Earliest navigation by means of rafts and canoes--Model of a
very primitive boat--Phoenician vessel of the time of
Sargon--Phoenician biremes in the time of Sennacherib--
Phoenician pleasure vessels and merchant ships--Superiority
of the Phoenician war-galleys--Excellence of the
arrangements--Patæci--Early navigation cautious--Increasing
boldness--Furthest ventures--Extent of the Phoenician land
commerce--Witness of Ezekiel--Wares imported--Caravans--
Description of the land trade--Sea trade of Phoenicia--1.
With her own colonies--2. With foreigners--Mediterranean and
Black Sea trade--North Atlantic trade--Trade with the West
Coast of Africa and the Canaries--Trade in the Red Sea and
Indian Ocean.
The first attempts of the Phoenicians to navigate the sea which washed
their coast were probably as clumsy and rude as those of other primitive
nations. They are said to have voyaged from island to island, in their
original abodes within the Persian Gulf, by means of rafts.[91] When
they reached the shores of the Mediterranean, it can scarcely have
been long ere they constructed boats for fishing and coasting purposes,
though no doubt such boats were of a very rude construction. Probably,
like other races, they began with canoes, roughly hewn out of the trunk
of a tree. The torrents which descended from Lebanon would from time
to time bring down the stems of fallen trees in their flood-time; and
these, floating on the Mediterranean waters, would suggest the idea
of navigation. They would, at first, be hollowed out with hatchets and
adzes, or else with fire; and, later on, the canoes thus produced would
form the models for the earliest efforts in shipbuilding. The great
length, however, would soon be found unnecessary, and the canoe would
give place to the boat, in the ordinary acceptation of the term. There
are models of boats among the Phoenician remains which have a very
archaic character,[92] and may give us some idea of the vessels in which
the Phoenicians of the remoter times braved the perils of the deep. They
have a keel, not ill shaped, a rounded hull, bulwarks, a beak, and a
high seat for the steersman. The oars, apparently, must have been passed
through interstices in the bulwark.
From this rude shape the transition was not very difficult to the
bark represented in the sculptures of Sargon,[93] which is probably a
Phoenician one. Here four rowers, standing to their oars, impel a vessel
having for prow the head of a horse and for stern the tail of a fish,
both of them rising high above the water. The oars are curved, like golf
or hockey-sticks, and are worked from the gunwale of the bark, though
there is no indication of rowlocks. The vessel is without a rudder; but
it has a mast, supported by two ropes which are fastened to the head and
stern. The mast has neither sail nor yard attached to it, but is crowned
by what is called a “crow’s nest”--a bell-shaped receptacle, from which
a slinger or archer might discharge missiles against an enemy.[94]
A vessel of considerably greater size than this, but of the same
class--impelled, that is, by one bank of oars only--is indicated by
certain coins, which have been regarded by some critics as Phoenician,
by others as belonging to Cilicia.[95] These have a low bow, but an
elevated stern; the prow exhibits a beak, while the stern shows signs of
a steering apparatus; the number of the oars on each side is fifteen
or twenty. The Greeks called these vessels triaconters or penteconters.
They are represented without any mast on the coins, and thus seem to
have been merely row-boats of a superior character.
About the time of Sennacherib (B.C. 700), or a little earlier, some
great advances seem to have been made by the Phoenician shipbuilders. In
the first place, they introduced the practice of placing the rowers on
two different levels, one above the other; and thus, for a vessel of
the same length, doubling the number of the rowers. Ships of this kind,
which the Greeks called “biremes,” are represented in Sennacherib’s
sculptures as employed by the inhabitants of a Phoenician city, who fly
in them at the moment when their town is captured, and so escape their
enemy.[96] The ships are of two kinds. Both kinds have a double tier
of rowers, and both are guided by two steering oars thrust out from the
stern; but while the one is still without mast or sail, and is rounded
off in exactly the same way both at stem and stern, the other has a
mast, placed about midship, a yard hung across it, and a sail close
reefed to the yard, while the bow is armed with a long projecting beak,
like a ploughshare, which must have been capable of doing terrible
damage to a hostile vessel. The rowers, in both classes of ships, are
represented as only eight or ten upon a side; but this may have arisen
from artistic necessity, since a greater number of figures could not
have been introduced without confusion. It is thought that in the beaked
vessel we have a representation of the Phoenician war-galley; in the
vessel without a beak, one of the Phoenician transport.[97]
A painting on a vase found in Cyprus exhibits what would seem to have
been a pleasure-vessel.[98] It is unbeaked, and without any sign of
oars, except two paddles for steering with. About midship is a short
mast, crossed by a long spar or yard, which carries a sail, closely
reefed along its entire length. The yard and sail are managed by means
of four ropes, which are, however, somewhat conventionally depicted.
Both the head and stern of the vessel rise to a considerable height
above the water, and the stern is curved, very much as in the
war-galleys. It perhaps terminated in the head of a bird.
According to the Greek writers, Phoenician vessels were mainly of two
kinds, merchant ships and war-vessels.[99] The merchant ships were of
a broad, round make, what our sailors would call “tubs,” resembling
probably the Dutch fishing-boats of a century ago. They were impelled
both by oars and sails, but depended mainly on the latter. Each of
them had a single mast of moderate height, to which a single sail was
attached;[910] this was what in modern times is called a “square sail,”
a form which is only well suited for sailing with when the wind is
directly astern. It was apparently attached to the yard, and had to be
hoisted together with the yard, along which it could be closely reefed,
or from which it could be loosely shaken out. It was managed, no doubt,
by ropes attached to the two lower corners, which must have been held
in the hands of sailors, as it would have been most dangerous to belay
them. As long as the wind served, the merchant captain used his sail;
when it died away, or became adverse, he dropped yard and sail on to his
deck, and made use of his oars.
