Phoenicia

ses II. of Egypt, Esar-haddon of Assyria, and Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia-can still be seen.

South of Beirut is Sidon (now Saida), the ancient cemetery of which has yielded many interesting monuments, including the sculptured sarcophagi of a GræcoPhoenician prince, now at Constantinople, which are among the finest productions of Greek art. Farther south again is Tyre (now Sur), originally built on an island 'rock' about 1,800 yards from the shore. On the mainland there grew up a town, to which the Greeks gave the name of Palæatyrus, and which, it is probable, is the Usu of Assyrian inscriptions. In 332 B.C. Alexander the Great connected the island with the mainland by a mole during his seven months' siege of the city. Owing to the silting up of the sand, the mole has long since become an isthmus. Between Sidon and Tyre was Sarepta, the Old Testament Zarephath. Tyre claimed rule over the coast as far s. as Mount Carmel, the Rosh Qadesh (Kadesh) or sacred promontory of the Egyptian inscriptions of the eighteenth dynasty. The chief towns in this district were Achzib or Ekdippa (now Zib), and Akko (the modern Acre), which in the days of the Ptolemies received the name of Ptolemais. South of Carmel was the plain of Sharon, with its seaports of Dor (now Tantura), Arsuf (which preserves the name of the Phoenician sun-god_Resheph), and Joppa or Jaffa. Here, too, Herod the Great transformed the tower of Strato into the magnificent city of Cæsarea.

It is,

however, questionable whether that part of the coast can, strictly speaking, be reckoned as Phoenicia. An Egyptian papyrus of the age of Solomon describes Dor as a city of Zakkal, whose people were related to the Philistines rather than to the Canaanites. the same time, the whole of the coast was Canaanite before the incursions of Cretan pirates made it Philistine, and Jaffa was certainly of Canaanitish foundation.

At

According to their own traditions, the Phoenicians came originally from the Erythræan Sea (Herodotus, i., 1, víi. 89), which the fragments of Berosus identify with the Persian Gulf. Here

were the islands of Arados and Tylos, in which Greek etymologists saw the names Arvad and Tyre. If we may believe Justin (xviii. 32-33), they had migrated from their home on 'the Syrian' (or, according to another reading, the Assyrian') 'lake' in consequence of an earthquake. This "Syrian lake' is usually identified with the Lake of Nedjef, s. of the ruins of Babylon; Bunsen's suggestion that it represents the

405

Dead Sea is out of the question. Equally unacceptable is the theory of Lepsius that the Phoenicians were colonists from the land of Punt on the Somali coast. The resemblance in physical type between the Phoenicians and the people of Punt, as depicted on the Egyptian monuments, can be accounted for by the fact that both belong to the Semitic race. On the linguistic side the Semitic affinities of the Phoenicians do not admit of question. Their language the language of Canaan,' as it is called in Isa. 19:18-is practically the same as Hebrew, and the Tell-el-Amarna tablets show that it was spoken throughout Canaan before the Exodus. According to St. Augustine, the peasantry near Carthage, if asked who they were, still answered in Punic-the Carthaginian daughter of the older Phoenician-'We are Canaanites' (Chanani).

Sidon was the oldest of the Phoenician cities (Gen. 10:15). If Justin is to be trusted, Tyre was founded by refugees from Sidon after the sack of the latter city by 'the king of the Ascalonians.' Tyre, however, was itself of considerable antiquity. The temple of Melkarth, its patron god, was built 2,300 years before Herodotus (ii. 44), and in the Tell-elAmarna tablets its riches are already celebrated. The city was at that time still confined to an island; and a century later, an Egyptian papyrus, which 'describes the adventures of a tourist in Canaan in the reign of Rameses II., states that drinking water was brought to it by boats. Arvad seems to have possessed at this period the largest and most formidable fleet; this at least is the conclusion which may be derived from the Tell-el-Amarna corre

spondence. The letters from

As

Phoenicia in the Tell-el-Amarna collection are, like the letters from other parts of W. Asia, in the Babylonian language and script. But for many centuries the Babylonian kings claimed supremacy Over Canaan and Syria, 'the land of the Amorites,' as it was termed; and the culture of Babylonia, including its language and literature, laws and theology, made its way to the shores of the Mediterranean. far back as 3800 B.C. Sargon of Akkad had erected his image on the Phoenician coast, and made Palestine a Babylonian province. Khammurabi, the contemporary of Abraham, calls himself 'king of the land of the Amorites,' as did also his great-grandson Ammiditana. The limestone and cedar wood of the Lebanon had long since been imported into Babylonia for the temples and palaces of the kings.

