The difference in the pronunciation may be briefly characterized as a tendency towards an obscuring or lowering, as it were, of the vowels: thus, the Hebrew a is changed into o, the e into i or?/, i into y, sometimes into u, and a into U. Peculiar is also the use of the Hebrew Ayin as a vowel (mater lectionis), with the pronunciation of o or 011 .Kimo occasions. however, it is entirely omitted. The gutturals are changed at tittles, as in the corrupted orthography of Samaritan and Sabian, so that L and II are sometimes assimi lated with the next consonant in the middle of the word, or entirely omitted, etc. As to grammar, our knowledge is extremely limited. A few undoubted facts are the ter mination of the nominative form in at instead of the Hebrew alt, the greater variety of genitive ft Ian; iu Phenician, the difference in the formation of the pronoun, and the identity of the article with that in Hebrew (ha). For the Phenician alphabet, the model of all Europe.m alphabets, see ALPHABET.
The literature of Phenicia, in its original form, bas, as we said, perished entirely. What traces and fragments we have of it, have survived in Greek translations. But from even these smell remnants, we can easily imagine the extreme antiquity, and the high importance and vast extent of these productions. which, at first, scent to have been chiefly of a theological or theogonical nature. Their authors are the gods themselves, and the writings are only accessible to the priests, and to those initiated in the mysteries. From the allegorical explanations of these exalted personages a new branch of sacred literature, of which those fragments of cosmogony mentioned above arc derived. To the literary age of Taaut, Kadinus, Ophion, Esnm, etc., succeeded Mahlon, lsiris, Sanehuniatho, and Mochas, \Nilo founded the schools of priests and prophets. These cultivated the sciences, chiefly the occult ones, magic, and the like. Nearest to the sacred literuure stands didactic poetry, somewhat related to the Orphie, whose chief representatives are Sido. .Topas, etc. The erotic poetry is characterized as of it very sensuous nature, both in Phenicia and the colonies. Of historians arc mentioned Mochus, Hypsikrates (Suatichoniatbo ?), Theodotns, Philostratus, Menander, and others; but these are mere Greek versions of their Phenician names, and absolutely been pre served of their writings. Punic literature is also frequently mentioned by Greek and Roman writers. Geography, history, agriculture, were the fields chiefly cultivated by the colonists of Carthage and the west generally.
The monuments that have come down to us, and which not only have enabled us to judge for ourselves of the religion, the language, and the manners of the Phenicians, arc of twofold kind—they are either legends on coitus and lapidary inscriptions, or Phc niciati proper nouns and texts imbedded in the works of ancient classical, or sacred writers. The principal and ever-growing source for our information, however, are the
monumental inscriptions, of whose existence, till the middle of the 18th c., nothing was known. The most numerous Phenician remnants have been discovered in the colonies. Richard Pococke first found, on the site of ancieut Citium (Larnaka of to-day). 31 (not 83, as generally stated) Phenician inscriptions, which he deposited at Oxford (published by Swinton, 1750). Malta, Sardinia, Carthage, Algiers, Tripolis, Athens, Marseilles, have each yielded a considerable number, so that altogether we are now in the possession of about 120 monuments, either votive tablets or tomb inscriptions. The latest and most remarkable are those now in the British museum, discovered at Carthage a few years ago by N. Davis, consisting of votive tablets, a (doubtful) tombstone, and is sacrificial tariff, which completes another stone found some years ago at. Marseilles of the same nature; both setting forth the amount of taxes, or rather the proportionate share the priest was entitled to receive for each sacrifice. Another exceedingly valuable (trilingual) inscrip tion, referring to the gift of an altar vowed to Eshmun-Asklepios, has been discovered quite recently in Sardinia. See below. One of the most important historical monu ments is the sarcophagus of Ashmanasar II., king of Sidon (son of Tonnes?), found at Tyre in 1855, the age of which has variously been conjectured between the 11th C. B.C. (Ewald)—n most incongruous guess indeed—the 7th (Hitzig), the 6th (Due de Luynes), and the 4th (Levy), of which we shall add the cora mencement, literally translated : " In the month of Bul, in the 14th year that I reigned, -king Ashman astir, king of the Sidonians, son of king Tebnith, king of the Sidonians—spake king Ashmanasar, king of the Sidoniaus, saying: Carried away before my time, in the flood of days—in dumbness ceases the son of gods. Dead do I lie in this tomb, in the grave, on the place which I have built. I myself ordain that all the nobles and all the people shall not open this place of rest; they shall not seek for treasures and not early away the sarcophagus of my resting place, and not disturb me by mounting the couch of my slumbers. If people should speak to thee- [and persuade thee to the contrary], do not listen to them. For all the nobles and all the people who shall open this sarcophagus of the place of rest, or carry away the sarcophagus of my couch, or disturb me upon this resting-place, may they find no rest with the departed; may they not be buried in a tomb, and may no son and successor live after them in their place;" etc.