Did the Phoenicians discover America?

DID THE PHOENICIANS DISCOVER
AMERICA ?

THE PHOENICIANS

UPON the Erythrean sea the people live

Who style themselves Phoenicians. These are sprung

From the true Erythrean stock,

From the sage race, who first essayed the deep,

And wafted merchandise to coasts unknown.

These too, digested first the starry choir,

Their motions marked, and called them by their name.

Dionysius — Pliny, v. 965.

AZTEC CALENDAR OR WATER STONE

Frontispiece

Did the Phoenicians
discover America?

BY

THOMAS CRAWFORD JOHNSTON

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA

HONORARY MEMBER OF THE GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY
OF CALIFORNIA, ETC.

WITH FOREWORD BY

OLIPHANT SMEATON, M.A., F.S.A.

Reprinted By

ST. THOMAS PRESS

P. O. Box 35096, Houston, Texas
1965

lonfcon

JAMES NISBET fcf CO., LIMITED
22 BERNERS STREET, W.

HA I to

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FOREWORD

THE problem of the original discovery of America
is no new one. Ever since indisputable traces of
the presence of the early Scandinavian Rovers or
Vikings were noted on the north-east coast of the
great western continent, speculation has been busy
as to the character, habits, and race of these primal
colonists. One fact soon emerged that the Scandi
navians were far from being the first to land on and
colonise portions of the vast territory. Traces were
discovered of earlier visits that throw the date back
upwards of 2500 years or even 3000 years to about
the epoch of the Trojan War ; while other theories
cast it still further "into the deep backward and
abysm of time/'

The present volume in many respects breaks new
ground in the geographico-ethnological study of the
globe. The author, Mr. Thomas Crawford Johnston,
studies the remains which the Phoenicians have left
in various parts of the world, such as the shores of
the Levant, of Spain, and of Britain, where traces
of their art, of their trade, and of their commercial
and colonial settlements were most in evidence.
These he compares with those left in various parts
of America, and comes to the conclusion that
they are all so closely allied as to have emanated
from the same source. Mr. Crawford Johnston wins
support for his theory by the calm, methodical,
systematic way in which every item of information

vi THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

bearing on the subject is carefully weighed. He
makes out a strong case for the Phoenicians being
the original discoverers of America. He also con
tends that the "Ophir" of Scripture was situated
in America, in support of this theory adducing some
remarkable evidences of Phoenician settlement on
the American mainland. Though the fact has long
been known that the early Toltec and Aztec civilisa
tion of Central America was not indigenous, the in
formation which Mr. Johnston cites in support of
his theory adds materially to the sum total of our
knowledge of the case.

To all interested in ethnological as well as an
thropological science, I would warmly recommend
this volume as one calculated to please as well as
to instruct. They will find here, apart from the
argument, a fund of interesting facts that throws
light on many disputed points regarding early tribal
customs and acts of sacrificial worship. For the
land of " Ophir " having been in America, he forges
a really strong chain of argument which students
of the subject would do well to weigh carefully and
calmly. No one will rise from the perusal of the
treatise without feeling convinced that it has been
written by a man possessed of strong convictions,
of keen reasoning powers, of varied scholarship,
and of a most reverent mind. I have perused the
work with pleasure and profit.

OLIPHANT SMEATON.

CONTENTS

PAGE

INTRODUCTORY . ..... xi

CHAPTER I
THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING

Early history — The Hyksos or Shepherd Kings — Their rule in
Egypt — In Bahrein Islands — Removal from Persian
Gulf to Mediterranean — The Hyksos in Palestine — Union
with Phoenicians — Commercial and manufacturing pros
perity — Some results — Phoenician route to Syria — Baby
lonian and Egyptian influences — Evolution of the Jew

CHAPTER II

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE

Region of Phoenicia — Colony of Sidon — Phoenician art and
craftsmanship — Commercial expansion — Arabian and
Babylonian trade — Importance of the former — Its
nature and transport — Phoenicians as the carriers of the
world — Western trade . . . . . . 32

CHAPTER III
NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE

Extent of the Phoenician marine — Causes of its remarkable de
velopment — Nature of early voyages — Phoenician policy
non-aggressive — First Phoenician colonial settlements —
The ships of Tharshish — Their testimony to Phoenician
seamanship — Trade monopoly in the Eastern Mediter
ranean — Also in the Atlantic — Xenophon's description
of a Phoenician armed merchant-ship — Phoenicians pre
eminent as shipbuilders and navigators . . . -55

viii THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

PAGE

CHAPTER IV

THE PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS

The Aztec Calendar or Water Stone described — Its connection
with the origin of the compass — Did the Chinese invent
this instrument ? — The Phoenicians and the compass —
Its importance to their naval expansion — Primitive com
pass familiar to early navigating nations — Instrument
closely identified with Phoenician civilisation — Bactellium
and the discovery of the Pole Star due to the Phoenicians 83

CHAPTER V
PHOENICIAN AND JEW IN CO-OPERATION

Phoenician desire for Eastern expansion — Trade with India —
Persian Gulf Settlements the base of more distant navi
gation — Phoenicians and Israelites unite for commercial
purposes — Friendship of Hiram, King of Tyre, and
David, King of Israel — Its important results — Phoenicia's
obligations to the Jewish people — Jewish influence on
Phoenician religious thought — Commercial treaty of
Solomon and Hiram — How it profited both countries
— Fleet of Solomon and Hiram and its destination —
Phoenicians as silver importers . . . . .105

CHAPTER VI
THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR

The Ophir of the Hebrews — Route pursued by Solomon and
Hiram's fleet — Evidence afforded by crew and cargo —
Testimony of the Scythians and Thracians — Evidences
of Phoenician civilisation on American mainland — Early
civilisation of Central America not indigenous — Votanic
tradition and its significance — Nomenclature of Pacific
Islands as a clue — Polynesians of Eastern Mediterranean
origin . . . . . . . . . .129

CHAPTER VII

HEBREW, PHOENICIAN, SCYTHIAN, AND THRACIAN IN
THE PACIFIC

Samoan traditions, beliefs, and usages — Their Phcenicio-
Hebraic source — Phoenician source of the Tahitian re
ligious cult 149

CONTENTS ix

CHAPTER VIII
THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC

Problem of the unity of the human race — How related to the
Biblical account of the Creation — Ancient civilisation of
Central and South America — Problems which it suggests.
— Did the fleet of Solomon and Hiram discover America ?
— Asiatic origin of the first American population — Was
the Ophir of Solomon and Hiram's fleet the Pacific slopes
of the American Continent ? — Testimony of native records
of Mexico and Central America — Humboldt's opinion —
What may be learned from the constitution and structure
of the native society of Central America . . . .182

CHAPTER IX
THE ANCIENT AMERICAN CIVILISATION

Constituent parts of ancient American civilisation — The region
described — Maya and Nahua civilisations — Their identity
of origin — Aztec as the representative of Nahua civilisa
tion — The foreign civiliser in Mexico — Composite source
of Pacific civilisation explained — The part played by the
Phoenicians . . . . . . . . 199

CHAPTER X

EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN AND AMERICAN CIVILISA
TIONS COMPARED

Similarities as shown by commercial system, use of dyes,
woollen and cotton manufactures, precious metals, glass
manufactures, pearl fishing, tanning, tattooing, imple
ments of war, gymnasia, religion, laws, &c. . . . 207

CHAPTER XI
CONCLUSION

List of some of the more apparent correspondences found to
exist between the people inhabiting the shores of the
Eastern Mediterranean, and those of Central America —
Quotation of or reference to authorities on which the
argument is founded 248

ILLUSTRATIONS

AZTEC CALENDAR STONE . . . Frontispiece

INTRODUCTORY

DURING a sojourn that covered the major portion
of two years spent among the islands of the Pacific
that stretch from the coasts of California to the
northern shores of New Zealand, my attention was
so powerfully arrested by evidences of the presence
in these regions of the early civilisations of the
Eastern Mediterranean that I was led to give
careful and extended inquiry as to the channels
through which they could have been conveyed to
this remote and isolated territory.

It did not at first occur to me that any connec
tion could be established between the civilisation
of the Eastern Mediterranean and that of Central
America, and in consequence of this the scope of
the investigation at the beginning was of a much
more limited nature than it later assumed.

As I proceeded with the collection of data bearing
on this problem I came, in course of time, to realise
that I had in my possession material that offered
something more than a clue to the solution of the
great enigma presented by the population of the
American Continent, and in this belief I pursued
the research on larger lines until the information
gathered was of a sufficiently valuable character
to warrant its submission to the scientific world.

In consequence of this I presented a draft of
the research and the conclusions to which it pointed

xii THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

to the Geographical Society of California, which
undertook its publication in the form of a special
bulletin under the caption " Did the Phoenicians
discover America ? '

This paper did not claim to be a complete solu
tion of the great enigma, but it provided what was
believed to be a clue which, if followed up, would
lead to such a solution.

It was not my attention at that time to pursue
the investigation further than this point, for other
matters of a pressing nature just then demanded
my undivided attention. My interest in the subject,
however, did not flag, and as in course of time I
came to the possession of a larger leisure, I again
took up the thread of the investigation. In course
of years of somewhat persistent study, I came to
realise that the facts ascertained, when woven
into a connected and inter-related form, would
supply all the light that was really necessary to
provide a rational solution as to the source from,
and the channels through, which the population of
the Pacific Islands, and at least the central portion
of the American Continent, were derived. Accord
ingly that portion of the data in my possession
requisite to attain this object has been woven
together in the following pages.

When beginning the compilation of this material
I fully realised the almost insuperable difficulties
that confronted the individual who undertook such
a task, for that portion of ancient history with which
the research is more immediately concerned trans
pired in a region of the world so far removed from
that inhabited by the more progressive nations of
modern times, that our knowledge of what happened

INTRODUCTORY xiii

there, apart from the scanty information found in
the Scripture narratives and from fragmentary re
ferences in the works of ancient writers, is of the
most meagre character.

Fortunately the historical researches of Pro
fessor Heeren, published in 1828, and later those
of Mr. George Rawlinson, published in 1878, brought
the major portion of this miscellaneous information
within reach of the investigator. It is true that
much of Professor Heeren's research has, by reason
of the progress of later historical discoveries, be
come antiquated, still the essential facts have not
been materially altered, the section relating to the
commerce of the Phoenicians especially, as Mr.
Rawlinson says, not having been superseded even
now by any later writer.

Of Mr. Rawlinson 's own work it is unnecessary
to speak. As a guide to the student in thorough
systematic study of ancient history his manner
has no equal in the English language, nor does any
name carry more weight in matters relating to
Phoenicia and the Phoenicians than his does.

The very limited character of this research com
pared with the immense scope of the subject of
which it treats necessarily precludes the possibility
of the presentation of that circumstantial state
ment of events on which the value of a regular
history depends. Still, in view of the tremendous
lapse of time since these events occurred, the paucity
of information with respect to the Southern Arabian
or Ophir trade and the consequent impossibility of
creating more than a mosaic of the historic frag
ments that are at present available, I may on that
account be permitted the liberty of treating the

xiv THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

subject in such a way as will enable me to present
the facts in my possession most effectively.

In the construction of the work I have been
more concerned with the continuous chain of events
than with mere lines of chronological demarcation,
still the divisions under which I have grouped the
various sections of the research weave themselves
naturally into a connected and inter-related whole,
which in its entirety throws new, and I believe
valuable, light on one of those great movements of
the human race of which up to this date we have
possessed very unsatisfactory information. The
following of this plan is the more excusable since,
in addition to this, it affords a convenient way of
approach to at least the boundaries of our inquiry.

In some cases it has been impossible to fix dates
accurately, but I believe there is sufficient prob
ability in those given to warrant their acceptance.

While prosecuting the final stages of the research
it became apparent that it would be necessary to
outline a much more comprehensive history than
was at first designed. In order to do this, and at
the same time keep the work within reasonable
limits, it has been necessary in some portions to be
more concise than prudence under more favour
able conditions would have dictated. It is possible,
therefore, that the work as a whole may not be
invulnerable to criticism. Still, even if in some in
stances it is found that errors have crept into the
research, it is more than probable that on careful
scrutiny these will not be found to be of a nature
to render less conclusive the results to which it
points.

The first chapter refers to a period of which at

INTRODUCTORY xv

present we have no continuous record available for
the purposes of our research. It has been necessary,
therefore, to construct one out of such data as exists,
and in view of the authorities supporting it I be
lieve it will not be considered without value. When
woven into connected form it provides a perspec
tive that makes one phase of our inquiry, and also
the later developments of the career and history of
the Phoenicians, understandable.

In the second and third chapters we are on
much surer ground. Consequently all that was
necessary was to arrange and group these essential
and well-ascertained facts bearing on the objects
of our research.

Such a course, however, was not possible in the
chapters on Navigation and the Compass, and in
order to arrive at a clear understanding of facts
bearing on these two phases of the problem, it has
been necessary to deal somewhat drastically with
many ancient and popularly accepted theories that
have no basis in fact, and to reconstruct them on
lines suggested by later and more reliable data.

It is unnecessary to offer any explanation for
the selection of the authorities on whom I have
relied for information with regard to the state of
native society in the insular Pacific when it was
first visited by Europeans. It is quite certain that
it could not have been drawn from any more care
ful, painstaking, and reliable source than that pro
vided by Dr. George Turner and Mr. William Ellis,
both of whom had a long and continuous residence
there before any modifying influence was at work
among the native population.

The great obstacle in the way of an acceptable

b

xvi THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

solution of the Aztec problem has been the attempt
to explain it by means of expeditions starting from
some Mediterranean base. Any attempt to obtain
a solution of the enigma on these lines is as clearly
out of the question as an attempt to create corres
pondences between the civilisation of the Aztec
and that existing in Europe in A.D. 1500, for while
these civilisations were clearly derived from the
same sources they had in course of evolution been
developing along lines diametrically opposed to
each other, that of the Aztec at no period having
passed under the refining influences of Christianity.

To understand this problem correctly, therefore,
it is necessary to dismiss from the mind all reference
to the later state of European society as it appeared
after the introduction of Christianity. It must be
viewed in the light of that period when Jew, Phoe
nician, Scythian, and Thracian were the dominant
factors in the national life of the Eastern Mediter
ranean, namely, about noo B.C. And this the
more so that both the Jewish and American tradi
tions refer in the clearest manner to this period as
that in which these movements, that alone are
capable of explaining in any rational manner the
origin of the population of the Pacific Islands, and
at least the central portions of the American
Continent, took place.

Moreover, the so-called physical difficulties that
have bulked so largely in the minds of all investi
gators of this problem are found to melt into thin
air. This will be made very clear by a careful
study of the section devoted to the navigation of
the ancients, for there it will be seen that a con
sensus of opinion exists among competent authorities,

INTRODUCTORY xvii

not least of whom is Lord Avebury, that for at least
from two to five hundred years before the date of
the setting out of these expeditions of Solomon and
Hiram from Eziongeber, which brought the Pacific
slopes of the American Continent temporarily within
the Phoenician sphere of influence, the shores of
Britain and Norway were already tributary to the
trade of Tyre and Sidon. Consequently voyages
across the Pacific in the latitudes of the steady
trade winds must have been an easy feat to a people
who had already mastered all the difficulties that
beset the dangerous navigation of the tempestuous
and storm-driven coasts of Western Europe.

In this connection it has been necessary to re
construct the history of the compass, which was
clearly a Phoenician invention. Fortunately, the
data necessary for that purpose was in existence,
and I believe that, presented as it now is, all future
doubt as to the origin of this invaluable instrument
will be set at rest.

That the American Continent was discovered
by the Jews and Phoenicians and populated by them
in conjunction with the Scythians and Thracians
of South Eastern Europe, and that the communi
cation so established between the Asiatic and
American Continents continued throughout a
period of probably 300 years, are the conclusions
submitted in the chapter on America.

In order that the full value of this portion of the
work may be easily comprehended by the average
reader, this chapter has been supplemented by one
containing a list of some of the more apparent
correspondences found to exist between the people
inhabiting the shores of the Eastern Mediterranean

xviii THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

and those of Central America. These, it will be
found, are of such a nature as enable us to recognise
the source from which the American population
sprang. With a view, however, to eliminating any
possibility of doubt, I have thrown the total results
of the research into the form of an inductio per
enumerationem simplicem, to which is appended a
list of authorities on which it is based. I trust this
may be found satisfying not merely to the general
reader but also to the student who may desire a
more intimate knowledge of the whole subject.

THOMAS C. JOHNSTON.

DID THE PHCENICIANS DISCOVER
AMERICA ?

CHAPTER I

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING

Early history — The Hyksos or Shepherd Kings — Their rule in Egypt —
In Bahrein Islands — Removal from Persian Gulf to Mediterranean-
— The Hyksos in Palestine — Union with Phoenicians — Commercial
and manufacturing prosperity — Some results — Phoenician route to»
Syria — Babylonian and Egyptian influences — Evolution of the Jew.

THE movements of that people which history
styles Phoenician, prior to their settlement on the
Syrian sea-board, is a subject full of mysterious
interest.

The most reliable authorities describe the first
of these as interrelated with the migrations of
successive masses of population which moved from
the mountainous districts of Kurdistan,1 near the
sources of the Tigris and Euphrates, to which the
Scripture narrative (Gen. ii. n) assigns the cradle
of the human race, to the Mesopotamian low lands,
where they settled and in course of time split up
into numerous tribes and families.

If therefore we accept this view it will be
necessary for us to conceive of the Phoenicians at
the beginning of their career not as a separate
people, but as an integral portion of the Syrian

1 Heeren, Hist. Res., vol. i. p. 292.

A

2 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

tribes known as " tent Arabs/' who, from the dawn
of history, occupied the vast plains that lay be
tween the Mediterranean sea-board and the river
Tigris, and stretched from the most southerly parts
of Arabia to the Caucasian mountains.

That great authority on the Semitic race, M.
Ren an, speaks of the Phoenicians as a part of the
first wave of those great migratory movements
which, proceeding to the fertile plains of the lower
Euphrates, there developed a civilisation so widely
different from that of their pastoral brethren as
to set them apart at the beginning of their career
as a separate and a peculiar people.

This statement is supported by the Phoenician
account of themselves, for says Herodotus (vii. 89) :
"The Phoenicians, as they themselves say, anciently
dwelt on the Red Sea, and having crossed from
thence, they settled on the sea coasts of Syria/'
If we are careful therefore to distinguish between
the name Red Sea in its ancient and modern appli
cation there should be no difficulty in understand
ing the case as it is now presented. Herodotus
(i. 180) explains that the Red Sea anciently meant
" that sea into which the Euphrates, a river broad,
deep, and rapid, flows/' and must therefore be
identified with the Persian Gulf. Strabo gives
still further light on the subject, for he writes of
two islands in the Persian Gulf, called Tylus and
Arados, in which remains of temples and other
ruins were found, bearing all the peculiar marks of
Phoenician architecture. The similarity of these
names with those of Tyre and Aradus, two of the
first foundations of the Phoenicians on the Medi
terranean sea-board, so strikingly supports this

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 3

tradition that we may safely enough accept it as
correct.

These early settlers, by the very force of cir
cumstances, led mainly a nomadic life. Only in a
very limited sense could they be called one people.
Probably enough in the manner of their life and in
the nature of the territory they occupied they had
much in common, but, splitting up into families
and tribes, they seldom co-ordinated unless for
some specific purpose or in time of common peril
(Gen. xiv. 13).

It is thus that the Scripture narrative presents
these populations of the Syrian plains to us. This
mode of life was not, however, without its advan
tages among a primitive people, for it made them
observant, resourceful, and self-reliant, and fitted
them to endure the hardships of these early ages
when men required to wrest their support from re
luctant nature by a constant struggle with the
elements. It also enabled them without prepara
tion to undertake such campaigns as were forced
on them by the periodic raids of the mountain
tribes.

It is thus we must understand the first migratory
movements of that people whom later were desig
nated Phoenicians. At a very early period they
separated themselves from the rude pastoral and
migratory tribes who occupied the lower reaches
of the Tigro-Euphrates valley and, either before
or with the main body of the Canaanites, removed
to the eastern shores of the Persian Gulf and under
took on their own account what has been described
as the first purely mercantile career.

Near the forefront of this movement of displace-

4 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

ment was that of the Hyksos or Shepherds, a name
assumed by the early Chaldaean princes, which
proves the primitive pastoral habits of the people
and the source from which they came before their
settlement in the Nile valley and their absorption
by its civilisation.

The ethnographic relation of the Phoenician to
these Hyksos has been the subject of much dispute.
In Genesis x. 15 Sidon the firstborn of Canaan is
classed with the Hamites, and many authorities
still plead that in spite of their purely Semitic
language the Phoenicians were a distinct race both
from the Hyksos and the Hebrews. The opposite
view, however, that the Hyksos, Phoenicians, and
Canaanites were an early offshoot from the Semitic
stock, receives strong support from the fact that
the language of the Hebrews was very similar to
that of the Phoenicians. Moreover, it is the only
view that meets all the necessities of the case.

The story of the Hyksos invasion of Egypt
told by Manetho, the Egyptian historian, and pre
served in a fragment by Josephus (Ag. Ap. i. 15),
has therefore, as forming a part of this general
movement of the Semitic population from the
Syrian plains, a peculiar interest in connection with
our inquiry.

The fragment is as follows : ' There was a
King of ours whose name was Amintimaos. Under
him it came to pass, I know not how, that God was
averse to us, and there came, after a surprising
manner, men of ignoble birth out of the eastern
parts, who had boldness enough to make an ex
pedition into our country and with ease subdue it
by force, yet without hazarding a battle. So when

THE PHCENICIANS IN THE MAKING 5

they had gotten those that governed us under
their power, they afterward burned down our cities
and demolished the temples of the gods and used
all the inhabitants after a most barbarous manner,
nay some they slew and led their children and wives
into slavery. This whole nation was called Hyksos,
that is Shepherd Kings, for in the sacred language
Hyk signifies King, and Sos in the ordinary dialect
shepherd/1

At length they made one of themselves king
whose name was Saites (in some versions Salates).
He chiefly aimed at securing the eastern parts,
fearing that the Assyrians, then stronger than him
self, would be desirous of that kingdom. Saites
was succeeded by other kings who with their
descendants held Egypt for 511 years.

After this the Theban kings and others of Egypt
arose against the Shepherd rule, and a great and long
war waged until Mispragmenthoses drove the Shep
herds out of all Egypt except Avaris. Herodotus
(ii. 28) describes these Hyksos invaders as enemies
to the religion of Egypt, who destroyed the temples,
broke in pieces the altars and images of the gods,
and killed the sacred animals with a view to uproot
ing the low and degrading system of animal worship
which prevailed there.

During the earlier stages of the occupancy, when
the barbarities referred to by Manetho and Hero
dotus were already a thing of the past, the con
querors, succumbing to the masterful influences of
ancient civilisation by which they were surrounded,
speedily became identified with the country and
its traditions, and in place of attempting to create
a new form of government in consonance with their

6 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

own antecedents and usages, made a careful study
of the institutions of the new territory occupied
by them.

