THE CITIES OF THE PHENICIANS.
The voyages of the Phenicians on the Mediterranean; their colonies on
the coasts and islands of that sea; their settlements in Cyprus, Rhodes,
Crete, the islands of the AEgean, Samothrace, and Thasos, on the coasts
of Hellas, on Malta, Sicily, and Sardinia; their establishments on the
northern edge of Africa in the course of the thirteenth and twelfth
centuries B.C.; their discovery of the Atlantic about the year 1100
B.C., have been traced by us already. Of the internal conditions and the
constitution of the cities whose ships traversed the Mediterranean in
every direction, and now found so many native harbours on the coasts and
islands, we have hardly any information. We only know that monarchy
existed from an ancient period in Sidon and Tyre, in Byblus, Berytus,
and Aradus; and we are restricted to the assumption that this monarchy
arose out of the patriarchal headship of the elders of the tribes. These
tribes had long ago changed into civic communities, and their members
must have consisted of merchant-lords, ship-owners, and warehousemen, of
numerous labourers, artisans, sailors, and slaves. The accounts of the
Hebrews exhibit the cities of the Philistines, the southern neighbours
of the Phenicians on the Syrian coast, united by a league in the
eleventh century B.C. The kings of the five cities of the Philistines
combine for consultation, form binding resolutions, and take the field
in common. We find nothing like this in the cities of the Phenicians.
Not till a far later date, when the Phenicians had lost their
independence, were federal forms of government prevalent among them.
The campaigns of the Pharaohs, Tuthmosis III., Sethos, and Ramses II.,
did not leave the cities of the Phenicians untouched (I. 342). After the
reign of Ramses III., _i.e._ after the year 1300 B.C., Syria was not
attacked from the Nile; but the overthrow of the kingdom of the Hittites
about this period, and the subjugation of the Amorites by the
Israelites, forced the old population to the coast (about 1250 B.C.).
One hundred and fifty years later a new opponent of Syria showed
himself, not from the south, but from the east. Tiglath Pilesar I., king
of Assyria (1130-1100 B.C.), forced his way over the Euphrates, and
reached the great sea of the western land (p. 42). His successes in
these regions, even if he set foot on Lebanon, could at most have
reached only the northern towns of the Phenicians; in any case they were
of a merely transitory nature.
The oldest city of the Phenicians was Sidon; her daughter-city, Tyre,
was also founded at a very ancient period. We found that the
inscriptions of Sethos I. mentioned it among the cities reduced by him.
The power and importance of Tyre must have gradually increased with the
beginning of a more lively navigation between the cities and the
colonies; about the year 1100 B.C. her navigation and influence appears
to have surpassed those of the mother-city. If Old Hippo in Africa was
founded from Sidon, Tyrian ships sailed through the Straits of
Gibraltar, discovered the land of silver, and founded Gades beyond the
pillars. Accordingly we also find that Tyre, and not Sidon, was
mistress of the island of Cyprus.
According to the statements of the Greeks, a king of the name of Sobaal
or Sethlon ruled in Sidon at the time of the Trojan war, _i.e._ before
the year 1100 B.C.;[474] about the same time a king of the name of
Abelbaal reigned in Berytus.[475] From a fragment of Menander of
Ephesus, preserved to us by Josephus, it follows that after the middle
of the eleventh century B.C. Abibaal was reigning in Tyre. A sardonyx,
now at Florence, exhibits a man with a high crown on his head and a
staff in his hand; in front of him is a star with four rays; the
inscription in old Phenician letters runs, "Of Abibaal." Did this stone
belong to king Abibaal?[476]
Hiram, the son of this king, ascended the throne of Tyre while yet a
youth, in 1001 B.C. He is said to have again subjugated to his dominion
the Kittians, _i.e._ the inhabitants of Citium, or the cities of Cyprus
generally, who refused to pay tribute. What reasons and what views of
advantage in trade induced Hiram to enter into relations with David in
the last years of his reign, and unite these relations even more closely
with Solomon, the successor of David, has been recounted above. It was
this understanding which not only opened Israel completely to the trade
of the Phenicians, but also procured to the latter secure and new roads
through Israel to the Euphrates and Egypt, and made it possible for them
to discover and use the road by sea to South Arabia. Thus, a good
century after the founding of Gades, the commerce of the Phenicians
reached the widest extension which it ever obtained. We saw that the
Phenicians about the year 990 B.C. went by ship from Elath past South
Arabia to the Somali coast, and reached Ophir, _i.e._ apparently the
land of the Abhira (_i.e._ herdsmen) on the mouths of the Indus.[477]
The other advantages which accrued to Hiram from his connection with
Israel were not slight. Solomon paid him, as has been said, 20,000 Kor
of wheat and 20,000 Bath of oil yearly for 20 years in return for wood
and choice quarry stones, and finally, in order to discharge his debt,
had to give up 20 Israelitish towns on his borders.
Hiram had to dispose of very considerable resources; his receipts must
have been far in excess of Solomon's. Of the silver of Tarshish which
the ships brought from Gades to Tyre, of the gold imported by the trade
to Ophir, of the profits of the maritime trade with the land of incense,
a considerable percentage must have come into the treasury of the king,
and he enjoyed in addition the payments of Solomon. In any case he had
at his command means sufficient to enlarge, adorn, and fortify his city.
Ancient Tyre lay on the seashore; with the growth of navigation and
trade, the population passed over from the actual city to an island off
the coast, which offered excellent harbours. On a rock near this island
lay that temple of Baal Melkarth, the god of Tyre, to which the priests
ascribed a high antiquity; they told Herodotus that it was built in the
year 2750 B.C. (I. 345). Hiram caused this island to be enlarged by
moles to the north and west towards the mainland, and protected these
extensions by bulwarks. The circuit of the island was now 22 stades,
_i.e._ more than two and a half miles; the arm of the sea, which
separates the island from the mainland, now measured only 2400 feet
(three stades).[478] The whole island was surrounded with strong walls
of masonry, which ran out sharply into the sea, and were washed by its
waves, so that no room remained for the besieger to set foot and plant
his scaling-ladders there. On the side of the island towards the
mainland, where the docks were, these walls were the highest. Alexander
of Macedon found them 150 feet high. The two harbours lay on the eastern
side of the island--on the north-east and the south-east; on the
north-east was the Sidonian harbour (which even now is the harbour of
Sur); and on the south-east the Egyptian harbour. If the former was
secured and closed by huge dams, the latter also was not without its
protecting works, as huge blocks in the sea appear to show, though the
dams here were no longer in perfect preservation even in Strabo's time.