Merchant ships had, commonly, small boats attached to them, which
afforded a chance of safety if the ship foundered, and were useful when
cargoes had to be landed on a shelving shore.[911] We have no means
of knowing whether these boats were hoisted up on deck until they were
wanted, or attached to the ships by ropes and towed after them; but the
latter arrangement is the more probable.
The war-galleys of the Phoenicians in the early times were probably of
the class which the Greeks called triaconters or penteconters, and which
are represented upon the coins. They were long open rowboats, in which
the rowers sat, all of them, upon a level, the number of rowers on
either side being generally either fifteen or twenty-five. Each galley
was armed at its head with a sharp metal spike, or beak, which was its
chief weapon of offence, vessels of this class seeking commonly to run
down their enemy. After a time these vessels were superseded by biremes,
which were decked, had masts and sails, and were impelled by rowers
sitting at two different elevations, as already explained. Biremes were
ere long superseded by triremes, or vessels with three banks of oars,
which are said to have been invented at Corinth,[912] but which came
into use among the Phoenicians before the end of the sixth century
B.C.[913] In the third century B.C. the Carthaginians employed in war
quadriremes, and even quinqueremes; but there is no evidence of the
employment of either class of vessel by the Phoenicians of Phoenicia
Proper.
The superiority of the Phoenician ships to others is generally allowed,
and was clearly shown when Xerxes collected his fleet of twelve hundred
and seven triremes against Greece. The fleet included contingents from
Phoenicia, Cyprus, Egypt, Cilicia, Pamphylia, Lycia, Caria, Ionia,
Æolis, and the Greek settlements about the Propontis.[914] When it
reached the Hellespont, the great king, anxious to test the quality of
his ships and sailors, made proclamation for a grand sailing match,
in which all who liked might contend. Each contingent probably--at any
rate, all that prided themselves on their nautical skill--selected its
best vessel, and entered it for the coming race; the king himself, and
his grandees and officers, and all the army, stood or sat along the
shore to see: the race took place, and was won by the Phoenicians of
Sidon.[915] Having thus tested the nautical skill of the various nations
under his sway, the great king, when he ventured his person upon the
dangerous element, was careful to embark in a Sidonian galley.[916]
A remarkable testimony to the excellence of the Phoenician ships with
respect to internal arrangements is borne by Xenophon, who puts the
following words into the mouth of Ischomachus, a Greek:[917] “I think
that the best and most perfect arrangement of things that I ever saw was
when I went to look at the great Phoenician sailing-vessel; for I saw
the largest amount of naval tackling separately disposed in the smallest
stowage possible. For a ship, as you well know, is brought to anchor,
and again got under way, by a vast number of wooden implements and of
ropes and sails the sea by means of a quantity of rigging, and is armed
with a number of contrivances against hostile vessels, and carries about
with it a large supply of weapons for the crew, and, besides, has all
the utensils that a man keeps in his dwelling-house, for each of the
messes. In addition, it is laden with a quantity of merchandise which
the owner carries with him for his own profit. Now all the things which
I have mentioned lay in a space not much bigger than a room which would
conveniently hold ten beds. And I remarked that they severally lay in a
way that they did not obstruct one another, and did not require anyone
to search for them; and yet they were neither placed at random, nor
entangled one with another, so as to consume time when they were
suddenly wanted for use. Also, I found the captain’s assistant, who is
called ‘the look-out man,’ so well acquainted with the position of all
the articles, and with the number of them, that even when at a distance
he could tell where everything lay, and how many there were of each
sort, just as anyone who has learnt to read can tell the number of
letters in the name of Socrates and the proper place for each of them.
Moreover, I saw this man, in his leisure moments, examining and testing
everything that a vessel needs when at sea; so, as I was surprised,
I asked him what he was about, whereupon he replied--‘Stranger, I
am looking to see, in case anything should happen, how everything
is arranged in the ship, and whether anything is wanting, or is
inconveniently situated; for when a storm arises at sea, it is not
possible either to look for what is wanting, or to put to right what is
arranged awkwardly.’”
Phoenician ships seem to have been placed under the protection of
the Cabeiri, and to have had images of them at their stem or stern or
both.[918] These images were not exactly “figure-heads,” as they are
sometimes called. They were small, apparently, and inconspicuous, being
little dwarf figures, regarded as amulets that would preserve the vessel
in safety. We do not see them on any representations of Phoenician
ships, and it is possible that they may have been no larger than the
bronze or glazed earthenware images of Phthah that are so common in
Egypt. The Phoenicians called them _pittuchim_, “sculptures,”[919]
whence the Greek {pataikoi} and the French _fétiche_.
The navigation of the Phoenicians, in early times, was no doubt cautious
and timid. So far from venturing out of sight of land, they usually
hugged the coast, ready at any moment, if the sea or sky threatened,
to change their course and steer directly for the shore. On a shelving
coast they were not at all afraid to run their ships aground, since,
like the Greek vessels, they could be easily pulled up out of reach of
the waves, and again pulled down and launched, when the storm was over
and the sea calm once more. At first they sailed, we may be sure, only
in the daytime, casting anchor at nightfall, or else dragging their
ships up upon the beach, and so awaiting the dawn. But after a time they
grew more bold. The sea became familiar to them, the positions of coasts
and islands relatively one to another better known, the character of
the seasons, the signs of unsettled or settled weather, the conduct to
pursue in an emergency, better apprehended. They soon began to shape
the course of their vessels from headland to headland, instead of always
creeping along the shore, and it was not perhaps very long before they
would venture out of sight of land, if their knowledge of the weather
satisfied them that the wind might be trusted to continue steady, and if
they were well assured of the direction of the land that they wished to
make. They took courage, moreover, to sail in the night, no less than
in the daytime, when the weather was clear, guiding themselves by the
stars, and particularly by the Polar star,[920] which they discovered to
be the star most nearly marking the true north. A passage of Strabo[921]
seems to show that--in the later times at any rate--they had a method of
calculating the rate of a ship’s sailing, though what the method was is
wholly unknown to us. It is probable that they early constructed charts
and maps, which however they would keep secret through jealousy of their
commercial rivals.