Quickly realising how much easier the task of
completely subjugating the native population would
become by continuing rather than destroying the
form of government with which they were familiar,
they pursued the easy and peaceful policy of assimi
lating themselves with the institutions of the con
quered peoples. So successfully was this done that
in recent times their presence in Egypt has only
been detected by means of the long hair, thick
beard, and strongly-marked Semitic features found
on some of the contemporary monuments.

This prudent policy seems not to have stopped
here. Realising how unfitted they were by reason
of their previous nomadic life for the management
of the complicated system of government adopted
by the native rulers, the Hyksos invaders so utilised
the skill of the Egyptians as to succeed, without
weakening their own power, in making them
govern themselves. Those officials, who were
familiar with the routine of office, were retained
until they were able to train young men of their
own race who should be capable of gradually re
placing their instructors.

Pari passu with these general movements, the
Court with its pomp and magnificence was revived
around the new Pharaohs. The usual retinue of
officials were installed, taxes were levied for the
support of the government, law courts were given
authority, religion was protected, and their own
god Set or Soutek set up in the Pantheon. Thus
the tide of Egyptian life swung back, without

THE PHCENICIANS IN THE MAKING 7

friction, into its accustomed channels, carrying on
its broad bosom Hyksos and Egyptian as a united
people.

From a remote period it had been the fixed
policy of the native rulers of Egypt not to welcome
strangers. Consequently the masses of population,
displaced by the inroads of the mountaineers into
the Syrian plains, who sought shelter in the Nile
valley, were treated as slaves, or at least as a
subject people. Under the new administration,
however, this ancient policy was reversed, with the
result that the nomad tribes now found not only
a home but employment awaiting them in Egypt.

The length of the occupancy of Egypt by the
Shepherds has been the subject of much dispute,
but, according to the best authorities (among
whom Maspero, the distinguished Egyptologist, to
whom I am much indebted, may probably be ac
cepted as representative), the period is said to have
extended from 2346 B.C. to 1720 B.C., or in all 626
years. This period proved of unspeakable ad
vantage to both Hyksos and Egyptian. To the
Hyksos it afforded an opportunity for an intimate
acquaintance with the best forms of civic, com
mercial, and manufacturing life, and it gave them
that training in science and art which is an integral
portion of the higher forms of civilisation. To
the Egyptians, on the other hand, it proved not
less valuable. The influence of their smooth-going
civilisation had so sapped the strength of the nation
that the invasion of the Hyksos is said not even to
have been opposed. But a change for the better
had come over the race. The native princes, who
had left the old capital at Memphis and with their

8 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

followers retired to Thebes, were in time awakened
from their fatal inaction. In their new home there
rankled in their breasts memories of the barbarities
of the invasion and the loss of the invaluable terri
tory over which they and their fathers had for so
many centuries held sway. Without assurance
that the invaders would be satisfied with the fief-
dom to which they had made them subject, they
rallied to their standard the princes and potentates
of the south country, and, uniting their forces,
fortified Thebes and made it impregnable.

Time ultimately came to their rescue and pro
vided both cause and leader. The slumbering
discontent was fanned into a fierce fire of rebellion
by the reduction of lower Egypt to a tributary
condition to the Hyksos Government. This re
bellion, headed by Ra-skeenan-taa, seems to have
had only a limited success, but on the accession to
the throne of Pharaoh Alisphrogmenthosis, his
successor, the native population at last found a
worthy leader. The Hyksos were defeated and
driven from the capital at Memphis and the entire
country to the west of the Delta, and shut up in the
immense fortified camp at Avaris.

This war was probably in some particulars the
most remarkable in Egyptian annals. It dragged
on for years without affording the besiegers any
hope of ultimate success. Ultimately the Hyksos
were compelled to offer terms of capitulation. In
the words of the Egyptian historian Manetho, they
" agreed to evacuate the fortress on condition that
they should be permitted to leave the country,
and, by virtue of this agreement, they withdrew
from Egypt with all their families and possessions,

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 9

to the number of 240,000 men, and traversed the
desert into Syria. Fearing, however, the power of
the Assyrians, who were at that time masters of
Asia, they turned into Palestine and in that part
which is now called Judaea built a city which should
be sufficient for so large a number of men, and
called it Jerusalem/' This exodus, which seems to
have been as complete as the later one of the Jews,
is believed to have taken place in 1720 B.C.

At this stage it should be pointed out that the
removal of the Phoenicians from the Persian Gulf
cannot be attributed altogether to a desire on their
part to profit by the advent of the Hyksos in Pales
tine, for, according to Herodotus (ii. 44), the arrival
of the first emigrants on the Syrian sea-board took
place 2300 years before his visit, which would place
the date of their arrival at about 2800 B.C. They
must therefore have been settled in Syria at least a
thousand years before the exodus of the Hyksos
took place.

While the national life of Egypt had been pass
ing through the long period of unrest and transition
caused by the invasion, occupancy, and expulsion
of the Hyksos, that branch of the Syrian nomads
who first separated themselves from the common
stock and settled on the lower reaches of the
Euphrates had not remained inactive. They had
developed a civilisation which constituted a distinct
departure from the simple life and manners of their
pastoral brethren.

Monument and tradition alike show that from
the most ancient times the Canaanites were forced
by these early inroads of the mountain tribes, or by
the conflicting interests in Mesopotamia, to migrate

io THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

from the banks of the Euphrates to the western
shores of the Persian Gulf. Those situated nearest
to Chaldaea and the sea appear to have first dis
carded the nomadic life and engaged in cultivatin
the soil in industrial pursuits and commerce, or in
the construction of the first ships that sailed the
seas.

A successful commercial career imposed three
conditions on these primitive traders. The first
was the accumulation at some central emporium
of stores of such merchandise as would find a ready
sale in available markets. Secondly, the selection
of some suitable centre from which they could
operate successfully between the markets of supply
and demand, and thirdly, the selection of such a
position as would afford security for these emporiums
and the primitive craft by which the transportation
was accomplished. This security was necessary to
prevent attack from the predatory nomadic tribes
which infested the country and found in these early
rich centres of civilisation the booty for which they
were constantly on the outlook.

It is more than probable that it was out of the
stress imposed by compliance with these conditions,
rather than any mere predilection for the sea, that
the custom arose (always a marked feature of the
Phoenician policy) of selecting for emporiums,
wherever possible, islands situated at a short dis
tance from the mainland, as at the Bahrein Islands,
Sidon, Tyre, Gades, and other points. The causes
which led to transference of the establishments of
the Phoenicians from the lower waters of the
Euphrates to the Bahrein Islands are not recorded
by history, yet we have no difficulty in recognising

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING n

them. In becoming the trade intermediaries be
tween the settled portions of eastern and southern
Arabia and the populous and cultivated centres of
trade in the Tigro-Euphrates valley, it was neces
sary to accumulate vast stores of Arabian and
Babylonian wares at some point midway between
these two widely separated regions. At the same
time these emporiums would enable them to avail
themselves of those manufactured wares of the Nile
which were always in active demand in the great
centres of population. In view of these circum
stances, no more suitable place could have been
chosen than the Bahrein Islands. Gerrha, from
which the bay where the Bahrein Islands are situ
ated took its name, was famous in antiquity as one
of the richest cities in the world in consequence of it
being the centre from which radiated the great
caravan routes. It was also renowned for its pearl
fishing, of which more anon.

The principal authorities on whom it is necessary
to rely for information with respect to the Phoe
nician settlements on the Bahrein Islands are Pliny
and Strabo. " On sailing south from Gerrha," says
Strabo, " we come to two islands, where are to be
seen Phoenician temples, and the inhabitants assure
us that the cities of Phoenicia bearing the same name
are colonies from them. These islands are two days'
sail from Tenedon at the mouth of the Euphrates,
and one from Cape Makai." This account is supple
mented by the more specific reference of Pliny,
" for Tylos," says he, " is situated fifty miles from
the Bay of Gerrha.1' As these statements agree
entirely with the position of the islands in the Bay
of Lachsa in the present day, there can be no question

12 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

that they are those referred to, so that if we conjoin
these statements with those of Ezekiel xxvii. 20 and
Genesis xxv. 3, in which Dedan is spoken of, which
was intended to be understood either as one of the
Bahrein Islands or the more northerly one of Cathana,
we will probably have before us all that is necessary
to a clear understanding of any future reference
we may make to Tylos, Arados, or Dedan, since all
of these were situated in the Bay of Gerrha and
adjacent to the city of that name.

That the Babylonians at a later period possessed
a maritime communication with these islands
through the Chaldaeans seems to be the purpose of
the statement of Isaiah xliii. 14, and also of ^Eschylus,
where the sending of ships and the receiving of
Arabian and Indian produce, presumably through
this channel of trade, is spoken of. This also appears
from the works of older writers, who refer to the
wealth of Gerrha as the direct result of its being
the centre of the Indo-Arabian, Babylonian trade
which in those days was the most important, since
the province of Oman or Arabia Felix, the native
country of frankincense and other valuable perfumes
in great demand for religious purposes, was in its
immediate vicinity.

In addition, however, to these islands being
the distributing centre for Indian and Arabian pro
duce, we are assured by Theophrastus, in his History
oj Plants (iv. 9), that the island of Tylos was occupied
by large plantations of cotton, from which were
manufactured cloths called Sindones, these being
mainly exported to Arabia and India. It is true
Herodotus (iii. 106) claims that India was the native
soil of this plant, but, if so, its spread to the Bahrein

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 13

Islands, Arabia, and Egypt could only have been
through Phoenician channels, for at a very early date
it formed a considerable branch of ancient commerce.
Curiously enough we can trace its progress from
this point through the Pacific Islands to America,
where, we shall see later, its presence is distinctly
attributed to the culture hero Tuetsalcoatl, who is
said to have brought maize and cotton into Mexico
(Ency. Brit., xvi. 208) on his first arrival.

Valuable, however, as pearls and cotton were to
the early settlers on the Bahrein Islands, there was
one product found there of infinitely more value
to the Phoenicians than either of these, one indeed
that had more to do with the fashioning of their
future career. If the Bahrein Islands had not af
forded an abundant supply of timber, the naviga
tion of the Persian Gulf and even that of the
Mediterranean might have been delayed for cen
turies, and the genius of the Phoenicians diverted
into other channels. From such information as
may be gathered from Pliny and other sources,
there was found in these islands a timber similar
to the Indian teak wood, which was reputed to be
capable of resisting putrefaction while under water
for upward of two hundred years, although decaying
much sooner when exposed to the atmosphere.

Among the commodities which formed the
staple of exchange at the Bahrein Islands were the
ivory, ebony, and cotton of India, the spices, cin
namon, and pearls of Ceylon, and the cotton and
pearls of the Persian Gulf. In addition to these
were the entire products of the Arabian peninsula
and the coasts of Ethiopia adjoining, which found
their natural outlet in the great central markets of

14 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Yemen. It will be evident, therefore, that the
entire region bordering on the Persian Gulf, with
the coasts of India, Ceylon, and Southern Arabia,
were familiar to the Phoenicians as to no other
nation of antiquity, and that during the earlier
portion of their career especially, they must have
been without a competitor in the navigation of
these seas, as was the case in their navigation of the
Mediterranean later.

We have no positive historic information that
would enable us to determine the exact spot to which
the Phoenicians directed their expeditions in the Red
Sea. It is, however, known that at a later date
they were accustomed to fit ships from the western
bay of the Arabian Gulf, the present Suez, and the
Hierapolis of antiquity. Unfortunately we have
no satisfactory information with respect to the
date at which this trade was inaugurated. But
it was certainly very ancient, reaching back to a
date long anterior to that of the expeditions of
Solomon and Hiram.

As to the causes which led to the transference of
the main establishments of the Phoenicians to the
Mediterranean, we are equally at a loss for positive
historic testimony. The mere fact, however, that
their first settlement there was Sidon (Gen. x. 15-19)
" the fish town/' and that their whole career on the
inland sea was beyond all things else identified
with fishing for the murex, which provided the
material from which their famous dye was obtained,
suggests the cause so plainly that it seems useless to
seek for another.

It is more than probable that the strategic
position of the emporiums of the Phoenicians at

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 15

Tylos and Arados, which enabled them in large
measure to control the commerce of the ancient
world, may have developed a spirit of animosity in
the great commercial centres of Babylonia and
South Arabia, which it was always the policy of
the Phoenicians to avoid. This may have acted as
a stimulus to a general movement towards the
Mediterranean. Beyond this presumption, how
ever, there is no evidence to show that any exodus
of a startling nature ever took place from the
Persian Gulf. On the contrary, everything indi
cates that the movement, however caused, was
slow and gradual, probably covering some centuries
and the legitimate outgrowth of commercial oppor
tunities developing in the West. Be that as it
may, from the new site the Phoenicians were in a
position to control the entire trade of the West.
The entire Mediterranean sea-board was rapidly
being covered by markets capable of absorbing all
that was produced by the infant industries of the
Phoenicians.

But while it is true that the possibilities of the
Bahrein Islands as a connecting link between the
Arabian and Babylonian markets, and the security
which they afforded for their emporiums and ship
ping, may have led the Phoenicians to make their
first settlements there, it is equally important to
remember that from this point they could handle
the transport trade between Arabia and Babylonia
by sea at a fraction of the expense entailed by cara
vans. From this point, too, they were well placed
with regard to the Indian peninsula, Ceylon, and
Egypt, whether by sea via some central port in
Hydramaut or Yemen, or by way of Gerrha and

16 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Aelana to Thebes, and later Memphis, the first
capital of the Hyksos.

What the extent of the marine and caravan
trade of the early Phoenicians was during their
residence on the Bahrein Islands we have no means
of determining by direct testimony. That these
people were intimately acquainted with the Arabian
peninsula and its markets and products has already
been shown. There seems little room for doubt
that the caravan trade, which was hardly less im
portant than the sea trade, was either directly in
the Phoenicians1 hands or, through the instru
mentality of the carrying tribes, had been by them
exploited to such an extent as to make it the object
of the cupidity of the Assyrian monarchs. This
view, moreover, is strongly supported by the fact
that all the great caravan routes which, so far as
we know, have undergone no change since they
were first established, found their outlet at the
Bay of Gerrha in the immediate neighbourhood
of the Phoenician establishments. There the gold,
precious stones, pearls, and frankincense of Arabia,
the pearls and cinnamon of Ceylon, and the ivory,
fine woods, spices, and cotton of India could be
exchanged for the manufactured products of Baby
lonia and Egypt more conveniently than at any
other point.

With the close of the revolutions in Egypt the
seat of the Phoenician trade seems to have been
changed. Thebes no longer remained the chief mart,
but the later capital Memphis, from which the pro
ducts of the African and Egyptian markets could be
more conveniently exchanged for those of Arabia
and Babylonia. The possession of large central

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 17

warehouses there, where an assortment of these
goods could be obtained in such quantities as suited
the local markets, necessarily proved a great con
venience to the Egyptian merchants, who could
have found very little in the situation to induce
competition with a people who either owned, or
were in a position to control, the trade of the
Arabian Peninsula. The country was then infested
by rude predatory tribes, who were a menace to life
and property, and made private operations im
possible, so that the carrying trade could only be
conducted either by sea or by large armed caravans
strong enough to combat successfully the Nomad
tribesmen.

It is not less difficult to arrive at a definite
understanding with respect to the exact stage to
which the allied arts of naval construction and
navigation had reached in the hands of the Phoe
nicians previous to their removal from the Bahrein
Islands to the Mediterranean. We can only piece
together the few fragments that have survived the
wrecks of time. Happily many of these fragmentary
references are often illuminative, and when thrown
into relief against the black background of an
tiquity, provide all that is really necessary to a
complete understanding of the case. Especially is
this so with respect to the few introductory remarks
of Herodotus (i. i) in his volume of research into
the state of ancient society. There he writes :
" The Phoenicians having settled in the country
which they now inhabit, forthwith applied them
selves to distant voyages, and having exported
Egyptian and Assyrian wares, touched at other
places and at Argos, which at that period in every

B

i8 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

respect surpassed all those stated which are now
comprehended under the general name of Greece/'
When we connect this with another passage from
the same author (ii. 44), we find that these voyages
must be referred to a date anterior to 2800 B.C.
These facts are extremely valuable, for they enable
us to know by direct testimony something of the
nature, extent, and direction of Phoenician trade
during their residence on the Bahrein Islands, and
from this to conclude that the arts of naval con
struction and navigation were at that period in no
such primitive a condition as is usually ascribed
to them.

The navigation of the Mediterranean was by no
means as simple as that of the Persian Gulf. The
eastern end especially was subject to storms of such
a character as struck terror in the heart of the boldest
navigator of those days. Voyages, therefore, cover
ing a distance of from 1500 to 2000 miles implied
an advanced state of naval construction and
seamanship.

While, then, we are not in possession of a com
prehensive statement with respect to the causes
which led to the transference of the main estab
lishments of the Phoenicians from the Persian Gulf
to the Mediterranean, we seem, in view of the testi
mony already adduced, to be forced to the con
clusion that in the name Sidon — the fish town —
we have an explanation that fits all the necessities
of the case. The " fish town " seems to afford a
sane and reasonable explanation of the movement
from the Bahrein Islands to the Syrian coasts, and
not only for the presence of the Phoenicians there,
but also in Sicily and Spain and even in the Atlantic,

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 19

so far at least as Madeira or the Purple Isles and the
coasts of Britain are concerned, for all these points
seem in the first instance to have been identified
with the murex fishing.

It is also highly probable that in the expulsion
of the Hyksos from Egypt, the commercial relations
of the Phoenicians with the Egyptians received a
considerable impetus. The re-occupation of lower
Egypt and the Delta by the Egyptians would
naturally create a very active demand for those
foreign commodities which they had been
accustomed to receive from this source. From
the harbours of Tyre and Sidon, the Nile and
the towns that lined its banks could be reached
in a tithe of the time and at a fraction of the
expense entailed by the long and perilous land
journey.

The general state of unrest, which the conflict
between the Hyksos and Egyptians must have
created throughout all Syria, may likewise have
been a factor of no small importance in determining
a change to a position of greater security for the
Phoenician emporiums. Moreover, the advantage
secured to the Phoenicians by the central position
their new emporiums occupied with respect to the
markets of Babylonia, Arabia, Palestine, and Egypt,
and the coasts and islands of Asia Minor where the
great masses of population were at that time situ
ated, was too obvious to have been overlooked by
a people whose career was even then definitely
marked out for them. By this time they had over
come all the initial difficulties of naval construction
and seamanship, and were in a position independ
ently of any outside assistance to construct and

20 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

navigate such vessels as the new situation may
have demanded.

Again, the advent of the Hyksos in Palestine
offered a magnificent field for further commercial
expansion, and this on the most favourable terms.
The transference of the main establishments of the
Phoenicians to the Syrian coasts was not less ad
vantageous in view of the fact that they were an
agricultural people ; here they were close to both
Palestine and Egypt, the granaries of the ancient
world, and their vessels and caravans were able to
bring back on their return journeys an abundant
supply of such food-stuffs as their densely popu
lated towns needed. In so doing they made doubly
certain of an established trade.

The Hyksos, who had just then left Egypt,
were, moreover, a very different people from the
rude barbarians who entered the Nile valley 626
years before. The leavening influences of the
civilisation of the Delta had effected a marvellous
transformation. The Hyksos, during that long
period, had not been simply identified with
Egyptian institutions, they had been Egypt itself.
Now they brought to the door of the Phoenicians
those markets which, in previous years, it had been
necessary for the traders of the Bahrein Islands to
cross practically a thousand miles of inhospitable
desert to reach.

The new career of the Hyksos was to be one of
more importance to mankind than the conquest of
the Nile, one in which they would live over again
not merely the life of Egypt, but a new and larger
life of their own, one in which would be found con
joined the best that the civilisation of Babylon and

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 21

Egypt had produced, yet one not less peculiarly
their own. Probably this new life in its details
might not be so refined as the original, but it was
a strong, healthy, and vigorous life, and, beyond
doubt, more practical and catholic in its sym
pathies and more likely to appeal to men as they
went to the uttermost parts of the earth, the
missionaries of that material civilisation that would
probably affect for good and evil every kindred and
tribe and people who came within the scope of its
influence.

That in the final adjustments of this exodus
from Egypt the herdsman would care for his cattle,
the husbandman for his farm in the well-watered
valleys and plains of Jordan and Sharon, and the
tradesmen and scientist drift to Phoenicia, so
favourably situated only 150 miles to the north,
who can doubt that has studied the migration of
mankind ? At the time of their arrival Tyre,
Sidon, Arados, and probably others in that long
series of towns which, like links in a chain, bound
together in later years the commonwealth on the
Syrian coast, had probably for centuries been busy
centres of commercial, if not of manufacturing,
activity. With the existence of these the Hyksos
could not fail to have been familiar, since their pro
ducts must often have excited the admiration of the
herdsmen, who naturally would prefer the wares
manufactured or to be purchased in the Syrian
coast towns to those produced in Babylon from
which they had been driven.

The Phoenicians likewise would naturally wel
come to their cities men of their own race who were
skilled in science, art, and manufacture, for through

22 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

the active co-operation of these native craftsmen
they would be enabled to strengthen their hold on
the Egyptian markets. It is more than probable,
therefore, that it is to the amalgamation of these
two branches of the common stock rather than to
any other cause that we must ascribe the pro
nouncedly Egyptian and Babylonian influence
found in the motives of Phoenician decorative
designs.

It is scarcely surprising, then, that in those two
great movements of what, for convenience sake,
may be called the Phoenicians from the Persian
Gulf, and those from Egypt, we find the natural
culmination of those segregations of what were at
one time portions of the nomadic tribes who issued
originally from the mountain regions of Kurdistan.

Prior to this amalgamation the population of
the coast towns must have been small and their
capital trifling, but with the advent of the Hyksos
in Palestine not only their numbers but their
capital must have been greatly augmented. It is
therefore easy to conceive of this period as striking
the keynote of a forward movement in the history
of humanity of no ordinary kind.

The Phoenicians of the Persian Gulf, with a
masterfulness that has perhaps no counterpart in
the history of mankind, wrested from nature secrets
that enabled them to achieve rare distinction in
science, art, and manufacture. They were without
a serious competitor in the early world of commerce
and transportation. To this distinction they added
the creation of navigation, the discovery of the
unique qualities of the murex for dyeing purposes,
and the manufacture of glass from the fine sands

THE PHCENIC1ANS IN THE MAKING 23

of the river Belus. Now they were joined by
that other branch of themselves, the Hyksos, who
had mastered Egypt and were skilled to weave, not
only woollen but linen fabrics, to design, to hew stone,
to erect pyramids and temples, to make pottery, to
engrave gems. They had also a knowledge of the
alphabet and of the exact and applied sciences.
All this enabled the Phoenicians in coming years to
outrival either Egypt or Babylon. Well may we
ask what career was impossible to such a people ?
It is extremely probable that about this period a
rupture took place in the commercial relations of
Phoenicia and Egypt. Under new conditions there
was, however, no reason why in the amalgamation
of the Hyksos with the business men of Tyre and
Sidon, Egypt should not again become a market of
the first importance to the Syrian coast towns, for
the Nile was convenient to the Phoenician ports,
and transportation by sea was both rapid and cheap.
Besides, the Phoenician emporiums were stored not
only with their own manufactured wares, but with
the varied products of the Babylonian and Arabian
markets.