On the south shore of the island, eastward of the Egyptian harbour, lay
the royal citadel; on the north-west side a temple of Baal Samim, the
Agenorion of the Greeks. The rock which supported the temple of Melkarth
appears to have been situated close to the city on the west.[479] This,
like the temple of Astarte, was adorned and enlarged or restored by
Hiram. For the roof he caused cedars of Lebanon to be felled. In the
ancient shrine of the protecting deity of the city, the temple of
Melkarth, he dedicated a great pillar of gold, which Herodotus saw there
500 years later beside an erect smaragdus, which was so large that it
gave light by night. This was perhaps a symbol of the light not overcome
by the darkness.[480]
Hiram died after a reign of 34 years, in the fifty-third year of his
life. His son Baleazar, who sat on the throne for seven years (967-960
B.C.), was succeeded by his son Abdastartus (_i.e._ servant of Astarte),
who, after a reign of nine years (960-951 B.C.), fell before a
conspiracy headed by the sons of his nurse. Abdastartus was murdered,
and the eldest of the sons of his nurse maintained his dominion over
Tyre for 12 years (951-939 B.C.). Then the legitimate dynasty returned
to the throne. Of the brothers of the murdered Abdastartus, Astartus was
the first to reign (939-927 B.C.), and after him Astarymus (927-918
B.C.), who was murdered by a fourth brother, Pheles. But Pheles could
not long enjoy the fruits of his crime. He had only been eight months on
the throne when he was slain by the priest of Astarte, Ethbaal
(Ithobaal). With Pheles the race of Abibaal comes to an end (917 B.C.).
Ethbaal ascended the throne of Tyre, and was able to establish himself
upon it. He is said to have built or fortified Bothrys in Lebanon,
perhaps as a protection against the growing forces of Damascus.[481] In
Israel, during Ethbaal's reign, as we have seen, Omri at the head of the
army made himself master of the throne in 899 B.C., just as Ethbaal had
usurped the throne of Tyre. Both were in a similar position. Both had to
establish their authority and found their dynasty. Ethbaal's daughter
was married to Ahab, the son of Omri. What were the results of this
connection for Israel and Judah we have seen already. To what a
distance the power of Tyre extended in another direction is clear from
the fact that Ethbaal founded Auza in the interior of Africa, to the
south of the already ancient colony of Ityke (p. 82).[482] After a reign
of 32 years Ethbaal was succeeded by his son Balezor (885-877
B.C.).[483] After eight years Balezor left two sons, Mutton and
Sicharbaal, both under age. Yet the throne remained in the house of
Ethbaal, and continued to do so even when Mutton died in the year 853
B.C., and again left a son nine years old, Pygmalion, and a daughter
Elissa, a few years older, whom he had married to his brother
Sicharbaal, the priest of the temple of Melkarth.[484] Mutton had
intended that Elissa and Pygmalion should reign together, and thus the
power really passed into the hands of Sicharbaal, the husband of Elissa.
When Pygmalion reached his sixteenth year the people transferred to him
the sovereignty of Tyre, and he put Sicharbaal, his uncle, to death,
either because he feared his influence as the chief priest of the
tutelary god of the city, or because, as we are told, he coveted his
treasures (846 B.C.).[485]
Elissa fled from Tyre before her brother, as we are told, with others
who would not submit to the tyranny of Pygmalion.[486] The exiles (we
may perhaps suppose that they were members of old families, as it was
apparently the people who had transferred the throne to Pygmalion) are
said to have first landed at Cyprus, then to have sailed to the
westward, and to have landed on the coast of Africa, in the
neighbourhood of Ityke, the old colony of the Phenicians, and there to
have bought as much land of the Libyans as could be covered by the skin
of an ox. By dividing this into very thin strips they obtained a piece
of land sufficient to enable them to build a fortress. This new
dwelling-place, or the city which grew up round this fortress, the
wanderers called, in reference to their old home, Karthada (_Karta
hadasha_), _i.e._ "the new city," the Karchedon of the Greeks, the
Carthage of the Romans. The legend of the purchase of the soil may have
arisen from the fact that the settlers for a long time paid tribute to
the ancient population, the Maxyans, for their soil. The ox-hide and all
that is further told us of the fortunes of Elissa, her resistance to the
suit of the Libyan prince Iarbas,[487] her self-immolation in order to
escape from this suit (Virgil made despised love the motive for this
immolation), is due to the transference of certain traits from the myths
of the horned moon-goddess, to whom the cow is sacred, the wandering
Astarte, who also bore the name of Dido, and of certain customs in the
worship of the goddess to Carthage; these also have had influence on the
narrative of the flight of Elissa.[488]
The new settlement was intended to become an important centre for the
colonies of the Phenicians in the West. The situation was peculiarly
fortunate. Where the north coast of Africa approaches Sicily most
nearly, the mountain range which runs along this coast, and forms the
edge of the table-land in the interior, sinks down in gentle
declivities, which thus form water-courses of considerable length, to a
fertile hill country still covered with olive-gardens and
orange-forests. From the north the sea penetrates deeply into the land
between the "beautiful promontory" (Ras Sidi Ali) and the promontory of
Hermes (Ras Addar). On the western side of this bay a ridge of land runs
out, which possesses excellent springs of water. Not far from the shore
a rock rises steeply to the height of about 200 feet. On this was
planted the new citadel, Byrsa, on which the wanderers erected a temple
to their god Esmun (I. 377). This citadel, which is said to have been
about 2000 paces (double paces) in the circuit,[489] was also the city
round which at a later time grew up the lower city, at first on the
south-east toward the shore, and then on the north-west toward the sea.
The harbour lay to the south-east, under the citadel. Some miles to the
north of the new settlement, on the mouth of the Bagradas (Medsherda),
at the north-west corner of the bay, was Ityke, the ancient colony of
the Phenicians, which had been in existence for more than two centuries
when the new settlers landed on the shore of the bay; and not far to the
south on the shore was Adrymes (Hadrumetum), another city of their
countrymen, which Sallust mentions among the oldest colonies of the
Phenicians.[490] The Carthaginians never forgot their affection for the
ancient Ityke, by whose assistance, no doubt, their own settlement had
been supported.[491]
The fragment which Josephus has preserved from the annals of the kings
of Tyre ends with the accession of Pygmalion and the flight of Elissa.