The Phoenicians for some centuries confined their navigation within the
limits of the Mediterranean, the Propontis, and the Euxine, land-locked
seas, which are tideless and far less rough than the open ocean. But
before the time of Solomon they had passed the Pillars of Hercules,
and affronted the dangers of the Atlantic.[922] Their frail and
small vessels, scarcely bigger than modern fishing-smacks, proceeded
southwards along the West African coast, as far as the tract watered
by the Gambia and Senegal, while northwards they coasted along Spain,
braved the heavy seas of the Bay of Biscay, and passing Cape Finisterre,
ventured across the mouth of the English Channel to the Cassiterides.
Similarly, from the West African shore, they boldly steered for the
Fortunate Islands (the Canaries), visible from certain elevated points
of the coast, though at 170 miles distance. Whether they proceeded
further, in the south to the Azores, Madeira, and the Cape de Verde
Islands, in the north to the coast of Holland, and across the German
Ocean to the Baltic, we regard as uncertain. It is possible that from
time to time some of the more adventurous of their traders may have
reached thus far; but their regular, settled, and established navigation
did not, we believe, extend beyond the Scilly Islands and coast of
Cornwall to the north-west, and to the south-west Cape Non and the
Canaries.
The commerce of the Phoenicians was carried on, to a large extent, by
land, though principally by sea. It appears from the famous chapter of
Ezekiel[923] which describes the riches and greatness of Tyre in the
sixth century B.C., that almost the whole of Western Asia was penetrated
by the Phoenician caravans, and laid under contribution to increase the
wealth of the Phoenician traders.
“Thou, son of man, (we read) take up a lamentation for Tyre,
and say
unto her,
O thou that dwellest at the entry of the sea,
Which art the merchant of the peoples unto many isles,
Thus saith the Lord God, Thou, O Tyre, hast said, I am perfect in
beauty.
Thy borders are in the heart of the sea;
Thy builders have perfected thy beauty.
They have made all thy planks of fir-trees from Senir;
They have taken cedars from Lebanon to make a mast for thee
Of the oaks of Bashan have they made thine oars;
They have made thy benches of ivory,
Inlaid in box-wood, from the isles of Kittim.
Of fine linen with broidered work from Egypt was thy sail,
That it might be to thee for an ensign;
Blue and purple from the isles of Elishah was thy awning.
The inhabitants of Zidon and of Arvad were thy rowers;
Thy wise men, O Tyre, were in thee--they were thy pilots.
The ancients of Gebal, and their wise men, were thy calkers;
All the ships of the sea, with their mariners, were in thee,
That they might occupy thy merchandise.
Persia, and Lud, and Phut were in thine army, thy men of war;
They hanged the shield and helmet in thee;
They set forth thy comeliness.
The men of Arvad, with thine army, were upon thy walls round about;
And the Gammadim were in thy towers;
They hanged their shields upon thy walls round about;
They have brought to perfection thy beauty.
Tarshish was thy merchant by reason of the multitude of all
kinds of
riches;
With silver, iron, tin, and lead, they traded for thy wares.
Javan, Tubal, and Meshech, they were thy traffickers;
They traded the persons of men, and vessels of brass, for thy
merchandise.
They of the house of Togarmah traded for thy wares,
With horses, and with chargers, and with mules.
The men of Dedan were thy traffickers; many isles were the mart of
thy hands;
They brought thee in exchange horns of ivory, and ebony.
Syria was thy merchant by reason of the multitude of thy
handiworks;
They traded for thy wares with emeralds, purple, and broidered
work,
And with fine linen, and coral, and rubies.
Judah, and the land of Israel, they were thy traffickers;
They traded for thy merchandise wheat of Minnith,
And Pannag, and honey, and oil, and balm.
Damascus was thy merchant for the multitude of thy handiworks;
By reason of the multitude of all kinds of riches;
With the wine of Helbon, and white wool.
Dedan and Javan traded with yarn for thy wares;
Bright iron, and cassia, and calamus were among thy merchandise.
Dedan was thy trafficker in precious cloths for riding;
Arabia, and all the princes of Kedar, they were the merchants
of thy
hand,
In lambs, and rams, and goats, in these were they thy merchants.
The traffickers of Sheba and Raamah, they were thy traffickers;
They traded for thy wares with chief of all spices,
And with all manner of precious stones, and gold.
Haran, and Canneh, and Eden, the traffickers of Sheba,
Asshur and Chilmad, were thy traffickers:
They were thy traffickers in choice wares,
In wrappings of blue and broidered work, and in chests of rich
apparel,
Bound with cords, and made of cedar, among thy merchandise.
The ships of Tarshish were thy caravans for they merchandise;
And thou wast replenished, and made very glorious, in the heart of
the sea.
Thy rowers have brought thee into great waters;
The east wind hath broken thee in the heart of the sea.
Thy reaches, and thy wares, thy merchandise, thy mariners, and thy
pilots,
Thy calkers, and the occupiers of thy merchandise,
With all the men of war, that are in thee,
Shall fall into the heart of the seas in the day of thy ruin.
At the sound of thy pilot’s cry the suburb’s shall shake;
And all that handle the oar, the mariners, and all the pilots
of the
sea,
They shall come down from their ships, they shall stand upon the
land,
And shall cause their voice to be heard over thee, and shall cry
bitterly,
And shall cast up dust upon their heads, and wallow in the ashes;
And they shall make themselves bald for thee, and gird them with
sackcloth,
And they shall weep for thee in bitterness of soul with bitter
mourning.
And in their wailing they shall take up a lamentation for thee,
And lament over thee saying, Who is there like Tyre,
Like her that is brought to silence in the midst of the sea?
When thy wares went forth out of the seas, thou filledst many
peoples;
Thou didst enrich the kings of the earth with thy merchandise and
thy riches.