Eventually Thothmes III. made

Phoenicia

Canaan an Egyptian dependency, and extended the boundaries of the Egyptian empire to the banks of the Euphrates. The Phoenician cities were placed under native governors. The Tell-el-Amarna letters were written when the Egyptian power was beginning to fail, and they set before us a curious picture of internal feuds and warfare between the Canaanitish governors, which the central authority was no longer able to suppress. Intrigues, moreover, were being carried on with Mitanni or Mesopotamia, with the Hittites, who had established themselves in N. Syria, and with Babylonia, which still hankered after the restoration of its ancient rule in the W. The fall of the eighteenth dynasty brought with it the loss of Canaan. Seti and Rameses II., indeed, of the nineteenth dynasty, once more restored the government of Egypt in Palestine and Phoenicia, but it was only for a time. The Phoenician cities became independent, though they lost their inland possessions; factories and colonies were established by them not only in the eastern and western Mediterranean, but even beyond the Strait of Gibraltar at Gadir or Cadiz, and their ships and trade multiplied until they became the richest people in the ancient world. Tyre gradually outstripped its sister states, and eventually occupied the position previously held by Sidon. Hiram, the son and successor of Abibaal and the contemporary of David and Solomon, first raised it to a commanding position. He restored and beautified the temples of Melkarth and the other chief deities of Tyre, enlarged and strengthened the city itself, introducing water into it from the mainland, and in conjunction with Solomon sent his fleet of merchantmen into the Indian Ocean. By the conquest of the old Phoenician colony of Utica he also secured a monopoly of the N. African trade. His sixth successor was Ethbaal, who cemented his power by an alliance with Ahab of Israel, to whom he gave his daughter in marriage, and by the foundation of Auza in Libya provided an outlet for the more adventurous spirits who might have been troublesome at home. During his reign the Assyrians first began to threaten the Mediterranean states of Asia, and it must have been soon after his death that the battle of Qarqar (Carcar) was fought (853 B.C.), in which they defeated a great coalition of the western kings, among whom were Ahab of Israel and Matin-baal of Arvad. In 842 B.C. Tyre and Sidon (which now formed part of the Tyrian kingdom) paid tribute to the Assyrian

Phoenicia

monarch Shalmaneser II. In the seventh year of the reign of Pygmalion or Pumai-yaton (820774 B.C.), the fourth successor of Ethbaal, Carthage was founded by his sister Elissa, whom legend afterwards identified with the goddess Dido. A few years later we find Hiram II. paying tribute to Tiglath-pileser III. of Assyria, and his successor Metenna (c. 735 B.C.) compelled to purchase pardon for his resistance to the Assyrian king by a fine of 150 talents of gold (about $200,000). Under Metenna's successor Elulæus (Ulalai) Tyre was besieged unsuccessfully for five years by the Assyrian king Shalmaneser IV., and in 701 B.C. the same prince was attacked by Sennacherib at the time of his campaign against Judah, and fled for refuge to Cyprus. Tyre, however, remained uncaptured; but Sidon, Usu, Akko, and the other Phoenician towns over which it had held rule were lost to it for ever. Sidon rebelled against Assyria in 676 B.C., the result being that it was destroyed by Esar-haddon, who built a new town near it, called after his own name, while the trade it had enjoyed was diverted to Tyre. Tyre itself subsequently intrigued with Egypt against Assyria, and had to undergo another siege. This lasted into the reign of Assur-bani-pal, when its king, Baal 1., submitted, and sent his son and heir Yahimelech on an embassy to Nineveh. After the fall of the Assyrian empire, Tyre, like Judah, resisted Nebuchadnezzar, and was besieged for thirteen years (587-574 B.C.). king, Ethbaal II., was eventually compelled to surrender, and the city thus became part of the Babylonian empire. For a time it was placed under suffetes or 'judges, but a member of the royal family was at last allowed to return and govern the state in the name of its Babylonian sovereign. The Persian conquest made little difference in the condition of the Phoenician states. They were permitted to retain their native princes and to develop their trade. In return, the Persian kings had the use of their navies and maritime knowledge. It was this that made Alexander the Great especially anxious_to destroy the power of Tyre. For seven months the city was blockaded, and was then taken with the help of a mole, partly constructed out of the buildings of Paletyrus. The inhabitants were massacred, and the town reduced to ruins. But it soon recovered, and seventeen years later resisted the attacks of Antigonus for eighteen months. Sidon had met with the same fate in 351 B.C. at the hands of Artaxerxes Ochus. Meanwhile trade was leaving the