More than two centuries had passed since the campaign of Tiglath Pilesar
I. to the Mediterranean, during which the cities of the Phenicians had
suffered nothing from the arms and expeditions of the Assyrians. But
when Balezor and Mutton, the son and grandson of Ethbaal, ruled over
Tyre (885-853 B.C.), Assurbanipal of Assyria (883-859 B.C.) began to
force his way to the west over the Euphrates. When he had reduced the
sovereign of Karchemish to obedience by repeated campaigns, and had
built fortresses on both banks of the Euphrates, he advanced in the year
876 B.C. to the Orontes, captured the marches of Lebanus (Labnana), and
received tribute from the king of Tyre, _i.e._ from Mutton, from the
kings of Sidon, of Byblus, and Aradus. According to the inscriptions,
the tribute consisted of bars of silver, gold, and lead. Assurbanipal's
successor, Shalmanesar II. of Assyria (859-823 B.C.), pushed on even
more energetically to the west. After forcing Cilicia to submit, he
attacked Hamath, and in the year 854, as we have seen, he defeated at
Karkar the united kings of Hamath, Damascus, and Israel, who were also
joined by Matinbaal, the king of Aradus. But Shalmanesar was compelled
to undertake three other campaigns to Damascus (850, 849, and 846 B.C.)
before he succeeded, in the year 842 B.C., in making Damascus tributary.
As has been remarked, Israel did not any longer attempt the decision of
arms, and sought to gain the favour of Assyria; like Tyre and Sidon,
Jehu sent tribute to Shalmanesar. This payment of tribute was repeated
perforce by Tyre, Sidon, and Byblus, in the years 839 and 835 B.C., in
which Shalmanesar's armies again appeared in Syria. Moreover, the
inscriptions of Bin-nirar, king of Assyria (810-781 B.C.), tell us that
Damascus, Tyre, Sidon, Israel, Edom, and the land of the Philistines had
paid him tribute. It is obvious that the cities of the Phenicians would
have been as a rule most willing to pay it. When Assyria had definitely
extended her dominion as far as the Euphrates, it was in the power of
the Assyrian king to stop the way for the merchants of those cities to
Mesopotamia and Babylon, and thus to inflict very considerable damage on
the trade of the Phenicians, which was for the most part a carrying
trade between the East and West. What were the sums paid in tribute,
even if considerable, when compared with such serious disadvantages?
Hitherto we have been able to observe monarchy in the patriarchal form
of the head of the tribe, in the god-like position of the Pharaohs of
Egypt, in the forms of a military principate, who ruled with despotic
power over wide kingdoms, or in diminished copies of this original. It
would be interesting to trace out and ascertain the changes which it had
now to undergo at the head of powerful trading and commercial cities
such as the Phenicians were. We have already seen that the principate of
these cities was of great antiquity, that it remained in existence
through all the periods of Phenician history, that it was rooted deeply
enough to outlive even the independence of the cities. All more detailed
accounts are wanting, and even inductions or comparisons with the
constitution of Carthage in later times carry us little further. Not to
mention the very insufficient accounts which we possess of this
constitution, it was only to the oldest settlements of the Phenicians in
Cyprus that the monarchy passed, at least it was only in these that it
was able to maintain itself. The examination of these institutions of
Carthage is adapted to show us in contrast on the one hand to the
tribal princes of the Arabians, and on the other to the monarchy of
Elam, Babel, and Asshur--what forms the feeling and character of a
Semitic community, in which the burghers had reached the full
development of their powers, were able to give to their state, which at
the same time was supreme over a wide region; but for the constitution
of the Phenician cities scarcely any conclusions can be drawn from it.
Of the internal condition of the Phenician cities, the fragment of the
history of Tyre in Josephus only enables us to ascertain that there was
no lack of strife and bloodshed in the palaces of the kings, and that
the priests of the tutelary deity must have been of importance and
influence beside the king. But it follows from the nature of things that
these city-kings could not have held sway with the same complete power
as the military princes of the great kingdoms of the East. The
development of independence among the burghers must have placed far
closer limitations upon the will of the kings in these cities than was
the case elsewhere in the East. The more lively the trade and industry
of the cities, the more strongly must the great merchants and
manufacturers have maintained against the kings the consideration and
advancement of their own interests. For the maintenance of order and
peace, of law and property in the cities they looked to the king, but
they had also to make important demands before the throne, and were
combined against it by community of interests. They were compelled to
advance these independently if the king refused his consent. Isaiah
tells us that the merchants of Tyre were princes. Ezekiel speaks of the
grey-haired men, the "elders" of the city of Byblus.[492] Of the later
period we know with greater certainty that there was a council beside
the kings, the membership in which may have belonged primarily to the
chiefs of the old families, but also in part to the hereditary priests.
Inscriptions of the cities belonging to Grecian times present the title
"elders."[493] The families in the Phenician cities which could carry
back their genealogy to the forefathers of the tribes which possessed
land and influence before the fall of the Hittites, the incursions of
the Hebrews, and the spread of trade had brought a mass of strangers
into the city walls, would appear to have had the first claim to a share
in the government; the heads of these families may at first have formed
the council which stood beside the king. Yet it lies in the nature of
great manufacturing and trading cities that the management of interests
of this kind cannot be confined to the elders of the family or remain
among the privileges of birth. Hence we may assume that the great
trading firms and merchants could not long be excluded from these
councils. In the fourth century B.C. the council of Sidon seems to have
consisted of 500 or 600 elders.[494] Owing to the treasures of East and
West which poured together into the cities of the Phenicians, life
became luxurious within their walls. Men's efforts were directed to gain
and acquisition; the merchants would naturally desire to enjoy their
wealth. The lower classes of the closely-compressed population no doubt
followed the example set them by the higher. From the multitude of
retail dealers and artizans, the number of pilots and mariners who
returned home eager for enjoyment after long voyages, men whose passions
would be unbridled, a turbulent population must have grown up, in spite
of the numerous colonies into which the ambitious as well as the poor
might emigrate or be sent with the certain prospect of a better
position. We saw above that the people of Tyre are said to have
transferred the rule to Pygmalion. For the later period it is certain
that even the people had a share in the government.[495]
The hereditary monarchy passed, so far as we can see, from the
mother-cities to the oldest colonies only, _i.e._ the cities in Cyprus.