In the time that thou was broken by the seas in the depths of the
waters,
Thy merchandise, and all thy company, did fall in the midst of
thee,
And the inhabitants of the isles are astonished at thee,
And their kings are sore afraid, they are troubled in their
countenance,
The merchants that are among the peoples, hiss at thee;
Thou art become a terror; and thou shalt never be any more.”
Translating this glorious burst of poetry into prose, we find the
following countries mentioned as carrying on an active trade with the
Phoenician metropolis:--Northern Syria, Syria of Damascus, Judah and
the land of Israel, Egypt, Arabia, Babylonia, Assyria, Upper
Mesopotamia,[924] Armenia,[925] Central Asia Minor, Ionia, Cyprus,
Hellas or Greece,[926] and Spain.[927] Northern Syria furnishes the
Phoenician merchants with _butz_, which is translated “fine linen,” but
is perhaps rather cotton,[928] the “tree-wool” of Herodotus; it also
supplies embroidery, and certain precious stones, which our translators
have considered to be coral, emeralds, and rubies. Syria of Damascus
gives the “wine of Helbon”--that exquisite liquor which was the only
sort that the Persian kings would condescend to drink[929]--and “white
wool,” the dainty fleeces of the sheep and lambs that fed on the upland
pastures of Hermon and Antilibanus. Judah and the land of Israel supply
corn of superior quality, called “corn of Minnith”--corn, i.e. produced
in the rich Ammonite country[930]--together with _pannag_, an unknown
substance, and honey, and balm, and oil. Egypt sends fine linen, one
of her best known products[931]--sometimes, no doubt, plain, but often
embroidered with bright patterns, and employed as such embroidered
fabrics were also in Egypt,[932] for the sails of pleasure-boats. Arabia
provides her spices, cassia, and calamus (or aromatic reed), and, beyond
all doubt, frankincense,[933] and perhaps cinnamon and ladanum.[934] She
also supplies wool and goat’s hair, and cloths for chariots, and gold,
and wrought iron, and precious stones, and ivory, and ebony, of which
the last two cannot have been productions of her own, but must have been
imported from India or Abyssinia.[935] Babylonia and Assyria furnish
“wrappings of blue, embroidered work, and chests of rich apparel.”[936]
Upper Mesopotamia partakes in this traffic.[937] Armenia gives horses
and mules. Central Asia Minor (Tubal and Meshech) supplies slaves and
vessels of brass, and the Greeks of Ionia do the like. Cyprus furnishes
ivory, which she must first have imported from abroad.[938] Greece
Proper sends her shell-fish, to enable the Phoenician cities to increase
their manufacture of the purple dye.[939] Finally, Spain yields silver,
iron, tin, and lead--the most useful of the metals--all of which she is
known to have produced in abundance.[940]
With the exception of Egypt, Ionia, Cyprus, Hellas, and Spain, the
Phoenician intercourse with these places must have been carried on
wholly by land. Even with Egypt, wherewith the communication by sea was
so facile, there seems to have been also from a very early date a land
commerce. The land commerce was in every case carried on by caravans.
Western Asia has never yet been in so peaceful and orderly condition as
to dispense prudent traders from the necessity of joining together in
large bodies, well provisioned and well armed, when they are about to
move valuable goods any considerable distance. There have always been
robber-tribes in the mountain tracts, and thievish Arabs upon the
plains, ready to pounce on the insufficiently protected traveller, and
to despoil him of all his belongings. Hence the necessity of the caravan
traffic. As early as the time of Joseph--probably about B.C. 1600--we
find a _company_ of the Midianites on their way from Gilead, with their
camels bearing spicery, and balm, and myrrh, going to carry it down
to Egypt.[941] Elsewhere we hear of the “travelling _companies_ of
the Dedanim,”[942] of the men of Sheba bringing their gold and
frankincense;[943] of a multitude of camels coming up to Palestine with
wood from Kedar and Nebaioth.[944] Heeren is entirely justified in
his conclusion that the land trade of the Phoenicians was conducted by
“large companies or caravans, since it could only have been carried on
in this way.”[945]
The nearest neighbours of the Phoenicians on the land side were the
Jews and Israelites, the Syrians of Damascus, and the people of Northern
Syria, or the Orontes valley and the tract east of it. From the Jews and
Israelites the Phoenicians seem to have derived at all times almost
the whole of the grain which they were forced to import for their
sustenance. In the time of David and Solomon it was chiefly for wheat
and barley that they exchanged the commodities which they exported,[946]
in that of Ezekiel it was primarily for “wheat of Minnith;”[947] and
a similar trade is noted on the return of the Jews from the
captivity,[948] and in the first century of our era.[949] But besides
grain they also imported from Palestine at some periods wine, oil,
honey, balm, and oak timber.[950] Western Palestine was notoriously a
land not only of corn, but also of wine, of olive oil, and of honey,
and could readily impart of its superfluity to its neighbour in time
of need. The oaks of Bashan are very abundant, and seem to have been
preferred by the Phoenicians to their own oaks as the material of
oars.[951] Balm, or basalm, was a product of the land of Gilead,[952]
and also of the lower Jordan valley, where it was of superior
quality.[953]
From the Damascene Syrians we are told that Phoenicia imported “wine
of Helbon” and “white wool.”[954] The “wine of Helbon” is reasonably
identified with that {oinos Khalubonios} which is said to have been the
favourite beverage of the Persian kings.[955] It was perhaps grown
in the neighbourhood of Aleppo.[956] The “white wool” may have been
furnished by the sheep that cropped the slopes of the Antilibanus, or by
those fed on the fine grass which clothes most of the plain at its
base. The fleece of these last is, according to Heeren,[957] “the finest
known, being improved by the heat of the climate, the continual exposure
to the open air, and the care commonly bestowed upon the flocks.” From
the Syrian wool, mixed perhaps with some other material, seems to
have been woven the fabric known, from the city where it was commonly
made,[958] as “damask.”
