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Canaan and the Aegean Sea: Greco-Phoenician Origins Reviewed

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2024

Adolpbe G. Horon

Extract

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No problem is more crucial in the history of the Old World than that of the relationship between opposite shores of the Mediterranean. We should like to approach it from a particular though historically central viewpoint: namely, from the connection existing between Canaan and the Aegean basin, or, in other words, between a Semitic Orient or Levant which the Greeks called Phoenicia, and a Europe which was the Occident, the region of Sunset, to the Near-Eastern Semites.

Type
Research Article
Information
Diogenes , Volume 15 , Issue 58 , June 1967 , pp. 37 - 61
Copyright
Copyright © 1967 Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie / International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)

References

1 It now appears that the two names are basically identical, cf. W.F. Albright, Archaeol. of Palestine, 1960, p. 185.

2 Turusha in Egyptian texts, probably also Tiras in the Bible (Genesis, x, 2); but it might already have been a group of such people settled in Italy. Cf. Jean Bérard, Revue des Etudes Anciennes, 1949, pp. 201 ss.

3 The identity of these Sardi (Shardana in Egyptian) seems well established; cf. W.F. Albright, "Some Oriental Glosses on the Homeric Problem," Amer. Journ. of Archaeology, 1950, p. 167, n. 18.

4 The Siculi (Sicels) seem to have left their mark in a toponym of the Palestinian south-country, which is often mentioned in the Bible: Tsiqlag or Siqelag in He brew, Sekelak, Siceleg in the Greek and Latin versions (cf. F.M. Abel, Géogr. de la Palestine, 1938, II, p. 465).

5 Especially after the paper by Julius Beloch, "Die Phoeniker am aegaeischen Meer," Rheinisches Museum f. Philologie, 1894, p. 111-132.

6 V. Bérard, La résurrection d'Homère, 1930; Les Phéniciens et l'"Odyssée", 1927, I-II.

7 "…The correct Phoenician approach of Bérard did not prevail against the wrong non-Semitic approach of Beloch. Bérard unfortunately did not know enough Semitics to maintain his essentially correct views with linguistic finesse. Like other people, scholars are likely to be more impressed with refined falsehood than with crude truth." These remarks by C.H. Gordon, Journ. of Semitic Studies, 1963, p. 76, n. 1, disregard the fact, however, that Beloch, while an outstanding Hellenist, had no knowledge whatsoever of Semitic languages, as he himself acknowledges.

8 The Ugaritic texts, notably those in cuneiform alphabet, have already given rise to a vast literature of interpretations, comments, etc, which we cannot review here even in the briefest way. Their first edition has been and still is the task of Charles Virolleaud (in the quarterly Syria, Paris, from 1929 on, as well as in the publications of the "Mission de Ras Shamra"). A good overall view can be gained from C.H. Gordon, Ugaritic Literature, Rome, 1949, and Ugaritic Manual, Rome, 1953.

9 Ugarit had no monopoly on the cuneiform alphabet; a tablet in a quite simi lar though not identical script has been found as far south as the site of Bêt-Shemesh, near the common borders of the tribal territories of Judah and of Dan. Cf. the drawing in Albright (1960), op. cit., fig. 24.

10 First, very tentative and debatable decipherment by E. Dhorme, Syria, XXV (1946-48), pp. 1-35.

11 Stele of Balu'ah; cf. Albright (1960), op. cit., pp. 186-187.

12 Cf. René Dussaud, "Yahwé, fils de El," Syria, 1957, pp. 232-242.

13 See R. Dussaud, Les découvertes de Ras Shamra (Ugarit) et l'Ancien Testa ment, 2nd ed., 1941; and more recently Cyrus H. Gordon, Before the Bible: The Common Background of Greek and Hebrew Civilizations, 1962.

14 Cf. Genesis, XLIX, 16-17: Dan is at once a "judge" and a "serpent."

15 Even Victor Bérard, Ithaque et la Grèce des Achéens, 1927, p. 14, attributed the creation of the hexameter to some mysterious "blending of Achaean and Aegean spirits" ("la rencontre des deux génies achéen et égéen…"), without mentioning here the Phoenicians. He knew nothing of Biblical prosody, which might have suggested to him some more ancient parallels.