Its

406

Phoenician towns. The Greeks were now masters of the Mediterranean, and their colonies were planted on its shores. Even Cyprus, one of the earliest of the Phoenician settlements, had become Greek. Carthage had driven the commerce of its mother land from the eastern Mediterranean, and Carthage itself, along with its Spanish possessions, was about to become a Roman dependency. The massacres and destruction which overtook the two leading cities of Phoenicia completed the downfall of the Phoenician states.

Phoenician religion was characteristically Semitic. Each locality had its Baal or divine 'lord,' who was supreme over the other deities of the place. He was absolute master of the locality and its inhabitants, but his power did not extend elsewhere. At Tyre, for instance, the supreme Baal was Melkarth, the king of the city'; at Beirut it was Eshmun. All good things were given by the Baalim; pain and misfortune were the consequences of their anger. Hence their worshippers sought to propitiate them by every means in their power. Parents sacrificed their first-born, and unmarried maidens prostituted themselves in the temples. The rite of circumcision, which was universal, may have had the same origin. The Baal was represented in human form, and though he acquired in time a solar character, his visible symbol being the sun, he ever remained a sort of divine king whose subjects were called upon to offer him all they had. By his side stood Baalat, the goddess, a pale and colorless reflection of the god. The chief goddess of primitive Canaan was Asherah, the goddess of fertility, whose symbol was a cone on the leafless stem of a tree; but she was thrown into the shade by Ashtoreth or Astarte, the Istar of Babylonia, from whence both her name and her cult were derived. Among the Phoenicians, however, Ashtoreth ceased to be the independent divinity she was in Babylonia; she became merely the consort and reflection of Baal; and at Sidon we even hear of an Ashtoreth who was Shem-Baal'the essence of Baal.' Accordingly there were as many Ashtoreths as there were Baalim. Sacred stones were honored as well as the gods. The worship of stones was a peculiarly Semitic custom, though in Phoenicia they came to be considered sacred not so much on their own account as because they were held to be Beth-els, or 'houses of god,' in which the divinity, or some particular divinity, was immanent. Certain trees also were accounted sacred, and were planted beside

Phoenix

the shrines of the deities to whom they were consecrated, as were also the rivers and mountains, to each of which a Baal was attached. The temples, if we may judge from the one at Gebal, consisted of a long court, with a portico running round it, and an altar in the centre, and of the temple proper-a roofed building in shape like a rectangular box. The sacrificial tariffs of Carthage and Marseilles show that the sacrifices and offerings closely resembled those of the Israelites

Phoenician art was a combination of that of Babylonia and Egypt modified in a special way. It is to the Phoenicians that we owe the alphabet, which they received possibly from Arabia in the 11th or 12th century B.C., and after adapting it to the expression of their language, handed it on to the Greeks, along with the names they had given to the letters. The manufacture of variegated glass, which was derived from Egypt, became one of the principal industries of Tyre; while Sidon was famous for its fine linen, the art of making which was probably a Babylonian invention. But the industry to which Phoenicia originally owed its wealth and fortune was that of dyeing with purple, obtained from the murex, or purple shellfish. Factories and their colonies were established for the sake of the trade wherever there was a good harbor and the chance of a market, and Phoenician settlements grew up not only in the islands and on the coasts of the E. Mediterranean, but also in Sicily, Sardinia, and the northern coast of Africa. Tartessos and Gadir were founded in Spain, and Phoenician ships sailed northward through the Atlantic for the tin of the Cornish mines. According to Pliny, there were beams of cedar in the temple of ApolloReshpeh at Gadir or Cadiz which had been brought from Numidia 1,178 years before he wrote. See Perrot and Chipiez's History of Art in Phoenicia (1885); Bovet's Egypt, Palestine, and Phænicia (1882); Rawlinson's History of Phænicia (1889); and Phænicia (Story of the Nations Series, 1889); Moore's Carthage and the Phænicians (1905); and the works of Professor Sayce and of T. G. Pinches.

