarded under different aspects before and after the loss of its independence.

(1.) What may be termed Phoenicia proper was a narrow undulating plain, extending from the pass of Ras el-Beyad or Abyad, the "Promontorium Album" of the ancients, about six miles south of Tyre, to the Nahr el-Auly, the ancient Bostrenus, two miles north of Sidon (Robinson, Bib. Res. 2:473). The plain is only twenty-eight miles in length, and, considering the great importance of Phoenicia in the world's history, this may well be added to other instances in Greece, Italy, and Palestine, which show how little the intellectual influence of a city or state has depended on the extent of its territory. Its average breadth is about a mile (Porter, Handbookfor Syria, 2:396); but near Sidon the mountains retreat to a distance of two miles, and near Tyre to a distance of five miles (Kenrick, Phoenicia, page 19). The whole of Phoenicia, thus understood, is called by Josephus (Ant. 5:3, 1) the great plain of the city of Sidon (τὸ μέγα πεδίον Σιδῶνος πόλεως). In it, near its northern extremity, was situated Sidon, in the north latitude of 330 34' 05"; and scarcely more than seventeen geographical miles to the south was Tyre, in the latitude of 33° 17' (admiral Smyth's Mediterranean, page 469): so that in a straight line those two renowned cities were less. than twenty English miles distant from each other. Zarephath, the Sarepta of the N.T., was situated between them, eight miles south of Sidon, to which it belonged (1Ki 17:9; Ob 1:20; Lu 4:26).

(2.) A still longer district, which afterwards became fairly entitled to the name of Phoenicia, extended up the coast, to a point marked by the island of Aradus, and by Antaradus towards the north; the southern boundary remaining the same as in Phoenicia proper. Phoenicia, thus defined, is estimated by Mr. Grote (Hist. of Greece, 3:354) to have been about one hundred and twenty miles in length; while its breadth, between Lebanon and the sea, never exceeded twenty miles, and was generally much less. This estimate is most reasonable, allowing for the bends of the coast; as the direct difference in latitude between Tyre and Antaradus (Tortosa) is equivalent to one hundred and six English miles; and six miles to the south of Tyre, as already mentioned, intervene before the beginning of the pass of Ras el-Abyad. The claim of this entire district to the name of Phoenicia rests on the probable fact that the whole of it, to the north of the great plain of Sidon, was occupied by Phoenician colonists; not to mention that there seems to have been some kind of politicalconnection, however loose, between all the inhabitants (Diodorus, 16:41). Scarcely sixteen geographical miles farther north than Sidon was Berytus; with a roadstead so well suited for the purposes of modern navigation that, under the modern name of Beirut, it has eclipsed both Sidon and Tyre as an emporium for Syria. Whether this Berytus was identical with the Berothah and Berothai of Eze 47:16, and of 2Sa 8:8, is a disputed point. Still farther north was Byblus, the Gebal of the Bible (Eze 27:9), inhabited by seamen and calkers. Its inhabitants are supposed to be alluded to in the word Giblim, translated "stonesquarers" in the A.V. of 1Ki 5:18 (32). It still retains in Arabic the kindred name of Jebeil. Then came Tripolis (now Tarabulus), said to have been founded by colonists from Tyre, Sidon, and Aradus, with three distinct towns, each a furlong apart from one another, each with its own walls, and each named from the city which supplied its colonists. General meetings of the Phoenicians seem to have been held at Tripolis (Diod. 16:41), as if a certain local jealousy had prevented the selection for this purpose of Tyre, Sidon, or Aradus. Lastly, towards the extreme point north was Aradus itself, the Arvad of Ge 10:18 and Eze 27:8, situated, like Tyre, on a small island near the mainland, and founded by exiles from Sidon.

During the period of the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites, the Phoenicians possessed the following towns, which we will enumerate successively in the direction from south to north: Dora (דור. Jos 11:2; Jos 17:11 sq.); Ptolemais (עכו, Jg 1:33); Ecdippa (אכזיב, Jos 19:29); Tyre (צור, Jos 19:29); Sarepta (צרפת, 1Ki 17:9 sq.; Lu 4:26); Sidon (צידון, Ge 10:15); Berytus (ברותה, Eze 47:16; 2Sa 8:8); Byblus (גבל, Jos 13:5); Tripolis, Simyra (הצמרי, Ge 10:18); Arka (הערקי, Ge 10:17); Simna (הסיני, Ge 10:16); Aradus (הארודי, Ge 10:18). Comp. the respective articles on these towns. Sidon is the only Phoenician town mentioned in Homer (see Iliad, 6:239; 23:743; Odyss. 15:415; 17:424).

3. Geographical Features. — The whole of Phoenicia proper is well watered by various streams from the adjoining hills; of these the two largest are the Khasimiyeh, a few miles north of Tyre — the ancient name of which, strange to say, is not certain, though it is conjectured to have been the Leontes and the Bostrenus, already mentioned, north of Sidon. The soil is fertile, although now generally ill-cultivated; but in the neighborhood of Sidon there are rich gardens and orchards. The havens of Tyre and Sidon afforded water of sufficient depth for all the requirements of ancient navigation, and the neighboring range of the Lebanon, in its extensive forests, firnished what then seemed a nearly inexhaustible supply of timber for ship-building. To the north of Bostrenus, between that river and Beirfit, lies the only desolate and barren part of Phoenicia. It is crossed by the ancient Tamyras or Damuras, the modern Nahr ed-Damur. From Beirut the plains are again fertile. The principal streams are the Lycus, now the Nahr el-Kelb, not far north from Beirat; the Adonis, now the Nahr Ibrahim, about five miles south of Gebal; and the Eleutherus, now the Nahr el-Kebir, in the bend between Tripolis and Antaradus.

The climate of Phoenicia — an item of immense moment in the history of a nation — varies very considerably. Near the coast, and in the lower plains, the heat in summer is at times tropical, while the more mountainous regions enjoy a moderate temperature, and in winter even heavy falls of snow are not uncommon. In the southern parts the early rains begin in October, and are, after an interval of dry weather, followed by the winter rains, which last till March, the time of the "latter" rains. From May till October the sky remains cloudless. The rare difference of temperature found in so small a compass is thus happily described by Volney: "If the heat of July is oppressive, a six hours' journey to the neighboring mountains transports you into the coolness of March; and if, on the contrary, the hoar-frost troubles you at Besharrai, a day's travel will bring you into the midst of blooming May;" or, as an Arabic poet has it, "Lebanon bears winter on its head, spring on its shoulders, autumn on its lap, and summer at its foot." The dense population assembled in the great mercantile towns greatly contributed to augment by artificial means the natural fertility of the soil. The population of the country is at present very much reduced, but there are still found aqueducts and artificial vineyards formed of mould carried up to the terraces of the native rock. Ammianus Marcellinus says (14:8), "Phoenicia is a charming and beautiful country, adorned with large and elegant cities." Even now this country is among the most fertile in Western Asia. It produces wheat, rye, and barley, and, besides the more ordinary fruits, also apricots, peaches, pomegranates, almonds, citrons, oranges, figs, dates, sugar-cane, and grapes, which furnish an excellent wine. In addition to these products, it yields cotton, silk, and tobacco. The country is also adorned by the variegated flowers of oleander and cactus. The higher regions are distinguished from the bare mountains of Palestine by being covered with oaks, pines, cypress-trees, acacias, and tamarisks; and above all by majestic cedars, of which there are still a few very old trees, whose stems measure from thirty to forty feet in circumference. The inhabitants of Sur still carry on a profitable traffic with the produce of Mount Lebanon, namely, in wood and charcoal. Phoenicia produces also flocks of sheep and goats; and innumerable swarms of bees supply excellent honey. In the forests there are bears, wolves, panthers, and jackals. The sea furnishes great quantities of fish, so that Sidon, the most ancient among the Phoenician towns, derived its name from fishing.

II. The People. —

1. Respecting the ethnography of the Phoenicians, we have only to observe that the opinions are as much divided on the subject as ever. According to Ge 10:15, Canaan had eleven "sons" ("Canaan begat Sidon his first-born, and Heth, and the Jebusite, and the Amorite, and the Girgasite, and the Hivite, and the Arkite, and the Sinite, and the Arvadite, and the Zemarite, and the Hamathite; and afterwards were the families of the Canaanites spread abroad"), six of whom had settled in the north of Palestine; and although all his descendants are sometimes included, both by classical writers and the Sept. (e.g. in Jos 5:1,12), in the name of Φοίνικες, yet in general the term chiefly applies to the inhabitants of the north. Scripture speaks of them as descendants of primeval giants (Autochthons) who had inhabited Canaan since the flood-that is, from times immemorial. Considering the careful attention paid by the Biblical writers to the early history of Palestine, and the close contact between the Phoenicians and Israelites, it would appear as if all traditions of a time anterior to their sojourn in that land had been long lost. Ge 10:6, on the other hand, calls Canaan a descendant of Ham — a statement which, unless explained to refer to their darker skins, would seem to war against their being indigenous inhabitants of Palestine, or a Shemitic population, an assumption much favored by their language. Herodotus, however, makes them, both on their own statements and by accounts preserved in Persian historians, immigrants from "the Erythreean Sea;" and Justin backs the notion of immigration by recording that the Tyrian nation was founded by the Phoenicians, and that these, being forced by an earthquake to leave their native land, first settled on the Assyrian lake (Dead Sea or lake of Gennesareth), and subsequently on a shore near the sea, where they founded a city called Sidon. The locality of the "Erythreean Sea," however, is a moot point still. It is taken by different investigators to stand either for the Arabian or Persian Gulf; the latter view being apparently favored by the occurrence of Phoenician names borne by some of its islands (Strabo) — though these may have been given them by late Phoenician colonists. Some have seen in them the Hyksos driven to Syria. Without entering any further into these most difficult, and, in the absence of all trustworthy information, more than vague speculations, so much appears certain, that many immigrations of Shemitic branches into Phoenicia, at different periods and from different parts, must have taken place, and that these gradually settled into the highly civilized nationality which we find constituted as early as the time of Abraham (Ge 12:6, או=then, already; comp. Aben-Ezra, ad loc., and Spinoza, Tract. Theol.Pol. chapter 8). It would be extremely vain to venture an opinion on the individuality of the different tribes that, wave-like, rushed into the country from various sides, at probably widely distant dates. The only apparently valuable tradition on the subject seems contained in the above- quoted passage of Ge 10:15-18. But there is one point which can be proved to be in the highest degree probable, and which has peculiar interest as bearing on the Jews, viz. that the Phoenicians were of the same race as the Canaanites. This remarkable fact, which, taken in connection with the language of the Phoenicians, leads to some interesting results, is rendered probable by the following circumstances:

1st. The native name of Phoenicia, as already pointed out, was Canaan, a name signifying "lowland." This was well given to the narrow slip of plain between the Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea, in contrast to the elevated mountain range adjoining; but it would have been inappropriate to that part of Palestine conquered by the Israelites, which was undoubtedly a hill-country (see Movers, Das Phoenizische Alterthum, 1:5); so that, when it is known that the Israelites at the time of their invasion found in Palestine a powerful tribe called the Canaanites, and from them called Palestine, the land of Canaan, it is obviously suggested that the Canaanites came originally from the neighboring plain, called Canaan along the sea-coast.

2d. This is further confirmed through the name in Africa whereby the Carthaginian Phoenicians called themselves, as attested by Augustine, who states that the peasants in his part of Africa, if asked of what race they were, would answer, in Punic or Phoenician, "Canaanites" (Opera Omnia, 4:1235; Exposit. Epist. ad Rom. § 13).