In the world's history it has been no unusual
thing to find that out of the ashes of conflict has
arisen to friend and foe alike a harvest of better
things than seemed possible when men followed
the leading of blind passion in the heat of battle.
It certainly was so in the case of Egypt, for the
national quickening which continued for many
centuries to affect Egyptian life is easily traceable
to this period. Nor was it less so in the case of
Phoenicia. The stimulus received from this move
ment of displacement lifted them from the ranks

24 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

of mere carriers and commercial intermediaries to
the high position of the great manufacturing nation
of the ancient world. It can hardly be doubted
that their genius in creating wares whose quality
and artistic skill challenge even to-day comparison
with the best we produce, must be traced in some
directions to the amalgamation of their population
with the displaced Hyksos who received their train
ing in Egypt.

The sifting and shaking down again to a new
order of things benefited not only Phoenicia, but,
through them, the peoples of the Mediterranean
basin generally. At the same time it must have
acted as a tonic on the manufacturing centres of
Babylonia, for the trade with the west could only
have been retained by a corresponding progress
there. As an educative force this movement must
have quickened the progress of civilisation in Asia
as well as Europe, and eventually benefited the
world at large.

Perhaps at this point it may be prudent to re
trace our steps for a little in order that we may
clear away a misunderstanding with reference to
a tradition reported by Trogas as to the route by
which a portion of the Phoenician people reached
the Syrian coast. He says that they travelled as
far as the Syrian lake, on whose shores they rested.
Some authorities have read this as referring to the
Phoenicians from Tylos and Arados, the lake being
Bambykes near the Euphrates. Others again seek
to identify it with the waters of Merom or the Sea
of Galilee, while a third section claim that it refers
to the Dead or Salt Sea. From what has already
been said it is more than probable that the last

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 25

of these (a view which receives the support of
that eminent Egyptologist, M. Maspero) must be
considered as the only tenable view. If so, then
it cannot have reference to |the movement from the
Persian Gulf.

As the movement of the Hyksos from Egypt
was, according to Manetho, in the direction of
Jerusalem, and occurred about the time of Abraham,
which is usually placed about the eighteenth century
B.C., it jequires no vivid imagination to realise that
the settlers must have been a portion of the dis
placed Hyksos, for, according to Genesis xiii. 10, the
region " was well watered everywhere, even as the
garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt as thou
comest into Zoar." Moreover, the lake into which
the Jordan flowed, lying like a mirror in a garden
of green, must have made the region peculiarly
inviting to these exiles, who for so many centuries
had been residents of the well-watered and fertile
fields of the Delta.

The awful cataclysm which followed in the wake
of their settlement and sunk the lake far below sea-
level would naturally increase its area, and, swallow
ing up the cities that lined its margin, turn the
fruitful fields into the barren wilderness we find
to-day. They would thus be driven to the north
and west, to the fertile fields of Siddim (Gen. xiv. 8),
to the well- watered valleys of the Jordan, or to the
plateaus and low lands of the coast line. Curiously
enough the date of all these historic events not only
accords with that of the evacuation of Egypt by
the Hyksos, but closely with that of the Scripture
narrative according to Archbishop Usher's chronology
(Gen. xii. 16 and xxiii. 19).

26 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

If, therefore, this explanation — one by no means
devoid of probability — be correct, we have a simple
and natural solution of the difficulty, and one that
does no violence to the facts recorded in Egyptian,
Phoenician, or Hebrew history. It is equally in
accord with the tradition recorded by Herodotus.
Naturally enough the Phoenicians would refrain
from narrating to the Greek stranger any of those
episodes in their composite national career which
even at that distance of time must have rankled in
the memory of the people as they thought of their
severance, even on honourable terms, from a terri
tory so splendid in association and offering such a
vantage ground of magnificent possibilities for the
furtherance of that unparalleled commercial career
on which they had embarked.

If, then, the Phoenicians of the Persian Gulf had
established themselves on the Syrian coasts and
erected the temple to Hercules 2300 years before
the visit of Herodotus (ii. 64), which is usually
placed about 457-456 B.C., then they must have
been securely settled there about 2756 B.C., and as
we have seen that the exodus of the Hyksos took
place about 1720 B.C., the Phoenician towns of Tyre
and Sidon must have been busy centres of commerce
and manufacture for many centuries before this
event. It is easy, therefore, to understand how a
considerable amalgamation of this common stock
with kindred sympathies may have taken place
from that time forward, tending not only to elevate
the social condition of the fishing towns, but to
impart a new influence with a distinctly Egyptian
leaning in culture, art, manufacture, and trade,
and perhaps more than all in architecture and

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 27

construction. With these points made clear, we
are now again in a position to take up the course of
our narrative.

With the trade of the Mediterranean basin in
their hands, backed by long experience in the
markets of Babylonia, Arabia, and Egypt, and
greatly augmented capital, the Phoenicians were
now in a position to control not only the western
trade, but to undertake any operations for the ex
tension either of their manufactures or their com
merce. With their weaving, dyeing, glass making,
metallurgy, and other manufactures in operation,
and a supply of skilled labour that can only be
explained by the junction of the forces of the Phoe
nicians with the Hyksos, it is easy to understand
the later manufacturing expansion of the Phoenicians
and the prevalence of Babylonian and Egyptian
motives in their permanent designs.

Prior to this movement, so far as history throws
any light on the situation, the Phoenicians were
simply traders. We have no record of the existence
of any manufacturing establishments on the Persian
Gulf, nor, in the beginning, do they seem to have
existed at Sidon. The Phoenicians possessed ships,
caravans, and warehouses only. In the co-ordina
tion of their forces with the exiles from Egypt,
however, a new career opened to them, for with the
necessary skilled labour within their own boundaries
manufactories of their own were erected and their
products thrown on the markets of the ancient world.

By reason of the very peculiar position in which
they were placed they were in a position to begin
where other nations had left off. They did not
require to create the looms to weave, or the vats to

28 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

dye, the blow-pipe to fashion glass, or to cultivate
the flax for linen. Like the alphabet, they inherited
these, but being an eminently receptive people, they
did what neither the Babylonians nor Egyptians
were capable of doing — they eliminated the less
valuable from what they had derived from these
sources and superadded something of their own.
Thus was produced a new type as distinctly Phoe
nician as before it had been Babylonian or Egyptian.

The training through which the nation as a united
people passed was advantageous in another direction.
It specially fitted them to cater with their manu
factured wares to the markets of Babylonia and
Egypt equally with those regions such as Palestine
and Arabia, which had for long centuries been
dependent on the older centres of trade.

In looking back over this period of reconstruc
tion, it is impossible to overestimate the value of
those varied experiences through which the nation
passed in the development of that flexibility of
temperament and that catholicity in art that
formed so marked a feature of the Phoenician life
throughout its long career. Since it was the des
tiny of unified Phoenicia that she should become
to the ancient world the missionary of material
civilisation, it was necessary that her people should
have a unique training. To apprehend the atmos
phere of the traditions of the people, to catch the
inspiration of their institutions and customs in
order to effectively appeal to the national prejudice
and the religious sentiment, it was essential that
the artisan even more than the merchant should
have received his initial inspiration on the ground,
so to speak, otherwise the products of his skill,

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 29

while approximating to those ideals which he strove
to translate, would always fail in producing that
local atmosphere, that intangible something which
is the very crux of art and gives it its final value.

The staple products of any manufacturing people,
but especially of any semi-civilised people, are apt
to be a mere expression of their thought. However
successfully they may interpret some more or less
familiar phase of external nature, or adapt themselves
to the climatic conditions which the region they
inhabit imposes, it is obvious that goods manu
factured under such conditions and for such a
restricted area must be acceptable in few markets.
To manufacture for and be the successful commercial
intermediaries of the ancient world, it was essential
that the Phoenicians should have passed very far
beyond this stage and developed among themselves
types that were not local but cosmopolitan in their
attractiveness. In this respect the Phoenicians emi
nently distinguished themselves.

The region to which they had come, whether
drawn by choice or driven by necessity, was one
peculiarly fitted to stimulate the imaginative facul
ties. It comprised within its boundaries every
natural element necessary to the development of a
high order of intellect, especially in the case of a
people the rudimentary stages of whose education
had been obtained in the best schools. The isola
tion created by the vast deserts adjacent to Phoe
nicia and Egypt was in some measure a means of
security, and had a definite tendency not only to
create but to perpetuate certain well-marked types.
This isolation, however, did more for Phoenicia
than it did for Egypt, for it fitted it to become,

30 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

in material things, what the Jew among the same
surroundings became in spiritual things. Who
could so easily provide for the inhabitants of the
frigid north as the Phoenician ? He possessed not
only the wool of the desert sheep, the distaff to spin,
the looms to weave, and the vats to dye, but a
population within his own borders in daily need of
such goods. Must his produce be adapted to the
denizen of the sweltering tropics ? He knew what
was required. The region to be supplied was one
he was familiar with. Was it necessary to find
raiment for the wandering Bedouins of the desert ?
They were his near neighbours, the people who
brought from afar the wealth of Ophir. Must he
anticipate the wants of those that went down to
the sea in ships ? Phoenicia was mistress of the
seas. Her ships sailed to all ports and traversed
all oceans, while her harbours were the havens
where the argosies would fain be.

Palestine was necessary for the evolution of the
Jew. His mission was a universal one, and a
universal sympathy with the idiosyncrasies of men
could only have been evolved where nature found
its most abundant and highest forms of expression.
In order that such a national education should be
complete, however, it was necessary that it should
have had its beginnings in the valley of the Nile,
and that every form of experience from that of
slave to lawgiver and priest should have been passed
through amid the refining influences of the highest
form of civilisation.

But such training was not less necessary to the
Phoenician. To be the missionary of material
civilisation as of a universal religion a long and

THE PHOENICIANS IN THE MAKING 31

arduous training was necessary. In this respect
Phoenicia might well say that other men had
laboured and she had entered into their labours.
Yet the processes by which this was accomplished
were, in the case of the Phoenicians, as effective as
those very different methods which operated in the
case of the Jews.

The time, however, was appointed for the co
ordinating of what was already in existence of the
divine plan, and without this co-ordinating there
never could have been superimposed those more
advanced forms of religious, ethical, and material
civilisation of which these two nations were the fore
runners and exponents. They incorporated in
themselves the best that, in these directions, had
survived previous races and generations of men.

It is true that neither Jew nor Phoenician
achieved their manifest destiny, but will we, in the
face of what we now know of the history of these
two peoples, believe that the plan of their career
was any the less divinely appointed ?

CHAPTER II

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE

Region of Phoenicia — Colony of Sidon — Phoenician art and craftsman
ship — Commercial expansion — Arabian and Babylonian trade —
Importance of the former — Its nature and transport — Phoenicians
as the carriers of the world — Western trade.

THE little strip of Syrian coast occupied by the
Phoenicians was familiar to the Greeks and Romans
by the name of Phceniki, interpreted by some as
" the palm land " or " the land where the palms
grew/' by others as " blood red," from the richer
shade of their famous purple dye, and the dark red
complexion of the people. It is probable, however,
that the former of these explanations is the correct
one. The Phoenician territory, so far as can be
gathered from the Biblical records, was not included
by the Hebrews under the name of either Canaan
or Phoenicia, but was familiar to them as Chittim.
In Numbers xxiv. 24 the name is applied to a
western power generally, which at that date and in
this connection would be quite satisfactory. This
again is corroborated in Jeremiah ii. 10, where the
name is applied to the dominant western region as
distinguished from Kedar in the east, embracing
not only the coasts but also the islands washed by
the eastern Mediterranean, these being under the
control of a great naval power.

Chittim of the Old Testament narrative may
therefore be safely regarded, like Ophir, as repre-

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 33

senting no particular spot or place, but rather a
region under the control of the dominant naval and
commercial power of that period. In this sense,
therefore, Chittim to the Jewish mind did not mean
Cittium the later Larnika, or even the strip of coast
line occupied by the Phoenicians, but greater Phoe
nicia, including the colonies on Cyprus, the Sporades
and Cyclades, the Hellenic Peninsula or Apia, and
the shores of Asia Minor prior to their occupancy by
the Greeks. It is highly important to have a clear
conception of the nomenclature of the region, for
upon this depends, to a large extent, the final
elucidation of this complex problem.

Phoenicia proper, as it was known to the Greeks
and Romans from whom the name has come
down to us, was the little strip of country stretching
from Gabula to Dora on the Syrian coast to the north
of Palestine. The territory which it embraced was
not more than 200 miles long, by an average of
20 miles broad, occupying a superficial area of about
4000 square miles. Even in its most prosperous
period Phoenicia proper was therefore one of the
smallest countries of antiquity — so small as to be
less than Palestine, only a little larger than York
shire in England, and a little less than Wales. In
spite, however, of the insignificance of Phoenicia's
territorial dimensions, its central position with re
spect to the great seats of commerce and civilisation,
the nature of its products, and its commercial affilia
tions with the contiguous countries, were of such
a character as quickly elevated it to a commanding
position in the history of the ancient world. Its
coast-line was not deeply indented, yet was suffi
ciently irregular to create a number of natural

c

34 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

harbours, which provided ports of sufficient dimen
sions to accommodate fleets of considerable size.

The situation of the territory for the develop
ment of a commercial career was therefore, apart
from its value as the home of the murex, well
chosen. The sea that fronted the new home re
duced dockage to its simplest terms, for it was
tideless, usually calm, and invited to navigation.
Cyprus was clearly visible on the western horizon,
and led the way to Rhodes and Cyndus, the Sporades
and Cyclades, the coasts of Asia Minor and Apia,
the later Peloponnesus, which, before many years
were past, were studded with their colonies and
became tributary to their trade.

We have no information with respect to the
population of Phoenicia proper during any portion
of its history, but from the restricted territory which
it occupied, the impossibility of expansion owing
to its mountainous surroundings, and its enormous
mercantile operations, there can be no doubt that
it must have been very dense.

Owing to trade expansion or to civil disputes, so
common in over-crowded communities, all the
Phoenician cities were colonies of each other,
founded by a species of " budding off " from the
first foundations. Thus Sidon was a colony founded
by the emigrants from the Persian Gulf, and Tyre
and Aradus are usually accredited with being
colonies of Sidon. Tripolis — the threefold city—
as the name implies, was a joint colony of the three
towns — Sidon, Aradus, and Tyre.

Sidon, in spite of the very ancient date usually
accredited to the foundation of Tyre (Her. ii. 44),
is generally accorded the distinction of having been

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 35

the oldest of the Phoenician settlements. Why it
was erected we can only conjecture. Still, as
Sidon in the native tongue means fish, and as the
chief renown of the Phoenicians as a manufacturing
people was from the beginning identified with the
purple dye obtained from the shell-fish, murex, and
purpura found on their coasts, it is probable that
in the name Sidon — or the fishing town — we have
more than a valuable clue. Especially is this the
case in view of the fact that the dye obtained from
the shell-fish found on the Syrian coast was always
more valuable than that obtained elsewhere, and
reached its highest perfection when applied to the
fleeces obtained from the adjoining deserts.

From first to last Sidon was in great repute
throughout the ancient world, not only for its dyes
and its beautiful garments, but also for its glass
ware and its metallurgy ; and its history in this
respect was simply the history of the other Phoe
nician towns which sprang from it. It seems clear,
then, that in the discovery of the purple-producing
murex, the fishing for the shell-fish, the preparation
of the dye, and its application to the fleeces of the
desert, spinning, weaving, and the manufacture of
the cloth into garments, and at a later period, when
joined by the Hyksos, the introduction of the allied
arts and industries, we have all the information
necessary to understand the causes which led to
the change of base from the Persian Gulf as well as
the phenomenal development which took place in
the early Phoenician settlements.

The purple dye which was the potent means of
creating Phoenicia was wholly different from that
for which Babylonia was famous. It was obtained

36 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

mainly from a small sac or vein in the neck of the
shell-fish, an object so infinitesimal in size that one
is amazed that the discovery of its properties led
to results so potent in the distribution of mankind
and the spread of civilisation in the ancient world.
Though the dye of the murex in later years was by
no means the exclusive property of the Phoenicians,
they brought the industry to a higher state of per
fection than any other manufacturing nation. The
scarlet and violet purples of the Sidonians and
Tyrians were for centuries the prevailing fashion
among the aristocratic and priestly ranks of society.
The dyed stuffs issuing from the Phoenician vats
were not, however, all obtained from the murex.
The Phoenicians were equally skilled in the use of
vegetable dyes, and these were doubtless liberally
used in the production of the cheaper fabrics, such
as cottons and linens. Still the best results were
only obtained when the dye of the murex was
applied to the fine fleeces obtained from the sheep
of the adjoining deserts. The dye being applied to
the raw material, there sprang up all along the Phoe
nician coast weaving centres which made Phoenicia
famous the world over.

While a claim has been made that glass was
the invention of the Phoenicians, there seems good
reason for believing that its manufacture was de
rived from Egypt. The sands of the Belus, however,
lent themselves to the production of an exquisite
quality of this commodity, and the glass trade,
according to Pliny, was mainly in the hands of the
Phoenicians for centuries — the principal seats of
the industry being Sidon and Sarepta. As the fine
climate in the East made windows unnecessary,

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 37

glass was mainly used at this time for decorating
the walls and ceilings of the apartments of the
wealthy classes, in which the Phoenicians displayed
their great artistic skill. Glass was also applied
at Sidon and other coast towns to the manufacture
of what are known as agry beads, which have been
found in tombs in all parts of Europe and Asia,
and even at Ash ant ee on the west coast of Africa.
These were made of an opaque glass generally
coloured and showing considerable skill in manipu
lation.

The drinking vessels of the Phoenicians were
mainly of stone and precious metals, though at
Sidon bottles, vases, drinking cups, bowls, and
other utensils were manufactured, while smaller
objects, exquisitely fashioned by means of the blow
pipe and engraved either by the use of a wheel or by
a sharp graving tool, were produced.

For metallurgy Tyre and Sidon were equally
famous. This was undoubtedly a Phoenician in
vention, and bronze seems to have been their
favourite metal. So skilful did the Phoenicians
become in this branch of industry that by a method
of treatment known only to themselves and the
Egyptians, and now lost to mankind, they could
form bronze into knives and even razors, that
carried an edge like steel. The manufacture of
bronze was peculiarly Phoenician art. It was a
Tyrian artist who fashioned for Solomon the great
bronze molten sea or laver, 45 feet in circumference,
supported on the back of twelve oxen, as well as
the magnificent bronze pillars, Jachin and Boax,
each 40 feet in height, which were accounted among
the chief glories of the temple at Jerusalem.

38 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

The works of the Phoenicians in metallurgy were
not, however, confined to bronze. They were
equally skilful in handling the precious metals.
It was Hiram, a Phoenician workman, who fashioned
for Solomon the altars and tables of gold whereon
the shewbread was set ; as well as the ten candle
sticks, the lamps, the flowers, the tongs and snuffers,
which were the chef d'ceuvres of the Jewish temple.
In ordinary articles of personal adornment the
Phoenicians were equally deft. In the great
sepulchre at Beyrut, described by M. Renan in his
Mission de Phenice (p. 39), were found a great
number of women's trinkets, including two gold
bracelets of fine workmanship, another ornamented
with coloured stones, and sixteen finger rings, all
of which betokened the astonishing manual dex
terity of the Phoenician workmen. Nor was the
skill and proficiency of the Phoenicians as engravers
of hard stones less remarkable. In this field they
were vastly superior to the Egyptians and Baby
lonians, their designs being drawn with greater
spirit and fidelity to life.

Tyre, as has already been remarked, was appar
ently a colony of Sidon, founded with a view to the
further development of the murex fishing, and as a
distributing centre for the manufactured products
of the older town. The first foundation was on
the mainland, and for many centuries was only of
secondary importance to Sidon. But on the sub
jugation of the latter town by the Philistines of
Askalon about 1250 B.C., Tyre, which had been
growing rapidly in power and affluence, became the
principal seat of trade and political influence, and
so continued until the time of the thirteen years'

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 39

investiture by Nebuchadnezzar in 585 B.C., when the
greater part of the inhabitants, taking refuge on the
adjacent island, already in some measure occupied
by their establishments, founded the island city of
Tyre, which, in consequence of its strong position,
soon outgrew the town on the mainland. Not
only did the island city of Tyre outlive the Baby
lonian and Persian monarchies, but by reason of
their decline continued to increase in power and
opulence until it was recognised as the commercial
capital of the world. It was captured, however,
and in a great measure destroyed by Alexander
the Great in 332 B.C.

Although Tyre, Sidon, Aradus, and Tripolis
were much more intimately identified with the
history of Phoenicia than any of the other towns on
the coast, yet these latter, from a commercial point
of view, are only less worthy of recognition. About
eighteen miles south of Tripolis was Byblus, famous
for its temple to Adonis, one of the chief seats of
the licentious orgies identified with the Phoenician
religious cult. To the south of this was Berytus,
now by far the most flourishing city on the Syrian
coast, but at that time simply a dependency of
Sidon or of Byblus. There were other towns of
less importance, but still seats of art and industry.

With the accession of Hiram, the son of Abibaal
and the friend of Solomon, to the throne, the
trade of Tyre, owing to the tremendous expansion
of commerce towards the western Mediterranean,
grew to such proportions that it was found neces
sary to take steps for the enlargement of the island
city, and to this end great engineering works were
inaugurated. The main island was enlarged to

40 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

the east by filling up the shore for a considerable
distance with stone and rubbish and closing the
channel between the two islands, so making one
with a circumference of two and a half miles. At
the same time the old temple of Hercules was pulled
down, and on a new and more commanding site
temples to Melkarth and Astarte, the principal
deities of the Tyrians, were reared.

