The Phoenicians in History and Legend
by
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At the beginning of recorded history the Phoenicians already appear to have had a rather advanced civilization. Their real origin extends back in time into the realm of legend. Europa, Baal, Cadmus, are characters in whom legend and history blend. Europa, a Phoenician princess, is in mythical times abducted and raped by Zeus, who takes her to Crete where she begins the dynasty of Minos. Greek historians and poets during the 5th-4th century BC would later place this event at the onset of history. A succesion of local wars took place in the Eastern Mediterranean area during the 3d and 2d millennia BC that led to a mixture of races and cultures. To the Phoenicians, the origin of hostilities was related to the abduction of Europa. To the Western historians, the motivation for the beginning of hostilities was the phoenician behaviour. Herodotus, for instance, favors this view and makes the Phoenicians responsible for the abduction of Greek women, (Io, the daughter of Inachus, is abducted and made pregnant by a phoenician captain ). Whether these were facts or legend, one can not with entire certainty clearly trace the origin of the conflict in the eastern Mediterranean shores at this period to any particular event. No extant evidence exists today. Eventually, however, the net result of these contacts was the miscegenation of European and Middle Eastern inhabitants on the shores of Asia Minor. Many facts and names of middle eastern places came to us transmitted by the Greeks. Greek knowledge of Geography outside Asia Minor appears to have been limited in the time of Herodotus because he states that Asia is uninhabited beyond India and Europe is as large as Africa and Asia put together. The name Lybia, given by the Greeks to Africa was originally that of the wife of Poseidon and mother of Agenor, king of Phoenicia. According to Herodotus most Greeks assumed that Lybia was so called after a native woman and Asia was named after the wife of Prometheus. According to the Lydians, however, Asia was originally the name of the grandson of Manes and that of a tribe called Asias in Sardis. Finally, the name Europe seems to have derived from Europa, the Phoenician princess, sister of Kadmus, abducted by Zeus, mentioned above. Unquestionably, the most significant and everlasting Phoenician contribution to civilization is the invention of the alphabet. This discovery was first credited to them by ancient writers, among whom arguably the most prominent was Herodotus. Its introduction into Greece during mythological times is attributed to Cadmus, the phoenician brother of Europa. Following his father's orders Cadmus went searching for his sister and initiated a lineage that blends mythology and history. The finding of the earliest extant example of the most evolved form of the consonant alphabet at Byblos, on the lid of the epitaph inscription of the Ahiram Sarcophagus, is a momentous event in the history of civilization. Its possible invention in Phoenicia proper is still subject of debate. Its diffusion by the Phoenicians to the Greeks and Romans is a fact now accepted by most scholars. The introduction into Greece by the Phoenicians, based on historical-legendary records, seems now undeniable and widely accepted. Historically it appears, despite some disagreements among scholars, that the most likely date for the introduction of the Phoenician alphabet into Greece by Cadmus was between the 12th and 11th century BC or perhaps earlier. This event greatly facilitated the creation, development, recording and propagation of human knowledge. The alphabet, modified and adapted by the Greeks and later by the Romans, remains in use until present and has played a paramount role in the development of Western thought. The Phoenicians would also count, among their contributions to the early history of mankind, the discovery and navigation of the Indian and Atlantic Oceans and the circumnavigation of Africa. Finally the Phoenicians, in the form of their descendants, Carthagineans and Celtiberic, appear to have also traveled to America, as more recent evidence seems to suggest.
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About the Book
The Phoenicians controlled the area of the Mediterranean Sea for over the entire first millennium BC and had lived on the Eastern shores of the sea for the previous two millennia. They spread to the northern and southern Mediterranean shores, making significant contributions to Western civilization. But today they are almost completely unknown. Except for scholars, they are mostly ignored today because the rival Greek and Roman cultures that eventually spread to the West attempted to erase any trace of the Phoenicians. History has no mercy on the vanquished and is written by the winners. While scholars are aware of the Phoenician contributions to civilization, most people know nothing about them. This book is an attempt to bring this topic back to the attention of modern readers. The author hopes that a broad audience of readers will be interested in the knowledge that was brought to us by the contributions of the Phoenicians. The intended audience of this book includes students of history, mythology or religion, writers and scholars from other disciplines, linguistic experts and anyone with an interest in enhancing their knowledge about forgotten civilizations. There are over three million people of Phoenician descent in the United States and twice as many in the remainder of the Americas, to whom this book would also be of interest.
About the Author
The author has been a university professor for over twenty years in the United States. In his early youth he was fortunate to live abroad, frequently visiting the countries bordering southern Europe, North Africa and Asia Minor. He has also traveled widely in the rest of the world. With this background, years later he began to work on the present book as a result of fortuitous encounters with people whom he had met all over these areas. An avid reader, he has acquired a broad knowledge of the historical civilizations that shaped Western culture. Further, he has come to realize the existence of much older, forgotten and mostly ignored pre-historical people who had been at the root of what was inherited by the West through the predominant influence of the Greco-Roman civilization. This book reflects his belief that multiple events that occurred in the remote past paved the way for our civilization to develop to the point that we enjoy today.