3d. The conclusion thus suggested is strongly supported by the tradition that the names of persons and places in the land of Canaan — not only when the Israelites invaded it, but likewise previously, when "there were yet but a few of them," and Abraham is said to have visited it-were Phoenician or Hebrew: such, for example, as Abimelek, "father of the king" (Ge 20:2); Melchizedek, "king of righteousness" (Ge 14:18); Kirjath-sepher, "city of the book" (Jos 15:15). As above observed, in Greek writers also occurs the name χνά for Phcenicia (comp. Gesenii Thesaurus Linguae Hebraicae [Leips. 1839], 2:696, and Gesenii Monumenta Phoenicia, page 570 sq.). The dialect of the Israelites perhaps resembled more the Aramaean, and that of the Phoenicians more the Arabic; but this difference was nearly effaced when both nations resided in the same country, and had frequent intercourse with each other. Concerning the original country of the Phoenicians and their immigration into Canaan, comp. especially Bertheau, Zur Geschichte der Israeliten (Gottingen, 1840), pages 152-186, and Lengerke, Kanaan, Volks- und Religionsgeschichte Israels (Kinigsberg, 1844), 1:182 sq.

2. Government. — Two principal divisions existed anciently among these Canaanites: these were those of the interior of Palestine, and the tribes inhabiting the sea-coast, Phoenicia proper. By degrees three special tribes, more powerful than the rest, formed, as it were, the nucleus around which the multitude of minor ones gathered and became one nationality, viz. the inhabitants of Sidon, of Tyre, and of Aradus. Three principal elements are to be distinguished, according to classical evidence (Cato, comp. Serv. ad En. 4:682), in the constitution of Phoenician states: 1. The aristocracy, consisting of certain families of noble lineage, which were divided into tribes (שבט), families (משפחה, Phoen. חבין), and gentes (בית אבות), the last generally of the number of 300 in each state or colony. Out of the "tribes" were elected thirty principes (Phoen. רב), who formed a supreme senate; besides which there existed another larger representative assembly of 300 members, chosen from the gentes. 2. The lower estates of the people, or "plebs" itself, who do not seem to have had their recognised special representatives, but by constant opposition, which sometimes broke out in open violence, held the nobles in check. 3. The kingdom, at first hereditary, afterwards became elective. Nor must the priesthood be forgotten; one of the most powerful elements in the Phoenician commonwealth, and which in some provinces even assumed, in the person of the highpriest, the supreme rule. There was a kind of federal union between the different states, which, according to their importance, sent either their kings or their judges, at the head of a large number of their senators, to the general councils of the nation, held at stated periods either at Sidon or Tyre. The colonies were governed much as the home-country, except that local affairs and the executive were intrusted to two (annual, as it would seem) judges (שופטים, suffetes) elected by the senate — an institution which for some time also replaced the monarchical form in Tyre. When Tripolis was founded by Tyre, Sidon, and Aradus, as a place of joint meeting for their hegemony, every one of these cities sent 100 senators to watch her special interests at the common meeting; and the senate of Sidon seems, in the 4th century B.C., at least, to have consisted of 500 to 600 elders, some of whom were probably selected more for their wealth than for their noble lineage. The king sometimes combined in his person the office of highpriest. The turbulent seething mass of the people, consisting of the poorer families of Phoenician descent, the immigrants of neighboring tribes, the strangers, and the whole incongruous mass of workmen, tradespeople, sailors, that must have abounded in a commercial and maritime nation like the Phoenicians, and out of whose midst must have arisen at times influential men enough — was governed, as far as we can learn, as "constitutionally" as possible. The unruly spirits were got rid of in Roman fashion somehow in the colonies, or were made silent by important places being intrusted to their care, under strict supervision from home. Only once or twice do we hear of violent popular outbreaks, in consequence of one of which it was mockingly said that Phoenicia had lost all her aristocracy, and what existed of Phoenicians was of the lowest birth, the offspring of slaves. As the wealth of all the world accumulated more and more in the Phoenician ports, luxury) and too great a desire to rest and enjoy their wealth in peace, induced the dauntless old pirates to intrust the guard of their cities to the mariners and mercenary soldiers, to Libyans and Lydians — "they of Persia and of Lud and of Phut," as Ezekiel has it; although the wild resistance which this small territory offered in her single towns to the enormous armies of Assyria, Babylonia and Greece shows that the old spirit had not died out. The smaller states were sometimes so much oppressed by Tyre that they preferred rather to submit to external enemies (comp. Heeren, Ideen, etc., page 15 sq.; Beck, Anleitung zur genaueren Kenntniss der Welt- und Volkergeschichte, page 252 sq., and 581 sq.).

3. History. — One of the most powerful and important nations of antiquity, Phoenicia has yet left but poor information regarding her history. According to Josephus, every city in Phoenicia had its collection of registers and public documents (comp. Targum to Kirjath-Jearim, Jg 1:11,15). Out of these, Menander of Ephesus, and Dias, a Phoenician, compiled two histories of Tyre, a few fragments of which have survived (comp. Josephus, Contra Ap. 1:17, 18; Ant. 8:5, 3; 13:1 sq.; 9:14, 2; Theophil. Ad Autol. 3:22; Syncellus, Chron. page 182). Sanchoniatho is said to have written a history of Phoenicia and Egypt, which was recast by Philo of Byblus, under the reign of Hadrian, and from his work Porphyrius (4th century A.D.) took some cosmogonical quotations, which found their way into Eusebius (Praep. Evang. 1:10). Later Phoenician historians' works (Theodotus, Hesycrates, Moschos, mentioned as authors on Phoenicia by Tatianus, Contra Grcecos, § 37) are likewise lost. Gesenlius mentions, in his Monumenta Phoenicia (page 363 sq.), some later I;hoenician authors, who do not touch upon historical subjects. Thus nothing remains but a few casual notices in the Bible, some of the Church fathers, and classical writers (Josephus, Syncellus, Herodotus, Diodorus, Justin), which happen to throw some light upon the history of that long- lost commonwealth. A great part of this history, however, being identical with that of the cities mentioned, in which by turns the hegemony was vested, fuller information will be found under their special headings. The names of the kings from Hiram to Pygmalion are preserved by Josephus (Apion, 1:18) in a fragment from the history of Tyre by Menander of Ephesus. We give them, with the computations of the reigns by Movers (ut sup. II, 1:140, 143, 149), Duncker (Gesch. des A lterthums [3d ed. Berl. 1863-7], 1:526 sq.), and Hitzig (Urgesch. und Mythol. der Philistber, page 191). See also Herzog, Encyklop. 11:620 sq.

Name. Menander. Movers. Duncker. Hitzig. Hiram I .... 34 years 980-947 1021-991. 1031-997 Balcazar.... 7 (17) years 946-940 991-994 997-990 Abdastartus 9 years 939-931 974-965 990-981 Unknown .. 12 years 930-919 965-953 981-969

Astartus.... 12 years 918-907 953-941 969-957 Astaryimus. 9 years 906-898 941-932 957-948 Pheles...... 8 months Ithobal .... 32 (12) years 897-866 931-898 948-916 Balezorus.. 6 (8, 18) years 865-858 898-890 916-910 Myttonus... 9 (25, 12) years 857-833 890-861 910-901

Pygmalion. 47 (40,48) years 832-785 861-813 900-853

Broadly speaking, we may begin to date Phoenician history from the time when Sidon first assumed the rule, or about B.C. 1500. Up to that time it was chiefly the development of the immense internal resources, and the commencement of that gigantic trade that was destined soon to overspread the whole of the then known world, which seem to have occupied the attention of the early and peaceful settlers. The symbolical representative of their political history during that period is El, or Belitan, builder of cities, supreme and happy ruler of men. The conquest of Canaan by the Israelites marks a new epoch, of which lists of kings were still extant in late Greek times. We now hear first of Sidonian colonies, while the manufactures and commerce of the country seem to have reached a high renown throughout the neighboring lands. The Israelites drove out Sidonian settlers from Laish, near the sources of the Jordan. Somewhat later (beginning of 13th century), Sidonian colonization spread farther west, founding the (island) city of Tyre, and Citium and Hippo on the coast of Africa. About 1209, however, Sidon was defeated by the king of Askalon, and Tyre, assuming the ascendency, ushered in a third period, during which Phoenicia reached the summit of her greatness. At this time, chiefly under the brilliant reign of Hiram, we hear also of a close alliance with the Israelites, which eventually led to common commercial enterprises at sea. After Hiram's death, however, political dissensions began to undermine the unparalleled peace and power of the country. His four sons ruled, with certain interruptions, for short periods, and the crown was then assumed by Ethbaal, the father of Jezebel. His grandson, Mattan, left the throne to his two children, Pygmialion and Dido (Elissa). The latter, having been excluded from power by her brother, left the country, together with some of the aristocratic families, and founded Carthage (New-Town), about B.C. 813. Of the century that followed, little further is known save occasional allusions in Joel and Amos, which tell of the piratical commerce of Tyrians and Sidonians. Assyrian, Chaldsean, Egyptian invasions followed each other in turns during the last phase of Phoenician history, dating from the 8th century, and soon reduced the flourishing country to insignificance. Deeds of prowess, such as the thirteen years' siege sustained by Tyre against overwhelming forces, could not save the doomed country. Her fleet destroyed, her colonies wrested from her or in a state of open rebellion, torn by inner factions, Phoenicia was ultimately (together with what had been once Nebuchadnezzar's empire) embodied with Persia B.C. 538. Once more, however, exasperated by the enormous taxes imposed upon them, chiefly during the Greek war, together with other galling measures issued by the successive satraps, the Phoenicians, under the leadership of Sidon, took part in the revolution of Egypt against Artaxerxes Mnlemon and Ochus, about the mnide die of the 4th century B.C., which ended very unhappily for them. Sidon, the only city that refused to submit at once at the approach of the Persian army, was conquered, the citizens themselves setting fire to it, and more than 40,000 people perished in the flames. Although rebuilt and repeopled shortly afterwards, it yet never again reached its ancient grandeur, and to Tvre belonged the hegemony, until she, too, had to submit, after a seven years' siege, to Alexander, who through the battle on the Issus (B.C. 333) had made all Phoenicia his as part and parcel of the gigantic Persian empire. Under Antiochus the Great, all except Sidon became subject to Seleucidian sway. Pompey, incorporating Phoenicia with Syria (B.C. 65), made it a Roman province. During the civil wars of Rome, when Cassius divided Syria into small provinces, and sold them separately, Tyre again became for a short period a principality, with a king of its own. Cleopatra in her turn received Phoenicia as a present from Antony. What shadow of independence was still left to the two ancient cities was taken from them by Augustus (A.D. 20). Tyre, however, retained much of her previous importance as an emporium and a manufacturing place through the various vicissitudes of Syrian history during the sixteen centuries that followed, until the Ottoman Turks conquered the country, and the opening up of the New World on the one hand, and of a new route to Asia on the other, destroyed the last remnant of the primitive grandeur of one of the most mighty empires of the ancient world, and one which has contributed one of the largest shares to the civilization of all mankind.