The activities of the Tyrians were not, however,
confined to the enlargement of the city and the
erection of these temples. Mindful of their enor
mous commercial expansion the main ports were
greatly improved. During the period from 1300 B.C.
to 1000 B.C. Phoenician colonisation had reached its
furthest limits, covering all the islands and shores
of the Mediterranean and reaching as far as the
Atlantic, the coasts of Britain, and even Norway.
In order that commodious harbours for the ships
of Tharshish employed in the Spanish trade might
be provided, engineering works of vast dimensions
were undertaken at the island of Tyre. Mr. Raw-
linson (p. 42), who describes these works with great
minuteness, says : "At the north-eastern extremity
of the island two piers of solid stone were carried
out from the shore into the sea at a distance of about
a hundred feet from each other, and to a distance
from the shore of about seven hundred feet, which,
running nearly due east and west, formed an effec
tive barrier against the north wind, and secured to
vessels needed protection. The outer line of wall
was a mere breakwater, but the inner one was a
real pier so deflected at its eastern extremity as to
join a low ridge of rocks which formed a natural
protection to the harbour on the east, and secure it

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 41

against squalls from Lebanon. Another ridge ran
out to meet this and completed the shelter on this
side, the mouth of the harbour between the two
ridges, which were strengthened by art, having a
width of about 105 feet." The extent of space
thus enclosed and made absolutely safe in all winds,
had an area of about 7500 yards, which was sufficient
to accommodate several hundred vessels of the size
usually employed by the ancients.

As, however, no harbour could be accessible
under all conditions of wind and weather, and
Tyrian commerce required that vessels should be
able to make port in all seasons, a second harbour
was constructed at the southern extremity of the
island which, from its looking towards Egypt, was
known as the Egyptian harbour. Here a pier
was carried out from the south-western part of
the island to a distance of 200 yards in a south
westerly direction, and a wall was carried thence
to the south-eastern extremity of the islands, a
single opening being left which could be closed by
a boom. A space of 800 yards long and from 50
to 150 wide was thus walled in. Finally, to
secure communication between the two harbours
a canal was dug, which enabled vessels to pass
from the Syrian to the Egyptian harbours, and vice
versa.

What portion of these works which made Tyre
the most commodious and safest harbour on the
Phoenician coast was due to Hiram's initiative it
is difficult to determine, but as these works seem
to have stimulated Solomon to enlarge and beautify
Jerusalem and provide it with an abundant water
supply, it is more than probable that they were all

42 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

parts of one comprehensive scheme made necessary
by the developments in Tharshish.

But the energies of the people during this period
were not wholly engrossed in the prosecution of
the western Mediterranean trade. The main trend
of their commerce was still towards the east and
south, but more especially towards Yemen1 and
Gerrha,2 which, even before the days of Moses, went
by the general name of Ophir.

There is probably no subject connected with
the history of early commerce and navigation on
which so much has been written as that of Ophir,
and probably on no subject has so little been satis
factorily determined. The name was identified
with one of the grandsons of Noah (Gen. x. 29),
who, with his descendants, occupied the region
situated between Bactriana and the Indian Ocean.
Like the name of other distant regions in ancient
geography, it represented no particular spot, but
only a certain roughly defined region of the
world.

The trade included under the general name of
Ophir proved most important to the Phoenicians,
embracing as it did what by later writers has
been described as the Arabian East Indian trade.
The long residence of the Phoenicians on the islands
of the Persian Gulf had made the coasts of India
and Ceylon very familiar to them, and there is good
reason to believe that they had an equally intimate
acquaintance with the Red Sea and its ports. There
was also a time when not only the coast line but
every portion of the interior of Arabia was as familiar
to their caravans as the coasts were to their ships.

1 Red Sea. 2 Persian Gulf.

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 43

It is unfortunate that beyond casual references
found in Genesis xxxvii. 25 and Judges viii. 24,
and more particularly in the 27th chapter of Ezekiel,
we have no satisfactory information regarding the
trade of Tyre in the region prior to 600 B.C. From
the nature of this trade and the fact that the Phoe
nicians had no ports of their own on the Red Sea,
it is apparent that it must have been carried on
mainly by caravan. Indeed the passage in Ezekiel
to which we have referred seems to indicate that
these caravans were formed by the Nomad tribes
men, who, from their mode of life, were better
adapted to this business than the dwellers in the
coast towns. Tyre in this respect was fortunately
situated, for she had on her own borders numerous
tribes which she was able to employ in this way,
and who wandered over the Syrian and Arabian
deserts. Diodorus says " that no small number of
these Nomad tribesmen followed the business of
carrying to the Mediterranean frankincense and
myrrh and other costly spices, which they purchased
from the merchants who brought them from Arabia
to the northern borders of the country/' The des
tination of the caravans, according to this view,
must have been the central mart at Petra, and this,
when taken in conjunction with the statement of
the prophet Ezekiel, would naturally create the
impression on the mind of the reader that the trade
was mainly in the hands of the carrying tribes.

It is scarcely possible, however, to conceive of
this being so, as far as the Phoenicians were con
cerned, for they were absolutely the masters of this
trade at least in the Mediterranean basin. We
know, moreover, that they were as familiar with

44 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

the interior regions as they were with the main
cross-country and coast routes, and at a later period
sought to secure better facilities for direct com
munication by sea with Yemen from Eziongeber
with a view to lessening the expense of the long
overland journey (i Kings ix. 28).

It is quite safe, therefore, to conclude that while
the Phoenicians encouraged a trade by barter with
the border tribes for wool, spices, gold, precious
stones, and other products, yet the great armed
caravans which periodically left Tyre and plunged
into the Arabian Peninsula could have had no other
objective than Gerrha and Yemen, where doubtless
the Phoenicians had their own purchasing agents
and warehouses, so as to secure at first hand the
products of these favoured regions, and also those
of India and Ethiopia. The more carefully the
subject is canvassed the more apparent does it
become that the main sources of supply for such
costly and bulky goods as were produced from
Yemen must have been kept in channels over
which the Phoenicians had a practical control.

Moreover, Arabia was one of the largest countries
in the eastern world. It was contiguous to Phoe
nicia and the Bahrein Islands, while its products
and markets were most valuable, for the southern
markets — those of Hydramaut and Yemen (which
in a special sense may be described as the Biblical
Ophir) — were the great emporiums of the myrrh,
cassia, cinnamon, and ladanum trade. In addition,
there were the great markets of Gerrha on the east
coast, and Petra on the northern boundary of
Arabia. These seem to have been mainly valuable
as the outlet for the Indian, Ceylon, and Persian

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 45

Gulf trade and as central emporiums for the
southern and interior markets.

The fleeces of the Arabian sheep were even more
valuable to the manufacturing centres in Phoenicia
than the rich products of the south country were
to its merchants, the heat of the climate and con
tinuous exposure to the dry air rendering them
peculiarly valuable in connection with the purple
trade.

The importance of Arabia to the Phoenicians
will therefore be understood. The valuable pro
ducts of this immense region were in constant de
mand, the delicate and expensive fabrics which
issued from their dye-vats and looms being wholly
dependent on the raw products found there. It is
not surprising, therefore, to find that the most
cordial relations always existed between the mer
chants of the Syrian coast towns and the Nomads
of the wilderness, a cordiality that must have been
enhanced by the knowledge that in the Phoenician
markets could be obtained a quality and style of
goods in exchange for these raw products that
could not be excelled, perhaps not even equalled,
in any other market.

If, however, Arabia was the direction towards
which the Phoenician caravans moved to secure
the products of the rich, southern, and central
markets, Babylonia was the no less important ob
jective towards which they moved in pursuit of
those of the farther east.

It is unfortunate that we know less of this
branch of Phoenician commerce than any other,
yet, according to Herodotus (i. i arid iii. 113), it was
the most ancient. Whether the direct route to

46 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

Babylon was at that time via Thapsacus and the
Euphrates is exceedingly doubtful. It certainly
was then, as it is to-day, the route mainly used for
the heavy caravan trade, tapping as it did the
northern road leading to China, through which
was obtained the products of the farther Asiatic
east and north.

All the ancient authorities, including the prophet
Ezekiel (xxvii. 20), speak of the Babylonian trade
in the most general terms. It is difficult, there
fore, to arrive at a clear understanding of its nature.
The vagueness may have been caused by the very
important character of the Babylonian markets,
which rendered any specific allusion to the trade
superfluous. The erection of the treasure cities
Palmyra and Baalbek, which are specifically as
cribed to Solomon (i Kings ix. 18), shows, however,
its importance, and that a participation in it entered
into the plans of Solomon.

It is quite probable that the commerce of Phoe
nicia with Babylonia may, at a later date, have
been conducted in some measure with currency
and bills of exchange, for the Babylonian mintage
passed current in Arabia from a very early period,
though, from the political animosities that existed
between the nations of the east and west, it is
extremely doubtful if, during the period of Solomon
and Hiram, the Babylonian mintage passed current
with the Mediterranean nations. Indeed, if we
read the prophet Ezekiel correctly, the trade of his
time, which is usually placed about 600 B.C., was
one of barter, pure and simple, an exchange of
commodities for commodities, in which even the
precious metals, gold and silver, passed as such. If

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 47

this was the case, and on this point there is little
room for doubt, then the Arabic-Babylonian trade
must have been enormously valuable to the Phoe
nicians, for silver in the east was a scarce metal,
and the mines of the ancient world were mainly in
the hands of the Phoenicians.

Though Arabia is not to-day included among
the gold-producing countries, the testimony of
antiquity as to its position in this respect is too
precise to leave any room for doubt that either by
washing or mining vast quantities of gold were
found, especially in the rich southern pro vines. In
deed a reference in Judges (viii. 29) makes this quite
clear. It is there stated that the Midianites, one
of the carrying tribes, had grown so opulent in this
business of carrying merchandise, and held gold in
so little esteem, that they made not only their own
articles of personal adornment, but even the chains
of their camels' necks of the precious metal. If,
therefore, Phoenicia was the medium through which
silver poured into the east, it is easy to understand
the commanding position which she quickly at
tained in the commerce of the ancient world, for
all or practically all of the silver mines were either
in her possession or under her control as early as
1200 B.C.

The Edomites, who occupied the north-eastern
portion of the Arabian Peninsula, were not like the
Midianites, a nomadic tribe, but a settled agri
cultural, pastoral, and commercial people. They
were in possession of many cities and of two ports
of considerable historic importance, Eloth and
Eziongeber, which, there is good reason to believe,
the Phoenicians were permitted to use in connection

48 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

with the Arabian trade. As the usual trade routes
which led from these ports to Tyre passed through
the country of the Edomites, it is highly probable
that Petra, a mart of only less importance than
Yemen, was from a very remote date employed as
the distributing centre for the north-west regions.

As Yemen served as a mart for the rich southern
countries, especially those of South Arabia, India,
and the Ethiopia coast adjoining, where was
gathered the gold, precious stones, ivory, frank
incense and slaves of these favoured regions, so
Gerrha on the east coast served as the emporium
for the staples of India, Ceylon, and the Persian
Gulf generally, such as cinnamon, spices, ebony,
pearls, precious stones, the horn of the sea unicorn,
ivory, cotton and silk. These were conveyed
thither by the Phoenician colonists, the men of
Daden, who acted as intermediaries in the trade
between the farther east and the Syrian coast.

Regular caravans were formed at Gerrha which
journeyed through the desert, bringing back the
manufactured wares of Tyre and Sidon, which
were in turn carried by caravan to the southern
provinces, or by vessel to India, Ceylon, and the
Golden Chersonese. Whether the northern cara
vans went by Salema and Thema to Aclama at the
head of the Red Sea, as the words of the prophet
Isaiah (xxi. 13) seem to indicate, or took the more
northerly route by Coromanis to Petra, which
seems equally probable, it is impossible to determine
accurately. Probably both routes were much used,
but from what we have already outlined, with re
spect to the course of the Arabian trade, it would be
useless to pursue the investigation further. Whether

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 49

we view the trade as being confined to one or as
embracing both of these channels, it should be
clear that the Phoenicians had a larger vested in
terest in the Arabian and Ophir markets than any
other nation of antiquity.

The distance * from Yemen to Petra, on the
borders of Palestine, was 1260 geographical miles,
which meant a caravan journey of seventy days.
This route seems to have been along the borders of
the Red Sea, passing through the towns of Macoraba
or Mecca, Satripa, and Medina, the present terminus
of the railroad from the Mediterranean. For a
considerable portion of the way the route was
through one of the most fertile regions of Arabia,
where at regular halting-places accessions from the
interior towns mentioned by Ptolemy were received,
which swelled the cavalcade and made the convoy
of an armed guard necessary.

With regard to the caravan routes from the east
coast we have less positive information. Gerrha
was the objective, as it was there that the products
of the eastern interior and south-east coasts, also
those of India south of the Ganges and Ceylon, were
gathered for further transportation. One road
seems to have followed the coast-line through the
province of Oman to Hydramaut, but the main
road ran directly through the desert direct to
Yemen, distant as the crow flies about 700
miles.

From Gerrha 2 to Phoenicia the road debouched
at Petra and Aclama, but it is possible that a direct
road by a route not now known passed in a north
westerly direction through the desert from the

1 Heeren, vol. i. p. 356. * Ibid., vol. i. p. 357.

D

50 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Persian Gulf port to Tyre. Indeed the reading of
Isaiah xxi. 13 seems to indicate as much.

It was out of the South Arabian trade that
Petra grew into such importance as to give its name
to the whole north-western territory. Even in
Phoenician times Petra seems to have been a central
mart of great importance, not only for the produce
of Central and South Arabia, but also for the wool
of the desert.

From what has now been stated, it should be
clear that Arabia was the great seat of the Phoe
nician land trade, and that in consequence of its
geographical position and also the magnitude of
the operations carried on there, the Phoenicians were
in a position to handle its products in a way possible
to no other nation of the ancient world. It is also
clear that with this trade there was interwoven an
intimate connection with that of those other rich
countries, Ethiopia and India.

Whether the Phoenicians prosecuted this busi
ness with their own caravans or not we have no
means of determining. But their well-known policy
of reaching the markets with which they did busi
ness directly, points clearly in this direction. Under
any circumstance caravans composed of the various
Nomad tribesmen were regularly hired by the
Phoenician merchants, which penetrated the Penin
sula in every direction, carrying the wares of the
coast towns and bringing back the produce of Ophir
to the Phoenician ports, which ultimately became
the great centre from which they were shipped
either in their raw or manufactured condition to
every land with which Phoenicia had established
trade relations.

THE PHCENICIAN LAND TRADE 51

That we have so very little direct testimony
with respect to this absorbing topic of the Arabian
trade and the methods pursued by the Phoenicians
in its prosecution and control, need occasion no
surprise, for, being a trade of barter pure and
simple, it must have been immensely profitable to
these astute sons of Canaan, who would have every
reason for throwing a view of mysterious secrecy
over the region. That water communication ex
isted between some of the ports in South Arabia
and those at the head of the Red Sea there can be
no question, for definite reference is made by ancient
authorities to the spice trade with the Egyptian
port of Hieropolis, which points clearly to the ex
istence of a similar trade between Yemen and
Eziongeber, the Phoenician and Egyptian markets
being those on which the Edomites depended for
the disposal of their produce.

It is extremely probable, therefore, that the
Edomites equally with the Egyptians would have
been willing to throw their ports open to Phoenician
shipping, though probably enough not on such
favourable terms as they accorded to their own
shipping employed in the South Arabian trade.
All doubt on the point seems indeed to be removed
by the specific statement of Scripture (i Kings ix.
27) that " Hiram sent in the ships of Solomon
shipmen that had knowledge of the sea/' The
Phoenician trade between Yemen and the ports at
the head of the Red Sea seems therefore to be
assured.

While all that has been written above is neces
sary to an intelligent understanding of the case,
it will nevertheless considerably reduce the com-

52 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

plexities of the problem with which we are wrest
ling, if we simply remember that, either by ship or
caravan, the principal marts of Arabia, those of
Yemen in the south, Gerrha in the east, and Petra
in the north, poured a steady stream of merchan
dise into Babylonia, Egypt, and Phoenicia, though
during the eleventh century B.C. mainly into Phoe
nicia, which was then the great distributing nation
of the ancient world.

The route from Petra to Babylon is represented
as running due east to Thapsacus on the Euphrates,
whence it followed the course of the river to its
objective. That from Gerrha seems to have followed
the coast-line to Oman and Hydramaut, but a direct
route through the desert is said to have connected
both Hydramaut and Yemen. It was, however,
through an inhospitable region, and was only
followed because of the immense saving in time and
distance. Yemen by this route was only about
700 miles distant from Gerrha, the journey occupy
ing a period of not more than forty days in its
prosecution (Heeren, Hist. Research, vol. i. p. 356).

In view of what has been said, it should there
fore be unnecessary to adduce further proof with a
view to it being made clear that the Arabian
Peninsula was a territory with which the Phoe
nicians were intimately familiar from a very early
date, and that long prior to the twelfth century B.C.
the produce of Yemen, Hydramaut, and Oman was
carried to Gerrha and Petra en route to Tyre, not
more than three months being necessary to place
in the Phoenician cities the products of Ophir
gathered in the emporia of these southern pro
vinces. Tyre, moreover, lay only about 350 miles

THE PHOENICIAN LAND TRADE 53

in a direct line north of Petra, so that if all necessary
allowances were made for stoppages at the various
halting-places the return journey from Tyre to
Yemen could be comfortably made in nine months.

However we may view this question of trans
port, one thing seems clear, namely, that by their
long residence on the Persian Gulf and the magni
tude of their transactions after the transference of
their main establishments to the Mediterranean,
the Phoenicians acquired a familiarity with the re
sources and trade routes of the Arabian Peninsula
possessed by no other nation of antiquity.

The carrying trade of the world was mainly
centred in Phoenicia certainly not later than the
twelfth century B.C. It was connected by road
and caravan with Arabia and the Persian Gulf, the
Euphrates, Armenia, Cappadocia, and Antolia, and
by sea with Asia Minor, the Greek Archipelago,
Egypt, Italy, North Africa, Spain, and very
probably with Madeira, Britain, and the Baltic.

With respect to the western expansion at this
date, it will be prudent to say a few words before
leaving this phase of our inquiry. Gades, the great
Phoenician emporium on the Atlantic for the
western trade, is said to have been founded at the
same time as Utica, the emporium of the Phoe
nicians on the African coast, and as the foundation
of Utica took place 270 years before Carthage, the
foundation of Gades must have taken place noo
years before the Christian era, or about 100 years
after the Trojan war. If, therefore, we make
allowance for considerable developments on the
Spanish Peninsula before the erection of this city
on the Atlantic coast, we may fairly enough assume

54 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

that the phenomenal progress in naval construction,
to which we referred in connection with the recon
struction of Tyre and the enlargement of its har
bours fifty years after this date, can only be viewed
as measures compelled by the great developments
on the Spanish Peninsula and the increasing trade
with the west generally.

That the phenomenal developments in naval
construction and navigation among the Phoenicians
belong to this period there can be no question, for
both science and art seem to have been called into
active co-operation in the creation of the great ships
of Tharshish, which are usually identified with this
period. The whereabouts of Tharshish, like that
of Ophir, has given rise to much discussion. In
Genesis x. 4 the name is there identified with one
of the sons of Javan, who is to have settled with
his descendants in Southern Italy. The name,
however, seems in time — like that of Ophir — to
have become displaced, and as the trade of the
Phoenicians moved westward, it moved with the
trade until in course of time it came to be applied
in a general way to the whole region bounded by
the inland sea to the west. The name Tharshish
seems never to have been very definite in its appli
cation. To the Jewish mind in later years it appears
to have been particularly associated with the name
of a region rich in silver. It is therefore not difficult
to understand how in Holy Writ we have reference
to an eastern as well as a western Tharshish, and
this the more that the ships employed in the prose
cution of this particular business in both directions
were ships of Tharshish (i Kings x. 22, and 2 Chron.
xx. 36).

CHAPTER III

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE

Extent of the Phoenician marine — Causes of its remarkable develop
ment—Nature of early voyages — Phoenician policy non-aggressive
— First Phoenician colonial settlements — The ships of Tharshish —
Their testimony to Phoenician seamanship — Trade monopoly in
the Eastern Mediterranean — Also I in the Atlantic — Xenophon's
description of a Phoenician armed merchant-ship — Phoenicians pre
eminent as shipbuilders and navigators.

STUPENDOUS as the land operations of the Phoe
nicians were they were as nothing compared with
their sea trade, with which indeed their chief fame
will always be identified. To the beginnings of
this sea trade we have already referred in dealing
with the causes which led to the selection of the
Bahrein Islands as a centre from which to control
the Arabico-Babylonian trade.

Subject as their emporia on the lower waters
of the Euphrates were to the periodic raids of the
predatory tribes that swept over the Mesopotamian
plains from the north, and harassed in their busi
ness operations by the conflicting interests of the
great monarchies that grew up in Babylonia, the
Phoenicians found very early that not only travel
but trade could be conducted more securely and
cheaply by sea than by land. In so doing they
solved the one great problem of commerce and
became the foremost intermediaries of the ancient
world.

The centres of trade and manufacture at that

55

56 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

period were mainly confined to Babylonia, Arabia,
India, and Egypt, and as these countries were
separated from one another by immense deserts
or stretches of sea, whoever was in a position to
control the carrying trade between them and the
outlying territories was necessarily mistress of the
commerce of the ancient world, and had the right
to dictate on practically her own terms the rate
of exchange on such commodities as were handled.
The astute and enterprising sons of Canaan
seized the opportunity thus presented, and in a
short time became factors of the first importance
in distributing to the outskirts of the known world
the products and manufactures of the more favoured
and densely populated regions as well as those
riper fruits of civilisation that blossomed in the
centres of wealth, culture, and refinement. Thus
they brought within the range of their influence
practically every centre of population, civilised
and uncivilised, known to the ancient world.

During the historic period the navigation of the
seas was confined to the Persian and Arabian
Gulfs, the Indian Ocean as far as Ceylon, and the
coasts of the Deccan. There is good reason for
believing that it may even have reached the mouth
of the Ganges. Some doubt has been expressed as
to the practicability of voyages to the more distant
of these regions at an early period, but this doubt
seems scarcely reasonable when we admit the
existence of a Red Sea navigation (i Kings ix. 27)
of the most extensive character in the eleventh
century B.C.

There were, moreover, various circumstances
which contributed to the development of this naviga-

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 57

tion, for none of the voyages need have been more
than mere coasting expeditions, the straits of Ormus
at the mouth of the Persian Gulf and those of Babel-
mandeb at the entrance to the Red Sea reducing
the distance from Arabia to India and from Arabia
to Ethiopia to a negligible quantity. Again, the
directions of the periodic monsoons in the Indian
Ocean, which are very similar to those prevailing
in the Persian and Arabian Gulfs, were peculiarly
favourable to voyages made to and from India and
Ceylon, the Arabian Peninsula and the Ethiopian
mainland.

Once embarked on this business, even in a small
way, the advantages of sea over land transporta
tion, in respect to the territory which was thereby
made tributary to the establishments of the Phoe
nicians, would, apart from all other considerations,
have provided a sufficient justification for its
adoption as a certain means of securing that mono
poly in trade on which their profits depended.
And this the more so that the provinces of Hydra-
maut and Yemen, in which were situated the great
central marts for the gold, precious stones, spices,
and frankincense of Arabia, the rich products of
India and Ceylon, and the equally valuable mer
chandise of Ethiopia, were easily reached by means
of mere coasting voyages over a comparatively
smooth sea, whereas the land journey, as we have
shown, was through an inhospitable desert.