According to the existing text of Ezekiel,[959] Syria Proper “occupied
in the fairs” of Phoenicia with cotton, with embroidered robes, with
purple, and with precious stones. The valley of the Orontes is suitable
for the cultivation of cotton; and embroidered robes would naturally be
produced in the seat of an old civilisation, which Syria certainly was.
Purple seems somewhat out of place in the enumeration; but the Syrians
may have gathered the _murex_ on their seaboard between Mt. Casius and
the Gulf of Issus, and have sold what they collected in the Phoenician
market. The precious stones which Ezekiel assigns to them are difficult
of identification, but may have been furnished by Casius, Bargylus,
or Amanus. These mountains, or at any rate Casius and Amanus, are of
igneous origin, and, if carefully explored, would certainly yield gems
to the investigator. At the same time it must be acknowledged that Syria
had not, in antiquity, the name of a gem-producing country; and, so far,
the reading of “Edom” for “Aram,” which is preferred by many,[960] may
seem to be the more probable.
The commerce of the Phoenicians with Egypt was ancient, and very
extensive. “The wares of Egypt” are mentioned by Herodotus as a portion
of the merchandise which they brought to Greece before the time of
the Trojan War.[961] The Tyrians had a quarter in the city of Memphis
assigned to them,[962] probably from an early date. According to
Ezekiel, the principal commodity which Egypt furnished to Phoenicia
was “fine linen”[963]--especially the linen sails embroidered with gay
patterns, which the Egyptian nobles affected for their pleasure-boats.
They probably also imported from Egypt natron for their glass-works,
papyrus for their documents, earthenware of various kinds for
exportation, scarabs and other seals, statuettes and figures of gods,
amulets, and in the later times sarcophagi.[964] Their exports to Egypt
consisted of wine on a large scale,[965] tin almost certainly, and
probably their peculiar purple fabrics, and other manufactured articles.
The Phoenician trade with Arabia was of especial importance, since not
only did the great peninsula itself produce many of the most valuable
articles of commerce, but it was also mainly, if not solely, through
Arabia that the Indian market was thrown open to the Phoenician traders,
and the precious commodities obtained for which Hindustan has always
been famous. Arabia is _par excellence_ the land of spices, and was the
main source from which the ancient world in general, and Phoenicia in
particular, obtained frankincense, cinnamon, cassia, myrrh, calamus
or sweet-cane, and ladanum.[966] It has been doubted whether these
commodities were, all of them, the actual produce of the country in
ancient times, and Herodotus has been in some degree discredited, but
perhaps without sufficient reason. He is supported to a considerable
extent by Theophrastus, the disciple of Aristotle, who says:[967]
“Frankincense, myrrh, and cassia grow in the Arabian districts of Saba
and Hadramaut; frankincense and myrrh on the sides or at the foot of
mountains, and in the neighbouring islands. The trees which produce them
grow sometimes wild, though occasionally they are cultivated; and the
frankincense-tree grows sometimes taller than the tree producing the
myrrh.” Modern authorities declare the frankincense-tree (_Boswellia
thurifera_) to be still a native of Hadramaut;[968] and there is no
doubt that the myrrh-tree (_Balsamodendron myrrha_) also grows there. If
cinnamon and cassia, as the terms are now understood, do not at present
grow in Arabia, or nearer to Phoenicia than Hindustan, it may be that
they have died out in the former country, or our modern use of the
terms may differ from the ancient one. On the other hand, it is no
doubt possible that the Phoenicians imagined all the spices which they
obtained from Arabia to be the indigenous growth of the country, when in
fact some of them were importations.
Next to her spices, Arabia was famous for the production of a superior
quality of wool. The Phoenicians imported this wool largely. The flocks
of Kedar are especially noted,[969] and are said to have included both
sheep and goats.[970] It was perhaps a native woollen manufacture, in
which Dedan traded with Tyre, and which Ezekiel notices as a trade in
“cloths for chariots.”[971] Goat’s hair was largely employed in the
production of coverings for tents.[972] Arabia also furnished Phoenicia
with gold, with precious stones, with ivory, ebony, and wrought
iron.[973] The wrought iron was probably from Yemen, which was
celebrated for its manufacture of sword blades. The gold may have been
native, for there is much reason to believe that anciently the Arabian
mountain ranges yielded gold as freely as the Ethiopian,[974] with which
they form one system; or it may have been imported from Hindustan, with
which Arabia had certainly, in ancient times, constant communication.
Ivory and ebony must, beyond a doubt, have been Arabian importations.
There are two countries from which they may have been derived, India
and Abyssinia. It is likely that the commercial Arabs of the south-east
coast had dealings with both.[975]
Of Phoenician imports into Arabia we have no account; but we may
conjecture that they consisted principally of manufactured goods, cotton
and linen fabrics, pottery, implements and utensils in metal, beads, and
other ornaments for the person, and the like. The nomadic Arabs,
leading a simple life, required but little beyond what their own
country produced; there was, however, a town population[976] in the more
southern parts of the peninsula, to which the elegancies and luxuries of
life, commonly exported by Phoenicia, would have been welcome.