4. Occupations. — Commerce and colonization were the elements by which this grandeur was chiefly accomplished. Regarding the former, we have already hinted at the overflowing wealth and almost unparalleled variety of home products which this small country furnished forth, and which, far too abundant for their own consumption, easily suggested the idea of exportation and traffic of exchange. Their happy maritime position further enabled them to do that which Egypt and Assyria, with all their perfection of industry and art, were debarred from doing; partly, it is true, through their isolated habits and narrow laws, but chiefly by the natural limits of their countries. To Phoenicia alone it was given to supply the link that was to connect the East with the West, or at least with Europe and Western Africa. Communicating by means of Arabia and the Persian Gulf with India and the coast of Africa towards the equator; and on the north, along the Euxine, with the borders of Scythia, beyond the Strait of Gibraltar, with Britannia, if not with the Baltic, their commerce divides itself into different great branches according to those natural highways. From the countries on the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea, the coasts of Arabia, Africa, and India, they exported spice, precious stones, myrrh, frankincense, gold, ivory, ebony, steel, and iron, and from Egypt embroidered linen and corn. In exchange they brought not only their own raw produce and manufactures, but gums and resins for embalming, also wine and spices. From Mesopotamia and Syria came the emeralds and corals of the Red Sea; from Babylon the manifold embroideries; wine and fine wool from Aleppo and the Mesopotamian plains; from Judaea the finest wheat, grape-honey, oil, and balm. Another remote region, Armenia, furnished troops of riding and chariot horses and mules; and this same country, or, rather, the south-eastern coast of the Euxine, further furnished the Phoenician emporiums with slaves of a superior market-value-for pirating and slave-dealing went hand in hand with their maritime calling- with copper, lead, brass (or ichalcum), and tunnies, which they also fetched, together with conger-eels, from the Atlantic coast. Their extensive early commerce with Greece is frequently alluded to in Homer, and is further shown by the remarkable fact of the abundance of Shemitic or Phoenician words in Greek for such things as precious stones, fine garments, vessels, spices, and Eastern plants in general, musical instruments, weights and measures, etc. (comp. μύῤῥα, מר; κίνναμον, קנמון; κάννα, קנה; λίβανος , לבנה; χαλβάνη, galbanum, : חלבנה; νάρδος, נרד; σάμφειρος שפיר ; ἴασπις, ישפה ; βύσσος, בווֹ;

κάρπασος, כרפס; νάβλα, נבל; τύμπανον, תŠ; σαμβύκη, סבכא; κύπρος, כפר ; ὕσσωπος, אזוב; κιβώρυον, כפור; σάκκος, שק; χάρτς,; δέλτος, חדט; ἀῤῥαβών, ערבון; μνᾶ, מנה; κάβος, קב; δραχμή, דרכמון; κόρος, כר, etc.). Beyond the Strait, along the north and west coast of Africa, they received skins of deer, lions, panthers, domestic cattle, elephants' skins and teeth, Egyptian alabaster, castrated swine, Attic pottery and cups, probably also gold. Yet the most fabulously rich mines of metalssuch as silver, iron, lead, tin — they found in Tartessus. So extensive and proverbial was this commerce that we enumerate its elements in detail.

The position of Phoenicia, as we have seen, was most favorable for the exchange of the produce of the East and West. Persians, Lydians, and Lycians frequently served as mercenaries in the Phoenician armies (Eze 27:10-11). Phoenicia exported wine to Egypt (Herod. 3:5, 6). Purple garments were best manufactured in Tyre (Amati, De Restitutione Purpurarunm, 3d ed. Casenee, 1784). Glass was made in Sidon and Sarepta (comp. Heeren, page 86 sq.; Beck, page 593 sq.). In Phoenicia was exchanged the produce of all known countries. After David had vanquished the Edomites and conquered the coasts of the Red Sea, king Hiram of Tyre entered into a confederacy with Solomon, by which he insured for his people the right of navigation to India. The combined fleet of the Israelites and Phoenicians sailed from the seaports of Ezion-geber and Elath. These ports were situated on the eastern branch of the Red Sea, the Sinus Elaniticus, or Gulf of Akabah. Israelitish-Phoenician mercantile expeditions proceeded to Ophir, perhaps Abhira, situated at the mouth of the Indus (comp. Lassen, Indische Alterthumskunde [Bonn, 1844], 1:537 sq.). It seems, however, that the Indian coasts in general were also called Ophir. Three years were required in order to accomplish a mercantile expedition to Ophir and to return with cargoes of gold, algum-wood, ivory, silver, monkeys, peacocks, and other Indian produce. Some names of these products are Indian transferred into Hebrew, as אלמגים, almuggim, Sanscr. valgu, or, according to the Decanic pronunciation, valgum; שןאּבּים, shen-habbim (ivory), Sanscr. קוŠ; ' koph (ape), Sanscr. kapi; תוכיים, tukkiyim (peacock), Sanscr. cikhi, according to the Decanic pronunciation (comp. 1Ki 9:27; 1Ki 10:11,22). SEE OPHIR. It seems, however, that these mercantile expeditions to India were soon given up, probably on account of the great difficulty of navigating the Red Sea. King Jehoshaphat endeavored to recommence these expeditions, but his fleet was wrecked at Ezion-geber (1Ki 22:48). The names of mercantile establishments on the coasts of Arabia along the Persian Gulf have partly been preserved to the present day. In these places the Phoenicians exchanged the produce of the West for that of India, Arabia, and Ethiopia. Arabia especially furnished incense, gold, and precious stones. The Midianites (Ge 37:28) and the Edomites (Eze 27:16) effected the transit by their caravans. The fortified Idumaean town Petra probably contained the storehouses in which the produce of southern countries was collected. From Egypt the Phoenicians exported especially byssus (verse 7) for wine. According to an ancient tradition, the tyrant of Thebes, Busiris, having soiled his hands with the blood of all foreigners, was killed by the Tyrian Hercules. This indicates that Phoenician colonists established themselves and their civilization successfully in Upper Egypt, where all strangers had usually been persecuted. At a later period Memphis was the place where, most of the Phoenicians in Egypt were established. Phoenician inscriptions found in Egypt prove that even under the Ptolemies the intimate connection between Phoenicia and Egypt still existed (comp. Gesenii Monumenta Phoenicia, 13:224 sq.). From Palestine the Phoenicians imported, besides wheat, especially from Judaea, ivory, oil, and balm; also wool, principally from the neighboring nomadic Arabs. Damascus furnished wine (Eze 27:5-6,17-18,21), and the mountains of Syria wood. The tribes about the shores of the Caspian Sea furnished slaves and iron; for instance, the Tibaraeans (תובל, Tubal) and Moschi (ִמשׁ, Meshech). Horsemen, horses, and mules came from the Armenians (תגרמה, Togarmah) (see Heeren, pages 86-130). The treasures of the East were exported from Phoenicia by ships which sailed first to Cyprus. the mountains of which are visible from the Phoenician coast. Citium was a Phoenician colony in Cyprus, the name of which was transferred to the whole of Cyprus, and even to some neighboring islands and coasts called כתים (Ge 10:4; Isa 23:1,12). Hence also חתים, the name of a Canaanitish or Phoenician tribe (Gesenii Monumenta Phoenicia, page 153). Cyprus was subject to Tyre up to the time of Alexander the Great. There are still found Phoenician inscriptions which prove the connection of Cyprus with Tyre. At Rhodes (רדנים) also are found vestiges of Phoenician influence. From Rhodes the mountains of Crete are visible. This was of great importance for the direction of navigators, before the discovery of the compass. In Crete, and also in the Cycladic and Sporadic Isles, are the vestiges of Phoenician settlements. On the Isle of Thasos, on the southern coast of Thrace, the Phoenicians had gold-mines; and even on the southern shores of the Black Sea they had factories. However, when the Greeks became more powerful, the Phoenicians sailed more in other directions. They occupied also Sicily and the neighboring islands, but were, after the Greek colonization, confined to a few towns, Motya, Soloes, Panormus (Thucydides, 6:2). The Phoenician mercantile establishments in Sardinia and the Balearic Isles could scarcely be called colonies. Carthage was a Phoenician colony, which probably soon became important by commerce with the interior of Africa, and remained connected with Tvre by means of a common sanctuary. After Phoenicia had been vanquished by the Assyrians. Babylonians, and Persians, the settlements in Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain came into the power of Carthage. The Phoenicians had for a long period exported from Spain gold, silver, tin, iron, lead (Eze 38:13), fruit, wine, oil, wax, fish, and wool. Their chief settlement was Tarshish, תרשׁישׁ, subjection, from the root רשׁשׁ, he vanquished, subjected. The Aramaeans pronounced תרתישׁ ; hence the Greek Tartessos. This was probably the name of a town situated to the west of the Pillars of Hercules (Calpe and Abyla, now Gibraltar and Ceuta), and even more west than Gades, at the mouth of the Baetis (Herod. 4:62; Scymnus Chius, 5:161 sq.). This river was also called Tartessus (Arist. Meteor. 1:13; Pausan. 6:19, 3; Strabo, 3, page 148). At a later period the town of Tartessus obtained likewise the Phoenician name Carteja, from קרת, town (Strabo, 3, page 151). There are other names of towns in Spain which have a Phoenician derivation: Gades, גדר, septum, fence (comp. Gesenii Monumenta Phoenicia, page 304 sq., 349); Malaga (מלח), on account of much salt fish thence exported; or, according to Gesenius (id. page 312 sq., and 353), from מלאכהאּמלכה, officinaf abrorum, iron-works, or manufactory of other metals, on account of the mines to be found there; Belon, בעלה, civitas, city (id. page 311 sq., and 348). The voyage to Tarshish was the most important of those undertaken by the Phoenicians. Hence it was that their largest vessels were all called ships of Tarshish, although they sailed in other directions (1Ki 10:22). It appears also that the Phoenicians exported tin from the British Isles, and amber from the coasts of Prussia. Their voyages on the western coasts of Africa seem to have been merely voyages of discovery, without permanent results. The Spanish colonies were probably the principal sources of Phoenician wealth, and were founded at a very remote period. The migration of the Phoenician, Cadmus, into Bceotia likewise belongs to the earlier period of Phoenician colonization. Homer seems to know little of the Sidonian commerce; which fact may be explained by supposing that the Phoenicians avoided all collision and competition with the increasing power of the Greeks, and preferred to direct their voyages into countries where such compe tition seemed to be improbable. Herodotus describes the Phoenicians as beginning soon after their settlement to occupy themselves in distant voyages (1:1). From the construction of rude rafts, they must speedily have reached to a style of substantial ship-building. Their commercial vessels are represented either as long in shape, and fitted both for sailing and being rowed with fifty oars — "ships of Tarshish;" or as rounder in form, and more capacious in stowage, but slower in speed- tubs or coasting-vessels — bearers of cargo on short voyages. Xenophon (Economics, 8) passes a high eulogy on a Phoenician ship — "the greatest quantity of tackling was disposed separately in the smallest stowage." Their merchantmen also carried arms for defence, and had figures on their prows, which the Greeks named πάταικοι. They steered by the Cynosure, or the last star in Ursa Minor; and they could cast reckonings, from the combined application of astronomy and arithmetic (Strabo, 16:2, 24). This nautical application of astronomy is ascribed by Callimachus to Thales, a Phcenician by descent (Frag. ed. Blomfield, page 213; Diog. Laert. Thales). Lebanon supplied them with abundance of timber, and Cyprus gave them all necessary equipments, from the keel to the topsails — "a fundamento ipso carinee ad supremos ipsos carbasos" (Amm. Marcell. 14:8-14). These daring Phoenician navigators in the reign of Pharaoh — Necho circumnavigated Africa — departing from the Red Sea and returning by the Strait of Gibraltar. They reported that in sailing round Libya they had the sun on their right hand — a story of which Herodotus says, "I, for my part, do not believe them," and yet it is the positive proof that they had gone round the Cape (Herod. 4:42). Diodorus speaks also of Phoenician mariners — being driven westwards beyond the Pillars of Hercules into the ocean, and reaching at length a very fertile and beautiful island — "a dwelling of gods rather than of men" — one probably of the Azores or Canary Islands. The Phoenicians furnished to Xerxes 300 ships, but they were defeated at Salamis. It is said that of all the nations employed in digging the famous canal across the isthmus of Athos, they alone had sufficient engineering skill to begin its banks on their section at a slope, and thus prevent caving in (7:23). The remote periods of Phoenician commerce and colonization are wrapped in myths. Phoenician ships may have first carried the produce of Assyria and Egypt but their own wares and manufactures were soon largely exported by them (Ezekiel 28). The commerce of Tyre reached through the world (Strabo, 3:5, 11). There was also a great trade in the tunny fisheries, and the Tyrians sold fish in Jerusalem (Ne 13:16). Phoenicia excelled in the manufacture of the purple dye extracted from the shell-fish murex, so abundant on parts of its coasts. This color in its richest hue was at length appropriated to imperial use, and the silk so dyed was of extraordinary value. The glass of Sidon was no less famous than the Tyrian dye — the fine white sand used for the process being very abundant near Mount Carmel. Glass has been found in Nineveh, and glass-blowing is figured at Beni-Hassan in Egypt. The art might have come from Egypt, but the discovery in Phoenicia is represented as accidental. The pillar of emerald shining brightly in the night, which Herodotus speaks of as being in the temple of Hercules, was probably a hollow cylinder of glass with a lamp within it (Kenrick, Phenicia, page 249). Phoenicia produced also drinking-cups of silver and gold. Homer describes Sidon as abounding in works of brass. Its building- stone was not of very good quality, but cedar-wood was largely employed. When stone was used the joints were bevelled — a practice which also characterizes Hebrew architecture, and gives it a panelled appearance. The mining operations of the Phoenicians were also celebrated. Herodotus says they turned a mountain over ἐν τῇ ζητήσει — in the search for gold. Mines were wrought in the various colonies — in the Grecian islands and in Spain — by processes much the same as those employed in more modern times. The marine knowledge and experience of Phoenicia led to the plantation of numerous colonies in Cyprus, Rhodes, Cilicia, and the islands of the AEgean-the Cyclades and Sporades (Thucyd. 1:8) — in Sicily, in Sardinia, the Balearic Islands, and in Spain. Strabo says that the Phoenicians possessed the best parts of Iberia before the days of Homer (3:22, 14). One principal colony was in Northern Africa, and Strabo asserts that they occupied the middle part of Africa soon after the Trojan war. The story of Dido and the foundation of Carthage is well known, the event being placed by some in B.C. 813. Byrsa, the name of the hill on which the city was built, denotes a fortress, being בָּצרָה. (Bozrah), the name also of the Idumaean capital; though its Greek form, Βύρσα, gave rise to the story about the purchase of as much land as a hide would measure. Carthage means "new town" (קרת חדשה), and Punici is only another spelling of Phuonici. Intercourse with many strange and untutored races led the Phoenicians to indulge in fictions, and love of gain taught them mercantile deceits and stratagems. "Phoenician figment" — ψεῦσμα φοινικικόν — or a traveller's tale, was proverbial in former times, likefides Punica at a later period (Strabo, 12, page 55). The Etymologium Magnum bluntly φοινικικόν by τὸ ψεῦδος, the lie. In the Odyssey they are described as "crafty" ναυσίκλυτοι (Odyss. 13:415), or as "crafty and wicked." As a trading nation they were ready sometimes to take advantage of the ignorant and savage tribes with which they bartered, and they cared nothing for law or right on the high seas, where no power could control or punish; so that Ulysses uses the phrase Φοίνιξ ἀνὴρ ἀρατήλια εἰδὼς τρώκτης, "a Phoenician man knowing deceitful things — crafty" (id. 14:285). The term "Canaan," "Canaanite," or "man of Canaan," the native name of the Phoenician, is sometimes rendered "merchant" in the English version (Isa 23:8; Zep 1:11; Job 41:6; Pr 31:24; Zec 14:21; Ho 12:7; Eze 17:4). "Phoenician" and "merchant" were thus interchangeable terms; so that Φοῖνιξ γίνομαι means, "I become a trader." But the phrase seems to have sunk in moral meaning, and trader was but another name for a hucksterer, or a pedler going from house to house, as in Pr 31:24. Nay, the prophet Hosea (12:7) says, "He is a Canaanite," or "Phenician," or "as for Canaan, the balances of deceit are in his hand: he loveth to oppress. And Ephraim said, Yet am I become rich, I have found me out substance." A common proverb expressive of fraud matching fraud was Σύροι πρὸς Φοίνικας. No coined money of Phoenicia is extant prior to its subjugation by the Greeks. The standard seems to have been the same as the Jewish; the shekel being equal to the Attic tetradrachm; and the zuz, which occurs on the tablet of Marseilles, being of the value of a denarius. On the same tablet keseph (silver) occurs, with the probable ellipse of "shekel," as in Hebrew. Foreign silver money (זר) is also there referred to. Among the antiquities dug up in Nineveh are several bronze weights in the form of lions; having both cuneiform legends with the name of Sennacherib, and also Phoenician or cursive Shemitic inscriptions (Layard, Nin. and Bab. page 601). The cor was a Phoenician measure, the same as the Hebrew chomer, and holding ten Attic metretee.each metretes being equal to about ten and a half gallons. The arithmetical notation was carried out by making simple strokes for the units; 10 was a horizontal stroke or a semicircle, and 100