If, however, a controlling interest in the produce
of the Indian and Arabian markets was the magnet
which drew the Phoenicians to the Bahrein Islands,
and there can be little doubt that it was, it is quite
certain that they did not long rest satisfied with the

58 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

commercial leverage which they obtained over the
Persian Gulf. There is very clear evidence that
their navigation was not confined to these waters,
but at a very early period embraced the southern
boundaries of the Arabian Peninsula, and probably
extended to the borders of Egypt. Theophrastus
in his History of Plants, when speaking of the
frankincense trade, mentions the port of Hierapolis,
the present Suez, as much used in connection with
this business. The magnitude of the transactions
of the Phoenicians in the southern markets must
have placed them in a peculiarly favourable position
for securing such shipping and warehouse facilities
in the ports of Hydramaut and Yemen as the exi
gencies of their business demanded. If, therefore,
the Phoenician trade between Yemen and Egypt
cannot from positive historic testimony be affirmed,
it can at least be reasonably enough assumed.
With the route and the value of the trade the
Phoenicians seem to have been familiar from the
beginning, so much so that they lost no time in
making overtures to the Jews for the transference
to their own control of the two ports of Eloth and
Eziongeber on the ^Elantic Gulf, when the practical
extermination of the Edomites provided an opening
for a more complete control of the Ophir trade
(i Chron. xviii. 12, I Kings ix. 27).

The reason for the development of the Red Sea
navigation can be easily understood. The Egyptian
markets could only be supplied with the products
of Ophir, either by direct communication with the
southern emporia by caravan or ship, or through
Gerrha and the Phoenician headquarters on the
Persian Gulf. The advantage of sea transport

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 59

from Yemen was, however, so apparent that, as
we have seen, it led to the transference of the
Phoenician headquarters to the Bahrein Islands.
As a means of controlling the Egyptian markets it
would have been as effective as in the case of the
Babylonian, so that it is unnecessary to suppose
any other reason than a desire to facilitate this trade
with the south Arabian ports in order to under
stand the easy and continuous access which the
Phoenicians enjoyed to the port of Hierapolis, and,
in all probability, to those of Yemen and Hydra-
maut.

There can be no doubt that it was the recogni
tion of the strategic importance of the Bahrein
Islands as a central emporium for the great markets
of the ancient world that led the Phoenicians to
establish their first settlements there. This view
is not dependent on a recognition of the nature and
origin of the architectural remains found there, but
receives the strongest possible confirmative support
in the fact that all the early trade routes which
honeycombed the Arabian Peninsula, routes which
have undergone no change, always found their
outlet at the Bay of Gerrha, opposite to the site of
Phoenicia's first warehouses. The erection of the
early Phoenician emporia on the Bahrein Islands
was, therefore, an act of rare sagacity. It placed
the Phoenicians in an unrivalled position to divert
into such channels as the exigencies of their com
mercial enterprises might demand, not only the
produce tributary to the Persian Gulf, but equally
that which found its natural outlet at the Red Sea.
That a trade existed between Yemen and Egypt
there can be no question (Asiat. Res., vol. iii. p. 324).

60 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

It is more than probable that it extended to the
Persian Gulf ports at an early period, because at a
later date it was shared in by the Chaldaeans.
Moreover, the mere fact that the Phoenicians seized
the opportunity presented by their political and
commercial affiliations with the Jews to secure a
port under their own control on the Red Sea in
place of one under foreign espionage, seems to
indicate that they were already familiar with the
navigation, which again implies that they were to
some extent at least in possession of the trade, and
were desirous of further developing it.

It will, moreover, be seen that the ports of the
Phoenicians at Tylos and Arados were admirably
situated for handling by sea the trade of Arabia
and India with Babylonia, and that of Babylonia
with India and Arabia, at a tithe of the expense
which such journeys would have entailed by cara
van transport. The position placed them in an
equally advantageous position with respect to the
Egyptian trade. This view provides an adequate
explanation of the early navigating skill of the
inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula, and of their
possessing in connection with this navigation, as we
shall have occasion to show later, the bactellium or
loadstone which only could have come to them
through Phoenician sources.

The trade with the Arabian Peninsula must
likewise have been greatly facilitated by reason of
the similarity of the languages of the two peoples
(Heeren, p. 360), for they were of the same Semitic
stock. Even in later times the language of Phoe
nicia and of Arabia were so similar that they could
be described as two dialects of the same speech.

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 61

This advantage alone would have been sufficient
to have secured them a predominant influence in
the commerce of Arabia, even if the situation of
their emporia and their possession of the sea
transport had not rendered it practically impossible
for any other nation to compete with them.

It is only in this way that it is possible to come
to an intelligent understanding of the opening
chapter of the first book of Herodotus, where is
indicated the existence of a considerable trade on
the part of the Phoenicians with the Assyrian and
Egyptian markets. Nor is this familiarity with
these markets surprising, because the population
of the Nile valley, as has been shown, was for at
least six centuries part and parcel of Phoenician
civilisation, being either the mainstay of the Hyksos
invasion or those driven to the eastern shores of
the Persian Gulf. The civilisation of Egypt was,
moreover, one of the most ancient, and as it had
always enjoyed the principal river and land traffic
of Africa it would have been passing strange if no
intercourse had existed between two such distinc
tively commercial peoples as the traders of the
Bahrein Islands and the Egyptians. Indeed it is
only by assuming the existence of such a trade at
a very early period that we can understand how it
came about that after the expulsion of the Hyksos
and the doors of Egypt were double barred against
the entrance of all foreigners, especially Semitics,
the Phoenicians were permitted to retain their
residence in the old Hyksos capital at Memphis.

From the beginning it must have been apparent
to the Egyptians that the territorial aggrandise
ment was no part of the policy of the Phoenicians,

62 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

who established themselves within their boundaries
and brought to their doors the products of Baby
lonia and the wealth of Ophir, as well as relieved
them of the surplus products of their cotton and
linen looms, and those masterpieces of art, the
embroideries of cotton on cotton, which were so
highly valued throughout the ancient world. If,
however, the naval emporia at the Bahrein Islands
were in the beginning the key to the Baby
lonian, Arabian, and Egyptian trade, it is clear that
there must have come a time when the success of
the traders of Tylus and Arados in controlling these
markets must have created a spirit of irritation in
both Egypt and Babylonia, probably even among
the carrying tribes of Arabia. To what extent
business rivalry may have influenced the removal
of the Phoenicians to the Mediterranean and their
beginning there a new career as a manufacturing as
well as a commercial nation cannot be determined.
All the probabilities, however, are in favour of the
view that if it affected the movement it was only
in a minor degree. But there were more important
influences at work calculated to produce this result,
namely, the discovery on the one hand of the un
rivalled dye to be obtained from the purple-produc
ing murex on the Syrian coasts, and on the other
the discovery of the Eldorado in the silver mines
of Spain, the tin mines of England, and probably
the amber of the Baltic.

It is unnecessary to suppose that any political
upheaval operated to bring about the change of
base for the Phoenician establishments. Ordinary
business prudence would have dictated such a
policy, more especially as the increasing competition

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 63

of the carrying tribes in the southern markets must
have made it apparent that the trade between
Yemen and India with Babylonia could not much
longer remain a monopoly in their hands, whereas
in the new territory, as the only navigating people
of the ancient world, they had it in their power to
block in the most effective manner any attempt
on the part of their eastern competitors to secure
a participation in the western trade. Moreover,
the west at this period was not what it had been
at the beginning of the Phoenician career, simply
Egypt or the Syrian coasts, for these migratory
movements from the further east had covered the
islands and shores of the inland seas with settle
ments which, in many cases, had grown into popu
lous communities, thus offering the widest scope
for the mercantile proclivities of the traders of the
Bahrein Islands.

It requires no special sagacity, therefore, to
recognise the causes which led to the change of base,
and at the same time to the remarkable develop
ments in Phoenician naval construction and navi
gation. On the Syrian coast the durable cedars
of Lebanon were substituted for the teaks of the
Persian Gulf, and the placid waters of the eastern
seas were exchanged for the turbulent and stormy
waters that washed the shores of the Mediterranean.

It is true that we have no historic record showing
the stage to which the Phoenicians carried their navi
gation either on the Persian Gulf or the Red Sea
further than can be drawn from our knowledge of
their trade with India, Arabia, and Egypt. If,
however, we even confine it to these seas and read
the story in the light of their exploits immediately

64 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

on their arrival on the Mediterranean, it will be
apparent that both shipbuilding and seamanship
must, in their hands, have passed far beyond the
primitive stages before they left the Bahrein Islands.
Otherwise the statement of Herodotus that, im
mediately on their arrival on the Mediterranean,
they forthwith applied themselves to such distant
navigation as that of the Argolic coasts would be
wholly incomprehensible. This statement is too pre
cise to leave any room for doubt as to the meaning
which Herodotus intended to convey, for Nauplia,
which was always the main port on the Argolic
coast, was distant as the crow flies some 700 miles
from the Phoenician coasts, and could only be
reached by navigating the Levant, whose gales at
certain seasons are as much dreaded as any that
blow.

These early voyages on the Mediterranean were
in no sense coasting voyages, nor were they con
ducted by novices in the art, but by seasoned and
experienced seamen. It is curious that this fact
should so far have escaped the observation of all
writers on the subject of Phoenician navigation, for
Herodotus, in his account of this memorable voyage
to the Argolic coast, says distinctly that after the
completion of their business " they immediately set
sail for Egypt/' Now, as Egypt lay 800 miles due
south of Argos, a coasting voyage was plainly out
of the question.

Whether the entire transference of the early
navigators from the Persian Gulf to the Syrian sea
board occupied a few years or a few centuries
cannot be stated, but at all events it led to great
developments in Phoenician naval construction and

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 65

navigation. During no portion of their career
could the navigation from the Persian Gulf have
reached beyond 30° north or south of the equator.
For even if at this point we admit, with a view to
clarifying the situation, the possibility of an Ameri
can discovery, certainly all of the region occupied
by the early civilised states of Central America lay
between these latitudes, and during the season of
navigation was well defined to the ancients by the
rise and setting of the Pleiades, which the Phoe
nicians were the first people to put to a practical
use.

The situation of the new home of the Phoeni
cians on the Mediterranean placed them abreast of
problems in navigation of a very different character
from those with which they had been accustomed
to wrestle on the Persian Gulf. The real perplexities
of navigation only begin when 35° north or south
latitude have been reached, and the major portion
of the Mediterranean, including Asia Minor, Greece,
Sicily, Italy, North Africa, Spain, the Levantine
and Adriatic seas, the Straits of Hercules, and the
major portion of the Atlantic in which the main
trend of their commerce lay, was beyond these
latitudes, so that all the skill the shipbuilders,
navigators, and scientists of Phoenicia possessed
must have been called into play.

Here, therefore, on the shores of this sea of
" the setting sun/' in this virgin territory, where
transportation was largely reduced to terms of their
own choosing, where from its very situation they
were for centuries protected from competition, the
Phoenicians secured a complete monopoly of the
Mediterranean and Atlantic trade and became a

E

66 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

'* merchant of the people for many isles " (Ezek.
xxvii. 3). At the beginning of the thirteenth
century B.C. a great commercial and navigating
nation, capable and aggressive beyond all others,
occupied the Phoenician coasts. For many cen
turies it was the good fortune of these pioneers to
enjoy an entire monopoly of the trade. But
scarcely fifty years had passed after the close of
the Trojan war before the Greek tribes, owing to
the influx of a mixed population from the north,
were thrown into violent confusion. This resulted
in the displacement of large masses of population,
who, spreading themselves over the adjacent coasts
and islands, so increased the boundaries of Greece
that it soon came to embrace many of those choice
and delightful districts of the eastern Mediterranean
that from a high antiquity had been colonised by
the Phoenicians.

As a commercial people it was, as has been
pointed out, a fixed policy of the Phoenicians to
avoid as far as possible all occasions of friction with
the various peoples with whom they established
business relations. Accordingly, when towards the
beginning of the eleventh century B.C. the jealousy
of the Pelasgic states, which had been steadily
growing in importance, threatened to precipitate
conflict, the Phoenicians ceded voluntarily many
favoured regions which for long had remained
within the sphere of their influence. This policy
was rendered easier of accomplishment in that
prior to this date they had already pushed into
the western Mediterranean, and ere long the
tin mines of the Cassiterides and Britain and
the fossilised resin or amber of the Baltic

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 67

were to become important factors in Phoenician
commerce.

With rare good judgment, therefore, the Phoe
nicians transferred their activities to a region where
they enjoyed a complete monopoly in place of dis
puting for merely sentimental reasons the possession
of a territory where profits would necessarily have
been rendered precarious by competition. More
over, under any circumstance the Greeks would
still be forced to purchase in the markets of Tyre
and Sidon those goods of finer grade which could
not be obtained elsewhere.

The coasts of the Mediterranean most celebrated
for the murex fishing were, as we have shown, those
of Phoenicia, Asia Minor, the Peloponnesus, and
Sicily. Only less valuable, however, were the
fisheries on the western Mediterranean and on the
Atlantic coasts, Britain, and in all probability the
modern Madeira.

There can be no doubt that it was the shell-fish
producing this invaluable dye that, in the first
instance, led to the amazing developments that
took place in naval construction and the spread of
the Phoenician colonial system. The whole fish
was not used in the preparation of the dye, but an
almost microscopic quantity obtained from a small
sac at the back of the head, which is said to have
yielded only one drop, whereas three hundred pounds
of the dye, according to some authorities, were re
quired to dye fifty pounds of wool. From this it
will be seen that the home fisheries could not for
any long period have yielded an inexhaustible
supply of the precious fluid. Consequently the
fishermen found it necessary to go farther afield,

68 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

where, although not so rich in the finer shades of
colour, still provided a fluid of great commercial
value.

That the first colonial settlements of the Phoe
nicians were therefore of the nature of mere fishing
stations will easily be understood, for nearly all the
Mediterranean colonies were in the first place
identified with this industry. The name purple,
however, must not be understood as representing
one distinct colour, but the entire range of colours
obtained from the murex, of which nine were simple
purple colours from white to black, and five mixed
(Heeren, Phoenicia, p. 343). As, however, the
quality and colour of the dye was determined by
physical causes superinduced by the temperature
of the sea, sunlight, and the food on which the
murex subsisted, an enormous area was necessarily
brought under levy to provide suitable pigment
for the wide range of colours demanded by the
world-wide trade to which the dye-vats of Tyre and
Sidon catered.

In a consideration of the causes which led to
the phenomenal development of the Phoenician
marine, it is necessary that we should not lose sight
of the increasing range of these voyages, for in this
will be found a sufficient cause not only for the
increasing tonnage of the Phoenician ships, but also
for the spread of their colonial system as a means
of providing harbours to which their vessels might
run in case of emergency (Asiat. Res., vol. i. 318).
It should also be remembered that the size of the
vessels of the Phoenicians would not depend on their
fitness to carry the relatively small cargo of a
manufactured nature consigned on the outward

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 69

voyage, so much as on their carrying capacity for
the bulky raw material which formed the staple of
the return cargoes.

Probably it is in consequence of the insufficient
attention that has been given to this aspect of the
subject that there has been a disposition to belittle
the advanced state of the Phoenician marine during
the period of Hiram and Solomon. This is un
fortunate, because it has prevented a true estimate
of the progress of the nation, both with respect to
the extent of its colonial developments and the
growth of its marine. If we conceive of it as re
presented by types of such craft as are outlined on
Phoenician coins and tombs during the period of
Phoenicia's greatest expansion, it will clearly be
impossible to suppose that the nation was ever
employed on such voyages as those that will shortly
engage our attention.

Until 500 B.C. no Greek ship had penetrated
beyond the pillars of Hercules. Phoenicia was at
that time the only navigating power in the world.
We may therefore conclude that " the ship of Thar-
shish" had attained its final developments before
1050 B.C., and was then a permanent portion of the
Phoenician marine, for the foundation of Gades as
the terminal point of the Mediterranean and the
starting-point for the Atlantic trade had already
become of considerable importance. If, therefore,
any reliance can be placed on the American Votanic
tradition of the arrival on the Pacific coasts of that
continent of seven large ships about the year 1000
B.C., it will clearly be necessary for us to turn
to this only navigating nation of antiquity for
information on the subject, for, as we have already

70 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

shown, there was no other nation of the ancient
world who, either by reason of the state of their
marine or familiarity with the southern and eastern
Asiatic seas, was capable of making the journey.

Voyages across the open sea are not, as has so
often been erroneously stated, the outcome of our
acquaintance with the new world from the Atlantic
ports, but are the natural result of the evolution of
the nautical art and the discovery or invention of
the loadstone. So long as navigation was confined
to coasting or even stretching from headland to
headland along the coast line, very little progress
was possible. Once this method of navigation was
discarded and steering by a stellar object took
its place (which was clearly of Phoenician origin),
supplemented by the use of the magnet, which
enabled the navigator when the weather was cloudy
to determine his position and direction (also, it
is equally clear, a Phoenician invention), then the
last obstacle to a complete mastery of the sea was
removed.

The history of the compass and its evolution
from the bactellium or loadstone stage is therefore
necessarily involved in the elucidation of our enigma.
As, however, it is too complex a subject to be dealt
with briefly in connection with navigation, it will
be profitable to treat it separately. But we may
be pardoned if, at this point, we content ourselves
by saying that there is strong evidence to show that
the instrument was of Phoenician origin.

It is undoubtedly true that the historic voyages
of the Phoenicians were mainly over a fixed course.
But besides these they were in the habit of fitting
out expeditions for purposes of discovery, which,

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 71

as we have shown, often led to an enlargement of
their commerce, though sometimes they seem to
have had no result beyond the mere extension of
geographical knowledge. In one of these voyages,
undertaken during the early part of their career,
when they set out to explore Europe, they discovered
not only the Isle of Thasos but its gold-mines, which
for centuries yielded them an immense revenue.

In spite of these historic facts, however, many
writers of high repute have not hesitated to ques
tion the possibilities of a greater eastern navigation
than that of the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf,
and even to call in question 'the trustworthiness of
the narrative of Herodotus, who ascribes to the
Phoenicians the distinction of being the first people
to circumnavigate Africa (Her. iv. 41). But as our
investigation hinges more particularly on the evolu
tion of " the ship of Tharshish " than on any other
portion of the Phoenician marine, we will confine
our attention to this phase of our subject for a
little.

The name Tharshish, as we have shown, was not
first applied to one of the districts of the Spanish
Peninsula, but derived from one of the sons of
Javan, who reached southern Italy, where he and
his descendants settled. The name indeed only
became displaced as the horizon of the Phoenician
navigators moved westward. The name Tharshish,
therefore, even when Phoenicia was at the zenith of
its power, seems to the Hebrew writers expecially
to have represented only a certain region by which
the Mediterranean was bounded on the west, just as
to Europeans the West Indies for centuries meant
not only the islands which we now call by that

72 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

name, but the whole continent of America, both
north and south, with the islands that cluster
around them.

The vessels, which went by the name of ships of
Tharshish, and were employed on these long voyages
to Italy and the Adriatic, and, later, to Cadiz and the
Atlantic ports, were so called to distinguish them
from the smaller craft plying on the eastern Medi
terranean. The Tharshish ship, therefore, must be
viewed as having been evolved pari passu with the
extension of Tharshish westward, so that probably it
stood for the terminal point of the Mediterranean voy
ages, when a steady trade between the Spanish Pen
insula was in operation. There can be no reasonable
doubt as to the Tharshish ship having formed the
model after which the Greeks constructed their great
Alexandria corn ships, which were famous during the
early portion of the Christian era (Acts xxvii. 6).
We have no difficulty, therefore, in recognising the
class of vessel to which the Tharshish ship was
allied, and it would be imprudent to associate it
with the sculptured reliefs of the Sargonid period
in which the Phoenician galleys are represented.

We should naturally expect that the evolution of
these ships of Tharshish would have been all the
more regular and certain by reason of the centuries
occupied in their development, the increasing range
of their navigation, and their better acquaintance
with the peculiar difficulties that beset their course
on the western Mediterranean. From Tyre or
Sidon to the Argolic coast, or rather to Nauplia,
which was always the leading port, was a distance
of 700 miles as the crow flies, but the distance from
Tyre to Gades was 2500 miles. The tin islands

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 73

were, however, 1200 miles from Cadiz, and the shores
of Norway 2000 miles from the Spanish port, so that
if the tin and amber of these distant regions were
with the silver of the Iberian Peninsula pouring at
that time into the warehouses of Tyre and Sidon,
it is easy to understand the causes that were at
work in the final developments of the Phoenician
marine. The navigation of 900 miles, which the
journey from Tyre to the Baltic implies, and this
through many degrees of stormy north latitude
where steady trade winds and the tideless Medi
terranean could not be counted on, must have
taxed to the utmost the skill and resource not only
of the hardy seamen of Phoenicia, but even of the
wise men of Tyre, who, it would seem from the
remarks of the prophet Ezekiel (xxvii. 8), were, on
account of the arduous nature of some of these
voyages, called to the assistance of the State in the
protection of its monopolies. It should also be
apparent from the nature and extent of Phoenician
navigation that their voyages were prosecuted by
night as well as by day, even if we had no direct
testimony that they were accustomed to steer by
the pole star (Ency. Brit., xviii. 804). We also know
from Herodotus (iii. 136) that they made charts of
those seas in which they did business, and from the
remarks of Strabo (xvi. 757) that they used arith
metical calculation for reckoning the ship's progress
at night and the relative position of ports, which
leads us to suppose that they were in possession of
some instrument like the log for determining the
speed of their ships. Besides they were not only
familiar with spring and neap tides but with their
causes.

74 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

From a consideration of these facts there should
be no great difficulty in realising that the Phoe
nicians had passed far beyond the primitive stages
of seamanship and navigation long before the
twelfth century B.C. By reason of their knowledge
and practical ability they were entitled to make the
proud boast that no navigation was impossible to
them.

The needs of an uncivilised, or at best only
partially civilised, people are necessarily of a some
what rudimentary character, so that the outlying
settlements opened up by the increasing range of
these voyages must have proved extremely valuable
to the Phoenicians as a market for their gew-gaws
and trinkets, and even more for the disposal of those
surplus stocks of manufactured goods no longer in
demand in the more civilised centres where custom
and fashion gave pattern and design only a tem
porary value.