Phoenix, a southern constellation, located between Grus and Eridanus by Bayer in 1603. The principal stars form a curved line. a Phoenicis, a solar star of 2.2 magnitude, was found by Sir David Gill to be in course of recession from the sun at the rate of 51 miles a second; B is a fine binary; 5, 9, and are double. R Phoenicis varies from 7.4 to about 12 mag-. nitude in a period of 270 days.

K

Phoenix

Phoenix, a genus of tropical palms. See DATE PALM.

Phoenix. In ancient Greek legend, a son of Amyntor, and king of the Dolopes, who took part in the Calydonian boar hunt; afterwards he fell out with his father, went to Peleus, and became Achilles's tutor, and accompanied him to Troy.-A mythical bird, of which Herodotus tells us that it appeared at Heliopolis in Egypt once every 500 years, when it buried its father in the sanctuary there, enclosing his body in an egg made of myrrh. The bird was like an eagle, with feathers partly red and partly golden. Other stories tell that when the phoenix (of which only one existed at a time) drew near its end, it made a nest, out of which the new phoenix grew. The bird came to life in Arabia. Later stories told that the dying phoenix cast itself into flames, out of which the new one arose. See Wiedemann's Religion of the Ancient Egyptians (1897).

Phoenix. (1.) City, Ariz., cap. of the territory and co. seat of Maricopa co., on the S. Pac., and the S. Fe, Prescott and Phoenix R. Rs., 100 m. N.E. of Tucson. Its mild climate makes it a favorite winter resort. Its chief buildings and educational and charitable institutions are the capitol, an agricultural experiment station, insane asylum, city hall, court house, public library, Academy of the Sacred Heart, and St. John's Indian School (R. C.). It has a trade in fruits, especially oranges, wine, honey, hay, grain, live-stock, and mining products. It was settled about 1875 and incorporated in 1881, and its present charter was granted in 1893. Pop. (1900) 5,544. (2.) City, Lee co., Ala., on the Chattahoochee R., opposite Columbus, Ga., and on the Central of Ga. R. R. It is chiefly a residential place, but has important commercial interests. It was settled in 1860, incorporated in 1883, and its present charter was granted in 1894. Pop. (1900) 4,163.

Phoenix Group, several small islands in the W. Pacific, about 1,200 m. N.E. of Fiji. They belong to Great Britain.

Phoenix Park, public resort, N.W. of Dublin, Ireland, 1,753 acres in extent, contains the Wellington Testimonial, Zoological Garden, and the Viceregal Lodge in the E. part. Near the last, Lord Frederick Cavendish, Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Thomas H. Burke, under secretary, were assassinated on May 6, 1882.

Phoenixville, bor., Chester co., Pa., on the Schuylkill R. at the mouth of French Creek, 23 m. N.W. of Philadelphia, on the Phila. and Read. and the Pa.

408

R. Rs. It possesses a public library, a hospital, and several parks. It is 4 m. from Valley Forge. There are large iron mills, blast furnances, important bridge and boiler works, and manufactories of boxes, matches, silk, underwear, and hosiery. In the surrounding district graphite and plumbago are found. The place was settled in 1790 and incorporated in 1849. Pop. (1900) 9,196.

Pholas, a genus of burrowing bivalve molluscs, whose members are known as piddocks or date shells. The species of Pholas are found within such rocks as shale, chalk, limestone, and coralrock in various parts of the world having a warm climate. Like all burrowing bivalves, they have gaping shells, which are open at both ends, and have accessory plates of lime attached. The animal is furnished with long siphons, having fringed extremities, which are protruded from the burrows, so that water, con

00

Pholas.

1, P. dactylus; 2, P. candida.

taining food and oxygen, may pass in. Some doubt still exists as to the exact mode of formation of the burrow. The shell is delicately toothed, and some authorities believe that these teeth form a rasp with which the operation is performed; while, according to others, the large foot is an important agent in the process. In southern Europe and in some other countries these molluscs are eaten, or esteemed valuable as bait.