was a special sign, the unit strokes added to it denoting additional hundreds (Gesenii Monumenta Phoenicia, page 85).

It appears almost incredible how, with the comparatively small knowledge of natural science which we must attribute to them, the Phoenicians could thus on theirfrail rafts traverse the wide seas almost from one end of the globe to the other, with apparently no more difficulty than their inland caravans, their chapmen and dealers, found in traversing the neighboring countries. Yet it must not, on the other hand, be forgotten that theirs appears to have been an uncommon knowledge of astronomy and physical geography — witness their almost scientifically planned voyage of discovery under Hiram — and that, above all, an extraordinary amount of practical sense, of boldness, shrewdness, unscrupulousness, untiring energy, and happy genius, went far to replace some of the safe contrivances with which modern discoveries have made our mariners familiar. These qualities also made and kept them the unrivalled masters of ancient commerce and navigation. They were, moreover, known rather to destroy their own ships and endanger their lives than let others see their secret way and enterprise; and it would be very surprising if theirs had not been also the greatest discoveries, the greatest riches and splendor and power for many a long century, though they owned but a small strip of country at home. Well might Tyre once say, "I am of perfect beauty" (Eze 27:3), and the prophet address Sidon, "Behold, thou art wiser than Daniel, there is no secret they can hide from thee: with thy wisdom and thine understanding thou hast gotten thee riches, and hast gotten gold and silver into thy treasures: by thy great wisdom and by thy traffic hast thou increased thy riches, and thine heart is lifted up because of thy riches" (28:3-5). There can, indeed, not be fancied a fuller and more graphic account of the state of Phoenicia, especially as regards her commercial relations, than the two chapters of Ezekiel (27 and 28) containing the lamentation on Tyre: which, indeed, form our chief information onl this point.

In regard to Phoenician trade, as connected with the Israelites, the following points are worthy of notice.

(1.) Up to the time of David, not one of the twelve tribes seems to have possessed a single harbor on the sea-coast: it was impossible, therefore, that they could become a commercial people. It is true that according to Jg 1:31, combined with Jos 19:26, Accho or Acre, with its excellent harbor, had been assigned to the tribe of Asher; but from the same passage in Judges it seems certain that the tribe of Asher did not really obtain the possession of Acre, which continued to be held by the Canaanites. However wistfully, therefore, the Israelites might regard the wealth accruing to their neighbors the Phoenicians from trade, to vie with them in this respect was out of the question. But from the time that David had conquered Edom, an opening for trade was afforded to the Israelites. The command of Ezion-geber, near Elath, in the land of Edom, enabled them to engage in the navigation of the Red Sea. As they were novices, however, at sailing, as the navigation of the Red Sea, owing to its currents, winds, and rocks, is dangerous even to modern sailors, and as the Phoenicians, during the period of the independence of Edom, were probably allowed to trade from Ezion-geber, it was politic in Solomon to permit the Phoenicians of Tyre to have docks and build ships at Ezion- geber on condition that his sailors and vessels might have the benefit of their experience. The results seem to have been strikingly successful. The Jews and Phoenicians made profitable voyages to Ophir in Arabia or India, whence gold was imported into Judaea in large quantities; and once in three years still longer voyages were made, by vessels which may possibly have touched at Ophir, though their imports were not only gold, but likewise silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks (1Ki 10:22). SEE TARSHISH. There seems at the same time to have been a great direct trade with the Phoenicians for cedar-wood (verse 27), and generally the wealth of the kingdom reached an unprecedented point. If the union of the tribes had been maintained, the whole sea-coast of Palestine would have afforded additional sources of revenue through trade; and perhaps even ultimately the "great plain of Sidon" itself might have formed part of the united empire. But if any possibilities of this kind existed, they were destroyed by the disastrous secession of the ten tribes; a heavy blow from which the Hebrew race has never yet recovered during a period of nearly 3000 years.

(2.) After the division into two kingdoms, the curtain falls on any commercial relation between the Israelites and Phoenicians until a relation is brought to notice, by no means brotherly, as in the fleets which navigated the Red Sea, nor friendly, as between buyers and sellers, but humiliating and exasperating, as between the buvers and the bought. The relation is meant which existed between the two nations when Israelites were sold as slaves by Phoenicians. It was a custom in antiquity, when one nation went to war against another, for merchants to be present in one or other of the hostile camps, in order to purchase prisoners of war as slaves. Thus at the time of the Maccabees, when a large army was sent by Lysias to invade and subdue the land of Judah, it is related that "the merchants of the country, hearing the fame of them, took silver and gold very much with servants, and came into the camp to buy the children of Israel for slaves" (1 Macc. 3:41); and when it is related that at the capture of Jerusalem by Antiochus Epiphanes, the enormous number of 40,000 men were slain in battle, it is added that there were "no fewer sold than slain" (2 Macc. 5:14; Credner's Joel, page 240). Now this practice, which is thus illustrated by details at a much later period. undoubtedly prevailed in earlier times (Odyssey, 15:427; Herod. 1:1), and is alluded to in a threatening manner against the Phoenicians by the prophets (Joe 3:4, and Am 1:9-10), about B.C. 800. The circumstances which led to this state of things may be thus explained. After the division of the two kingdoms there is no trace of any friendly relations between the kingdom of Judah and the Phoenicians: the interest of the latter rather led them to cultivate the friendship of the kingdom of Israel; and the Israelitish king, Ahab, had a Sidonian princess as his wife (1Ki 16:31). Now, not improbably in consequence of these relations, when Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, endeavored to restore the trade of the Jews in the Red Sea, and for this purpose built large ships at Ezion-geber to go to Ophir for gold, he did not admit the Phoenicians to any participation in the venture, and when king Ahaziah, Ahab's son, asked to have a share in it, his request was distinctly refused (22:48,49). That attempt to renew the trade of the Jews in the Red Sea failed, and in the reign of Jehoram, Jehoshaphat's son, Edom revolted from Judah and established its independence; so that if the Phoenicians wished to despatch trading-vessels from Ezion-geber, Edom was the power which it was mainly their interest to conciliate, and not Judah. Under these circumstances the Phoenicians seem, not only to have purchased and to have sold again as slaves, and probably in some instances to have kidnapped inhabitants of Judah, but even to have sold them to their enemies the Edomites (Joel, Amos, as above). This was regarded with reason as a departure from the old brotherly covenant, when Hiram was a great lover of David, and subsequently had the most friendly commercial relations with David's son; and this may be considered as the original foundation of the hostility of the Hebrew prophets towards Phoenician Tyre (Isa 23; Eze 28).