The mere fact that the main trend of the busi
ness of the Phoenicians was always toward the great
centres of civilisation, makes it apparent that it
was not only on account of the quality of their goods
but equally on account of their manner of disposing
of them that they were highly approved. There is,
nevertheless, just as little doubt that while the
transactions of the larger merchants in the great
centres of population such as Babylonia, Yemen,
Greece, and Egypt earned for the Phoenicians a
reputation for probity and trustworthiness, the
commerce of the outlying regions and the more
sparsely populated territories opened up by the
increasing radius of their navigation was largely
in the hands of bold and often unscrupulous ad-

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 75

venturers. Still it is difficult to conceive of business
being continued on such lines much beyond the in
cipient stages, especially on the coasts of Asia
Minor and the Greek Archipelago, for these regions
were at an early period colonised by their own
people, who carried with them the leavening influ
ence of a somewhat advanced civilisation. It is,
therefore, more than probable that after a few
generations the traders with the main centres of
civilisation must have recognised that a continu
ously profitable business could only be conducted
by a practical application of the belief that honesty
was the best policy.

The magnitude of the Phoenician transactions in
the Babylonian, Egyptian, and Arabian markets,
in consequence of the position which they occupied
as a manufacturing and exporting as well as an
importing nation, must have enabled them for
centuries to enjoy a complete monopoly of the
trade of the eastern Mediterranean. During the
period from 1500 B.C., when Cadmus, the son of
Agenor, king of Phoenicia, first arrived in Bceotia,
carrying with him the sixteen letters of the Phoe
nician alphabet, until at least uoo B.C., when the
Greeks took possession, the eastern end of the
Mediterranean, or at least that portion which in
cludes the Sporades and Cyclades, Cyprus, Rhodes,
the Peloponnesus, and the coasts of Asia Minor
generally, was colonised by the Phoenicians and
wholly occupied by their marine. Here they
catered to the inhabitants with articles of the most
costly description, for which there was always a
steadily growing demand. Among these were the
products of Southern Arabia, the manufactures of

76 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Tyre, the purple garments and rich apparel so much
in demand among the priestly and wealthy classes,
the jewellery of gold and amber, priceless silver
ornaments and bronzes, and those trinkets and gew
gaws for which the Phoenician workmen had always
been famous. With whatever good grace the Phoe
nicians may have accepted their dismissal from the
markets nearest to the home ports, they speedily
adopted a policy with regard to their more distant
settlements that seems to have stood the nation in
good stead. Henceforth they allowed nothing to
transpire either with regard to their navigation to
these distant settlements or the character of their
colonial expansion. Probably it was this policy
of secrecy that was instrumental in the rapid
progress of Phoenicia as a manufacturing and navi
gating nation, for they could not have failed to
recognise that it was only to these distant settle
ments that large consignments of merchandise
could be made, the sales in all other markets being
of a more or less retail character.

The need of protecting their colonial expansion
from invasion by outsiders demanded at the same
time the ability to supply all the distant markets
required, and that with as good if not a superior
character of merchandise to that obtainable else
where. Moreover, as this traffic was one of barter
pure and simple, Phoenicia was necessarily the final
arbiter of values, the ultimate profit to the merchant
not depending wholly on the purchasing price of
the merchandise that was carried abroad, but on
the value of the raw products in the home markets.

There was one branch of their distant sea trade
io which the Phoenicians clung with extreme tenacity,

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 77

and which at a date long subsequent to the seventh
century they prevented even the Romans from
sharing with them. This was the tin trade with
the Scilly Isles and the coasts of Cornwall, which
was one of the chief sources of their wealth, tin being
required by nearly all the races with which they
had dealings, for hardening into bronze the copper
which they used for tools.

Throughout their long career the Phoenicians
pre-eminently distinguished themselves in the work
ing of mines. So great was the quantity of silver
found by the Phoenicians on their first arrival in
the south-western portion of the Spanish Peninsula,
that they are said to have loaded their craft with
the metal down to the water's edge and, on returning
to Tyre, to have so fired the imagination of the nation
with their tales of the wealth of this western
Eldorado as to cause many of their countrymen
to proceed to Spain, which was rich not only in
metals but also in corn, wine, oil, wax, wool, and
fruits. Thus the sea trade to this distant region
became of the most advantageous character to the
Phoenicians at a time when they were losing their
hold on the more convenient markets of Asia Minor
and the Peloponnesus.

Another advantage accruing to the Phoenicians
from the Spanish colonies was the service which
they rendered in the extension of their commerce
on the Atlantic, for Gades was not only the port
for the Tharshish trade but likewise the starting-
point for a more extended navigation on the Atlantic
coasts. The great value of the tin, silver, and
amber derived from this further west by the Phoe
nicians explains quite satisfactorily the care they

78 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

exercised that they should not be supplanted in
these regions as they had been nearer home. Amber
in the Mediterranean markets was as valuable as
gold, while silver in the southern countries was
even more precious than that metal. Tin was also
extremely valuable.

Relatively small vessels have in all ages been
considered the most suitable for purposes of ex
ploration and discovery, because many dangers are
avoided by the use of vessels of light draft. It
would be unwise, therefore, to judge of the possi
bility of discovery in any region of the world by
the Phoenicians by simple reference to the size of
the vessels in their possession at any given period.
Rather should we view the comparatively small
craft which they employed on these expeditions,
when well equipped and commanded by the right
men, as representing a type of vessel that was
thought to be the most effective. Indeed, the mere
fact that the small craft of Columbus and Cook
fulfilled the expectations of the practical seamen
who selected them should not be lost sight of in an
inquiry such as this, for the question of the original
discovery of America by Igh and Imox (Nat. Races,
v. 164) is necessarily involved, and this must have
taken place some years before the construction of
these ships of Tharshish for Solomon and Hiram.

The ship of Tharshish was evolved by combining
in one vessel the peculiar features belonging to the
round merchant Gaulos and the long lost ship of
war. It was the starting-point for the creation of
an entirely new type of vessel, which in its main
features has survived through succeeding ages,
although it does not seem to have become a fixed

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 79

model before the twelfth century B.C., when the
Tharshish trade as relating to the Spanish Peninsula
assumed vast dimensions. History has not left us
in complete ignorance regarding this phase of
Phoenician naval architecture. By reference to
Xenophon (Oecon., viii. n) we obtain a rather graphic
account of a Phoenician armed merchant ship of
this type during the Persian period, which is usually
placed about 500 B.C. In this passage Xenophon
makes one of his characters say, " I think that one
of the best and most perfect arrangements of things
that I ever saw was when I went to look at the great
Phoenician sailing vessels, for I saw there the largest
amount of naval tacking separately disposed in the
smallest stowage. For a ship, as you know, is
brought to anchor and again got under weigh by
means of a number of wooden implements and of
ropes, and sails the seas by means of a quantity of
rigging, and is armed with a number of contrivances
against hostile vessels, and carries about with it a
supply of weapons for the crew, and has besides all
the utensils that a man keeps in his dwelling for
each of the messes. In addition it is loaded with a
quantity of merchandise which the owner carries
with him for his own profit. Now all these things
which I have mentioned lay in a space not much
larger than a room which could conveniently hold
ten beds. And I remarked that they lay in such a
way as not to obstruct one another so as to consume
time when they were suddenly wanted for use.
Also I found that the captain's assistant, who is
called the look-out man, so well acquainted with
the position of all the articles and with the number
of them that even at a distance he could tell where

8o THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

everything lay and how many there were of each,
just as one who had learned to read could tell the
number of letters in the name of Socrates, and
the proper place for each. Moreover, I saw this
man in his leisure moments examining and testing
everything that the vessel needed when at sea.
Sons, I was surprised, I asked him what he was
about, whereupon he replied, ' Stranger, I am looking
to see in case anything should happen how every
thing is arranged and whether anything is wanting
or is inconveniently placed, for when a storm arises
at sea it is not possible to look for what is wanting
or to put to rights what is awkwardly arranged/ '

It should be clear from this description that the
navigation of the Phoenicians was neither of the
primitive character nor conducted in the reckless
manner that some writers have attributed to it,
for the apparent purpose of Xenophon is to call
attention to the fact that the Phoenician ships were
a class by themselves and vastly superior to those
of his countrymen. That many of the Phoenician
vessels, especially those employed on the Syrian
seaboard, were small enough to haul on shore there
can be no question, but that many of the vessels
were of respectable size and that monster ships,
even for modern times, were by no means uncommon,
is apparent. The ship in which St. Paul was
wrecked carried 276 persons beside her crew and a
cargo of wheat (Acts xxvii. 27). Josephus again
tells of his being wrecked in the Adriatic in a vessel
which carried 600 passengers. These vessels have
by competent authorities been computed to have
measured from 600 to 1000 tons burthen.

There is at the same time abundant reason for

NAVIGATION AND SEA TRADE 81

believing that the seamanship of the ancients and
the sailing powers of their vessels were far advanced.
It may be safely conceded that they did not sail so
close to the wind as our more modern ships, but
they could get within seven points, which shows that
they were not so dependent on a fair wind as has
generally been supposed. The rate at which the
vessels sailed was likewise considerable. St. Luke
and St. Paul, with a fair wind, made the run from
Rhegium to Puteoli (Acts xxviii. 13), a distance of
182 miles, in a day, which gives an average of from
seven to eight knots an hour, a rate much superior
to the five knot average on the 140 day run over
the 15,000 mile course from California to Europe
made by grain ships to-day.

The point we seek to emphasize, however, is not
that the Phoenicians were in possession of monster
ships with great sailing powers, but that they were
capable of building and sailing any ships that the
exigencies of their private business or the business
of the State demanded ; that their navigation was
over long courses and was conducted with prudence,
foresight, and skill, and furthermore, that both the
ships and the nautical skill requisite to the discovery
of America from the Red Sea port of Eziongeber
were in their possession long before the period of
Hiram and Solomon.

Indeed it is futile to attempt to intelligently
understand the state of the Phoenician marine
either at the Solomonic or any other period by
comparison with that of other nations of the ancient
world. As shipbuilders and navigators the Phoe
nicians were in a class by themselves. So isolated
was their position that for 2100 years, or from

F

82 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

611 B.C., when Phoenician seamen circumnavigated
Africa, the world was confronted by a feat which,
so far as we know, was not repeated until the fif
teenth century of our era, when Vasco da Gama
revolutionised the commerce of the world by
doubling the Cape of Good Hope from the west.
To arrive at the advanced position which we occupy
with respect to the nautical arts, we have been
compelled to relay the foundations on which the
Phoenicians reared their marvellous creations. The
more closely we examine the ruins of the Phoe
nician marine the more we are impressed by the
presence of a knowledge which served the needs of
those adventurous pioneers for a thousand years.
" Are we indeed/' asks Heeren, " in a position to
judge even with a tolerable degree of accuracy of
the perfection to which Phoenician navigation was
carried or of its various resources ? The long
centuries during which they were exclusive masters
of the sea gave them sufficient time in which to make
that gradual progress which was perhaps all the
more regular in proportion to the time which it
occupied. They carried the nautical art to the
highest point of perfection then required, and gave
a much wider scope to their discoveries and enter
prises than either the Venetians or Genoese, their
numerous fleets being scattered over the Indian
and Atlantic Oceans, the Tyrian pennant waving
at the same time on the coasts of Britain and
Ceylon " (Hist. Res., iii. 340).

CHAPTER IV

THE PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS

The Aztec Calendar or Water Stone described — Its connection with the
origin of the compass — Did the Chinese invent this instrument ?
— The Phoenicians and the compass — Its importance to their
naval expansion — Primitive compass familiar to early navigating
nations — Instrument closely identified with Phoenician civilisation
— Bactellium and the discovery of the Pole Star due to the
Phoenicians.

" For I saw that among rude people of early times, inventors and discoverers
were reckoned as gods." — FRANCIS BACON.

" Moreover the god Ouranas devised Bactellia, which were stones that moved
as possessing life." — Phoenician History of Sanckoniathon, translated by PHILO
OF BYBLIUS.

THERE were four things essential to the successful
accomplishment of any voyage undertaken by the
Phoenicians. These were the ships of which we have
already spoken, charts of the seas frequented, the
cross staff, and the loadstone. That the Phoeni
cians were accustomed to survey by some means
the coasts which they frequented there can be no
question, for Herodotus (iii. 136) makes a positive
statement to this effect, supplementing it with the
information that when so doing they tabulated their
notes for future reference. Strabo supports the testi
mony of Herodotus by explaining that the Phoenicians
applied their knowledge of astronomy and arithmetic
to reckoning a ship's course. The knowledge thus
acquired also enabled them to sail by night.

We have no positive information with respect
to the date of the invention of the cross staff, but it
seems to have been created by the early astronomers
for just the purpose for which it would be required

in navigation. We may, therefore, assume that it

83

84 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

was known to, if not invented by, the first astro
nomers and navigators of the Persian Gulf and the
Syrian coasts.

But the one instrument on which it is absolutely
necessary to obtain further light in connection with
our investigation is the loadstone or compass.
Without the possession of this instrument it is
impossible to conceive of such voyages as the Phoe
nicians systematically undertook and prosecuted
successfully, for while those on the eastern seas were
by no means impossible during the well determined
season of navigation, those to the west would have
been extremely hazardous in the high latitudes.

Had they depended on astronomical help alone
it is easy to see that a slight change of weather
would have left them at night without any accurate
means of determining either their position or the
direction in which they were sailing. It is un
fortunate, therefore, that we have as little definite
information with respect to the origin of the load
stone as we have with regard to the cross staff.
This, however, is scarcely surprising when we re
member the care that was exercised by the Phoe
nicians in preserving from the rest of mankind,
but especially from competing nations, all knowledge
with respect to their navigation and their trade.
Still there is sufficient historic data to enable us to
solve the enigma satisfactorily if we approach the
subject with an open mind.

Among the more prominent features of the
remains of the ancient civilisation of Central America
there is to be found a monument which seems to
provide the guidance necessary to lead us to a clear
solution of our problem. Built into the walls of
the Cathedral of Mexico is a rectangular parallel

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 85

opipedon of porphyry 13 feet i| inches square,
3 feet 3 1 inches thick, and weighing in its present
mutilated state twenty-four tons. By some writers
this monument has been described as a Calendar
Stone and by others as a Piedra de Agua, or Water
Stone. The sculpture on this strange memorial is
of a unique character. Baron Humboldt, in de
scribing it, says " the concentric circles, the divisions
and subdivisions without number, are traced with
mathematical exactitude, and the more we examine
the details of the sculpture the more do we discover
that taste for repetition of the same form, that
spirit of order, that sentiment of symmetry which,
among half civilised peoples, takes the place of the
sentiment of the beautiful."

A careful examination of this memorial will, we
venture to submit, throw a flood of light on the
origin of the compass, this so-called Calendar or
Water Stone being neither more nor less than a
national memorial of a seafaring people in the form
of a mariner's compass to the invention or posses
sion of which they seem to have attributed the dis
covery of the New Continent. The Calendar Stone
presents one or two features that may be counted
as giving weight to this view. It will, for instance,
be observed that the design possesses not only a
north and a south point but also the remaining
cardinal points, these being duly emphasized — Kan
to the south, Maluc to the east, Ix to the north, and
Cuac to the west (Laudas) ; in addition there are
symbols of the four winds that blow. Not only are
the cardinal points and winds indicated, but in
sub-divisions mathematically correct. The thirty-
two points into which what we call the modern
compass is divided are all here. Again, in the main

86 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

or south point will be observed the faces of Cox-
cox and Xochiquetzae, the Mexican Noah and his
wife, the grandparents of Chan, the progenitors of
the Phoenicians, the first recorded navigators (Gen.
vi. 14), and underneath these the Aztec symbol for
water. All this clearly indicates that navigation
was the subject which the stone was originally
intended to commemorate.

But the wonder does not end here. If the stone
be placed in its correct position with respect to the
sun god, the Phoenician Ouranos, it will be observed
that the main or emphasized point is not north but
south, and that in this respect it agrees with the
Chinese compass. Clearly then the design had its
origin among a people who were the common in
ventors of both instruments, and to whom the South
Pole had either a special religious significance or
whose early navigation was mainly in a direction
to the south of the harbours from which they set
out. Both of these presumptions are in perfect
accord with our knowledge of the Phoenicians. All
the early navigating nations considered the south
the important point. To the sun worshipper the
south was the right hand of the world, the place
of power, the region whence emanated the divine
influence, and therefore sacred. The early nations
therefore reversed our usage, and were accustomed
to think of the world as having its south on top
and its north underneath.

What in all probability led the Mediterranean
nations to make the change in the relative positions
of the poles, placing the north above and the south
below, was the discovery that the Pole Star was the
one constant star in the heavens — a discovery
which is universally accredited to the Phoenicians.

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 87

Now if this change be placed about the ninth
century B.C. our problem will be simplified, for,
as Greek navigation never extended to a point
south of the equator, the constellations used by them
for this purpose were not those of the southern but
the northern hemisphere.

The so-called Chinese compass (using the word
in its restricted sense) was not in use for purposes
of navigation until about the third century of our
era, and was a rude and unsatisfactory instrument
with only sixteen points, so that it is useless to
attempt to make any direct connection between it
and the very elaborate design found on the Mexican
calendar stone. There has been, however, so much
misunderstanding regarding the supposed relation
of this instrument to the mariner's compass that it
will be profitable to give some attention to the
Chinese narrative on which the claim is founded.

The earliest historic reference relative to the
discovery of the directive properties of the suspended
magnet is, according to these Chinese records, 200
years after the erection of the temple to Hercules
at Tyre, by which time the Phoenicians were already
the great trade intermediaries of the ancient world.
But this Chinese document nowhere refers to the
instrument as a Chinese invention. Indeed the
fact that it was hastily constructed during the
progress of a war leads us to infer that the story was
not designed to give an account of its invention, but
simply to show the surpassing value of the instru
ment to the Chinese during a period of national
stress. This story was not translated into any
European language until Klaproth published his
letter to Baron Humboldt in 1834. It was entitled
" La invention de la Console." A translation from

88 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

the French was made by Mr. T. S. Davies in his
u Early History of the Compass/' published in
the British Annual of 1837, to which we now
advert. The document refers it to 2634 B.C. and
is entitled " Honang-ti punishes Tchi-Yeon at
Tchon-lon."

" The Wai-ki said Tchon-Yeon bore the name
Khiang : he was related to the Emperor Yan-ti.
He delighted in war and turmoil. He made swords
and lances and large cross-bows to oppress and
devastate the empire. He called and brought to
gether the chiefs of all the provinces ; his grasping
disposition and avarice exceeded all bounds.

" Yang-ti was obliged to retire and seek an
asylum in the plains of Tchon-lon. The latter
then raised a thick fog that by means of the dark
ness he might spread confusion in the enemy's
ranks, but Honang-Yonan, which is the proper
name of the Emperor Yang-ti, constructed chariots
for indicating the south in order to indicate the four
cardinal points by means of which he pursued Tchi-
Yeon and took him prisoner. He caused him to
be ignominiously put to death at Tchonng-ki, the
spot from this circumstance receiving the name of
the broken curb/'

It is on this bald statement of the manufacture
of a land carriage, surmounted by a loadstone for
the purpose of indicating the south and north
points, that the Chinese claim to the invention of
the compass is founded. But this is not the only
reference to these magnet cars found in Chinese
literature. A passage from the Sze-ki, a historical
memoir of Szi-ma Tseen, the restorer of Chinese
history, compiled in the early part of the second
century of our era from authentic documents, says

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 89

that in the second year of the reign of Chang-wang,
the second emperor of the Cow dynasty (mo B.C.),
five of these magnetic chariots, called Fse-nan or
indicators of the south, were presented to the am
bassadors of Tonquin and Cochin China to direct
their course over the immense grassy plains which
it was necessary for them to cross on their return
journey. These chariots are said to have been
finished with a little manikin clad in a vest of
feathers, having his outstretched arm so suspended
that, despite the movement of the car, the mag
netised hand pointed steadily to the south. In
addition to this figure a hodometer was attached
to each car, which by strokes marked the distance
covered on a bell so arranged as to exhibit a sort of
dead reckoning

The use of these magnetic cars does not seem
to have altered in any particular throughout the
succeeding centuries, for their presence in Tartary
as late as the fifteenth century of our era is vouched
for by Baron Humboldt. Mr. Klaproth, in his
study of the subject, calls attention to the use to
which the Chinese put the magnet and magnetised
iron. The most ancient of the two was the
employment of the loadstone or magnet in the
manufacture of magnetic cars. The other was the
employment of magnetised iron in making compasses
either to float or to balance on a pivot, which en
abled them, without obstruction, to move in the
Polar direction. Many writers, failing to grasp
this distinction, have confounded the land chariot
with the compass, and consequently have errone
ously supposed that these chariots were directed by
a magnetised needle instead of the loadstone.
China, so far as we know, during the period 2634

go THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

B.C. did not extend to the sea, the capital of the old
emperors being situated in the central plains either
on the Yellow River or on one of its affluents. The
construction of the magnetic chariot, therefore, did
not involve the invention of the sea compass which,
according to our best authorities, was not known
in China before the third century of our era, or
about 3000 years after the construction of the first
magnetic car by the Emperor Honang-ti.

From all this it should be apparent that prior
to A.D. 300 China did not possess a sea compass.
On the other hand, it was in possession of a know
ledge of the directive properties of the loadstone or
suspended magnet as early as 2634 B.C., and applied
it then in the only direction in which it could have
been of any service to them, namely, for land
journeys and to enable them to cross uninhabited
territory at a period when land transportation over
the Asiatic continent was in the hands of the
Phoenicians.

There is nothing in Chinese history but the
stories, to which we have referred, to indicate that
the compass, any more than their systems of
astronomy, numerals, or religion, were of indigen
ous birth. The astronomical system of the Chinese
was Babylonian, and their numeral and religious
systems Indian. If, therefore, we take these as
affording any light regarding the origin of the
compass, it will be necessary to look to some more
ancient civilisation for the source from which it
was drawn.

The earliest reference to the magnet and its
peculiar properties is that found in the Phoenician
history of Sanchoniathon preserved in a fragment
translated into Greek by Herenius Philo, better

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 91

known as Philo Byblius. In this fragment San-
choniathon ascribes to the god Ouranos the con
struction of the first suspended magnet or bactellium.
The passage is as follows : " But in process of time,
whilst Ouranos was still in banishment, he sent his
daughter Astarte, being a virgin, with two other
of his sisters, Rhea and Dione, to cut off Chronus
by treachery, but Chronus took the damsels and
married them, notwithstanding they were his own
sisters. When Ouranos understood this he sent
other auxiliaries to make war against him, but
Chronus gained the affection of these also and
detained them with himself. Moreover the god
Ouranos devised bactellia-contriving stones that moved
as having life."* Ouranos, one of the progenitors
of the Phoenician race, by a comparison of Phoe
nician and Hebrew chronologies, is identified with
Noah, who lived many centuries before the arrival
of the Chinese in the region of the Yellow River.
We have, therefore, a historic or at least traditional
account of the discovery and invention of the sus
pended magnet from a source where the stress of
the national life of its possessors would naturally
lead us to look for its presence.