Phonetics is the science of speech sounds; it investigates their character, relations, combinations, and changes. Speech sounds are best defined in terms of the manner in which they are produced by the vocal organs. Acoustical descriptions in which words such as 'soft' and 'flat' are employed convey no clear conception of the character of a sound, and are altogether valueless as aids to pronunciation. A description of the position occu

Phonetics

pied by the vocal organs when a particular sound is formed provides a definite means of comparison with other sounds, and is also an indication of how an unknown sound may be produced. The physiology of the vocal organs is an important auxiliary in the study of phonetics. Speech sounds may be broadly classified according as the breath by which they are produced streams though the mouth channel or the nose channel, or through both together. (1.) When the breath passes through the mouth, the extent to which the passage is blocked is an important factor in the case. Sometimes (a) the breath is almost unimpeded (as in the case of vowel sounds); sometimes (b) the passage is narrowed so that the friction of the breath on the walls is generally noticeable (f, th); sometimes (c) the passage is completely blocked (p, b). (2.) Usually the entrance to the nose passages is closed when speech sounds are produced. It may, however, be open, while at the same time the mouth passage is in any one of the three positions just described. Hence there are three groups of nasalized sounds (e.g. nasal vowels as in French). (3.) In a third class of sounds the mouth passage is closed, and the breath streams through the nose passages only. These are nasal sounds in the strictest sense (m, n).

Several additional factors also contribute in the production of distinctive sounds. The part played by the glottis, the opening between the vocal cords, is important. When the stream of breath, as it passes, makes the vocal cords vibrate strongly, what is technically known as 'voice' is produced. (It is a kind of buzz in the throat which may be heard in v and z compared with fand s.) Every voiced sound has a corresponding voiceless sound, and vice versa, although both may not occur side by side in the same language. The glottis may also be used to add a peculiar force or emphasis to many sounds (as in the Semitic languages), and the manner in which the lips are set is another modifying influence.

The classification of speech sounds according to the character of the sound passage is not without its defects. The same sound passage may give rise to a fricative (friction sound), and to another from which friction is absent. In fact, the distinction between the groups 1 (a) and 1 (b), above, is merely of a general character. Besides, the classification separates certain sounds which are in certain aspects related. The factors which combine in the production of speech sounds are many, and the com

Phonetics

mon character which some of these impart may be more prominent acoustically in certain languages at certain periods, and may affect sound change to a greater extent than the relations indicated by the classification.

All attempts to establish a complete distinction between vowels and consonants must be pronounced unsuccessful. The current opinion that a consonant cannot be pronounced except in combination with a vowel is quite erroneous. The sounds of f, v, s, and z are easily pronounced by themselves almost at the first attempt, and any consonants may be so pronounced after a little practice. Nor is it true, in languages such as English, French, and German, that vowels are essential elements

in every syllable (cf. 'written' when pronounced ritn). In some languages there are words composed of consonants only. The vowel sounds are those included in groups 1 (a) and 2 (a) above; all the others are consonants. Con

sonants, with the possible exception of the 'stop' group, vary in length like vowels, but not so evidently. (See under L below.)

Six

It is, of course, essential in phonetics that the signs used to denote sounds should be quite unambiguous, and that there should be one for each sound that is represented. Even English sounds are too numerous to be represented by the Roman alphabet which is in ordinary use. additional signs are required for consonants alone; but if digraphs are employed, two additions are sufficient. In this article th, dh, sh, zh, ng, and wh are used for the sounds in the words thin, thee, shine, azure, long, and when respectively. These sounds are, of course, simple sounds, not compounds, although two letters are here employed to represent each of them. On the same principle kh may represent the sound which occurs in loch' (Scotch). It is to be noted that ch in 'child' and jin 'joy' (or g in 'gem') do not denote simple sounds, and therefore are not referred to subsequently; cht+sh, and j=d+zh.