(3.) The only other notice in the Old Testament of trade between the Phoenicians and the Israelites is in the account given by the prophet Ezekiel of the trade of Tyre (Eze 27:17). While this account supplies valuable information respecting the various commercial dealings of that most illustrious of Phoenician cities, SEE TYRE, it likewise makes direct mention of the exports to it from Palestine. These were wheat, honey (i.e., sirup of grapes), oil, and balm. The export of wheat deserves attention [concerning the other exports, SEE BALM; SEE HONEY; SEE OIL, ] because it shows how important it must have been to the Phoenicians to maintain friendly relations with their Hebrew neighbors, and especially with the adjoining kingdom of Israel. The wheat is called wheat of Minnith (q.v.), which was a town of the Ammonites, on the other side of the Jordan, only once mentioned elsewhere in the Bible: and it is not certain whether Minnith was a great inland emporium, where large purchases of corn were made, or whether the wheat in its neighborhood was peculiarly good, and gave its name to all wheat of a certain fineness in quality. Still, whatever may be the correct explanation respecting Minnith, the only countries specified for exports of wheat are Judah and Israel, and it was through the territory of Israel that the wheat would be imported into Phoenicia. It is suggested by Heeren (in his Historical Researches, 2:117) that the fact of Palestine being thus, as it were, the granary of Phoenicia, explains in the clearest manner the lasting peace that prevailed between the two countries. He observes that with many of the other adjoining nations the Jews lived in a state of almost continual warfare; but that they never once engaged in hostilities with their nearest neighbors the Phoenicians. The fact itself is certainly worthy of special notice; and is the more remarkable, as there were not wanting tempting occasions for the interference of the Phoenicians in Palestine if they desired it. When Elijah at the brook Kishon, at the distance of not more than thirty miles in a straight line from Tyre, put to death 450 prophets of Baal (1Ki 18:40), we can well conceive the agitation and anger which such a deed must have produced at Tyre. At Sidon, more especially, which was only twenty miles farther distant from the scene of slaughter, the first impulse of the inhabitants must have been to march forth at once in battle array to strengthen the hands of Jezebel, their own princess, in behalf of Baal, their Phoenician god. When again afterwards, by means of falsehood and treachery, Jehu was enabled to massacre the worshippers of Baal in the land of Israel, we cannot doubt that the intelligence was received in Tyre, Sidon, and the other cities of Phoenicia, with a similar burst of horror and indignation to that with which the news of the massacre on St. Bartholomew's day was received in all Protestant countries; and there must have been an intense desire in the Phoenicians, if they had the power, to invade the territories of Israel without delay and inflict signal chastisement on Jehu (2Ki 10:18-28). The fact that Israel was their granary would undoubtedly have been an element in restraining the Phoenicians, even on occasions such as these; but probably still deeper motives were likewise at work. It seems to have been part of the settled policy of the Phoenician cities to avoid attempts to make conquests on the continent of Asia. For this there were excellent reasons in the position of their small territory, which, with the range of Lebanon on one side as a barrier, and the sea on the other, was easily defensible by a wealthy power having command of the sea, against second or third rate powers, but for the same reason was not well situated for offensive war on the land side. It mav be added that a pacific policy was their manifest interest as a commercial nation, unless by war they were morally certain to obtain an important accession of territory, or unless a warlike policy was an absolute necessity to prevent the formidable preponderance of any one great neighbor. At last, indeed, they even carried their system of non-intervention in continental wars too far, if it would have been possible for them by any alliances in Syria and Coele-Syria to prevent the establishment on the other side of the Lebanon of one great empire. For from that moment their ultimate doom was certain, and it was merely a question of time as to the arrival of the fatal hour when they would lose their independence. But too little is known of the details of their history to warrant an opinion as to whether they might at any time by any course of policy have raised up a barrier against the empire of the Assyrians or Chaldees. SEE COMMERCE.

The impulse given to industry and the arts by this almost unparalleled extension of the commercial sphere of the Phoenicians was enormous. Originally exporters or traders only for the wares of Egypt and Assyria, they soon began to manufacture these wares themselves, and drew the whole world into their circle of commerce. As to the early and most extensive commercial intercourse between Phoenicia and Greece and her colonies, nothing can be more striking than the circumstance of nearly all the Greek names for the principal objects of Oriental commerce being Phoenician, or rather Shemitic; identical, almost, with the terms found in the Old Testament. The descriptions of the abundance of precious metals verge on the fabulous. Thus, the Phoenicians are supposed to have made even their anchors of silver, when they first discovered the mines, not knowing how to stow away all the silver in their vessel. What must have been the state of these mines is clear from the fact that even in the Roman time 40,000 men were constantly employed as miners, and the state received a clear revenue of 20,500 drachms daily. The "Fortunate Islands," which, according to Diodorus, they discovered after many days' sailing along the coast of Africa, beyond the Pillars of Hercules, and which, to judge from the name Purpurariae given to some islands off the coast of Mauritania, would seem to have been the Canaries, yielded them the shell- fish purpura, so useful for their dyeing manufactories. Besides their wholesale commerce carried on by fleets and caravans, they also appear to have' gone about the interior of Syria and Palestine, retailing their home or foreign produce. What degree of perfection they had reached in metallurgy may be seen in the minute description of the mining process contained in Job (Job 28:1-11), probably derived from mines which they worked in the Lebanon, Cyprus, Thasos, Iberia, Tartessus, and wherever a trace of metal was found. That they had acquired a high standing in what we should call the fine arts may be gathered from the fact that not only architects, but skilful workers of all kinds, for the adornment and embellishment of the Temple, were sent for by Solomon when he intended to fulfil the task his father David had set himself, in all the magnificence and splendor worthy of his golden reign. Their sculptures — what there has been found of them-do not, it is true. give us a very high notion of their artistic perfection; but, for all we know, these may be only the archaic beginnings, or the remnants of a corrupt age or unskilful hands. Better things may come to light any day. There certainly exist some exceedingly skilful engravings of theirs on gems among the Assyrian remnants. We further know (comp. the gold-edged silver bowl, for instance, given to Telemachus by Menelaos, which had been previously given to Hephaestos by the king of the Sidonians; the silver vase offered by Achilles as a prize at the funeral games for Patroclus; the columns and the magnificent vessels cast for the Temple of Jerusalem by Tyrian artists, and the like) that they manufactured all kinds of beautiful vessels and ornaments in gold, silver, and ivory, and knew how to extract perfumes from the lily and cypress; but, as in every other respect, they must in this province also be declared to have been only the skilful appropriators of the knowledge of others, of which, however, they made use with a diligence and perseverance entirely unparalleled.

In broadly recapitulating the routes their vessels took around the earth, we have indicated the line of their colonization. We cannot do more in this place than hint at the wanderings of Baal (q.v.), Astarte (q.v.), and Melkarth (q.v.), as the principal allegories in which the myth couched the primitive traditions of their settlements abroad. The whole of the Mediterranean, with its islands and coast, had been made theirs by rapid strides. Commencing with neighboring Cyprus, they proceeded to Cythium, to Rhodes, Crete, the Cycladic and Sporadic Isles, Cilicia, Lycia, and Caria, Chios, Samos, Tenedos, Bithynia, the Euxine, Samothrace, Lemnos, Thasos (whither they had come "in search of Europa"), Boeotia, and Euboea. More difficult was the occupation of Sicily and the neighboring islands, where Motya, Machanetti, Panormus, and other cities, testify to their successful settlements. Thence also, by way of Malta, they sailed to Africa, and founded Carthage, which afterwards possessed herself of all the colonies in Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain. In Sardinia and the Balearic Islands they had commercial establishments at Caralis (Cagliari), Minorca, Iviza, Elba. Spain was one of their earliest and principal settlements, where they founded Cadiz, Malago, Belon, Abdarach, and other cities. It is also more than probable, although we have no distinct evidence on the point, that they had colonies in the tin districts of Cornwall and the Scilly Isles, as also on the Baltic. They settled, further, both on the north-west coast of Africa (Mauritania, Cerne), and on its north coast (Hippo, Utica, Leptis, Hadrumetum). How far Phcenicians may have had a more than temporary sojourn in India (Ophir =? Abhira), whither they went by way of the Red Sea, we are unable to determine at present.

5. Religion. — The same lack of genuine and authentic information, of which we have spoken before, baffles our endeavors to arrive at anything like a proper understanding of the real character of the religion of the Phcenicians. The mutilated scraps contained in classical writers can be of as little use for its full reconstruction as the uncertain allusions of the Bible. As to Sanchoniatho. extracts of whose Phoenician writings (in Philo of Byblus's Greek version) are, as has been mentioned above, supposed to have survived in Eusebius, all that can be said regarding them is that we have more than ample reasons to suspect both the author, the translator, and the Church father, not of wilful misinterpretation, but of a certain want of candor in doing that full and fair justice to both sides which we expect from a historian of our day. A few broken votive and sacrificial stones, a few coins and unshapely images, make up the rest of our sources of information for the present. A few years hence, however, we may, if our excavations are carried on with unflagging zeal, and are as successful as they have been of late years, have as ample a supply to work upon as we have now respecting the once-hardly fifteen years ago-much more unknown land of Nebuchadnezzar and Sennacherib, if not with respect even to Greece and Rome. It will be sufficient here to indicate that Phoenician, like Canaanitic religion, in general consisted in a worship of the powers of nature under their favorable or creative (=female), and unfavorable or destroying, yet also begetting ( =male) aspects. Still more concretely were these represented in the different phases of life, as child (Adonis), youth (Esmun), man (Baal-Hercules), or old man (Belitan); again, as kings (Moloch) or queens (Astarte), and other characters most fitting to the idea symbolized in them. Their chief (visible) representatives — the sun, the moon, the planets, and the elements were revered as supreme deities, who, at the same time, were also the special Numina of particular tribes; places, and seasons, and some of their general designations, such as King (ִמל), Lord (אדון), Almighty (אל), etc., are also found in the Bible. To the supreme class of deities (עליונים ועליונות:) belong Baal and Astarte, with their different attributes and ramifications, e.g. Baalsamim, בעל שמים Ζεύς Ο᾿λύμπιος, Optimus Maximus, Baalitan, Baal Ram, Baal Mon; Baal Melkarth, מל ִקרתא , king of the city (Tyre); Astarte=Tanith, תנת, generally with the epithet רבת, the great one, who appears identical with the Egypto-Persian warand moon-goddess Tanaith. Corresponding to this triad in the Syro-Sidonian worship, we meet in Northern Phoenicia with the two Sidonian tribes: El (אל) or Kronos, the founder of Byblus and Berytus; Baaltis (בעלתי, my lady) Aphrodite (Astronoe, Beruth); and Adonis (Gauas, Eljun, Esmun, etc.). Besides other well-known deities, such as Moloch and Dagon (Derketo, Atergatis) — for all of which we refer to the special articles treating of them — we find a certain mysterious number of minor gods, variously denominated the strong ones (Kabiri), or the children of the Just One (Zadik, כביר צדיק), the principal patrons of the seafarers, worshipped alike by all the Phoenician tribes (Dioscuri, Paetaci: Chusor- Phtha [Chusartis], Astarte, Cadmus [קדם] or Taaut, Adod, and principally Esmun [אשמן =JEsculapius]). These, together with the infernal oi Chthonic deities, Muth (מות =death), further a goddess known only to us as " Persephone" (daughter of Jephta with the Samaritan Sichemites), or Dido (נדידה =the wandering one), or generally Elothi= my lady, my goddess, etc., are, as far as we know at present, the chief representatives of the Pheenician Pantheon, which, be it observed by the way, appears to have been almost as catholic in the reception of foreign deities as that of imperial Rome. Like the Greeks, and after them the Romans, the Phoenicians also deified certain natural phenomena and "elements" (sun, moon, stars, water, fire, earth, air), personal attributes, abstract ideas, allegories, the seasons of life, of the year, of the day, trades and professions, and even animals; probably as symbols only at first. The serpent (Agathodaemon, Esmun, Typhon), the bull (Ashteroth-Karnaim), the lion, the ass (symbol of Shemitic Baal-worship), the dog, fishes, doves, goats, etc., are found either representing divinities, or merely sacred to them. Anything like an investigation into the various phases of Phoenician mythology, which, stretching from the remotest prehistoric days far into the first Christian centuries, must needs contain the most contradictory, apparently irreconcilable, elements and data, lies beyond the scope of this article. We shall only mention that Sanchoniatho distinguishes — a sure sign of the consciousness on the part of native writers of the hopeless confusion in the religious notions and traditions of their time — three periods or aeras, with distinct circles of deities of special classes and families. The first period contains twelve families of gods. In the second three dynasties follow each other, and there are twenty-two supreme deities (according to the letters of the Phoenician alphabet), at the head of whom stands El or Kronos, etc., as follows:

א, El, Kronos. ב Baityl. ט, Astarte. ָע, Apollo. ג Dagon. י, Rhea. פ, Pontos. ד, Atlas. כ, Baaltis. צ, Typhon. ה, Persephone. ל, Heimarmeue. ק, Nereus. ו, Athene. מ, Hora. ר, Sido. ז, Zeus Demarus. נ, Kronos. ש, Poseidon. ִח, Sadid. ס, Zeus Belus. ת, Hadod.