In the other colonies the chief officers were magistrates, usually two
in number.[496] They were called _Sufetes_, _i.e._ judges. In Carthage
these two yearly officers, in whose hands lay the supreme administration
of justice, and the executive, formed with 30 elders the governing body
of the city. It seems that these 30 men were the representatives of as
many original combinations of families into which the old houses of the
city were incorporated. The connection of the colonies and
mother-cities, both in general and more especially where the colony
could dispense with the protection of the mother-city, were far more
mercantile and religious than political. The colonies worshipped the
deities of the mother-cities, and gave them a share in their booty. We
also find that descendants of priests who had emigrated from the
mother-city stood at the head of the temples of the colonies. In
Carthage, where the priests of Melkarth wore the purple robe, the office
was hereditary in the family of Bithyas, who is said to have left Tyre
with Elissa.[497]
We are acquainted with the gods of the Phenician cities, and the mode in
which they worshipped them; with El and Baal-Samim, Baal-Melkarth and
Baal-Moloch, Adonis, Astarte and Ashera, with the rites of continence
and mutilation, of sensual excess and prostitution, of sacrifice and
fire-festival, which were intended to win their favour and grace. We
observed that the protecting deities of the separate states had even
before the days of Hiram been united in the system of the seven great
gods, the Cabiri, at whose head was placed an eighth, Esmun, the supreme
deity. We saw that in this system special meanings were ascribed to them
in reference to the protection of peace and law, of industry and
navigation; and we cannot doubt that with the riches which accumulated
in the walls of the cities, with the luxury of life which these riches
permitted, the lascivious and sensual side of the worship must have
increased and extended.
The life led by the kings of the old Phenician cities is described as
rich and splendid. We have already assumed that the princes of the
Phenician cities had a rich share in the returns of trade, and indeed
the fact can be proved from the Hebrew Scriptures for Hiram, king of
Tyre. Ezekiel tells us, "The king of Tyre sits like a god in the seat of
God, in the midst of the seas; he dwells as in Eden, in the garden of
God. Precious stones are the covering of his palaces: the ruby, the
topaz, the diamond, the chrysolite, the onyx, and the jasper, the
sapphire, the carbuncle, the emerald, and gold; the workmanship of his
ring-cases he bears upon him."[498] "His garments," we are told in a
song of the Hebrews, "smell of myrrh, aloes, and cassia; in ivory
palaces the sound of harps gladdens him. At his right hand stands the
queen in gold of Ophir, in a garment of wrought gold: on broidered
carpets she shall be brought to him; the young maidens, her companions,
follow her."[499]
Hosea calls Tyre "a plantation in a pleasant meadow."[500] Of the city
itself Ezekiel says, "The architects have made her beauty perfect. All
her planks (wainscot) were of cypress, and her masts of cedar of
Lebanon; the rudders are of oaks of Bashan, the benches of ivory, set in
costly wood from the island of Cyprus. For sails Tyre spreads out byssus
and gay woofs; blue and red purple from the islands of Elisa formed
their coverlets."[501] In the description of Strabo, more than 500 years
later, Tyre appears less magnificent. The houses of the city were very
high, higher than at Rome; the city still wealthy, owing to the trade in
her two harbours and her purple factories, but the number of these made
the city unpleasant. Strabo does not mention any considerable building
in the city. Of Aradus he says, "The smallness of the rock on which the
city lies, seven stades only in circuit, and the number of inhabitants
caused every house to have many stories. Drinking-water had to be
obtained from the mainland; on the island there were only wells and
cisterns."[502]
Scarcely any striking remains of the ancient buildings of Phoenicia have
come down to our time. The ancient temples enumerated in the treatise on
the Syrian goddess have perished without a trace; the temple of Melkarth
of Tyre, the great temple of Astarte at Sidon, the temple of Bilit
(Ashera) at Byblus,[503] although they were certainly not of a character
easy to destroy. That the Phenicians were acquainted from very ancient
periods with the erection of strong masonry was proved above. Not only
have we the legend of the Greeks, that Cadmus taught them the art of
masonry and built the famous walls of Thebes; we saw how Israel, about
the year 1000 B.C., provided herself with masons, stone-cutters, and
materials from Tyre. Hence we may also assume that the architecture of
the temple and the royal palaces of Solomon described in the Books of
Kings corresponded to the architecture of the Phenicians. The temples
and palaces of the Phenicians consisted, therefore, of walls of large
materials, roofed with beams of cedar; in the interior the materials
were no doubt covered, as at Jerusalem, with planks of wood and
ornaments of brass, "so that the stone was nowhere seen" (p. 183).
Ezekiel has already told us that the planks of the roofs of the royal
palace at Tyre were overlaid with gold and precious stones; and the
Books of Kings showed us that even the floors were adorned with gold.
All the remains of walls in Phoenicia that can be referred to an ancient
period exhibit a style of building confined to the stone of the mountain
range which hems the coast, and desirous of imitating the nature of the
rocks. Blocks of large dimensions were used by preference; at first they
were worked as little as possible, and fitted to each other, and the
interstices between the great blocks were filled with smaller stones. Of
this kind are the fragments of the walls which surround the rock on
which the city of Aradus stood. Gigantic blocks, visible even now here
and there, formed the dams of the harbours of Aradus, Sidon, Tyre, and
Japho.[504] It was a step in advance that the blocks, while retaining
the form in which they were quarried, were smoothed at the joints in
order to be fitted together more firmly, and a further step still that
the blocks were hewn into squares, though at first the outer surfaces of
the squares were not smoothed. So far as remains allow us to see, the
detached structures were of a simple and massive character, in shape
like cubes of vast dimensions; the walls, as is shown by the city wall
of Aradus, were joined without mortar, and in the oldest times the
buildings appear to have been roofed with monoliths. Cedar beams were
not sought after till larger spaces had to be covered. Beside old
water-basins hewn in the rock, and oil or wine presses of the same
character, we have no remains of ancient Phenician temples but those on
the site of Marathus (now Amrit), a city of the tribe of the Arvadites,
to the south of Aradus, and in the neighbourhood of Byblus.[505] The
bases of the walls which enclose the courts and water-basins of the
temple of Marathus can still be traced, as well as the huge stones which
formed the three cellae, the innermost shrines of this temple. On either
side of a back wall formed of similar materials heavy blocks protrude,
and are roofed over, together with this wall, by a great monolith, which
protected the sacred stone or the image of the deity.[506] This heavy
style of the city walls, dams, temples, and royal castles did not
prevent the Phenicians, any more than the Egyptians, from building the
upper stories of the dwelling-houses of their cities in light wood-work.