The Phoenician trade with Babylonia and Assyria was carried on probably
by caravans, which traversed the Syrian desert by way of Tadmor or
Palmyra, and struck the Euphrates about Circesium. Here the route
divided, passing to Babylon southwards along the course of the great
river, and to Nineveh eastwards by way of the Khabour and the Sinjar
mountain-range. Both countries seem to have supplied the Phoenicians
with fabrics of extraordinary value, rich in a peculiar embroidery, and
deemed so precious that they were packed in chests of cedar-wood, which
the Phoenician merchants must have brought with them from Lebanon.[977]
The wares furnished by Assyria were in some cases exported to
Greece,[978] while no doubt in others they were intended for home
consumption. They included cylinders in rock crystal, jasper, hematite,
steatite, and other materials, which may sometimes have found purchasers
in Phoenicia Proper, but appear to have been specially affected by the
Phoenician colonists in Cyprus.[979] On her part Phoenicia must have
imported into Assyria and Babylonia the tin which was a necessary
element in their bronze; and they seem also to have found a market in
Assyria for their own most valuable and artistic bronzes, the exquisite
embossed pateræ which are among the most precious of the treasures
brought by Sir Austen Layard from Nineveh.[980]
The nature of the Phoenician trade with Upper Mesopotamia is unknown to
us; and it is not impossible that their merchants visited Haran,[981]
rather because it lay on the route which they had to follow in order to
reach Armenia than because it possessed in itself any special attraction
for them. Gall-nuts and manna are almost the only products for which the
region is celebrated; and of these Phoenicia herself produced the one,
while she probably did not need the other. But the natural route to
Armenia was by way of the Coelesyrian valley, Aleppo and Carchemish, to
Haran, and thence by Amida or Diarbekr to Van, which was the capital of
Armenia in the early times.
Armenia supplied the Phoenicians with “horses of common and of noble
breeds,”[982] and also with mules.[983] Strabo says that it was a
country exceedingly well adapted for the breeding of the horse,[984]
and even notes the two qualities of the animal that it produced, one of
which he calls “Nisæan,” though the true “Nisæan plain” was in Media.
So large was the number of colts bred each year, and so highly were they
valued, that, under the Persian monarchy the Great King exacted from
the province, as a regular item of its tribute, no fewer than twenty
thousand of them annually.[985] Armenian mules seem not to be mentioned
by any writer besides Ezekiel; but mules were esteemed throughout the
East in antiquity,[986] and no country would have been more likely
to breed them than the mountain tract of Armenia, the Switzerland of
Western Asia, where such surefooted animals would be especially needed.
Armenia adjoined the country of the Moschi and Tibareni--the Meshech
and Tubal of the Bible. These tribes, between the ninth and the seventh
centuries B.C., inhabited the central regions of Asia Minor and the
country known later as Cappadocia. They traded with Tyre in the “persons
of men” and in “vessels of brass” or copper.[987] Copper is found
abundantly in the mountain ranges of these parts, and Xenophon remarks
on the prevalence of metal vessels in the portion of the region which
he passed through--the country of the Carduchians.[988] The traffic in
slaves was one in which the Phoenicians engaged from very early times.
They were not above kidnapping men, women, and children in one country
and selling them into another;[989] besides which they seem to have
frequented regularly the principal slave marts of the time. They
bought such Jews as were taken captive and sold into slavery by the
neighbouring nations,[990] and they looked to the Moschi and Tibareni
for a constant supply of the commodity from the Black Sea region.[991]
The Caucasian tribes have always been in the habit of furnishing
slave-girls to the harems of the East, and the Thracians, who were not
confined to Europe, but occupied a great part of Asia Minor, regularly
trafficked in their children.[992]
Such was the extent of the Phoenician land trade, as indicated by the
prophet Ezekiel, and such were, so far as is at present known, the
commodities interchanged in the course of it. It is quite possible--nay,
probable--that the trade extended much further, and certain that it must
have included many other articles of commerce besides those which we
have mentioned. The sources of our information on the subject are so few
and scanty, and the notices from which we derive our knowledge for the
most part so casual, that we may be sure what is preserved is but a most
imperfect record of what was--fragments of wreck recovered from the sea
of oblivion. It may have been a Phoenician caravan route which Herodotus
describes as traversed on one occasion by the Nasamonians,[993] which
began in North Africa and terminated with the Niger and the city of
Timbuctoo; and another, at which he hints as lying between the coast
of the Lotus-eaters and Fezzan.[994] Phoenician traders may have
accompanied and stimulated the slave hunts of the Garamantians,[995] as
Arab traders do those of the Central African nations at the present day.
Again, it is quite possible that the Phoenicians of Memphis designed and
organised the caravans which, proceeding from Egyptian Thebes, traversed
Africa from east to west along the line of the “Salt Hills,” by way of
Ammon, Augila, Fezzan, and the Tuarik country to Mount Atlas.[996] We
can scarcely imagine the Egyptians showing so much enterprise. But these
lines of traffic can be ascribed to the Phoenicians only by conjecture,
history being silent on the subject.
The sea trade of the Phoenicians was still more extensive than their
land traffic. It is divisible into two branches, their trade with their
own colonists, and that with the natives of the various countries to
which they penetrated in their voyages. The colonies sent out from
Phoenicia were, except in the single instance of Carthage, trading
settlements, planted where some commodity or commodities desired by
the mother-country abounded, and were intended to secure to the
mother-country the monopoly of such commodity or commodities. For
instance, Cyprus was colonised for the sake of its copper mines and its
timber; Cilicia and Lycia for their timber only; Thasos for its gold
mines; Salamis and Cythera for the purple trade; Sardinia and Spain for
their numerous metals; North Africa for its fertility and for the trade
with the interior. Phoenicia expected to derive, primarily, from each
colony the commodity or commodities which had caused the selection of
the site. In return she supplied the colonists with her own manufactured
articles; with fabrics in linen, wool, cotton, and perhaps to some
extent in silk; with every variety of pottery, from dishes and jugs of
the plainest and most simple kind to the most costly and elaborate
vases and amphoræ; with metal utensils and arms, with gold and silver
ornaments, with embossed shields and pateræ, with faïnce and glass, and
also with any foreign products or manufactures that they desired and
that the countries within the range of her influence could furnish.
Phoenicia must have imported into Cyprus, to suit a peculiar Cyprian
taste, the Egyptian statuettes, scarabs, and rings,[997] and the
Assyrian and Babylonian cylinders, which have been found there. The tin
which she brought from the Cassiterides she distributed generally, for
she did not discourage her colonists from manufacturing for themselves
to some extent. There was probably no colony which did not make its own
bronze vessels of the commoner sort and its own coarser pottery.