Of the third period only fragments of Sanchoniatho have come down, but it would appear as if Zeus Belus had in this assumed the chief rank, equal to Kronos of the second period. These gods and goddesses were propitiated in various ways, but chiefly by sacrifices, which consisted on certain occasions of first-born male children (ִהעביר למול). Prostitution (זקדש) in honor of Astarte was considered another praiseworthy act. Among the rites of sacrifice and expiation must also be enumerated circumcision, which was not practiced with all the Phoenician tribes, but seems to have been a ceremony peculiar to the worshippers of El, the special deity of Berytus and Byblus. Whether, however, as has been held, it is to be considered analogous to this prostitution of virgins in the service of Astarte, we shall not here investigate. The country abounded with places of worship, for every grove and every height, every river and every well, were adapted for the purpose, if it could be fancied a dwelling-place for some deity. SEE IDOLATRY. Nor were special buildings (sanctuaries, temples), with all their accessories of arks and priests, wells and fires, wanting; as indeed the Phoenicians are supposed to have been the first who erected such permanent sanctuaries. Their construction was in accordance with their destination, which was not to be houses of prayer, but the seat of honor of the special deity. They were divided into two parts, the first of which contained the statues and symbols which were the objects of public worship. The second, the Adyton, on the other hand, contained such symbols which were not to be seen constantly, but were reserved for certain special festive occasions; besides the holy arks with their mystical contents, and the holy vehicles upon which these sacred objects were carried about. The walls were covered with the symbolical representations of the deities; and in this place also the priests kept their archives. Something of the abhorrence of all visible representations of the Deity which seems in the first stages of their existence to have filled the minds of all Shemitic nations — an abhorrence erroneously taken of late to indicate their monotheistic propensity (comp. Renan's and Munk's Inaugural Lectures) — is also noticeable with the Phoenicians, whose gods were legion. No paintings, statues, or other likenesses of deities are recorded as found in the ancient temples of Gades, Tyre, Samaria, Paphos, etc. There were, however, certain symbolical columns of wood, אשרים (for the female Numen, Astarte), of stone, מצבות (for Baal), of gold or emerald (חמנים), together with phallic representations, found in and before the Phoenician sanctuaries. Another kind of divine mementos, as it were, were the Betylia (בית אל), probably meteors, for which a fetich-like reverence was shown, and which were called by the names of Father, Mighty Father (אדרי אב אב), and at the time of Augustine there were still a number of priests engaged in Punic Africa to wait upon these idols and to elicit oracles from them (Eucaddirs). Among the principal festivals, with some of which, as with those of the Hebrews, were connected pilgrimages -from the farthest colonies even are the "awakening" and the "self-destruction by fire" of Hercules, a certain festival of "staves," a vintage-feast in honor of the Tyrian Bacchus, and certain others in honor of Astarte, celebrating her disappearance, flight, and wanderings, the Adonia, etc. An account of the different Phoenician gods named in the Bible will be found elsewhere (SEE ASHERAH; SEE ASHTAROTH; SEE BAAL, etc.), but it will be proper here to point out certain effects which the circumstance of their being worshipped in Phoenicia produced upon the Hebrews.

(1.) In the first place, their worship was a constant temptation to polytheism and idolatry. It is the general tendency of trade, by making merchants acquainted with different countries and various modes of thought, to enlarge the mind, to promote the increase of knowledge, and, in addition, by the wealth which it diffuses, to afford opportunities in various ways for intellectual culture. It can scarcely be doubted that, owing to these circumstances, the Phoenicians, as a great commercial people, were more generally intelligent, and as we should now say civilized, than the inland agricultural population of Palestine. When the simple-minded Jews, therefore, came in contact with a people more versatile and, apparently, more enlightened than themselves, but who nevertheless, either in a philosophical or in a popular form, admitted a system of polytheism, an influence would be exerted on Jewish minds, tending to make them regard their exclusive devotion to their own one God, Jehovah, however transcendent his attributes, as unsocial and morose. It is in some such way that we must account for the astonishing fact that Solomon himself, the wisest of the Hebrew race, to whom Jehovah is expressly stated to have appeared twiceonce, not long after his marriage with an Egyptian princess, on the night after his sacrificing 1000 burntofferings on the high place of Gibeon, and the second time after the consecration of the Temple-should have been so far beguiled by his wives in his old age as to become a Polytheist, worshipping, among other deities, the Phoenician or Sidonian goddess Ashtoreth (1Ki 3:1-5; 1Ki 9:2; 1Ki 11:1-5). This is not for a moment to be so interpreted as if he ever ceased to worship Jehovah, to whom he had erected the magnificent Temple, which in history is so generally connected with Solomon's name. Probably, according to his. own erroneous conceptions, he never ceased to regard himself as a loyal worshipper of Jehovah, but he at the same time deemed this not incompatible with sacrificing at the altars of other gods likewise. Still the fact remains that Solomon, who by his Temple in its ultimate results did so much for establishing the doctrine of one only God, became himself a practical Polytheist. If this was the case with him, polytheism in other sovereigns of inferior excellence can excite no surprise. With such an example before him, it is no wonder that Ahab, an essentially bad man, should after his marriage with a Sidonian princess not only openly tolerate, but encourage the worship of Baal; though it is to be remembered even in him that he did not disavow the authority of Jehovah, but, when rebuked by his great antagonist Elijah, he rent his clothes and put sackcloth on his flesh, and showed other signs of contrition evidently deemed sincere (1Ki 16:31; 1Ki 21:27-29). Finally, it is to be observed generally that although, before the reformation of Josiah (2 Kings 23), polytheism prevailed in Judah as well as Israel, yet it seems to have been more intense and universal in Israel, as might have been expected from its greater proximity to Phoenicia; and Israel is sometimes spoken of as if it had set the bad example to Judah (2Ki 17:19; Jer 3:8); though, considering the example of Solomon, this cannot be accepted as a strict historical statement.

(2.) The Phoenician religion was likewise in other respects deleterious to the inhabitants of Palestine, being in some points essentially demoralizing. For example, it sanctioned the dreadful superstition of burning children as sacrifices to a Phoenician god. "They have built also," says Jeremiah, in the name of Jehovah (Jer 19:5), "the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt-offerings unto Baal, which I commanded not, nor spake it, neither came it into my mind" (comp. Jer 32:35). This horrible custom was probably in its origin founded on the idea of sacrificing to a god what was most valuable in the eyes of the suppliant; but it could not exist without having a tendency to stifle natural feelings of affection, and to harden the heart. It could scarcely have been first adopted otherwise than in the infancy of the Phcenician race; but grown-up men and grown-up nations, with their moral feelings in other respects cultivated, are often the slaves in particular points of an early implanted superstition, and it is worthy of note that, more than two hundred and fifty years after the death of Jeremiah, the Carthaginians, when their city was besieged by Agathocles, offered as burntsacrifices to the planet Saturn, at the public expense, two hundred boys of the highest aristocracy; and, subsequently, when they had obtained a victory, sacrificed the most beautiful captives in the like manner (Diod. 20:14, 65). If such things were possible among the Carthaginians at a period so much later, it is easily conceivable how common the practice of sacrificing children may have been at the time of Jeremiah among the Phoenicians generally; and if this were so, it would have been certain to prevail among the Israelites who worshipped the same Phoenician gods; especially as, owing to the intermarriages of their forefathers with Canaanites, there were probably few Israelites who may not have had some Phoenician blood in their veins (Jg 3:5). Again, parts of the Phoenician religion, especially the worship of Astarte, tended to encourage dissoluteness in the relations of the sexes, and even to sanctify impurities of the most abominable description. Connected with her temples and images there were male and female prostitutes. whose polluted gains formed part of the sacred fund appropriated to the service of the goddess; and, to complete the deification of immorality, they were even known by the name of the "consecrated." Nothing can show more clearly how deeply this baneful example had eaten into the hearts and habits of the people, notwithstanding positive prohibitions and the repeated denunciations of the Hebrew prophets, than the almost incredible fact that, previous to the reformation of Josiah, this class of persons was allowed to have houses or tents close to the temple of Jehovah, whose treasury was perhaps even replenished by their gains (2Ki 23:7; De 23:17-18; 1Ki 14:24; 1Ki 15:12; 1Ki 22:46; Ho 4:14; Job 36:14; comp. Lucian, Lucius, c. 35; De Dea Syrd, c. 27, 51; Gesenius, Thesuarus, s.v. קָדֵשׁ, page 1196; Movers, Phon. 1:678, etc.; Spencer, De Legibus Hebraeorum, 1:561).

A few words may be added here on Phoenician theogony and cosmogony, which, as far as they are known to us, give evidence of the enormous amount of thought bestowed by the thinkers of that people on the enigma of creation. The Deity was, in accordance with the antique mind, presupposed. Speculation never questioned its eternal existence, the original quality of each of its two principal — male and female — sides, and the way in which, out of their union, sprang the universe. According to the system of Eudemus, Time, Desire, and Mist formed the first triad of existence; and from the embrace of the last two sprang air and "motion of air," out of which again was produced the mundane egg. The cosmogony, according to Sanchoniatho on the other hand, assumes, in the beginning of all things, a gloomy and agitated air, and a turbid chaos of thickest darkness, which for a long course of ages was without limits. The wind becoming enamoured with its own essence, Mot sprang into being, as a kind of thick, putrid fluid, which contained all germs. The first beings created from this were without intellect; and from them, again, came intellectual beings, Zopha-Semin (צופי שמים), watchmen, or beholders of the heavens. "And it began to shine Mot, also the sun and the moon, the stars and the great planets. The glowing sun, heating sea and earth, raised vapors, which produced clouds and winds, lightning and thunder, and at their crash the beings began to awake in terror, and male and female moved on land and sea." The wind Kolpia further produced with Baau (בֹּהוּ of Genesis) Aion and Protogonos, the first mortals. Aion first discovered the art of nutriment from fruit-trees; and their children, Genos and Genea, who dwelt in Phcenicia, first worshipped Baalsamin, or the sun. Genos begat Light, Fire, and Flame, out of whom came giants, Cassius, Libanus, Antilibanus, and Brathys. Their sons invented the art of constructing huts of reeds and meshes and the papyrus, and the art of making coverings for the body out of the skins of wild beasts. After them came the inventors of hunting and fishing, the discoverers of iron, of the art of navigation, etc. One of their descendants was Elyon (probably the Goda whose priest was Melchisedec, Ge 14:18, etc.; Abraham, in his reply to the king of Sodom, emphatically adds "Jehovah" to El-Elyon), who with his wife Beruth begat an Autochthon, afterwards called Uranos (heaven), and his sister Ge (earth). They had issue four sons, Ibis, Betylus, Dagon, and Atlas; and three daughters, Astarte, Rhea, and Dione. Chronos deposed his father, subsequently killed him, and travelled about in the world. He then assigned the whole of Phoenicia to Astarte, to Athene he gave Attica, and to Taut Egypt. The country being involved in war, he offered up his two sons, Jeud and Muth (מות, Pluto), in expiation. He afterwards bestowed the city of Byblus upon the goddess Baaltis (Dione), and Berytus upon Poseidon and the Kabiri. Taut made the first images of the countenances of the gods Chronos and Dagon, and formed the sacred characters of the other elements; and the Kabiri, the seven sons of Sydyc, and their eighth brother Asklepios, first set them down in memory. "Thabion," Eusebius (Pr. Ev. 1:10) continues, "the first hierophant, allegorized these things subsequently, and, mixing the facts with physical and mundane phenomena, he delivered them down to those that celebrated orgia, and to the prophets who presided over the mysteries, and to their successors, one of whom was Isiris, the inventor of three letters, the brother of Chna, the first Phoenician."