By far the most important remains of ancient Phoenicia are the
rock-tombs, which are found in great numbers and extent opposite to the
islands of Tyre and Aradus, as well as at Sidon, Byblus, and among the
ruins of the other cities on the spurs of Lebanon; and which at Tyre
especially spread out into wide burial-places, and several stories of
tombs, one upon the other. In the same style we find to the west of the
ruins of Carthage long walls of rocks hollowed out into thousands of
tombs, and furnished with arched niches for the reception of the
dead.[507] In the oldest period the Phenicians must have placed their
dead in natural cavities of rock, and perhaps they erected a stone
before them as a memorial. In Genesis Abraham buries Sarah in the cave
of Machpelah, and Jacob sets up a stone on the grave of Rachel.[508]
Afterwards the natural hollows were extended, and whole cavities dug out
artificially for tombs. The tomb of David and the tombs of his
successors were hewn in the rocks of the gorge which separated the city
from the height of Zion (p. 177). The oldest of the artificial tombs in
Phoenicia are doubtless those which consist of cubical chambers with
horizontal hewn roofs. Round one or two large chambers lower oblong
depressions are driven further in the rocks to receive the corpses. The
entrance into these ancient chambers are formed by downward
perpendicular shafts, at the bottom of which on two sides are openings
into the chambers secured by slabs of stone laid before them. Shafts of
this kind must be meant when the Hebrews say in a figure of the dead,
"The mouth of the well has eaten him up." Later than the tombs of this
description are those the entrance to which is on the level ground
(which was then closed by a stone), which have roofs hewn in low arches,
and side niches for the corpses. The arched chambers approached by steps
leading downward, the walls of which are decorated after Grecian
patterns on the stone, or on stucco, must originate from the time of
the predominance of Greek art, _i.e._ of the days of Hellenism. The
oldest style of burial was the placing of the corpse in the cavity, the
grave-chamber, and afterwards in the depression at the side of this. At
a later time apparently the enclosure of the corpse in a narrow coffin
of clay became common here, as in Babylonia. Coffins of lead have also
been found in the rock-tombs of Phoenicia. But beside these, heavy
oblong stone-coffins with a simple slab of stone as a lid were in use in
ancient times; along with flat lids, lids raised in a low triangle are
also found; later still, and latest of all, are coffins and sarcophagi
adorned with acroteria and other ornaments of the Greek style.[509]
In the flat limestone rocks which run at a moderate elevation in the
neighbourhood of Sidon, and contain the vast necropolis of that city,
there is a cavern, now called Mogharet Ablun, _i.e._ the cave of Apollo.
Beside the entrance, in a depression covered by a structure attached to
the rock-wall (the rock-tombs were supplemented and extended by
structures attached to the wall), was found a coffin of blackish blue
stone, the form of which indicates the shape of the buried person after
the manner of the mummy-coffins of Egypt, and displays in colossal
relief the mask of the dead in Egyptian style, with an Egyptian covering
for the head and beard on the chin; the band round the neck ends behind
in two hawk's heads. The inscription in Phenician letters teaches us
that this coffin contained Esmunazar, king of Sidon. Similar sarcophagi
in stone, in part expressing the form even more accurately, seven or
eight in number, have been discovered in other chambers of the
burial-place of Sidon, and in the burial-places of Byblus and
Antaradus, but only in cubical, _i.e._ in more ancient chambers. Marble
coffins of this kind have also been found in the Phenician colonies of
Soloeis and Panormus in Sicily, and of the same shape in burnt earth in
Malta and Gozzo. The Phenicians, therefore, came to imitate the coffins
of the Egyptians. Similar imitation of Egyptian burial is proved by the
gold plates found in Phenician chambers, which are like those with which
we find the mouth closed in Egyptian mummies, and the discovery of
golden masks in Phenician chambers,[510] which correspond to the gilding
of the masks of the face of the innermost Egyptian coffins which
immediately surround the linen covering. As the face-mask of the
external coffin imitated the face of the dead in stone or in coloured
wood, so also ought the inner gilded face to preserve the features of
the dead. This imitation of the Egyptian style of burial among the
Phenicians must go back to a great antiquity. It is true that Esmunazar
of Sidon did not rule till the second half of the fifth or the beginning
of the fourth century B.C.[511] Yet the shape and style of his coffin
reminds us of older Egyptian patterns; it is most like the stone coffins
of Egypt which have come down from the beginning of the sixth century.
And if the ancient tombs opened at Mycenae behind the lion's gate belong
to Carians influenced by Phenician civilisation (p. 74), if golden masks
are here found on the face of the dead, the Phenicians must have
borrowed this custom from the Egyptians as early as the thirteenth
century, if not even earlier.
The remains which have come down to us of the sculpture, jars, and
utensils of Phoenicia exhibit the double influence which the art and
industry of the Phenicians underwent even at an early period. Agreeably
to the close relations into which the Phenicians entered, on the one
hand with Babel and Asshur, and on the other with Egypt, the effects of
these two ancient civilisations meet each other on the coast of Syria.
The arts of the kindred land of the Euphrates, the relations of which to
Phoenicia were at the same time the older, naturally made themselves
felt first. When Tuthmosis III. collected tribute in Syria at the
beginning of the sixteenth century, the Babylonian weight was already in
use there; the jars which were brought to this king as the tribute of
Syria are carefully worked, but as yet adorned with very simple and
recurring patterns of lines. On the other hand, the ornaments found in
the tombs of Mycenae, gold-plates, frontlets, and armlets, exhibit
ornaments like those figured on the monuments of Assyria; and the
objects found in the rock-tombs on Hymettus, at Spata, point even more
definitely to Babylonian patterns: winged fabulous animals and battles
of beasts (a lion attacking a bull or an antelope[512]) are formed in
the manner of the Eastern Semites, which brings the form of the muscles
into prominence. We may assume that the influence of Egypt began with
the times of the Tuthmosis and Amenophis, and their supremacy in Syria,
and slowly gathered strength. The heavy style of Phenician buildings
would not be made lighter or more free by the architecture of Egypt,
which also arose out of building in rock. The temples of Phoenicia
adopted Egyptian symbols for their ornaments; the monoliths of the roofs
of those three cellae at Marathus exhibit the winged sun's-disk, the
emblem at the entrance of Egyptian temples; the chests for the dead and
masks for the mummies of the Egyptians were imitated in the rock-tombs
of Phoenicia. If the weaving of the Phenicians at first copied the
ancient Babylonian patterns, they began under the stronger influence of
Egypt to adorn their pottery and metal-work after Egyptian patterns. But
they also combined the Babylonian and Egyptian elements in their
art.[513] The oldest memorial of this combination is perhaps retained in
that winged sphinx, which belongs to the time of the dominion of the
shepherds in Egypt. In the graves on Hymettus pictures in relief of
female winged sphinxes are found with clothed breasts and peculiar
wings, in a treatment obviously already conventional. In Phoenicia
itself are found reliefs of similar sphinxes, old men with a human face
on either side of the tree of life, which meet us oftentimes in the
monuments of Assyria. This combination, this use of Babylonian and
Egyptian types and forms side by side, is seen most clearly on a large
bowl found at Curium near Amathus, in Cyprus, and wrought with great
care and skill.[514] It follows that the art of the Phenicians was
essentially imitative and intended to furnish objects for trade. Of
round works of sculpture we have only dwarfish deities (I. 378), the
typical form of which was naturally retained, and a few lions coarsely
wrought in the style of the plastic art of Babylon and Assyria.[515] The
relation in which the lion stood to the god Melkarth naturally made the
delineation of the lion a favourite object of Phenician art.