In her trade with the nations who peopled the coasts of the
Mediterranean, the Propontis, and the Black Sea, Phoenicia aimed
primarily at disposing to advantage of her own commodities, secondarily
at making a profit in commodities which she had obtained from other
countries, and thirdly on obtaining commodities which she might dispose
of to advantage elsewhere. Where the nations were uncivilised, or in a
low condition of civilisation, she looked to making a large profit by
furnishing them at a cheap rate with all the simplest conveniences of
life, with their pottery, their implements and utensils, their clothes,
their arms, the ornaments of their persons and of their houses.
Underselling the native producers, she soon obtained a monopoly of this
kind of trade, drove the native products out of the market, and imposed
her own instead, much as the manufacturers of Manchester, Birmingham,
and the Potteries impose their calicoes, their cutlery, and their
earthenware on the savages of Africa and Polynesia. Where culture was
more advanced, as in Greece and parts of Italy,[998] she looked to
introduce, and no doubt succeeded in introducing, the best of her own
productions, fabrics of crimson, violet, and purple, painted vases,
embossed pateræ, necklaces, bracelets, rings--“cunning work” of all
manner of kinds[999]--mirrors, glass vessels, and smelling-bottles. At
the same time she also disposed at a profit of many of the wares that
she had imported from foreign countries, which were advanced in certain
branches of art, as Egypt, Babylonia, Assyria, possibly India. The
muslins and ivory of Hindustan, the shawls of Kashmir, the carpets of
Babylon, the spices of Araby the Blest, the pearls of the Persian Gulf,
the faïence and the papyrus of Egypt, would be readily taken by the more
civilised of the Western nations, who would be prepared to pay a high
price for them. They would pay for them partly, no doubt, in silver and
gold, but to some extent also in their own manufactured commodities,
Attica in her ceramic products, Corinth in her “brass,” Etruria in her
candelabra and engraved mirrors,[9100] Argos in her highly elaborated
ornaments.[9101] Or, in some cases, they might make return out of the
store wherewith nature had provided them, Euboea rendering her copper,
the Peloponnese her “purple,” Crete her timber, the Cyrenaica its
silphium.
Outside the Pillars of Hercules the Phoenicians had only savage nations
to deal with, and with these they seem to have traded mainly for
the purpose of obtaining certain natural products, either peculiarly
valuable or scarcely procurable elsewhere. Their trade with the Scilly
Islands and the coast of Cornwall was especially for the procuring of
tin. Of all the metals, tin is found in the fewest places, and though
Spain seems to have yielded some anciently,[9102] yet it can only have
been in small quantities, while there was an enormous demand for tin
in all parts of the old world, since bronze was the material almost
universally employed for arms, tools, implements, and utensils of all
kinds, while tin is the most important, though not the largest, element
in bronze. From the time that the Phoenicians discovered the Scilly
Islands--the “Tin Islands” (Cassiterides), as they called them--it is
probable that the tin of the civilised world was almost wholly derived
from this quarter. Eastern Asia, no doubt, had always its own mines, and
may have exported tin to some extent, in the remoter times, supplying
perhaps the needs of Egypt, Assyria, and Babylon. But, after the rich
stores of the metal which our own islands possess were laid open, and
the Phoenicians with their extensive commercial dealings, both in the
West and in the East, became interested in diffusing it, British tin
probably drove all other out of use, and obtained the monopoly of the
markets wherever Phoenician influence prevailed. Hence the trade with
the Cassiterides was constant, and so highly prized that a Phoenician
captain, finding his ship followed by a Roman vessel, preferred running
it upon the rocks to letting a rival nation learn the secret of how the
tin-producing coast might be approached in safety.[9103] With the tin
it was usual for the merchants to combine a certain amount of lead and a
certain quantity of skins or hides; while they gave in exchange pottery,
salt, and articles in bronze, such as arms, implements, and utensils for
cooking and for the table.[9104]
If the Phoenicians visited, as some maintain that they did,[9105] the
coasts of the Baltic, it must have been for the purpose of obtaining
amber. Amber is thrown up largely by the waters of that land-locked
sea, and at present especially abounds on the shore in the vicinity of
Dantzic. It is very scarce elsewhere. The Phoenicians seem to have
made use of amber in their necklaces from a very early date;[9106] and,
though they might no doubt have obtained it by land-carriage across
Europe to the head of the Adriatic, yet their enterprise and their
commercial spirit were such as would not improbably have led them to
seek to open a direct communication with the amber-producing region, so
soon as they knew where it was situated. The dangers of the German
Ocean are certainly not greater than those of the Atlantic; and if the
Phoenicians had sufficient skill in navigation to reach Britain and the
Fortunate Islands, they could have found no very serious difficulty
in penetrating to the Baltic. On the other hand, there is no direct
evidence of their having penetrated so far, and perhaps the Adriatic
trade may have supplied them with as much amber as they needed.
The trade of the Phoenicians with the west coast of Africa had for its
principal objects the procuring of ivory, of elephant, lion, leopard,
and deer-skins, and probably of gold. Scylax relates that there was an
established trade in his day (about B.C. 350) between Phoenicia and
an island which he calls Cerne, probably Arguin, off the West African
coast. “The merchants,” he says,[9107] “who are Phoenicians, when they
have arrived at Cerne, anchor their vessels there, and after having
pitched their tents upon the shore, proceed to unload their cargo, and
to convey it in smaller boats to the mainland. The dealers with whom
they trade are Ethiopians; and these dealers sell to the Phoenicians
skins of deer, lions, panthers, and domestic animals--elephants’ skins
also, and their teeth. The Ethiopians wear embroidered garments, and use
ivory cups as drinking vessels; their women adorn themselves with ivory
bracelets; and their horses also are adorned with ivory. The Phoenicians
convey to them ointment, elaborate vessels from Egypt, castrated
swine(?), and Attic pottery and cups. These last they commonly purchase
[in Athens] at the Feast of Cups. These Ethiopians are eaters of flesh
and drinkers of milk; they make also much wine from the vine; and the
Phoenicians, too, supply some wine to them. They have a considerable
city, to which the Phoenicians sail up.” The river on which the city
stood was probably the Senegal.