16 J. Chadwick, The Decipherment of Linear B, 2nd ed., 1960.

17 Two examples will suffice: it had been suspected for a long time that the Greek terms for "gold" (chrysòs) and for a "shirt" (chit6n) were Semitic bor rowings. Now these two words have been found in "Mycenaean" (M. Ventris and J. Chadwick, Documents in Mycenaean Greek, 1956), written in linear B, with the syllabic spelling ku-ru-so(-s) and ki-to(-n). These are obviously kharû(t) s and K.T.N (ketônet, kutônet in the feminine), which are specifically West-Semitic terms, attested to also at Ugarit.

18 C.H. Gordon, "Minoan Linear A," Journ. of Near Eastern Studies, 1958, pp. 245-255.

19 C.H. Gordon, "Minoica," ibid., 1962, pp. 207-210.

20 In 1965, Gordon was able to announce that the syllabic script ("linear A," then "linear B") had developed, according to the principle of "acrophony," from hieroglyphic signs which were in use down to the 18th century approximately. Thus, the sign for the syllable tu represents an "apple" or some similar fruit. Now the only language of the Middle Bronze Age in which the name of the apple starts with this syllable is indeed Canaanite, especially Ugaritic: tuppûh' (Scientific American, as reported in UNESCO Features).

21 C.H. Gordon, "Eteocretan," Journ. of Near Eastern Studies, 1962, pp. 211- 214; id., "The Dreros Bilingual," Journ. of Semitic Studies, 1963, pp. 76-78.

22 Claude Schaeffer, Ugaritica, II, 1949, pp. 115-116, 119-120.

23 V. Gordon Childe, New Light on the Most Ancient East, latest revised edi tion, 1953, p. 242.

24 The latest translation is by E.F. Weidner, "The Inscription from Kythera," Journ. of Hellenic Studies, 1939, pp. 137-138. The king, Narâm-Sin, son of Ibiq-Adad, king of Eshnunna, also reigned over the city of Assur and entered Syria. Moreover, Cythera is quite certainly a West-Semitic name, signifying "the island of the Crown or Tiara" (K.T.R., which should be vocalized here Kutara). Bérard, Les Phéniciens, I, pp. 207-208, had already proved it conclusively, by the method of toponymical "doublets."

25 R.W. Hutchinson, Prehistoric Crete, 1962, pp. 178-179.

26 L. Woolley, A Forgotten Kingdom, 1953, pp. 74-75.

27 The land of Kaptara and its products: see Georges Dossin, "Les archives économiques du palais de Mari," Syria, 1939, p. 111 ss.

28 An example of such merchant-adventurers in Ugarit, who imported directly from Kaphtor (Kapturi in the genitive, with vocalization conforming to Canaanite, properly speaking) is provided by the archives of the royal palace at Ugarit in the Late Bronze Age (cf. Le Palais Royal d'Ugarit, III, pub. "Mission de Ras Shamra," 1955, p. 107).

29 S.A. Immerwahr, "Mycenaean Trade and Colonization," Archaeology, 1960, no. 1, p. 12; complemented by the remarks of M. Astour, Hellenosemitica, Leiden, 1965, pp. 350-351, n. 6.

30 Ancient authors report that the Phoenicians had explored the Western Med iterranean and entered the Atlantic Ocean well before the end of the second millennium. Utica, which antedated Carthage in Tunisia, and Gadir (the "enclo sure," or "fortified settlement" in Canaanite, modern Cadiz), were founded, according to such reports, by the year 1100, if not earlier. See, for instance, the refer ences collected in Bérard, Ithaque, p. 47. There is no reason to doubt it. Certain ivories of Phoenician workmanship in the tombs of Carmona (Guadalquivir valley) are closely related to those of the pre-Israelite treasure at Megiddo in Canaan, dating back to the end of the Bronze Age; cf. Albright (1950), op. cit., p. 176. Nevertheless, Albright himself imagines this vast colonization to have taken place within a short span of time in the 10th century (under Hiram and Solomon), which seems highly unlikely.