The phonetic representation of vowels is far more difficult because of their numbers, and because of the extreme poverty of the Roman alphabet in this direction. Murray (New English Dictionary) distinguishes fifteen simple vowels in English alone, without including those classed as 'obscure.' The English 'orthographical' representation these is a perfect chaos, and is very remote from the original Roman system, to which most Continental languages still approximate. (See articles on A, E, I, o, U.) In phonetics it is usual to give the vowel signs, as far as pos

of

409

sible, their original values (found in such words as 'psalm,' 'men,' 'machine,' 'pull'). This is all the more necessary seeing that the English vowel letters in ordinary spelling represent largely diphthongs: the vowel in 'bone' is a compound ou, and in 'name' ae; English long i,' as in high, is, of course, a diphthong. It is important to observe that the vowels in 'pit' and 'peat,' 'men' and German See (French été), differ in quality as well as in length. The difference is that between what are called 'wide' and 'narrow' vowels. (See below.) Murray represents the former by i, e, etc.; the latter by the use of italics, i, e, etc. (so also this article). After the number of vowel signs has been in this way doubled signs are still required, particularly for the English sounds in 'saw,' 'bird,' and 'bat.' For these Murray gives o, ǝ, and æ. For the German sounds in über and schützen, ü1 and ü2 may be used; and for those in schon and Völker, ö1 and ö2.

What follows is a summary statement regarding the principal groups of speech sounds.

The stop consonants are formed by cutting off the stream of breath and suddenly releasing it again. They include p, t, k, b, d, g, in which the breath is cut off by the lips (p, b), point of the tongue (t, d), or back of the tongue (k, g); b, d, g are distinguished from p, t, k by being voiced, and at the same time more weakly pronounced. A very large number of different 's (and d's) are possible, according to the position of the point of the tongue as interdental, post-dental, etc. There are also a whole series of k's (and g's) according to the part of the palate which the back of the tongue approaches when the sound is formed. A front group and a back group are specially to be distinguished. The former is sometimes called palatal, and the latter velar.

In the Semitic languages a glottal stop is denoted by aleph. An ordinary cough is an exaggerated example of this sound. It is known to singers as the coup de glotte, and occurs frequently in German before initial long vowels.

Spirant consonants are also known as fricatives or continuants. Corresponding to the stop series, p, t, k, b, d, g is a spirant series, (wh), th, kh, v (w), dh, gh, in which the stream of breath is only checked, not stopped, by the lips, point of the tongue, and back of the tongue respectively. All the varieties noted above find their counterparts here, and in addition the degree of friction of the breath multiplies the possibilities. It is to be observed that English and v are not pure lip

Phonetics

spirants, but lip-tooth spirants (in which the obstruction is caused by conjunction of the lower lip with the upper teeth). A pure labial spirant occurs in the word 'nymph,' and was probably the sound of Greek . The aspirate combinations p+h, t+h, etc., are quite different from the spirants ph, th, etc. In Greek they appear to have been an intermedíate stage in the transformation of stops into spirants. wh, when distinguished from w is a voiceless w. Consonantal w. is distinguished from the vowel u by a slight narrowing of the breath passage. A palatal' variety of the sound gh is represented by y in English yard.' (See letter Y.)

Another set of spirants are the sibilants s, z, sh, and zh. z is voiced s, and zh voiced sh. The blade of the tongue (Sweet's expression for the part immediately behind the point) seems to be prominent in the formation of s, but other factors also help to determine its character. There is a whole series of s's, almost parallel to the th series, with which it is frequently confused by speakers whose native language contains no th. sh is defined by Sweet as 'point-blade.' The manner of its formation is still very obscure. zh is not common in English, but frequently occurs in French (as in rouge).

The h sounds may be reckoned throat spirants; but they are weak, and have a distinctly vocalic character. The strong Arabic h is a throat spirant. Possibly the Semitic ayin is a voiced (Sweet). But it seems to commence with a glottal stop, and so to be closely connected with aleph (Sievers).

Land R are closely related in the manner of their formation, and therefore also in the history of language. The peculiarity of

is due to the breath escaping by the sides of the mouth or by one side. The centre is blocked by the position of the tongue. The greatest differences between I sounds depend on the extent to which the tongue blocks the exit of the mouth. English final 7 (as in 'ball') is a fuller sound than in French and German owing to its greater length, and to the hollow shape given to the tongue when it is produced. There are voiced, voiceless, and nasal l's. Welsh (in 'llan') is a voiceless, distinctly long and emphatic; it is a simple and not a compound sound. A shorter and weaker voiceless occurs in French words such as table, and perhaps sometimes in English words such as 'plan.' The sounds denoted by r are a somewhat miscellaneous group. Those who are familiar with trilled r's regard the trill as their most important