It will be observed that Scylax says nothing in this passage of
any traffic for gold. We can scarcely suppose, however, that the
Phoenicians, if they penetrated so far south as this, could remain
ignorant of the fact that West Africa was a gold-producing country,
much less that, being aware of the fact, they would fail to utilise it.
Probably they were the first to establish that “dumb commerce” which
was afterwards carried on with so much advantage to themselves by the
Carthaginians, and whereof Herodotus gives so graphic an account.
“There is a country,” he says,[9108] “in Libya, and a nation, beyond the
Pillars of Hercules, which the Carthaginians are wont to visit, where
they no sooner arrive than forthwith they unlade their wares, and having
disposed them after an orderly fashion along the beach, there leave
them, and returning aboard their ships, raise a great smoke. The
natives, when they see the sample, come down to the shore, and laying
out to view so much gold as they think the wares are worth, withdraw to
a distance. The Carthaginians upon this come ashore again and look. If
they think the gold to be enough, they take it and go their way; but if
it does not seem to them sufficient, they go aboard ship once more, and
wait patiently. Then the others approach and add to their gold, till the
Carthaginians are satisfied. Neither party deals unfairly by the other:
for they themselves never touch the gold till it comes up to the worth
of their goods, nor do the natives ever carry off the goods until the
gold has been taken away.”
The nature of the Phoenician trade with the Canaries, or Fortunate
Islands, is not stated by any ancient author, and can only be
conjectured. It would scarcely have been worth the Phoenicians’ while
to convey timber to Syria from such a distance, or we might imagine the
virgin forests of the islands attracting them.[9109] The large breed of
dogs from which the Canaries derived their later name[9110] may perhaps
have constituted an article of export even in Phoenician times, as
we know they did later, when we hear of their being conveyed to King
Juba;[9111] but there is an entire lack of evidence on the subject.
Perhaps the Phoenicians frequented the islands less for the sake of
commerce than for that of watering and refitting the ships engaged in
the African trade, since the natives were less formidable than those who
inhabited the mainland.[9112]
There was one further direction in which the Phoenicians pushed their
maritime trade, not perhaps continuously, but at intervals, when their
political relations were such as to give them access to the sea which
washed Asia on the south and on the southeast. The nearest points at
which they could embark for the purpose of exploring or utilising the
great tract of ocean in this quarter were the inner recesses of the two
deep gulfs known as the Persian and the Arabian. It has been thought by
some[9113] that there were times in their history when the Phoenicians
had the free use of both these gulfs, and could make the starting-point
of their eastern explorations and trading voyages either a port on one
of the two arms into which the Red Sea divides towards the north, or a
harbour on the Persian Gulf near its north-western extremity. But the
latter supposition rests upon grounds which are exceedingly unsafe and
uncertain. That the Phoenicians migrated at some remote period from the
shores of the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean may be allowed to be
highly probable; but that, after quitting their primitive abodes
and moving off nearly a thousand miles to the westward, they still
maintained a connection with their early settlements and made them
centres for a trade with the Far East, is as improbable a hypothesis as
any that has ever received the sanction of men of learning and repute.
The Babylonians, through whose country the connection must have been
kept up, were themselves traders, and would naturally keep the Arabian
and Indian traffic in their own hands; nor can we imagine them as
brooking the establishment of a rival upon their shores. The Arabians
were more friendly; but they, too, would have disliked to share their
carrying trade with a foreign nation. And the evidence entirely fails
to show that the Phoenicians, from the time of their removal to the
Mediterranean, ever launched a vessel in the Persian Gulf, or had
any connection with the nations inhabiting its shores, beyond that
maintained by the caravans which trafficked by land between the
Phoenician cities and the men of Dedan and Babylon.[9114]
It was otherwise with the more western gulf. There, certainly, from
time to time, the Phoenicians launched their fleets, and carried on a
commerce which was scarcely less lucrative because they had to allow the
nations whose ports they used a participation in its profits. It is not
impossible that, occasionally, the Egyptians allowed them to build ships
in some one or more of their Red Sea ports, and to make such port or
ports the head-quarters of a trade which may have proceeded beyond the
Straits of Babelmandeb and possibly have reached Zanzibar and Ceylon.
At any rate, we know that, in the time of Solomon, two harbours upon
the Red Sea were open to them--viz. Eloth and Ezion-Geber--both places
situated in the inner recess of the Elanitic Gulf, or Gulf of Akaba,
the more eastern of the two arms into which the Red Sea divides.
David’s conquest of Edom had put these ports into the possession of the
Israelites, and the friendship between Hiram and Solomon had given the
Phoenicians free access to them. It was the ambition of Solomon to make
the Israelites a nautical people, and to participate in the advantages
which he perceived to have accrued to Phoenicia from her commercial
enterprise. Besides sharing with the Phoenicians in the trade of
the Mediterranean,[9115] he constructed with their help a fleet at
Ezion-Geber upon the Red Sea,[9116] and the two allies conjointly made
voyages to the region, or country, called Ophir, for the purpose
of procuring precious stones, gold, and almug-wood.[9117] Ophir is,
properly speaking, a portion of Arabia,[9118] and Arabia was famous for
its production of gold,[9119] and also for its precious stones.[9120]
Whether it likewise produced almug-trees is doubtful;[9121] and it is
quite possible that the joint fleet went further than Ophir proper, and
obtained the “almug-wood” from the east coast of Africa, or from India.
The Somauli country might have been as easily reached as South-eastern
Arabia, and if India is considerably more remote, yet there was nothing
to prevent the Phoenicians from finding their way to it.[9122] We have,
however, no direct evidence that their commerce in the Indian Ocean ever
took them further than the Arabian coast, about E. Long. 55º.