31 Such an attitude is evident even in recent books, like that of John Boardman, The Greeks Overseas, 1964, dealing with the Iron Age. While recognizing on almost every page the innumerable borrowings by archaic Greece, notably Phoeni cian borrowings, or through Phoenician middlemen, Boardman would like to assume that they are due essentially to some very early Greek colonization of the Levant's shores, which is completely at variance with all factual data.

32 Michael C. Astour, Hellenosemitica: An Ethnic and Cultural Study in West Semitic Impact on Mycenaean Greece, Leiden, 1965.

33 Jean Bérard, "Les Hyksos et la légende d'Io," Syria, 1952, p. 35.

34 Concerning the Canaanite etymology of Epaphos-Apôphis, see Astour, op. cit., p. 94, n. 4.

35 Or even "Danaios" (spelled syllabically da-na-yo), which seems a more "Phoe nician" variant, at Cnossos; cf. Astour, op. cit., p. 341.

36 Aegyptos, or Aikupitiyo(s) in "Mycenaean;" this is a borrowing, through Canaanite, of an Egyptian name for the city of Memphis or its temple: H'e(t)- Ka - Ptah', "the Castle of Bull-god Ptah." Cf. Astour, op. cit., p. 81, and ibid., n. 6.

37 Misarayo (s) in "Mycenaean," ibid., p. 81.

38 Cf. for instance C.H. Gordon, Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 1962, p. 209: written in syllabic "A" as Mi-na-ne (with "mute e" in final position), but Mi-na-an in Akkadian cuneiforms at Alalakh, and M.N.N. in cuneiform alphabet at Ugarit.

39 Astour, op. cit., pp. 51-53.

40 Genesis, XLVIII, 22, in fact contains a pun on "Sichem" and the "Shoulder," but it is not understandable from the too-literal translation in the Septuaginta and is lost altogether in all other versions. However, it was well-known to the epic poets of Ugarit: cf. the "Rephaim" (tablet III Rp B, line 5), where the punning words apply to the city of Sichem and to its eponymic hero (cf. Syria, 1941, pp. 16-17 and 19; the editor, Ch. Virolleaud, has understood the name, but not the allusion, and he failed to make the obvious comparison with the words at tributed to Jacob in the Book of Genesis).

41 Astour, op. cit., p. 75.

42 Cf. Shalom Spiegel, Noah, Danel, and Job… Canaanite Relics in the Legends of the Jews, in L. Ginzberg Jubilee Volume, New York, 1945, pp. 307 ss.

43 This episode was called by Ch. Virolleaud "Anat and the Heifer" (Anat et la Génisse), Syria, 1936, pp. 150-173. Cf. R. Dussaud, "Cultes cananéens aux sour ces du Jourdain," Syria, 1936, pp. 283-295; Astour, op. cit., passim, concerning the relationship between the Biblical "Moses" and the Ugaritic M. Sh.

44 Stephanus Byzantius still knew that Adana had been founded by a god "Adanos" (cf. Roscher, Lex. d. griech. und römisch. Mythol., sub voce). This is obviously a variant of Greco-Phoenician Adonis and of Judaic Adonay. The ter mination in -ân rather than in -ôn points to the early age of the tradition; cf. Dagôn, more anciently Dagân.

45 The "Tale of Sinuhe," the action of which belongs to the very beginning of the 20th century B.C.; the earliest manuscripts of this Egyptian "novel" go back to the year 1800 at the least (cf. James B. Pritchard, The Ancient Near East, 1958, pp. 5, 7).

46 Summary and bibliography in Astour, op. cit., pp. 387-388.

47 Astour, op. cit., passim, reviews several Ugaritic variants of such fable.

48 Cf. R.W. Hutchinson, op. cit., pp. 212-213, "Europa." There were those who tried to find a way out by means of the Greek word rhops for "willow;" that is one more pun, a modern one, not etymologically defensible.