Phoenicia

Manufactures, Inventions, Art.

From an early date the towns of the Phoenician coast were occupied, not only with dis tributing the merchandise of other countries but with working at industries of their own ; especially purple-dyeing and textile fabrics (Il., vi. 289 sqq.), metal work in silver, gold and electrum (Il., xxiii. 741 sqq.; Od., iv. 615 sqq. xv. 458 sqq.), and glass work, which had its seat at Sidon. The iron and copper mines of Cyprus (not Sidon, as Homer implies, Od., xv. 424) furnished the ore which was manufactured into articles of commerce. Egyptian monuments frequently mention the vessels of gold and silver, iron and copper, made by the Dahi, i.e., the Phoenicians (W. M. Milner, As. a. Eur., 306) ; and in Cyprus and at Nimrud bronze and silver paterae have been found, engraved with Egyp tian designs, the work of Phoenician artists (see table-cases C and D in the Nimrud gallery of the Brit. Mus.). The invention of these various arts and industries was popularly ascribed to the Phoenicians, no doubt merely because Phoenician traders brought the products into the market. But dyeing and em broidery probably came from Babylon in the first instance ; glass making seems to have been borrowed from Egypt ; the invention of arithmetic and of weights and measures must be laid to the credit of the Babylonians. The ancients believed that the Phoeni cians invented the use of the alphabet (e.g., Pliny, N.H., v. 13, cf. vii. 57; Lucan, Bell. Civ., ill. 220 seq.) ; but it is unlikely that any genuine tradition on the subject existed, and though the Phoenician theory has found favour in modern times it is open to much question.

The art of Phoenicia is characterized generally by its depend ence upon the art of the neighbouring races. It struck out no original line of its own, and borrowed freely from foreign, espe cially Egyptian, models. Remains of sculpture, engraved bronzes and gems, show clearly the source to which the Phoenician artists went for inspiration ; for example, the uraeus-frieze and the winged disc, the ankh or symbol of life, are Egyptian designs frequently imitated. It was in the times of the Persian monarchy that Phoenician art reached its highest development, and to this period belong the oldest sculptures and coins that have come down to us. A characteristic specimen of the former is the stele of Yehaw-milk, king of Gebal (CIS. i. I), in which the king is represented in Persian dress, and the goddess to whom he is offering a bowl looks exactly like an Egyptian Isis-Hathor; (Gressmann, Texte u. ii. Pl. ccviii.). The whole artistic movement in Phoenicia may be divided into two great periods: in the first, from the earliest times to the 4th century B.C., Egyp tian influence and then Babylonian or Asiatic influence is pre dominant, but the national element is strongly marked ; while in the second, Greek influence has obtained the mastery, and the native element, though making itself felt, is much less obtrusive. Throughout these periods works of art, such as statues of the gods and sarcophagi, were imported direct at first from Egypt and afterwards mainly from Rhodes. The finest sarcophagi that have been found in the necropolis of Sidon (now in the Imperial Museum, Constantinople) are not Phoenician at all, but exquisite specimens of Greek art. The Phoenicians spent much care on their burial-places, which have furnished the most important monuments left to us. Thus, on the site of Gebal, now Jebeil, the French excavators, under the leadership of Montet, 1921-23, have unearthed the fine sarcophagus of Ahiram, Egyptian in style, and engraved with the earliest Phoenician inscripition so far known; see Gressmann; Texte u. i. 440; ii. 189-192 and P1. ccliv.

(1927). Besides busts and figurines, which belong as a rule to the Greek period, the smaller objects usually found are earthen pitchers and lamps, glass-wares, tesserae and gems. Of buildings which can be called architectural few specimens now exist on Phoenician soil, for the reason that for ages the inhabitants have used the ruins as convenient quarries. Not a vestige remains of the great sanctuary of Melqarth at Tyre; a few traces of the temple of Adonis near Byblus were discovered by Renan, and a peculiar mausoleum, Burj al-Bezzaq, is still to be seen near Amrit; excavations at Bostan esh-Shekh near Sidon revealed parts of the enclosure or foundations of the temple of Eshmun (NSI. p. 401) ; the conduits of Ras el- 'Ain, south of Tyre, are considered to be of ancient date.

Religion.

Like the Canaanites of whom they formed a branch, the Phoenicians connected their religion with the great powers and processes of nature. The gods whom they worshipped belonged essentially to the earth ; the fertile field, trees and mountains, headlands and rivers and springs, were believed to be inhabited by different divinities, who were therefore primarily local, many in number, with no one in particular supreme over the rest. It seems, however, that as time went on some of them acquired a more extended character; thus Ba'al and Astarte assumed celestial attributes in addition to their earthly ones, and the Tyrian Melqarth combined a celestial with a marine aspect.

The gods in general were called 'elonim, 'elim; Plautus uses alonium valonuth for "gods and goddesses" (Poen., v. I, 1). These plurals go back to the singular form 'El, the common Semi tic name for God ; but neither the singular nor the plural is at all common in the inscriptions (NSI. pp. 24, 41, 51) ; 'El by itself has been found only once; the fem. 'Elath is also rare (ibid., pp.

135, 158). The god or goddess was generally called the Ba'al or Bacalath of such and such a place, a title which was used not only by the Canaanites, but by the Aramaeans (Beep and Baby lonians (Bel) as well. There was no one particular god called Bacal; the word is not a proper name but an appellative, a descrip tion of the deity as owner or mistress; and the same is the case with Milk or Melek, 'Adon, 'Amma, which mean king, lord, mother. The god himself was unnamed or had no name. Oc casionally we know what the name was; the Baal of Tyre was Melqarth which again means merely "king of the city"; similarly among the Aramaeans the Ba'al of Harran was the moon-god Sin. As each city or district had its own Ba'al, the "husband" of the land which he fertilized, so there were many Ba'als, and the Old Testament writers could allude to the Baealim of the neighbour ing Canaanites. Sometimes the god received a distinguishing attribute which indicates an association not with any particular place, but with some special characteristic ; the most common forms are Ba'al-hamman, the chief deity of Punic north Africa perhaps "the glowing Ba'al," the god of fertilizing warmth, and Ba'al-shamem, "Beal of the heavens" (cf. Dan. xii. i1, xi. 31, etc.). The latter deity was widely venerated throughout the north Semitic world ; his name, which does not appear in the Phoenician inscriptions before the 3rd century B.C., goes back at least to Boo B.C. (Aramaic inscription of Zakir, from Hamath.) The worship of the female along with the male principle was a strongly marked feature of Phoenician religion.