Now it is as impossible to suppose that this
discovery would have been one of the few surviving
fragments of Phoenician history unless it had a very
definite association with the national career of the
people, as it would be to carefully observe the
vibratory, life-like movement of the suspended
bactellium without one's attention being conscious
that it only continued so long as the bactellium
was turned from the Polar direction, and that,
however turned or set in motion, it always came to

1 Sanchoniathori) Rt. Rev. R. Cumberland, 1720.

92 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

rest when pointing to the Kibleh or sacred point.
It seems reasonable, therefore, to assume that the
discovery of the directive power of the bactellium
was synchronised with the discovery of the vibra
tory, life-like movement of the suspended magnet.

Can we suppose then that the Phoenicians, who
were the discoverers of the Pole Star and used it as
the principal sign in their navigation, never ob
served the connection that existed between the
Polar directive properties of the bactellium and the
Phoenician or Pole Star ? The Phoenicians were
accredited by the ancient world with having out
stripped all other nations in navigation, largely on
account of the discovery that the Pole Star alone
remains constant in the heavens, so that if the use
to which the suspended bactellium was put by
them was that of locating the position of this Phoe
nician star in stormy and cloudy weather, we are
able to establish a most important relation between
the two discoveries.

It is, however, unnecessary to presume merely
that this was the case, for all the early writers on
the compass, while still in the bactellium or load
stone stage, emphatically state that it was an
instrument used for finding the Pole Star when the
sky was clouded. It is a very significant fact that
the Phoenician nation evidently placed a higher
practical value on the invention of the bactellium
than they did on the discovery of the Phoenician or
Pole Star. The first is incorporated in their history
of themselves as among their crowning achieve
ments, whereas the discovery of the Pole Star is
not recorded by themselves but by Greek historians.
The reason is obvious. The discovery that the
Phoenician Star was the one constant star in the

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 93

heavens would not of itself have solved the problem
of navigation, nor would the invention of the bac-
tellium have done more for Phoenicia than provide
a plaything for the children of Tyre and Sidon if
it had not been known to provide a definite and un
failing guidance from its suspended polar direction
to the Pole Star. It is in the due conjunction of
these two great discoveries that we find the key
to the phenomenal naval expansion of the Phoe
nicians.

To suppose that the Phoenicians actually
ventured on such long voyages as those to Ophir
(i Kings ix. 28) and carried valuable cargoes (the
return cargo in gold alone on one voyage amounted
to four hundred and twenty talents or about four
million pounds sterling), with no better guide than
the coast line, when caravan transport would not
only have eliminated risks but cut down the journey
to eight months, is to exhibit amazing credulity
with respect to the sagacity of the Phoenicians and
gross ignorance as to the means by which they be
came the greatest navigating power of the ancient
world. We find traces of their presence in localities
which, as we shall see later, they would never have
sought and from which it would have been prac
tically impossible to return unless they had been
in possession of some instrument that rendered
them independent both of a stellar object and
weather conditions.

The more this subject is considered the more
does it become apparent that the stress of the
national life of Phoenicia demanded the compass.
Indeed, it is more than evident from the fragments
of their history surviving, to which attention has
been called, that it existed, though the secret of

94 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

its existence was guarded with as scrupulous care
from the other nations of antiquity as the secret
of the destination of their most distant voyages.
The invention and development of the compass
from the crude bactellium or suspended magnet to
the Piedra de Agua found in the first centres of
civilisation on the American continent, stands in
much the same relation to the commercial and
colonial development of the Phoenicians that the
invention and development of the steam-engine
does to the commercial and colonial development
of our day.

In order to understand the full significance of
the compass to the Phoenicians, it will be necessary
to follow the evolution of the instrument from the
simple bactellium, a Bethel or house of God, in
which was supposed to be resident the indwelling,
vibrating life of the Deity.

It has been said that one of the first uses to
which the south-pointing chariot was applied was
locating to the worshipper the Kibleh or sacred
south point when the sky was obscured. What
truth there may be in this statement it is difficult
to discover, but if true it would at least enable us
to trace the existence of a connection in the mind
of the early Semite between the south point of the
bactellium and that of the supposed residence of
the deity to whom he presented his devotions.
Among the Semites sacrifices originally were not
burned. The god was not conceived of as seated
aloft but as present in the place of sacrifice, in
habiting the sacred stone, the bactellium. To under-
derstand this belief it is necessary, in our conceptions
of the ideas associated with stone worship and true
worship, to think of both as containing evidences

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 95

of life, otherwise the symbolism would be wholly
meaningless. The presence of life in the tree is
self-evident, but it is not so in the stone, so that
the construction of bactelloi that manifested the
divine immanence was a feat of no ordinary sig
nificance to the subtle oriental mind. At the outset,
therefore, we must not conceive of the bactellium
as a mass of inert magnetic ore like the Caaba —
the great black stone at Mecca — but as a manu
factured and suspended instrument whose vibrating,
life-like movement suggested a spiritual infilling.

How long a period, it will be asked, was occupied
in the evolution of the compass from the bactellium
or Bethel stage until it arrived at a really effective
instrument ? The answer is that it was an effective
instrument from the date on which it was dis
covered that the Polar axis rested when the bac
tellium pointed in a north and south direction.
Although the compass was moving steadily towards
perfection from 3400 B.C. (which date some of our
authorities identify with the life of Ouranos) it was
only finally perfected at the hands of Lord Kelvin
in 1876. If, therefore, the final constructive stages
of the compass took 600 years it should surely
teach us to view with complacency the apparently
slow progress of its early development.

That the Phoenicians possessed some instrument
that enabled them to steer a definite course through
the trackless deep, irrespective of obstacles interposed
by sea, coast line, or sky, seems to be incontrovertible.
But if further proof were needed one might point
to the statement of the prophet Ezekiel (xxvii. 8) :
" Thy wise men that were in thee, O Tyre, were thy
pilots/' Why should the wise men of Tyre go to
sea to direct the navigation of a ship on a port to

96 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

port coasting voyage where the practical experience
of any captain in the marine familiar with the coast
line would have been of more practical value ? Of
course the prophet is not referring to the coasting
trade but to the more distant navigation of the
Phoenicians, when a direct course thither was
steered either by a stellar object, when this could
be seen, or by the use of some instrument which
would infallibly determine the ship's position by
day or night. In navigation of this kind the wise
men of Tyre, who were expert in astronomy and
the use of numerals and possessed the bactellium,
would be invaluable.

For overland travel, where the contour of the
country provided an infallible means of determining
direction and position, a rude map or chart of the
general course pursued, when accompanied by the
primitive bactellium or magnetic cross, was all that
was necessary. This likewise was sufficient for the
navigation of the eastern Mediterranean, the Persian
Gulf, and the Red Sea. When, however, the Phoe
nicians began to venture on long voyages with
valuable cargoes and large ships requiring much
tacking in the open sea, the use of an instrument
of finer adjustment must have been necessary, and
it is from this date, which Herodotus places about
1200 B.C., when Cadiz became the port of entry for
the Atlantic trade, that substantial improvements
were made which constituted a distinct departure
from the primitive bactellium. It is impossible to
conceive of the phenomenal expansion that took
place in Phoenician naval construction and naviga
tion at this period, which culminated in the great
ship of Tharshish, unless it is assumed that a
corresponding advance had been made in the

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 97

means by which both ships and cargoes were safe
guarded.

The first form in which we find what, for sim
plicity's sake, we will designate the Amalfi or
western compass, was divided into eight points,
whereas the Chinese compass of that date was
divided into sixteen, and, according to some
authorities, into twenty-four parts. Both com
passes, however, used the same method of suspend
ing the needle just a little below the centre of
gravity with a view to increasing the sensitiveness
of its movement, yet the one compass had a de
termined north and the other a determined south
point, whereas what we may call the Aztec compass,
he so-called calendar stone or Piedra de Agua, had
the divisions carried to an infinitely finer degree, it
being possible to read to a sixty-fourth part, as
would be convenient, if not necessary, in navigating
the tremendous stretch of ocean that lay between
Torres Straits and the American continent. It is
interesting, therefore, in this connection to notice
that the compass, although a unit in its basic
principles, seems to have been adapted in the
various stages of its construction to the particular
needs of the navigation on which it was employed.
But the perfect instrument is only found where we
would expect to find it, namely in Phoenicia's
most distant colony, in that place the navigation
to which would call for the finest possible adjust
ment.

To navigate from the Red Sea or the Persian
Gulf through the Indian and Pacific Oceans to
America would not have required the use of superior
ships or finer seamanship than that on the Atlantic
voyages, but it would certainly have demanded a

G

98 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

compass with a much finer degree of adjustment.
The situation is therefore suggestive of the origin
of the Piedra de Agua or calendar stone, more especi
ally in view of the fact that we find it in a place
where the plainest evidences of the presence of the
Phoenician occupancy exist.

In order that the whole scope of this inquiry
may be clearly understood it will now be necessary
to forge again some of the links that in a remote
past seem to have united these various forms of
the compass in a common symbol.

The Arabs, as was indicated in an earlier chapter,
were from the beginning the most intimate neigh
bours of the Phoenicians. Arabian tribes were
their carriers and commercial correspondents in
connection with the produce of the Arabian Penin
sula. It is not surprising, then, that we find them
in possession of a compass, which, though rude,
fulfilled all their needs. The Arabs used not only
the bactellium but the Phoenician Star in the prose
cution of their journeys, and the relation of these
two facts is, to say the least, very significant of the
source from which their knowledge was derived.
There was, moreover, no good reason why the
Phoenicians should have withheld this information
from the Arabs. Every reason indeed was present
why they should not have withheld knowledge that
would safeguard the transportation of the valuable
merchandise of the central and southern markets
of that country on which they were so dependent
for their Mediterranean trade.

Koulak Kibdjalick, an Arabian author, who
made a voyage across the Indian Ocean in A.D. 1242,
describes vividly the manufacture of one of these
primitive compasses under his own observation.

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 99

It incorporated all that was thought to be necessary
when the bactellium was first applied to navigation,
and at that early period seems to have been such
common property that the mariners did not hesitate
to make it known to a stranger. Says the traveller :
' They took a cup of water which they sheltered
from the wind, they then took a needle which they
fixed on a reed or straw so as to form a cross, they
then took the loadstone in their hand and turned it
round for some time above the cup, moving from
left to right, the needle following ; they then with
drew the loadstone, after which the needle stood
still pointing north and south/'

It will be evident from what has been said that
the earliest statement from Arabian sources does
not afford us any more satisfactory light on the
origin of the compass than does the Chinese stories.
And this will be more evident as we proceed, for it
will be found that all the information conveyed by
this Arabian author was possessed by the Icelanders
400 years before this date, a fact all the more start
ling because we can establish no historic connection
between either China or Arabia and Iceland.

But there is very little difficulty in tracing the
movements of the compass in its progress from
Phoenicia to Europe. Exasperated at the assist
ance which the Phoenician seamen rendered to the
Persians in their wars against the Greek States,
Alexander the Great determined on an expedition
with a view to terminating for all time the menace
which this co-operation presented to his absolute
sovereignty of the ancient world. He therefore set
about the reduction of the Phoenician towns and the
destruction of their fleets. After a relentless war
he secured not only the capitulation of the main

ioo THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Phoenician towns, but he took island Tyre by
storm and massacred 8000 of the inhabitants.

It was, however, through the erection of Alex
andria much more than the destruction of island
Tyre that the purposes of the conqueror Alexander
in the ruin of the Phoenician hegemony were secured,
for Alexandria was speedily transferred to that proud
pre-eminence as the great emporium of the trade
between the East and West that had for so many
centuries been the distinction of the Phoenician
towns.

Shortly after the rise of Alexandria came the
death of the Greek conqueror, and Tyre, which had
ceased to be a city, speedily sprung into life again.
But its greatness as a naval port and the central
emporium for the eastern and western trade was a
thing of the past. Carthage meanwhile had sprung
into power, peopled with the fugitives from the
Phoenician towns. These carried to their new home
not only an intimate knowledge of the western
Mediterranean trade, which speedily became tribu
tary to their port, but also the ability to administer
the government of Carthage and stimulate the
commerce of the adjacent regions. The usual result
from such a division followed. Alexandria, profit
ing by the disaster to Tyre and the growth of
Carthage which began to monopolise the western
trade, steadily grew in importance and wealth, so
that the great Alexandria corn ships soon took
the place of the stately ships of Tharshish.

Of all the nations engaged in the eastern Medi
terranean business the Italians had the shortest
and most direct voyage to make in order to reach
Alexandria, so that a practical monopoly of the
eastern trade fell into their hands before the end of

PHCENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 101

the thirteenth century A.D. First among the Italian
cities to profit by this change were Amalfi and Pisa.
It was as the result of the transference of the Tyrian
trade to Alexandria and the growth of Amalfi to be
an independent republic regulating the commerce
between Alexandria and Italy, that the compass
made its appearance in a definite commercial form.

It has been claimed that the compass was first
introduced into Italy from China by Marco Polo,
the Venetian traveller, in A.D. 1260. This claim is
largely based on the fact that the Amalfi and Chinese
compasses used the same method of suspending
the needle. It does not, however, accord with
other well-established historic facts, for a reference
to the use of a rude compass as early as A.D. 868 is
made by Hanstein in a quotation from an Icelandic
historian of the eleventh century. He again is
followed by Alexander Neckham, the foster brother
of Richard Cceur de Lion, who speaks of the instru
ment not as a secret of the learned, but as a guide
of the mariner. Guiot de Provence also sheds some
light on the hold which the compass had taken on
the public mind of his day in a poem dated A.D. 1190.
Says he, " The mariner can sail to the north star
without seeing it by simply following the needle
floating on a straw in a basin of water after it has
been touched with the magnet/' Brunetto Latini,
author of Le Tresor and Dante's tutor, refers to a
visit to Roger Bacon in A.D. 1258, when the friar
showed him the magnet and explained its properties.
The Cardinal de Vitray, who visited Palestine during
the fourth Crusade, also refers to the instrument.
In chapter xci. of his Historia Orientalis he notes
the use of the bactellium in almost identical terms
to Guiot de Provence. He says, " The needle after

102 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

contact with the magnetic stone constantly turns
to the north star which, as the axis of the firmament,
remains immovable, whilst the others revolve, and
hence it is essentially necessary to those who navi
gate the ocean "—words as explicit as they are
remarkable.

From these references it should be clear that the
form in which the primitive compass was familiar
to all the early navigating nations was either the
bactellium or loadstone or the magnetised needle.

As to the Chinese claim to the invention the
documents already referred to determine absolutely
nothing. The Chinese were not deep water sailors.
They were river navigators, and although they seem
to have cultivated the coasting trade they did not
venture out of sight of land, being ignorant of the
islands adjacent to their own shores. Even the
large island of Formosa was unknown to them until
it was discovered by the Dutch.

To sum up, we seem to have no option but to
turn away from China, Arabia, Amain, and all
other sources to Phoenicia if we would obtain any
satisfactory solution of the difficulty that has for
so long surrounded the origin of the compass. It
should now be apparent that five things were
necessarily involved in the evolution of the compass,
and that at least four of these were intimately
identified with the national life of Phoenicia,
(i) The invention of the bactellium or suspended
magnet and the observation that its vibrant, life
like movement only continued so long as the instru
ment remained out of the Polar direction. (2) The
knowledge that the Phoenician or Pole Star was the
only constant star in the firmament, and therefore
supremely valuable to the traveller by land and by

PHOENICIANS AND THE COMPASS 103

sea. (3) A sea and land trade of so extensive a
character that it would be impossible to conceive
of it being conducted without the possession of such
an instrument. (4) That the later forms of the
compass point clearly to their derivation from the
first rude bactellium. (5) That a connection should
have been established between the Polar directive
properties of the suspended bactellium and the
Phoenician or Pole Star. In answering this last
point as to whether there is any sufficient reason
for believing that the Phoenicians did establish this
connection between the Polar directive properties
of the suspended magnet and the Phoenician Star
which solved the great problem of navigation for
all time, we at the same time settle the question of
the origin of the compass.

Now it is important to remember that the in
vention of the bactellium and the discovery of the
Pole Star are peculiarly Phoenician, no nation of
antiquity but Phoenicia laying claim to either.
Furthermore, it was through the discovery of this
star that a means was found by which to steer the
compass. It cannot, however, be supposed that
Phoenician navigation can be explained by the
mere fact of their having discovered the Pole Star,
for centuries after the death of Ouranos the trend of
their navigation was in a direction where the Pole
Star could not be seen. If, therefore, it was used as
a constant it must have been through the medium
of such an instrument as the bactellium, which was
capable of locating its position when the object to
which it pointed was not in sight.

Apart therefore from a definite statement from
the Phoenicians themselves as to the use to which
the bactellium was applied, there can be no question

104 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

that they were not only capable of establishing but
actually did establish the connection existing between
the Polar directive power of the bactellium and the
Phoenician Star, and so used it in their navigation.
The paramount value of the compass to the Phoeni
cians was undoubtedly the cause of their long reten
tion of the secret of its existence at least on the
Mediterranean coasts, for there was much to be
feared, as they found, from Greek expansion.

It has been said with a considerable show of
learning that sea charts did not exist until the end
of the thirteenth century A.D. This is clearly a
mistake. It is probable that the first Italian or
Pisan compass charts which cover the whole Medi
terranean belong to this period. The first, of which
we have any exact information, are those of P.
Visconti in A.D. 1311, and these seem to have been
made from data obtained in the same manner as
that ascribed by Herodotus (iii. 136) to the Phoe
nicians, who, he says, " surveyed the coasts of Hellas,
taking notes in writing/' Either of these charts
would, however, have been of very little value to
seamen if they had not been correctly platted by a
compass and the seas they represented navigated
by the same instrument. So that we may fairly
enough assume that all that was involved in the
discovery and invention of the bactellium and
compass was clearly of Phoenician origin.

Well may the prophet Ezekiel (xxviii. 3) say of
such people, " Behold thou art wiser than Daniel,
there is no secret that they can hide from thee."

CHAPTER V

PHOENICIAN AND JEW IN CO-OPERATION

Phoenician desire for Eastern expansion — Trade with India — Persian
Gulf Settlements the base of more distant navigation — Phoenicians
and Israelites unite for commercial purposes — Friendship of Hiram,
King of Tyre, and David, King of Israel — Its important results —
Phoenicia's obligations to the Jewish people — Jewish influence on
Phoenician religious thought — Commercial treaty of Solomon and
Hiram — How it profited both countries — Fleet of Solomon and
Hiram and its destination — Phoenicians as silver importers.

THE two great empires which grew up side by side
on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates were so
closely united that the temporary power of the one
was simply the measure of the weakness of the
other, both territories possessing the same racial
types, speaking the same language, and historically
passing through the same changes.

Until very recent years it was customary to
speak of this entire region as Assyria,1 but later
research makes it plain that the first place should
have been accorded Babylonia, since, with the ex
ception of a few centuries, Assyria seems always to
have occupied a subordinate position. This at
least is the Scriptural view, for in Genesis x. 10 the
first foundations of Nimrod are made to include
Babel and Accad in the land of Shinar. This view
is further supported by the fact that the arts,
science, literature, and religion of Assyria always
bore the impress of Babylonia. We will not
therefore impeach the veracity of history if we

1 Ency. Brit.
105

io6 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

speak of the territory so embraced as Babylonia
rather than Assyria. Up to the year 1130 B.C.
Babylonia was the great centre of science, art,
trade, and manufacture in eastern Asia, and at the
same time the seat of the dominant power of the
East. In the year referred to, however, the rise to
power of Tiglath Pileser I of Assyria created a
period of serious unrest throughout all Syria and
Mesopotamia, which resulted in Babylonia becoming
for a time a dependency of Assyria. The paralysis
of the Babylonian trade resulting from the wide
spread operation of this monarch's forces, and the
rise to almost supreme power of Assyria in eastern
Asia, provided an opportunity for eastern trade
expansion that seems to have been eagerly seized
by the Phoenicians, whose emporia on the
Persian Gulf provided that wealth of imported and
manufactured wares of Tyrian and Sidonian woven
and dyed stuffs and the products of the Indian,
Arabian, and Egyptian markets, of which Babylonia
at that time stood in need.

This market was one with which the Phoenicians
had been familiar from the beginning, and it was
from their association with it that the inspiration
of much of Phoenicia's skill in gem engraving,
weaving, and dyeing was derived. While, there
fore, the campaigns of Tiglath Peleser were para
lysing commerce on the Syrian caravan routes, the
Phoenicians, by means of their emporia on the
Bahrein Islands, were able to enter Babylonia with
their own products and those of the Egyptian,
Arabian, and Indian markets. It is, however,
scarcely possible to believe that the Phoenicians,
who were notorious for their business sagacity, did
not, while rejoicing in the success of their operations

PHOENICIAN AND JEW 107

in the East, recognise the precariousness of the tenure
they had secured in the Babylonian markets.

The main trend of the colonial development of
the Phoenicians prior to this date had been, as we
have already shown, mainly in a western direction.
Indeed from the situation of their home ports it
could hardly be otherwise, for their true dominion
never extended either to the Persian Gulf nor to
the Red Sea. As soon, however, as the land trade
through Asia became paralysed by reason of the
unrest in Babylonia the Indian trade via Crocola,
the modern Kurachi at the mouth of the Indus,
and that of Ceylon, which found its natural outlet
either at the Bahrein Islands or at Hydramaut and
Yemen, received more careful attention. This terri
tory was not only the first but remained until the
later Assyrian period, the most valuable to the
Phoenicians. It is reasonable, therefore, to suppose
that the need of further expansion eastward with a
view to securing their hold on the commerce of the
territory then in their possession, was not lost sight
of. Evidences of such a movement reaching back
to a very remote period are not wanting, for the
retention of their trade connection with the Bahrein
Islands and their use of the Egyptian port of
Hierapolis on the Red Sea, which must have provided
a very powerful leverage on the Babylonian and
Egyptian markets, make it apparent that a further
development in the East, paralleling that in the Westr
was an object which the Phoenicians had cherished
with the utmost eagerness.

It is extremely unfortunate that we know so
little about the Persian Gulf settlements and the
movements which took place from them. Al
though their possession of the ivory, ebony, pearls,

io8 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

and cinnamon of India and Ceylon indicate that
from a very early period the Phoenicians had an
intimate acquaintance with the Deccan and the
East Indian peninsulas and islands, they could not
have been the sole possessors of this trade, for the
Chaldseans equally with the Phoenicians had a share
in it (Ezek. xxvii. 15). So far as can be gathered
this business was not conducted from Phoenicia
direct, but like the trade with the Cassiterides, the
shores of England, and the Baltic, which was
controlled by the Gadeans, seems to have been
handled by the Dedanites, who inhabited the islands
in the Bay of Gerrha and controlled the navigation
of the Persian Gulf and the Indian seas.

