Series), chap. iv.: Memphis; Cilicia; Cyprus; Rhodes; in the Egean Sea-Carpathos, Casos, Telos, the Sporades and Cyclades; Grecian Islands-Cythera, Salamis, Eubæa; African Colonies-Utica, Carthage, Leptis Magna; Sicilian Colonies-Eryx, Egesta, Palermo, Gaulos (Gozo); Malta; Colonies in SpainTartessus, Gades, Malaca, Carteïa; Colonies in Sardinia -Tharros and others; settlements in the Scilly Islands and Cornwall; and possible settlements on the Red Sea. To these we may add Joppa, Crete, the Balearic Isles, Kalpe (Gibraltar), and Ézion-geber. "Behold Philistia, and Tyre, and Ethiopia" (Psa. lxxxvii. 4). The Phoenicians occupied Sicily before the time of the Greeks, who established their first colony of Naxos there in 735 B.C. Palermo is probably of Phoenician origin, and remained for some centuries in the possession of the Carthaginians. They planted their colonies in the south of Spain, in the modern province of Andalusia. The silver mines and gold dust of Spain proved a veritable El Dorado to the Tyrians; as Mexico and Peru, in modern times, became to the Spaniards. Slave-dealing was likewise a source of wealth to the Tyrians, as mentioned by the prophet Ezekiel (xxvii. 13). The Phoenicians naturally extended their colonies first in their immediate neighbourhood, and Joppa (the modern Jaffa), which is one of the oldest towns in the world, was a Phoenician colony. One hundred miles to the north-west of the coast of Phoenicia lies the island of Cyprus. On its southern coast, looking towards Phoenicia, stood the city of "Citium," rendered "Kith," and "Chith" in Phoenician inscriptions, and "Kittii" in Assyrian cuneiform records. Sidonian coins describe Citium as a daughter of Sidon. Then the city, and subsequently the whole island of Cyprus, was known as "Kittim" and "Chittim (Isa. xxiii. 1, 12; Ezek. xxvii. 6), and later, this name embraced all the islands in the Mediterranean. The legend of the Greeks makes Hercules, i.e., Baal-Melkarth, the chief deity of the Phoenicians and lord of the West. About 1100 B.C. the Phoenicians I went to the far west of the Mediterranean and established a colony beyond the Straits of Gibraltar. "In obedience to the words of an oracle, a fleet carried a colony to the Pillars of Hercules and landed not far from the mouth of the Boetis. Here, on the east side of the island, they built a temple to Hercules; on the opposite side of the island, they built the town of Gadeira or Gades, on the river Guadalquivir. This foundation of Gades--the modern Cadiz-is without doubt the most ancient city of Europe which has preserved its name since its foundation in 1100 B.C." I The Tyrians colonized Tartessus (Tarshish), Malaka (Malaga), and Kalpe (Gibraltar), and the position of their city of Gades (Cadiz), beyond the Pillars of Hercules on the Atlantic, would naturally lead them on to further voyages of discovery to the north as well as to the south. Traces of Phoenician occupation have recently been found even in Africa, where Mr. Wilmot's researches demonstrate that Zimbawbe, in South Central Africa, with its ruins of towers and vast crumbling piles of masonry, must, at an early period, have been a centre of civilized life.2 "The Phoenicians, though never a great nation, yet played a great part in the history of the civilization of the ancient world. Settled from remote times on the coast of Syria, where their two greatest cities, Tyre and Sidon, flourished, and being a seafaring people, they traded in all parts of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Their colonies dotted the main coasts and were established in the islands. Carthage, their greatest colony in the west, at a later period, rivalled the power of Rome, and was crushed only after a desperate struggle. The Phoenicians carried the germs of civilization wherever they traded; they brought the nations of the Mediterranean into communication with one another, and to the present day the world is in their debt." 3 2 The Antiquary, July, 1903. W. B. Wallace, B.A. The following is an extract from an article in the Encyclopædia Britannica, on Phoenicia, with reference to its colonization :— "Ezekiel has left a vivid picture which shows how large was the share they had in overland as well as in naval commerce. It was they, in fact, who from the earliest time distributed to the rest of the world the wares of Egypt and of Babylon (Herod., i. 1) Actual inland settlements seem to have been few. In the Arabian caravan trade in perfume, spices, and incense for worship, the Phoenicians had a great interest (Herod., iii. 107). "In Egypt Phoenician trade and civilization took firm root. The Tyrians had their own quarter in old Memphis (Herod., ii. 112), but there were never real colonies of the Phoenicians in Egypt. "In matters economic Syria and Palestine depended upon Phoenicia; so also did Togarmah, an Armenian district. Cicilia was important to the Phoenicians as the natural point of shipment for wares from the Euphrates regions; and the opposite island of Cyprus attracted them by its store of timber for shipbuilding, and of copper. "The Homeric poems represent the Phoenicians as present in Greek waters for purposes of traffic, including the purchase and capture of slaves, but not as settlers. Tradition is unanimous in representing the Phonicians as occupying the southern islands of the Ægean before the migrations of the Greeks to Asia Minor. Two great islands were held as main seats of the purple trade, Cythera and Thera, with the neighbouring Anaphe, as also the town Itanus at the eastern extremity of Crete. Specially famous was the purple of the Laconian waters, "the isles of Elishah" of Ezekiel (xxvii. 