Phoenicia, though the home of alphabetical writing, has left us no more
than two or three inscriptions, and Carthage has not left us a great
number. Not that there was any lack of inscriptions in Phoenicia in
ancient days. We have heard already of ancient inscriptions at Rhodes,
Thebes, and Gades. Job wishes that "his words might be graven on rocks
for ever with an iron chisel and lead."[516] The inscriptions of
Phoenicia have perished because they were engraved like those
inscriptions of Gades, on plates of brass. Beside the inscription on the
coffin of Esmunazar, king of Sidon, already mentioned, of a date about
400 B.C., only two or three smaller inscriptions have been preserved,
which do not go beyond the second century B.C. In this inscription
Esmunazar speaks in person; he calls himself the son of Tabnit, king of
the Sidonians, son of Esmunazar, king of the Sidonians. With his mother,
Amastarte, the priestess of Astarte, he had erected temples to Baal,
Astarte, and Esmun. He beseeches the favour of the gods for himself and
his land; he prays that Dor and Japho may always remain under Sidon; he
declares that he wishes to rest in the grave which he has built and in
this coffin. No one is to open the tomb or plunder it, or remove or
damage this stone coffin. If any man attempts it the gods will destroy
him with his seed; he is not to be buried, and after death will find no
rest among the shades.[517]
There is scarcely any side of civilisation, any forms of technical art,
the invention of which was not ascribed by the Greeks to the Phenicians.
They were nearly all made known to the Greeks through the Phenicians;
more especially the building of walls and fortresses, mining, the
alphabet, astronomy, numbers, mathematics, navigation, together with a
great variety of applications of technical skill. If the discovery of
alphabetic writing belongs to the Phenicians, the Babylonians were the
instructors of the Phenicians in astronomy as well as in fixing measures
and weights (I. 305). Yet this is no reason for contesting the statement
of Strabo that the Sidonians were "eager inquirers into the knowledge of
the stars and of numbers, to which they were led by navigation by night
and the art of calculation."[518] In the same way the technical
discoveries ascribed by the Greeks to the Phenicians were not all made
in their cities; they carried on with vigour and skill what grew up
independently among them as well as what they learnt from others. The
making of glass was undoubtedly older in Egypt than in Phoenicia (I.
224). Egypt also practised work in metals before Phoenicia. Snefru and
Chufu made themselves masters of the copper mines of the peninsula of
Sinai before the year 3000 B.C. (I. 95), while the Phenicians can hardly
have occupied the copper island off their coast (Cyprus) before the
middle of the thirteenth century B.C. Artistic weaving and embroidery
were certainly practised at a more ancient date in Babylonia than in the
cities of the Phenicians. But all these branches of industry were
carried on with success by the Phenicians. Sidon furnished excellent
works in glass, which were accounted the best even down to a late period
of antiquity. The dunes on the coast between Acco and Tyre, where is the
mouth of the glass-river (Sihor Libnath),[519] provided the Phenician
manufacturers with the earth necessary for the manufacture of glass. It
was maintained that the most beautiful glass was cast in Sarepta
(Zarpath, _i.e._ melting), a city on the coast between Sidon and
Tyre.[520]
The purple dyeing, _i.e._ the colouring of woofs by the liquor from
fish, was discovered by the Phenicians. They were unsurpassed in this
art; it outlived by many centuries the power and splendour of their
cities. Trumpet and purple fish were found in great numbers on their
coasts, and the liquor from these provided excellent dye. The liquor of
the purple-fish, which comes from a vessel in the throat, is dark-red in
the small fish, and black in the larger fish; the liquor of the
trumpet-fish is scarlet. The fish were pounded and the dye extracted by
decoction. By mixing, weakening, or thickening this material, and by
adding this or that ingredient, various colours were obtained, through
all the shades of crimson and violet down to the darkest black, in which
fine woollen stuffs and linen from Egypt were dipped. The stuffs soaked
in these colours are the purple cloths of antiquity, and were
distinguished by the bright sheen of the colours. The Tyrian double-dyed
cloth, which had the colour of curdled blood, and the violet amethyst
purple were considered the most beautiful.[521] Three hundred pounds of
the raw material were usually required to dye 50 pounds of wool.[522]
When the purple stuffs began to be sought after, the fish collected on
the coasts of Tyre, Sidon, and Sarepta were no longer sufficient. We saw
how the ships of the Phenicians went from coast to coast in order to get
fresh materials for the dye, and found them in great numbers on the
shores of Cyprus, Rhodes, Crete, Cythera, and Thera; in the bays of
Laconia and Argos, and in the straits of Euboea. Purple-fish were also
collected on the greater Syrtis, in Sicily, the Balearic Isles, and
coasts of Tarshish.[523] Even at a later period, when the art of dyeing
with the purple-fish was understood and practised at many places in the
Mediterranean Sea, the Tyrian purple still maintained its pre-eminence
and fame. "Tyre," says Strabo, "overcame her misfortunes, and always
recovered herself by means of her navigation, in which the Phenicians
were superior to all others, and her purples. The Tyrian purple is the
most beautiful; the fish are caught close at hand, and every other
requirement for the dyeing is there in abundance."[524] A hundred years
later Pliny adds "that the ancient glory of Tyre survived now only in
her fish and her purples."[525] The consumption and expense of purple in
antiquity was very great, especially in Hither Asia. At first the
Phenician kings wore the purple robe as the sign of their rank; then it
became the adornment of the princes of the East, the priests, the women
of high rank, and upper classes. In the temples and palaces the purple
served for curtains and cloths, robes and veils for the images and
shrines. The kings of Babylon and Assyria, and after them the kings of
Persia, collected stores of purple stuffs in their palaces. Plutarch
puts the value of the amount of purple found by Alexander at Susa at
5000 talents.[526] In the West also the purple robe soon became the
distinguishing garb of royalty and rank. Yet the Greeks and Romans of
the better times, owing to the costliness of the material, contented
themselves with the possession of borders or stripes of purple.