6. Language. — The most important intellectual invention of man, that of letters, was universally asserted by the Greeks and Romans to have been communicated by the Phoenicians to the Greeks. The earliest written statement on the subject is in Herodotus (5:57, 58), who incidentally, in giving an account of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, says that they were by race Gephyraeans; and that he had ascertained by inquiry that the Gephyraeans were Phoenicians, among those Phoenicians who came over with Cadmus into Bceotia, and instructing the Greeks in many other arts and sciences, taught them likewise letters. It was an easy step from this to believe, as many of the ancients believed, that the Phoenicians invented letters (Lucan, Pharsal. 3:220, 221). This belief, however, was not universal; and Pliny the Elder expresses his own opinion that they were of Assyrian origin, while he relates the opinion of Gellius that they were invented by the Egyptians, and of others that they were invented by the Syrians (Nat. Hist. 7:57). Now, as Phoenician has been shown to be nearly the same language as Hebrew, the question arises whether Hebrew throws any light on the time or the mode of the invention of letters, on the question of who invented them, or on the universal belief of antiquity that the knowledge of them was communicated to the Greeks by the Phoenicians. The answer is as follows: Hebrew literature is as silent as Greek literature respecting the precise date of the invention of letters, and the name of the inventor or inventors; but the names of the letters in the Hebrew alphabet are in accordance with the belief that the Phoenicians communicated the knowledge of letters to the Greeks: for many of the names of letters in the Greek alphabet, though without meaning in the Greek, have a meaning in the corresponding letters of Hebrew. For example: the first four letters of the Greek alphabet, Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, are not to be explained through the Greek language; but the corresponding first four letters of the Hebrew alphabet, viz. Aleph, Beth, Gimel, Daleth, being essentially the same words, are to be explained in Hebrew. Thus in Hebrew Aleph or Eleph means an ox; Beth or Bayith a house; Gamal, a camel; and Deleth a door. The same is essentially, though not always so clearly, the case with almost all the sixteen earliest Greek letters said to have been brought over from Phoenicia by Cadmus, Α Β Γ Δ Ε Γ Ι Κ Λ Μ Ν Ο Π Ρ Σ Τ; and called on this account Phoenician or Cadmeian letters (Herodot. l.c.; Pliny, Hist. Nat. 7:57; Jelf, Greek Gram. 1, page 2). The sixth letter, afterwards disused, and now generally known by the name of Digamma (from Dionysius, 1:20), was unquestionably the same as the Hebrew letter Vav (a hook). Moreover, as to writing, the ancient Hebrew letters, substantially the same as Phoenician, agree closely with ancient Greek letters — a fact which, taken by itself, would not prove that the Greeks received them from the Phoenicians, as the Phoenicians might possibly have received them from the Greeks; but which, viewed in conniection with Greek traditions on the subject, and with the significance of the letters in Hebrew, seems reasonably conclusive that the letters were transported from Phoenicia into Greece. It is true that modern Hebrew writing and the later Greek writing of antiquity have not much resemblance to each other; but this is owing partly to gradual changes in the writing of Greek letters, and partly to the fact that the character in which Hebrew Bibles are now printed, called the Assyrian or square character, was not the one originally in use among the Jews, but seems to have been learned in the Babylonian captivity, and afterwards gradually adopted by them on their return to Palestine (Gesenius, Gesch. der Hebraischen Sprache und Schrift, page 156). SEE ALPHABET.

As to the mode in which letters were invented, some clew is afforded by some of the early Hebrew and the Phoenician characters, which evidently aimed, although very rudely, like the drawing of very young children, to represent the object which the name of the letter signified. Thus the earliest Alpha has some vague resemblance to an ox's head, Gimel to a camel's back, Daleth to the door of a tent, Vav to a hook or peg. Again, the written letters, called respectively, Lamed (an ox-goad), Ayin (an eye), Qoph (the back of the head), Resh or Rosh (the head), and Tav (a cross), are all efforts, more or less successful, to portray the things signified by the names. It is said that this is equally true of Egyptian phonetic hieroglyphics; but, however this may be, there is no difficulty in understanding in this way the formation of an alphabet; When the idea of representing the component sounds or half-sounds of a word by figures was once conceived. But the original idea of thus representing sounds, though peculiarly felicitous, was by no means obvious, and millions of men have lived and died without its occurring to any one of them.

It may not be unimportant to observe that, although ro many letters of the Greek alphabet have a meaning in Hebrew or Phoenician, yet their Greek names are not in the Hebrew or Phoenician, but in the Aramaic form. There is a peculiar form of the noun in Aramaic called by grammarians the status emphaticus, in which. the termination a (א )is added to a noun, modifying it according to certain laws. Originally this termination was probably identical with the definite article "ha;" which, instead of being prefixed, was subjoined to the noun, as is the case now with the definite article in the Scandinavian languages. This form in a is found to exist in the oldest specimen of Aramaic in the Bible, Yegar sahadutha, in Ge 31:47, where sahaduth, testimony, is used by Laban in the status enmphaticus. Now it is worthy of note that the names of a considerable proportion of the "Cadmeian letters" in the Greek alphabet are in this Aramaic form. such as Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, Eta, Theta, Iota, Kappa, Lambda; and although this fact by itself is not sufficient to support an elaborate theory on the subject, it seems in favor, as far as it goes, of the conjecture that when the Greeks originally received the knowledge of letters, the names by which the several letters were taught to them were Aramaic. It has been suggested, indeed, by Gesenius, that the Greeks themselves made the addition in all these cases, in order to give the words a Greek termination, as "they did with other Phoenician words, as melet, μάλθα, nebel, νάβλα." If, however, a list is examined of Phoenician words naturalized in Greek, it will not be found that the ending in a has been the favorite mode of accommodating them to the Greek language. For example, of the words specified by Bleek (Einleitung in das A.T. page 69) as having been communicated through the Phoenicians to the Greeks (see above), it is remarkable that only four end in a in Greek which have not a similar termination in Hebrew; and of these four one is a late Alexandrian translation, and two are names of musical instruments, which, very probably. may first have been communicated to Greeks, through Syrians, in Asia Minor. Under any circumstances, the proportion of the Phoenician words which end in a in Greek is too small to warrant the inference that any common practice of the Greeks in this respect will account for the seeming fact that nine out of the sixteen Cadmneian letters are in the Aramaic status emphaticus. The inference, therefore, from their endings in a remains unshaken. Still this must not be regarded in any way as proving that the alphabet was invented by those who spoke the Aramaic language. This is a wholly distinct question, and far more obscure; though much deference on the point is due to the opinion of Gesenius, who, from the internal evidence of the names of the Shemitic letters, has arrived at the conclusion that they were invented by the Phoenicians (Paliographie, page 294). The strongest argument of Gesenius against the Aramaic invention of the letters is that, although doubtless many of the names are both Aramaic and Hebrew, some of them are not Aramaic — at least not in the Hebrew signification; while the Syrians use other words to express the same ideas.

Thus אלŠ in Aramaic means only 1000, and not an ox; the word for "door" in Aramaic is not דלת, but תרע; while the six following names of Cadmeian letters are not Aramaic: פא מִיַם יוֹד וו (Syr. פּוּם), קוֹŠ, תו.

As this obviously leads to the conclusion that the Hebrews adopted Phoenician as their own language, or, in other words, that what is called the Hebrew language was in fact "the language of Canaan," as a prophet called it (Isa 19:18), and this not merely poetically, but literally and in philological truth; and as this is repugnant to some preconceived notions respecting the peculiar people, the question arises whether the Israelites might not have translated Canaanitish names into Hebrew. On this hypothesis the names now existing in the Bible for persons and places in the land of Canaan would not be the original names, but merely the translations of those names. The answer to this question is,

1. That there is not the slightest direct mention, nor any indirect trace, in the Bible, of any such translation.

2. That it is contrary to the analogy of the ordinary Hebrew practice in other cases: as, for example, in reference to the names of the Assyrian monarchs (perhaps of a foreign dynasty) Pul, Tiglath-Pileser, Sennacherib, or of the Persian monarchs Darius, Ahasuerus, Artaxerxes, which remain unintelligible in Hebrew, and can only be understood through other Oriental languages.

3. That there is an absolute silence in the Bible as to there having been any difference whatever in language between the Israelites and the Canaanites, although in other cases where a difference existed that difference is somewhere alluded to, as in the case of the Egyptians (Ps 81:5; Ps 114:1), the Assyrians (Isa 20:6,6), and the Chaldees (Jer 5:15). Yet in the case of the Canaanites there was stronger reason for alluding to it; and without some allusion to it, if it had existed, the narration of the conquest of Canaan under the leadership of Joshua would have been singularly imperfect.

The Phoenician language, however, certainly belonged to that family of languages which, by a name not altogether free from objection, but now generally adopted, is called "Shemitic." Under this name are included three distinct branches:

a. Arabic, to which belongs AEthiopic as all offshoot of the Southern Arabic or Himyaritic.

b. Aramaic, the vernacular language of Palestine at the time of Christ. in which the few original words of Christ which have been preserved in writing appear to have been spoken (Mt 27:46; Mr 5:41; and mark especially Mt 16:18, which is not fully significant either in Greek or Hebrew). Aramaic, as used in Christian literature, is called Syriac, and as used in the writings of the Jews has been very generally called Chaldee.

c. Hebrew, in which by far the greater part of the Old Testament was composed. Now one of the most interesting points to the Biblical student connected with Phoenician, is, that it does not belong to either of the'first two branches, but to the third; and that it is in fact so closely allied to Hebrew that Phoenician and Hebrew, though different dialects, may practically be regarded as the same language. This may be shown in the following way:

(1.) In passages which have been frequently quoted (see especially Gesenii Monumenta Scripturae Linguaeque Phoenicie, page 231), testimony is borne to the kinship of the two languages by Augustine and Jerome, in whose time Phoenician or Carthaginian was still a living language. Jerome, who was a good Hebrew scholar, after mentioning, in his Commentaries on Jeremiah (lib. 5, c. 25) that Carthage was a Phoenician colony, proceeds to state, "Unde et Poeni sermone corrupto quasi Phoeni appellantur, quorum lingua Hebreaea linguse magna ex parte confinis est." Augustine, who was a native of Africa, and a bishop there of Hippo, a Tyrian colony, has left on record a similar statement several times. In one passage he says of the two languages, "Istse linguae non multum inter se differunt" (Quaestiones in Heptateuchum, 7:16). In another passage he says, "Cognatae sunt istse linguae et vicinae, Hebraea, et Punica, et Syra" (In Joann. Tract. 15). Again, on Ge 18:9, he says of a certain mode of speaking (Ge 8:9), "Locutio est, quam propterea Hebraeam puto, quia et Punicae linguae familiarissima est, in quamulta invenimus Hebraeis verbis consonantia" (lib. 1, cap. 24). On another occasion, remarking on the word Messias, he says, "Quod verbum Punicae linguae consonum est, sicut alia Hebraea multa et poene omnia" (Contra literas Petiliani, 2, c. 104).

(2.) These statements are fully confirmed by a passage of Carthaginian preserved in the Penulus of Plautus (act 5, scene 1), and accompanied by a Latin translation as part of the play. There is no doubt that the Carthaginians and the Phoenicians were the same race; and the Carthaginian extract is undenliably intelligible through Hebrew to Hebrew scholars (see Bochart's Canaan; and especially Gesenii Monumenta Phaeniiie, pages 357-382, where the passage is translated with notes, and full justice is done to the previous translation of Bochart).

(3.) The close kinship of the two languages is, moreover, strikingly confirmed by very many Phoenician and Carthaginian names of places and persons, which, destitute of meaning in Greek and Latin, through which languages they have become widely known, and having sometimes in those languages occasioned false etymologies, become really significant in Hebrew. Thus through Hebrew it is known that Tyre, as Ts6r, signifies "a rock," referring doubtless to the rocky island on which the city was situated: that Sidon, as Tsidon, means "Fishing" or "Fishery," which was probably the occupation of its first settlers: that Carthage, or, as it was originally called, "Carthada," means "New Town," or "Newton:" and that Byrsa, which, as a Greek name, suggested the mythological mythus of the Bull's Hide (AEneid, 1:366, 367), was simply the citadel of Carthage — "Carthaginis arcem," as Virgil accurately termed it: the Carthaginian name of it, softened by the Greeks into Βύρσα, being merely the Hebrew word Botsrah, "citadel;" identical with the word called Bozrah in the English Version of Isa 63:1. Again, through Hebrew, the names of celebrated Carthaginians, though sometimes disfigured by Greek and Roman writers, acquire a meaning. Thus Dido is found to belong to the same root as David, "beloved;" meaning "his love" or "delight:" i.e., the love or delight either of Baal or of her husband: Hasdrubal is the man "whose help Baal is:" Hamilcar the man whom the god "Milcar graciously granted" (comp. Hananeel; θεόδωρος): and, with the substitution of Baal for El or God. the name of the renowned Hannibal is found to be identical in form and meanifig with the name of Hanniel, who is mentioned in Nu 34:23 as the prince of the tribe of Manasseh: Hanniel meaning the grace of God, and Hannibal the grace of Baal.