7). Farther east the Phoenicians settled in Rhodes. "The great centre of Phoenician colonization was the western half of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic coasts, to the right and left of the Straits. In especial the trade with Tarshish, that is, the region of the Tartessus (Guadalquivir), was what made the commercial greatness of the Phoenicians; for here they had not only profitable fisheries of tunny and muræna, but, above all, rich mines of silver and other metals, to which the navigable rivers Guadiana and Guadalquivir gave easy access. Next the Phoenicians ventured farther on the ocean, and drew tin from the mines of north-west Spain, or the richer deposits of Cornwall. "The rich trade with Spain led to the colonization of the west (Diodorus). Strabo (i. 48) dates the settlements beyond the Pillars of Hercules soon after the Trojan war, in the time, that is, of Tyre's first expansion. Lixus, in Mauritania, was older than Gades (Pliny, xix. 63) and Gades a few years older than Utica, which was founded IIOI B.C. Most of the African colonies were no doubt younger, Aoza (887-885 B.C., Menander), Carthage (814 B.C., Timæus). "The trading connections of the Phoenicians reached far beyond their most remote colonies, and it must have been their knowledge of Africa which encouraged Pharaoh Necho to send a Phoenician expedition to circumnavigate Africa. This greatest feat of ancient seamanship was actually accomplished in 611-605 B.C., at a time when the mother-country had already lost its independence, and when the colonial empire had but a shadow of its former splendour. The power of Tyre rested directly on her colonies. . . . The colonies paid tithes of all their revenues, and sometimes also of booty taken in war, to the Tyrian Hercules, and sent envoys to Tyre for his chief feast." I It is very probable that there were Phoenician settlements in the south of England, for the Tyrians evidently traded with the aboriginal Britons, from whom they purchased the metals of tin, iron, lead, and silver. There is no doubt that the Phoenicians had a flourishing colony at Marseilles, and were in constant communication with Britain. They made the journey by boat as far as Lyons; and thence by wagons to a northern 1 Phœnicia: Encyclopædia Britannica, vol, XVIII. p. 825–807. seaport, crossing to the Isle of Wight or Cornwall by ship. The tin was brought down to the coast, cast into square blocks, and after the ships were laden, the return journey was made in the same manner. Tin was a rare metal and invaluable to the ancients, who employed it for hardening copper, thus forming bronze, which was used for weapons of war, for tools, for ornaments, and for utensils of all kinds. If the traders to the Scilly Isles came from a colony in North Africa, it is probable and more natural that they would have made the journey by sea. There is no doubt that the Phoenicians came through the Straits of Gibraltar; and coasting up by Portugal and France, discovered Ireland, where they established settlements and passed to the Scilly Isles (the ancient Cassiterides) in search of tin.1 Colonies are so nearly allied to commerce, and commerce to colonies, that they get intertwined, and it is difficult to draw a line of distinction between them; but in this chapter we restrict our attention to colonies, properly so called. As time went on and nations increased, the Phonicians sent out expeditions to explore unknown regions, to acquire fresh fields for commerce, or to relieve their surplus population, as the bees of the parent hive send forth their annual swarms. "The progress of the Greeks, and their triumph in the waters of the Ægean and Ionian Seas, and the rapid expansion of the Etruscan navy after the end of the ninth century, gradually restricted the Phoenician merchantmen to the coasts of the Western Mediterranean and the Atlantic; they industriously exploited the mineral wealth of Africa and Spain, and trafficked with the barbarous tribes of Morocco and Lusitania.” 2 Ancient Greece made certain migratory expeditions, and colonized the adjacent coast of Asia Minor, at different times between 1000 B.C. and 776 B.C. This 1 See History of England, by Lingard, and also by Lappenberg. 2 The Passing of the Empires, p. 281. Prof. Maspero. S.P.C.K., 1900, |