The weaving and embroidery of the Phenicians apparently followed
Assyrian and Babylonian patterns. They must also have made and exported
ceramic ware and earthen vessels in large numbers at an ancient period,
as is proved by the tributes brought to Tuthmosis III., the discoveries
in Cyprus, Rhodes, Thera, and at Hissarlik. In the preparation of
perfumes Sidon and Tyre were not equal to the Babylonians. It is true
that their manufacturers supplied susinum and cyprinum of excellent
quality, but they could not attain to the cinnamon or the nard ointment,
nor to the royal ointment of the Babylonians.[527]
In mining the Phenicians were masters. In regard to the Phenician skill
in this art, the Book of Job says, "The earth, from which comes
nourishment, is turned up; he lays his hand upon the flint; far from the
dealings of men he makes his descending shaft. No bird of prey knows the
path; the eye of the vulture discovers it not; the wild beasts do not
tread it. Through the rocks paths are made; he searches out the darkness
and the night. Then his eye beholds all precious things. The stone of
the rocks is the place of the sapphire and gold-dust. Iron is taken out
of the mountains; stones are melted into brass, the drop of water is
stopped, and the hidden is brought to light."[528] The Phenicians dug
mines for copper, first on Lebanon and then in Cyprus. We saw that they
afterwards, in the second half of the thirteenth century, opened out the
gold treasures of Thasos in the Thracian Sea. Herodotus, who had seen
their abandoned mines there (they lay on the south coast of Thasos),
informed us that the Phenicians had entirely "turned over a whole
mountain." Yet even in the fifth century B.C. the mines of Thasos
produced a yearly income of from two to three hundred talents. In Spain
the Phenicians opened their mines in the silver mountain, _i.e._ in the
Sierra Morena, above the lower course of the Baetis (the
Guadalquivir);[529] their ships went up the stream as far as Sephela
(perhaps Hispalis, Seville). The richest silver-mines lay above Sephela
at Ilipa (Niebla); the best gold and copper mines were at Cotini, in the
region of Gades.[530] Diodorus assures us that all the mines in Iberia
had been opened by Phenicians and Carthaginians, and not one by the
Romans. In the more ancient times the workmen here brought up in three
days an Euboic talent of silver, and their wages were fixed at a fourth
part of the returns. The mines in Iberia were carried down many stades
in depth and length, with pits, shafts, and sloping paths crossing each
other; for the veins of gold and silver were more productive at a
greater depth. The water in the mines was taken out by Egyptian spiral
pumps. Strabo observes that the gold ore when brought up was melted over
a slow fire, and purified by vitriolated earth. The smelting-ovens for
the silver were built high, in order that the vapour from the ore, which
was injurious and even deadly, might pass into the air.[531]
The Phenicians also understood how to work skilfully the metals supplied
by their mines. At the founding of Gades, which we had to place about
the year 1100 B.C., iron pillars with inscriptions are mentioned which
the settlers put up in the temple of Melkarth (p. 82). The brass work
which the melter, Hiram of Tyre, executed for Solomon (p. 182) is
evidence of long practice in melting brass, and of skill in bringing
into shape large masses of melted metal. The Homeric poems speak of
Sidon as "rich in brass," and "skilful;" they tell us of large beaten
bowls of brass and silver of Sidonian workmanship, "rich in invention."
Even at a later period the goblets of Sidon were in request. Not only
metal implements and vessels of brass and copper, molten and beaten,
were furnished by the Phenicians; they must also have manufactured
armour in large quantities, if we may draw any conclusion about armour
from the tribute imposed on the Syrians by Tuthmosis III. It is easily
intelligible of what value it must have been for the nations of the West
to come into the possession of splendid armour and good weapons. Besides
these are the ornaments found in great numbers, and of high antiquity,
in the tombs of Spata and Mycenae, and in the excavations at Hissarlik.
In Homer, Phenician ships bring necklaces of gold and amber to the
Greeks. At a later time the ornaments of the Phenicians and their
alabaster boxes were sought after; the carved work in ivory and wood,
with which they also adorned the prows and banks of oars of their ships,
is praised by Ezekiel. They also knew how to set and cut precious
stones; some seals have come down to us in part from an ancient
date.[532]
In ship-building the Phenicians were confessedly superior; they are said
to have discovered navigation.[533] The ancient forests of cedar and
cypress which rose immediately above their shores supplied the best
wood, which resisted decay for an extraordinary length of time even in
salt water. Much as the Phenicians used these forests in the course of a
thousand years for building their ships, their palaces, and temples, as
well as for exportation, they provided even in the third century B.C. a
material which for extent, size, and beauty won the admiration of the
Greeks.[534] The oldest ship of the Phenicians which continued through
all time in use as a trading-vessel was the _gaulos_, a vessel with high
prow and stern, both of which were similarly rounded. It was propelled
by a large sail and by rowers, from 20 to 30 in number. Besides the
gaulos, there was the long and narrow fifty-oar, which served for a
merchantman and pirate-ship as well as for a ship of war, and after the
discovery of the silver land the large and armed merchantman, the ship
of Tarshish. Isaiah enumerates the ship of Tarshish among the costly
structures of men.[535] Ezekiel compares Tyre to a proud ship of the
sea. We know that the great transport-ships and merchantmen of the
Phenicians and Carthaginians could take about 500 men on board. The
Byblians were considered the best ship-builders. The keels of the ships,
like the masts, were made of cedar; the oars were of oak, supplied by
the oak forests of the table-land of Bashan. The mariners of Sidon and
Aradus were considered the best rowers. The Greeks praise the strict and
careful order on board a Phenician ship, the happy use of the smallest
spaces, the accuracy in distributing and placing the lading, the
experience, wisdom, activity, and safety of the Phenician pilots and
officers.[536] Others commend the great sail and oar power of the
Phenician ships. They could sail even against the wind, and make
fortunate voyages in the stormy season of the year. While the Greeks
steered by the Great Bear, which, if a more visible, was a far more
uncertain guide, the Phenicians had at an early time discovered a less
conspicuous but more trustworthy guide in the polar star, which the
Greeks call the "Phenician star." The Greeks themselves allow that this
circumstance rendered the voyages of the Phenicians more accurate and
secure. On an average the Phenician ships, which as a rule did not set
out before the end of February, and returned at the end of October,
accomplished 120 miles in 24 hours; but ships that were excellently
built and equipped, and sufficiently manned, ran about 150 miles.[537]
In the fifteenth century the galleys of Venice could run from 50 to 100
miles in the Mediterranean in the 24 hours. The excellence of the
Phenician navy survived the independence of the cities. Inclination
towards, and pleasure in navigation, as well as skill in it, were always
to be found among the populations of those cities. The Phenician ships
were by far the best in the fleets of the Persian kings.