(4.) The same conclusion arises from the examination of Phoenician inscriptions, preserved to the present day; all of which can be interpreted, with more or less certainty, through Hebrew. Some of these will be more particularly noticed below.

III. Literature. —

1. Original Remains. — With the exception of Greek and Latin, no language was so widely known and spoken throughout antiquity as the Phoenician; and monuments of it have been found, and contiuue to be found, almost all over the ancient world. We can only vaguely speculate on its early history and its various phases, so long as our materials yield so little information on that point. Its decline seems to date from the 8th century B.C., when Aramaisms crept in in overwhelming numbers. Finally, the close contact with, and the everywhere preponderating influence of the Greeks, superseded — chiefly after Alexander's time — the ancient language almost completely; and even coins with Phoenician legends occur not later than the 2d century B.C.

An important Phoenician literature seems to have been extant as late as the 1st century A.D., but it has disappeared from the face of the earth. After the second half of the 3d century the language had vanished entirely in the country itself, and Jerome, who lived in Palestine, mentions the Punic, but never the Phoenician. In the West it survived to a much later period. In Mauritania and Numidia it remained, in a corrupted form, the reigning tongue as late as the 4th century A.D.; and Augustine draws his explanations of Scripture from the Punic current in the 5th century. There was a translation of the whole Bible into Punic made for the use of the Punic churches; and in and near Tripolis it was the language of the common people up to a late period. From the 6th century, however, it rapidly died out, chiefly in consequence of the Vandals, Goths, Moors, and other foreign tribes overrunning the country, and ingrafting their own idioms upon it.

The literature of Phoenicia, in its original form, has, as we have said, perished entirely. What traces and fragments we have of it have survived in Greek translations. But from even these small remnants we can easily imagine the extreme antiquity, and the high importance and vast extent of these productions, which, at first, seem to have been chiefly of a theological or theogonical nature. Their authors are the gods themselves, and the writings are only accessible to the priests, and to those initiated in the mysteries. From the allegoridal explanations of these exalted personages sprang a new branch of sacred literature, of which those fragments of cosmogony mentioned above are derived. To the literary age of Taaut, Cadmus, Ophion, Esmun, etc., succeeded Thabion, Isiris, Sanchoniatho, and Mochus, who founded the schools of priests and prophets. These cultivated the sciences, chiefly the occult ones, magic, and the like. Nearest to the sacred literature stands didactic poetry, somewhat related to the Orphic, whose chief representatives are Sido, Jopas, etc. The erotic poetry is characterized as of a very sensuous nature, both in Phoenicia and the colonies. Of historians are mentioned Mochus, Hypsikrates (Sanchoniatho?) Theodotus, Philostratus, Menander, and others; but these are mere Greek versions of their Phoenician names, and absolutely nothing has been preserved of their writings. Punic literature is also frequently mentioned by Greek and Roman writers. Geography, history, agriculture, were the fields chiefly cultivated by the colonists of Carthage and the West generally.

The monuments that have come down to us, and which not only have enabled us to judge for ourselves of the religion, the language, and the manners of the Phoenicians, are either original, as legends on coins and lapidary inscriptions, or at second hand, as Phoenician proper nouns and texts imbedded in the works of ancient classical or sacred writers. The principal and ever-growing source for our information, however, is the monumental inscriptions, of whose existence, till the middle of the 18th century, nothing was known. The most numerous Phoenician remnants have been discovered in the colonies. Richard Pococke first found, on the site of ancient Citium (Larnaka of today), thirty-one (not thirty-three, as generally stated) Phoenician inscriptions, which he deposited at Oxford (published by Swinton, 1750). Malta, Sardinia, Carthage, Algiers, Tripolis, Athens, Marseilles, have each yielded a considerable number, so that altogether we are now in the possession of about one hundred and twenty monuments. either votive tablets or tomb inscriptions. The latest and most remarkable are those now in the British Museum, discovered at Carthage a few years ago by N. Davis, consisting of votive tablets, a (doubtful) tombstone, and a sacrificial tariff, which completes another stone found some years ago at Marseilles of the same nature; both setting forth the amount of taxes, or rather the proportionate share the priest was entitled to receive for each sacrifice. Another exceedingly valuable (trilingual) inscription, referring to the gift of an altar vowed to Eshmun-Asklepios, has lately been discovered in Sardinia (see below). One of the most important historical monuments is the sarcophagus of Eshmanasar II, king of Sidon (son of Tennes ?), found at Tyre in 1855, the age of which has variously been conjectured between the 11th century B.C. (Ewald) — a most incongruous guess indeed — the 7th (Hitzig), the 6th (due De Luynes), and the 4th (Levy), of which we shall add the commencement, literally translated:

"In the month of Bul, in the fourteenth year that I reigned, king Eshmanaiar, king of the Sidonians, son of king Tebuith, kingr of the Sidoilians — spake king Eshmanasar, king of the Sidonians, lsaying: Carried away before my time, in the flood of days — in dumbness ceases the soin of gods. Dead do I lie in this tonlm, in the glaeve, on the place which I havie built. 1 myself ordaiun tiat all the nobles and all the people shall not openi this place of rest; they shall not seek for treasures and not carry taway the sarcophmagus of my resting-place, and not disturb me by mounting the couch of my slumbers. If people should speak to thee [and pyersuade thee to the contralry], do not listen to them. For all the nobles and all the people who shall open this sarcophagus of the place of rest, or carry awayt the sarcophagus of my conch, or disturb me upon this resting- place, may they find no rest with the departed; may they not be buried in a tomb, and may no son and successor live after them in their place," etc. (see Thomson, Land and Book, 1:198 sq.).

The votive tablets bear the same character throughout, differing only with respect to the name of the man or woman who placed it in a certain sanctuary in accordance with his or her vow. Their material is mostly limestone or fine sandstone, rarely marble, and they vary from 5 to 15 inches in height, from 4 to 7 in width, and from 11 to 4 in thickness. Beginning in most cases with the dedication to the god or goddess, or both, thus: "[Sacred] To the god . . . [this tablet] which vowed N. son (daughter) of N. When he (she) heard my voice and blessed," or "hear my voice and bless;" etc. The sepulchral tablets generally run somewhat in this manner: "Stone erected to . . . who lived . . . years." Much yet remains to be done. Even the palaeographical side has, notwithstanding all the ready material, not been settled satisfactorily yet. One point, however, is indisputable even now. There are at least two kinds of Phoenician writing to be distinguished most clearly. The older, purer, more orthographical, and more neatly executed, is found in the inscriptions of Phoenicia herself, of Malta, Athens, Citium, and Carthage; the younger, corrupted not only with respect to the grammar and language, but also with respect to the form of the letters, which are less carefully executed, and even exhibit some strange, probably degenerate characters, is found chiefly on the monuments of Cyprus, Cilicia, Sardinia, Africa, Spain, Numidia, and the adjacent parts.

Besides these monumental sources for the language, there are a few remnants of it embedded, as we said, in ancient non-Phoenician writings. The Old Testament alone, however, has preserved its words — proper nouns chiefly — unmutilated. Later eastern writers even, not to mention the Greeks and Romans, have corrupted the spelling to such a degree that it is often most puzzling to trace the original Shemitic words. Phoenician names occur in Suidas, Dioscorides, Apuleius, in martyrologies, calendariums, Acts of Councils, in Church fathers (Augumstine, Priscianus, Servus), etc. The only really important remnant, however, is found preserved-albeit fearfully mutilated and Latinized in Plautus's Pcellsfus, act 5, scene 1 of which contains, in sixteen lines, the Phoenician translation of the Latin text, with more than one hundred Phoenician words. Several 'other phrases and words are embodied in act 5, scenes 2 and 3 of the same play. Yet, although there is very little doubt among scholars about the greater portion of these texts, the corruption and mutilation which thev had to undergo, first at the hands of Plautus, who probably only wrote them by the ear, then at the hands of generations of ignorant scribes, have made more than one word or passage an insoluble puzzle. The first of the two specimens of Phoenician [Punic] writing subjoined is taken from one of those Carthaginian votive tablets with which the British Museum (now the wealthiest in Phoenician monuments) has lately been enriched, as mentioned before. The emblems on it are symbolical, and refer to the deities invoked. The lower part is mutilated, but easily supplied. The date is uncertain, perhaps the 2d or 3d century B.C. The second is a trilingual inscription from a base of an altar recently found at Pauli (errei, in Sardinia, and has been fully explained by Deutsch (see Transactions of the Roval Society of Literature, 1864). Its contents are briefly this: A certain Cleon, Phoenician by religion, Greek by name, Roman by nationality, a salt- farmner, yows an altar-material and weight of which are only given in Phoenician: viz. copper,. a hundred pounds in weight to EshmunAsklepios "the Healer" (the Phoenician Mearrach, clumsily transcribed Merre in Latin, and Mirre in, Greek), in consideration for a cure to be performed. The date, given in Phoenician, viz. the year of two, apparently annual, entirely unknown judges, gives no clew to the time. Paloeographical reasons, however, would place'it in about the 1st century B.C.

2. Modern Authorities. — Among those who have more or less successfully occupied themselves with Phoenician antiquities, language, and literature, and who have also, in some instances, deciphered inscriptions, we mention Scaliger, Bochart, Pococke, Barth lemy, Swinton, Bayer,. Dutens, Hamaker, Gesenius, Movers, Munck, Judas, Bargbs, De Saulcy, Ewald, Levy, Vaux, Renan, De Luynes, De Vogud, Deutsch, and others; to whose writings, contained either in special works or scattered in Transactions of learned societies, we refer for further information on the subject of our article.

In English, see Kenrick's Phoenicia (Lond. 1855); in Latin, the second part of Bochart's Geographia Sacra, under the title "Canaan" and Gesenius's work, Scripturae Linguaeque Phoniciae Monumenta quotquot supersunt (Leips. 1837); in German, the exhaustive work of Movers, Die Phonizier und das Phonizische Alterthum (Berlin, 1841-1856, 5 volumes); Gerhard, Kunst der Phonizier (ibid. 1848); an article on the same subject by Movers, in Ersch and Gruber's Encyclopadie, and an article in the same work by Gesenius on Polaographie. See likewise Gesenius, Gesch. der Hebraischen Sprache und Schrift (Leips. 1815); Bleek, Einleitung in das Alte Testament (Berl. 1860). Phoenician inscriptions discovered since the time of Gesenius have been published by Judas, Etude demonstrative de la lanque Phenicienne et de la langue Libyque (Paris, 1847), and forty-five other inscriptions have been published by the abbe Bourgade (ibid. 1852, fol.). In 1845 a votive tablet was discovered at Marseilles, respecting which see Movers, Phonizische Texte (1847), and Judas Analyse (Par. 1857), and Etudes (ibid. 1857). On the sarcophagus of Eshmanasar, see Dietrich, Zwaei Sidonische Inschriften, nd eine alte Phonizische Konigsinschrift (Marburg, 1855), and Ewald, Erklarung der grossen Phonizischen Inschrift von Sidon (GBttingen, 1856, 4to; from the seventh volume of the Abhandlungen der Konigl. geograph. Gesellschaft zu Gottingen). Information respecting these works, and others on Phoenician inscriptions, is given by Bleek; pages 64, 65. See also Barthelemy, Monumens Pheoniciens (Paris, 1795); Hamaker, De Monumentis Punicis (Leips. 1822); Raoul-Rochette, Monumenta Phoenicia (Paris, 1828); Davis, Carthage (Lond. 1861); Wilkins, Phenicia and Israel (Lond. 1871); Renan, Mission de Phenicie (Paris, 1864).