FOOTNOTES:
[474] Eustath. ad "Odysseam," 4, 617.
[475] Vol. i. p. 352.
[476] De Luynes, "Essai sur la numismatique des satrapies," p. 69.
[477] Above, p. 188.
[478] Curt. 4, 8. Pliny ("Hist. Nat." 5, 17) puts the distance from the
mainland at 700 paces (double paces).
[479] On coins of Tyre of a later time we find two rocks, which indicate
the position of the city. Ezekiel (xxvi. 4, 5) threatens that she shall
be a naked rock in the sea for the spreading of nets. Joseph. "c.
Apion," 8, 5, 3; Diod. 17, 46; Arrian, 2, 21, 23. Renan's view ("Mission
de Phenicie," p. 546 ff.) on the Agenorion has been adopted; some others
of his results appear to be uncertain.
[480] Vol. i. 367; Menander in Joseph. "c. Apion." 1, 17, 18.
[481] Joseph. "Antiq." 8, 13, 2.
[482] Joseph. _loc. cit._
[483] In order to bring the reigns of Josephus into harmony with his
total, the total, which is given twice, must be retained. Hence nothing
remains but to replace, as Movers has already done, the three and six
years given by Josephus for Balezor and Mutton by the eight and 25 years
given by Syncellus.
[484] On the identity of the names Acerbas, Sichaeus, Sicharbas,
Sicharbaal, Serv. "ad AEneid," 1, 343; Movers, "Phoeniz." 2, 1, 355.
[485] Justin, 18, 4.
[486] Timaeus, fragm. 23, ed. Mueller; Appian, "Rom. Hist." 8, 1.
[487] Timaeus, fragm. 23, ed. Mueller.
[488] Vol. i. 371; Movers, "Phoeniz." 1, 609 ff.
[489] Oros. 4, 22; Strabo, p. 832.
[490] Sall. "Jug." 19.
[491] The various statements about the year of the foundation of
Carthage are collected in Mueller, "Geograph. Graeci min." 1, xix. It is
impossible to fix the foundation more accurately than about the middle
of the ninth century B.C. We may place it in the year 846 B.C. if we
rest on the 143-2/3 years of Josephus from the building of the temple
(according to our own date 990 B.C.), and the round sum given by
Appian--that 700 years elapsed from the founding by Dido to the
destruction of the city; "Rom. Hist." 8, 132.
[492] Ezekiel xxvii. 9.
[493] Renan, "Mission de Phenicie," p. 199.
[494] Diod. 16, 41, 45; fragm. 23, ed. Bipont; cf. Justin. 18, 6.
[495] Joseph. "Antiq." 14, 12, 4, 5; Curt. 4, 15.
[496] Liv. 28, 37; Movers, "Phoeniz." 2, 1, 490 ff, 529 ff.
[497] Servius, "ad AEneid." 1, 738.
[498] Ezekiel xxviii. 2-17.
[499] Psalm xlv. 9-15. Though it is doubtful whether there is any
reference here to Tyre, the court-life of the Israelites was imitated
from the Phenicians.
[500] Hosea ix. 13.
[501] Ezekiel xxvii. 4-7.
[502] Strabo, pp. 754, 756.
[503] Lucian, "De Syria dea," 3-5.
[504] Renan, "Mission de Phenicie," p. 39 ff, 362.
[505] Ceccaldi, "Le Monument de Sarba," Revue Archeolog. 1878.
[506] Renan, "Mission de Phenicie," p. 60 ff.
[507] Beule, "Nachgrabungen zu Karthago," s. 98 ff (translation).
[508] Gen. xxxv. 20.
[509] Renan, _loc. cit._ 412 ff.
[510] In Cyprus also a mask of this kind has been found.
[511] Von Gutschmid, in "Fleckeisens Jahrbuecher," 1875, s. 579.
[512] [Greek: ATHENAION s' g' pinax]; A. 7, B. 8.
[513] Helbig, "Cenni sopra l'arte fenicia," p. 17 ff.
[514] Ceccaldi, "Les fouilles de Curium," Revue Archeolog. 1877.
[515] Renan, _loc. cit._ pp. 175, 181, 397.
[516] Job xix. 23.
[517] Roediger, "Z. D. M. G." 9, 647; Schlottmann, "Inschrift
Esmunazars;" Halevy, "Melanges," pp. 9, 34; Oppert, "Records of the
Past," 9, 109.
[518] Strabo, p. 757.
[519] Joshua xix. 26. Strabo, p. 758. Tacitus says, "On the shore of
Judaea the Belus falls into the sea: the sand collected at the mouth of
this river, when mixed with saltpetre, is melted into glass. The strip
of shore is of moderate extent, but inexhaustible;" "Hist." 5, 7
[520] Pliny, "Hist. Nat." 5, 17.
[521] Adolph Schmidt, "Forschungen auf dem Gebiete des Alterthums," s.
69.
[522] Schmidt, _loc. cit._ 129 ff.
[523] Herod. 4, 151; Pliny, "Hist. Nat." 9, 60; Strabo, pp. 145, 835.
[524] Strabo, p. 757.
[525] Pliny, "Hist. Nat." 5, 17.
[526] Plut. "Alex." c. 36.
[527] Movers, "Phoeniz." 3, 103.
[528] Job xxviii. 1-11. In this description the author could only have
Phenician mines in his eye.
[529] Muellenhoff, "Deutsche Altertumskunde," 1, 120 ff.
[530] Strabo, p. 142. Kotini = the Oleastrum of the Romans; Pliny,
"Hist. Nat." 3, 3. Ptolem. 2, 4, 14.
[531] Strabo, pp. 175, 176, 120; Pliny, "Hist. Nat." 7, 57.
[532] Ezekiel xxvii. 5, 6; Levy, "Siegel und Gemmen." If the first text
of the Pentateuch represents the names of the tribes of the people as
engraved upon the precious stones in the shield on the breast of the
high priest (Exod. xxv. 7; xxviii. 9 ff, _supra_, 207), the author had,
no doubt, the work of Phenician artists in his eye.
[533] Pliny, "Hist. Nat." 5, 13.
[534] Diodor. 19, 58.
[535] Isaiah ii. 16.
[536] Xen. "Oecon." 8, 12.
[537] Movers, "Phoeniz." 3, 182 ff, 191 ff.