That a considerable navigation existed on the
Persian Gulf carried on by the Chaldaeans, " whose
cry is in the ships " (Isa. xliii. 14), and by the Phoe
nicians through their correspondents the Dedan
ites, there is no room to doubt. Some light on the
matter is obtainable from a consideration of the
nature of the commodities which were exported.
These were ivory, precious stones, pearls, ebony,
cinnamon, apes, and peacocks, the latter of which
could only have been obtained from Java and
Sumatra, the native home of the bird, or from the
islands adjoining the Indian peninsula. This clearly
indicates that from a very early period the ex
tremities of the Asiatic continent to the south-east
had been made tributary to the trade of the Bahrein
Islands (2 Chron. ix. 21).

In view therefore of the tremendous expansion
which had taken place in Phoenician commerce
towards the West, it is not surprising to find traces
of an effort on the part of the establishments on
the Bahrein Islands to obtain some corresponding

PHOENICIANS AND JEW 109

information with respect to the resources of the
further East. Emporia like these at the entrance
to the Persian Gulf in the hands of so enterprising
and progressive a people as the Phoenicians naturally
leads us to assume a more distant navigation than
the mouth of the Indus or Ceylon. The same causes
which operated to bring about the western develop
ments and draw Tharshish and the English coasts
within the sphere of their commerce were equally
at work here, for the Babylonians, who had so long
dominated the eastern trade and the Indian and
Arabian markets, were still a power to be reckoned
with although suffering temporary eclipse.

It is necessary, then, to view the colonies on the
Persian Gulf not as the end of Phoenician navigation
to the East, but, like Gades in the west (which formed
the base from which the Atlantic and Baltic trade
was handled), as the starting point for more distant
navigation. Fortunately, there is a mass of un
digested historic data that leaves no room for doubt
that the enterprises were directed to very remote
regions. As the elucidation of this phase of our
problem comes, however, more naturally within the
scope of another branch of our inquiry, we will leave
the subject at this point for the present, contenting
ourselves with having called attention to the need
which existed at that time for expansion in the East.

The great developments which took place in
Phoenician naval construction and navigation on
the Mediterranean were, as we have already shown,
brought about by two causes. The first was the
practically unlimited quantity of durable and easily
worked timber found on the mountain chains
which surrounded their new homes, and was like
wise obtainable from the adjacent Cyprus, which

no THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

later became the rendezvous of the Phoenician
fleets. The second was the nature of the navigation
which the residence of the Phoenicians on the eastern
shores of the Mediterranean imposed. More strongly
built and roomier craft were necessary when their
commercial operations and the establishment of
their more pretentious colonies drew them westward.

But there was no special need for such naval
developments on the Persian Gulf. Yet vessels of
considerable tonnage seem, from the Hebrew narra
tive (2 Chron. viii. 18), to have been employed there.
Can there be any other explanation than that these
vessels were specially constructed with a view to
investigating the possibilities of a further eastern
expansion ?

Whatever causes may have led to the system of
expansion at the Bahrein Islands, there can be no
doubt that this system of expansion was inaugu
rated in the East equally with the West, and that
the developments which resulted were of so far
reaching a character as to rivet the attention of the
nation for some time to the exclusion of matters
nearer home.

Somewhere about the middle or end of the
eleventh century B.C. information of a somewhat
startling character with respect to discoveries in
the further East paralleling those made in Tharshish
in the West seem to have reached Phoenicia through
its correspondents, the Dedanites. The informa
tion was of so specific and definite a character as
to create an international departure in the associa
tion of Phoenicia and Palestine in business enter
prises of a nature that has probably no exact
counterpart in history.

About the beginning of the eleventh century B.C.

PHOENICIAN AND JEW in

David, the son of Jesse the Bethlehemite, had been
anointed king of Israel, and with his accession to
the throne the commerce of the Phoenicians began
to be of the most prosperous character. Not only
was the territory to the westward in their undisputed
possession but that of the East speedily received a
new commercial value. Phoenician commerce was
at the same time strengthened by the complete
pacification of Palestine owing to the subjugation of
the Canaanites and Philistines, and the advantages
accruing from the institution of a stable govern
ment which stimulated a mutual exchange of com
modities between the two kingdoms. Phoenicia
was dependent in a large measure on Palestine for
its supplies of foodstuffs, its wheat and barley, its
oil and wine, and Israel was equally dependent on
the Phoenician markets for those manufactured
articles and luxuries which the growing independ
ence and wealth of the population naturally led
them to desire.

Stimulated by these favouring conditions of
mutual advantage the association between Hiram,
king of Tyre, and David, king of Israel, soon came
to be of the most intimate character, and resulted
in a friendship which seems to have continued
unimpaired throughout the varied careers of the
two kings. It is true that we have no record of
personal association between them, but that such
existed may reasonably be assumed since we have
the explicit statement of Scripture (i Kings v. i)
that Hiram was ever a lover of David, an assumption,
moreover, supported by the fact that Hiram built a
palace for the king of Israel in recognition of this
friendship and of the obligations under which
Phoenicia lay to David.

H2 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

The great Syrian campaign of David did more
than bring about the voluntary or forced submis
sion to Israel of all the lesser kingdoms that lay
between the Orontes and the Euphrates. It re
duced Damascus, the terminus of the great over
land routes through western Asia and southern and
eastern Arabia to the Mediterranean to the position
of a Hebrew dependency, and restored to a state
of security a route which for a long period must
have been viewed by the Phoenicians as most peril
ous. But the association with Israel resulted in
even more important advantages to Phoenicia. In
his campaign against the Edomites, who occupied
the hill country to the east and north of the Red
Sea, David raised the embargo which this com
mercial nation had placed on the navigation of the
Red Sea towards its own ports.

With the object of these campaigns successfully
accomplished a long period of profound peace en
sued, advantageous alike to Phoenicia and Palestine.
This period, which comprised the latter half of the
reign of King David, seems to have been devoted
by the Jewish king to gathering tribute from the
rulers and princes of the subject provinces and in
the reorganisation of the kingdom and its defences.
Probably, too, it was devoted to cementing the
friendship with the great commercial state on the
sea coast and to consultations with Hiram about
plans for the improvement of the Israelitish capital
and the erection of a magnificent temple, the con
struction of which David was instructed by God
to entrust to his son Solomon (i Chron. xxviii. 3).

Whatever the financial condition of Palestine
may have been under the rule of the judges of King
Saul, there is evidence that at this period a new and

PHCENICIAN AND JEW 113

startling departure from the primitive simplicity
of the national life took place and continued through
out the latter years of King David's reign. At his
death the Jewish monarch bequeathed to his son
Solomon not only the most minute instructions
relative to the carrying out of the plans for the
erection of a temple to Jehovah, but enormous sums
of money. According to i Chron. xxii. 14 the
actual treasure provided by King David for the
building of the temple amounted to one hundred
thousand talents of gold and a thousand thousand
talents of silver, a sum calculated by Dr. Hastings,
editor of the Dictionary of the Bible, to be equiva
lent to £1,025,000,000 sterling, but by Lever and
Prideaux to amount to £833,000,000 sterling.

That Hiram was intimately familiar with David's
plans there can be no question, for in the final design
of the temple there was observable a considerable
departure from the primitive simplicity of the
Tabernacle structure of a clearly Phoenician origin.
Moreover, immediately after the accession of Solo
mon we find Hiram taking the initiative and " send
ing his servants unto Solomon, for he had heard
that they had anointed him king in the room of
his father, for Hiram was ever a lover of David"
(i Kings v. i). That this embassage conveyed
much more than mere congratulations on the ac
cession of a neighbouring prince is certain. All
the probabilities indeed favour the view that
Solomon and Hiram had many times met at the
summer palace in Lebanon constructed for David
by the Tyrian king (2 Sam. v. n), where the capti
vating personality of the young prince could not
fail, apart from the fact that he was the favourite
son of the great Hebrew monarch, to have won the

H

H4 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

kindly recognition of the Phoenician king. At all
events Solomon's reply to the Phoenician embas-
sage was of such a familiar character as to warrant
the belief that a definite understanding on the sub
ject of the erection of the temple existed between
David and Hiram, and that, relying on the strength
of a friendship cemented by many years of intimate
association, Hiram sought, and that not unadvisedly,
a continuance of the good understanding that had
been of such advantage to Phoenicia.

As a means to this end Hiram's embassy seems
to have made overtures to the young monarch to
place at his disposal the resources of Phoenicia for
the furtherance of the projects which had been
entrusted to Solomon's care by his father. And
this proposal must have been warmly welcomed by
Solomon, for his people at that time were devoid
of the talent necessary to the successful prosecution
of those great enterprises which had been entrusted
to his care.

The beautification of Jerusalem and the erection
of the national temple, it must be remembered, were
not private enterprises. David had for at least one
half of his reign been in the habit of levying the
enormous tax of 10 per cent, on the produce of the
nation, and we may safely assume, from the loyalty
of the king to his religious convictions, that the tax
had a specific relation to the purpose for which it
was ultimately used. The kingly estate in Palestine
during this formative period, even when closely
associated with the Phoenician court and probably
enough taking colour from it, could never have
demanded for its own support such a drain on the
resources of the people as this tax represented.
On the other hand, the advantages accruing to

PHOENICIAN AND JEW 115

Phoenicia through the final pacification of the
territory contiguous to its own and the opening of
the Red Sea ports for the successful control of the
Yemen or Ophir trade were benefits which did not
revert to Hiram alone but to Phoenicia at large.
Both time and circumstance, therefore, were pre
eminently favourable to the furtherance of these
developments sought by the two neighbouring
kingdoms and their respective rulers. The over
tures of Hiram on behalf of the Phoenician people
to consummate the promises evidently made to
David during his lifetime, were not only such as
good statecraft would have suggested, but showed
that both king and people recognised the great
obligation under which they rested to the house of
David and to the Jewish people. It was none the
less a beautiful and touching tribute of affection
from Hiram to the young king, of whose father he
had ever been a warm friend.

In order to understand clearly the sequel to this
exchange of courtesies it will be necessary again
to emphasize the overwhelming obligations under
which Phoenicia at this period stood to the Jewish
kingdom, for the sequel of these overtures presented
a startling innovation in the national career of the
Jews. During no portion of its history but this
did Palestine exhibit the traits of an aggressively
territorial mercantile nation. That a trade may
have existed between the Jews and the carrying
tribes of the adjacent deserts with a view to securing
myrrh and frankincense for the temple services is
extremely probable, but this trade during the earlier
period could only have been of the most limited
character, probably amounting to nothing more
than an exchange of commodities. The whole

n6 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

system of government among the Hebrews, no less
than their traditions and religion, set them apart
at the beginning of their career as a peculiar and
isolated people (Deut. xiv. 2). The overtures of
Hiram to Solomon could not fail, therefore, to have
been viewed with grave suspicion by the priesthood,
if the affection existing between the Tyrian and the
Jewish monarchs had not had its root in a religious
sympathy of a wholly different character from that
which could have been possible at any later date, for
between the pure and exalted worship of Jehovah and
that of Baal there was a whole world of difference.

It is supposed, and with good reason, that the
personal influence of David over Hiram may have
been a factor of no small importance in producing
a modification in the trend of Phoenician religious
thought and practice. Certainly the intensely re
ligious nature of Hiram shows in these communi
cations with the Jewish king strong leanings towards
the early cult of the Semites, which in itself may
account for the magnificent contribution of one
hundred and twenty talents of gold or about
£40,000 sterling, which Hiram made for the adorn
ment of the temple at Jerusalem (i Kings ix. 14),
as well as the complacent acceptance of the
situation by the Jewish priesthood. Were we in
possession of a detailed and authoritative state
ment regarding the progress of Phoenician religious
thought, it would probably be found that the
spiritual conception of the Deity received a peculiar
emphasis at this period. Originally the Phoe
nicians, like the Jews, were monotheists, and pos
sessed a lofty estimate of the power which created
and ruled the universe, whom they called El-great,
Baal-lord, Bel-samin, lord of heaven. But this

PHCENICIAN AND JEW 117

belief was soon overlaid and corrupted by means
of the tribal totemism which was always a marked
feature of the Semitic belief, with the result that
the different names of God passed by degrees into
the nomenclature of different gods. Polytheism
and religious symbolism then took the place of the
primitive monotheism. Be that as it may, it re
quires no special sagacity to realise that Phoenicia,
while dominated by so masterful a sovereign as
Hiram, who was in affectionate sympathy with
the pre-eminently religious monotheist, — at that
time master of all Syria, — may have thrown the
whole weight of its influence towards bringing into
life again the earlier and purer ideas of the national
religious cult.

The tendency to religious symbolism was not
confined to Phoenicia. Traces of it are clearly
visible in Hebrew literature, where the Lord God is
represented as a sun and shield (Psalms Ixxxiv. n).
This view receives still further emphasis in Numbers
xxi. 8, where incense is offered to the brazen serpent
of Moses (2 Kings xviii. 4). It is probable, there
fore, that the primitive conceptions of the Hebrews,
which in some measure survived in their later and
purer belief, may not have differed in any marked
degree from those of the Phoenicians (whose prin
cipal symbols were the sun and the serpent) when
their common ancestors occupied the plains that
lay between the Tigris and Euphrates.

Whether the commercial treaty which arose out
of this rapprochement between Solomon and Hiram
was in the first place international in its scope is
uncertain, even though we view it as resulting in
the erection of the fortified cities of Petra, Gezer,
Baalath, and Tadmor or Palmyra in the wilderness

n8 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

(i Kings ix. 16 ff.), in which the merchandise collected
by the various caravans might be stored for further
distribution. Indeed all the probabilities indicate
that the partnership partook of the nature of a
monopoly conducted for the private advantage of
the two sovereigns.

The annual income of Solomon is stated in
i Kings x. 14 and 2 Chron. ix. 13 to have amounted
to six hundred and sixty-six talents of gold or a little
more than £4,000,000 sterling. But, besides pay
ments in money, he received payments in kind both
from his own subjects and from the subject princes,
so that his income from all sources was not less than
six or eight million pounds sterling per annum, a
sum which would represent a very literal fulfilment
of the promise (i Kings iii. 13), "I have also given
thee that which thou hast not asked, both riches
and honour ; so that there shall not be any among
the kings like unto thee all thy days/'

The chief place among the Phoenician cities
which from the beginning seems to have been
occupied by Sidon was transferred to Tyre about
1250 B.C., when Sidon was besieged and taken by
the Philistine king of Ascalon. It is an open
question whether the commercial causes to which
we have already referred did not operate to bring
about the change without the intervention of this
extraneous cause. The commercial ascendancy of
the city took place about 1250 B.C., when the results
of the western expansion and the opening of Thar-
shish began to be felt. From that date Tyre con
tinued in the ascendant for a period of about 400
years when, owing to the defection and flight of
Dido, Carthage was founded by the fugitives from
Tyre.

PHCENICIAN AND JEW 119

There seems to be no room vf or question as to this
being the correct view of the situation, for it was at
this period that the advantages to be derived from
an extension of their colonial system seems to have
been most clearly recognised by the Phoenicians.
It was then also that her merchants began to realise
the uncertainty of their hold on the great centres
of trade on the eastern Mediterranean. Fortunately
this did not occur before the period when Phoenician
expansion to the westward had become so profitable
that the nation could, without serious inconvenience
to its trade, transfer its activities to regions where
friction and competition were non-existent.

Phoenicia, at a time of unparalleled commercial
expansion, could very well afford to consider how
it could best utilise to its own advantage the growing
resources of the new kingdom in Palestine. Hiram
had in some measure already paved the way to this
more intimate association by erecting for David a
palace in keeping with his kingly dignity. But
this was not sufficient. It was also necessary to
cement a union between the two nations, and to
this Hiram devoted his energies.

Phoenicia was a purely commercial state, and
was wholly dependent on a mercenary force for its
defence. Israel, on the other hand, constantly
liable to attack on every hand, possessed an army
on foot of 240,000 men, who served David without
expense to the State (i Chron. xxviii. i). When,
however, war broke out during David's reign
288,000 men and 12,000 officers, or an effective
fighting force of 300,000 men, were available at a
moment's notice. But the ambition of Solomon
does not seem to have been satisfied with even this
provision, for, with the extension of the boundaries

120 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

of the kingdom and Jewish participation in the
eastern commerce, arrangements were made for the
erection of a number of fortified cities and outposts
which necessitated a large increase in the standing
army. We have no specific statement in the Scrip
tures as to the additions to Solomon's forces during
his reign, but we are probably not very far off the
mark if, during the period of greatest expansion,
we apply to it the figures recorded with respect to
the reign of Jehoshaphat, who did not extend the
boundaries of the Solomonic empire. According to
2 Chron. xvii. 12 the army of Jehoshaphat amounted
to one million one hundred and eighty thousand
men besides the garrisons in the fenced cities.

The magnanimity of Hiram and of the Phoe
nician people towards the Jewish king and his
subjects is therefore easily understood, although
the situation does not in any way militate against
the sentiments that may have actuated Hiram as
an individual in the proposals he made to Solomon.
So far as history sheds light on the subject, the
Phoenicians, while under the protection of Israel,
were never called on to pay tribute, so that their
proposals with respect to the erection of the temple
and a participation in commercial enterprises set
ting out from parts under Jewish jurisdiction was,
to say the least, statesmanlike. Moreover, these
proposals could not fail to be of great advantage to
both peoples. Solomon needed a temple and palaces,
and desired the enlargement and beautification of
his capital, objects which Hebrew skill and resources
could not provide. Hiram, on the other hand,
required protection for Phoenician commerce, ports
for his shipping on the Red Sea, and a granary
from which supplies for the support of the teeming

PHOENICIAN AND JEW 121

populations of the Phoenician towns could be drawn.
Out of this common need and the desire and ability
to meet it arose these favouring conditions which
led to a conjunction of the forces of Phoenicia and
Palestine culminating in those joint expeditions
which led to such far-reaching results.

The initiative towards this desirable end seems
to have been taken by Hiram. According to
Eusebius (prczp. Evan. x. 99) a marriage was con
tracted between Solomon and a daughter of Hiram
as the most satisfactory way of cementing the
union. This was followed later by a marriage
with the daughter of Pharaoh Vapres (prcep. Evan,
ii. 30), who is said to have sent as a marriage portion
80,000 workmen to assist in the building of the
temple. The time was peculiarly opportune for the
prosecution of this enterprise. A profound peace,
which the Jewish nation then enjoyed as the result
of the aggressive policy of David, stimulated the
industries of the entire population. Abundant
labour was available. The tribes beyond the
Jordan had become rich by plundering the Hagar-
ines, and found a ready market for their cattle.
The agricultural tribes again enjoyed a soil and
climate peculiarly fitted to produce in richest
abundance all that was most desirable of semi-
tropical products. For exportation the Jews pos
sessed wheat and barley, wine, oil, wool, hides,
and other raw products all extremely valuable to
the Phoenicians.

The commercial rapprochement between Phoe
nicia and Israel, from a purely business point of
view, was therefore desirable in the highest degree.
It tended to keep the peace between two neighbour
ing states mutually dependent on each other at a

122 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

time when cupidity provided an excellent reason
for ruthless war.

In order to understand clearly how the services
of the enormous army of labourers were utilised in
the building of the temple it will be necessary to
obtain some light regarding the peculiar character
istics of Phoenician architecture. " The foundation
of Phoenician architecture/' says Renan,1 " is the
carved rock, not the column as with the Greeks.
The wall replaces the carved rock without entirely
losing its character. Nothing conduces to the
belief that the Phoenicians ever made use of the
keyed vault.

' The principle of monolithism which ruled the
Phoenician and Syrian art even after it had adapted
much from the Greek is very contrary to the art of
the Hellenes. Grecian architecture starts from the
principle of the division of the stone into small
pieces and avows this principle boldly. Never did
the Greeks derive from Pentelicus blocks of a size
at all comparable to those of Baalbek and Egypt.
They saw no advantage in them. On the contrary,
they saw that with masses of this kind, which are
to be used entire, the architect has his hands tied ;
the material, instead of being subordinate to the
design of the edifice, runs counter to the design."

The Syrian and Phoenician architects, and even
those of Egypt, were at the command of their
material. The stone did not submit to the shape
which the artist would have impressed upon it ;
it continued to be with them mere rock.

From the accounts which have come down to us
it seems safe to conclude that the material em
ployed in the construction of the Phoenician build-

1 Mission de Phenice^ p. 822.

PHOENICIAN AND JEW 123

ings themselves was wood, and that mainly the
cedar and fir from Lebanon. Stone as a rule was
only employed in the substructions of the edifices.
These substructions were, nevertheless, like those
of Palmyra and especially Baalbek, of remarkable
size, some of the stones weighing as much as a
hundred tons. It is, however, to the peculiar
feature of wooden superstructures in Phoenician
architecture that we must look for an explanation of
the dearth of remains of ancient buildings in Phoe
nicia, for, naturally, these wooden buildings would
entirely disappear in the course of a few centuries.

The time consumed in the building of the Great
Temple, we learn from i Kings vi. 38, was seven
years, and from I Kings vii. I we gather that thirteen
years were occupied in the erection of the summer
palace in Lebanon. From i Kings (iv. 20 and x. 21),
however, we gather some information that on the
face of it seems even more wonderful than the
erection of the temple and palace, namely, that
while this enormous drain was sapping the resources
of the kingdom, " Judah and Israel were many as
the sand which is by the sea in multitude, eating and
drinking and making merry/' " And all the vessels
of the house of the forest of Lebanon were of pure
gold ; none were of silver : it was nothing accounted
of in the days of Solomon/' In the 2/th verse of
the tenth chapter we read that during this period
Solomon " made silver to be in Jerusalem as
stones/' whereupon the writer, as if appreciating
the incongruity of the facts related, offers what is
intended to be a satisfactory explanation, which,
curiously enough, makes no reference to the enor
mous amount of treasure left by David, but simply
to the fact that the workmen were paid from a

124 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

wholly different source, " for the king had at sea
a navy of Tharshish with the navy of Hiram : once
in three years came the navy of Tharshish, bringing
gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks "
(i Kings x. 22).

We have already shown that Phoenician enter
prise had from a very remote period opened a way
by land over the western side of Asia, thus placing
the nation in communication with the Babylonians
and Arabians. The great point to which their
operations in the East were directed, apart from the
Bahrein Islands, was undoubtedly Babylon. The
route thither was through a desert where the traders
were subject to raids from the people who shortly
before had been brought into subjection to Israel.
As a participation in the Phoenician trade was
apparently the intention of Solomon, he either
built or rebuilt Baalath and Tadmor or Palmyra,
which were fortunately situated on the route, and
garrisoned them with a view to safeguarding his
operations (i Kings ix. 18).

Whatever access the Phoenicians possessed by
that route to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean
prior to this date must have been by favour of the
Egyptians, whose port of Hieropolis they are known
to have used. Through the conquest of the
Edomites, the Jews, however, had come into pos
session of the two ports of Eloth and Eziongeber
on the Gulf of ^Elana, and knowing how valuable
they would be to the Phoenicians they turned them
over to them under Jewish protection. The gift
must have been invaluable since it gave the Phoe
nicians access to the Red Sea without the necessity
for undesirable Egyptian espionage. At the same
time it placed in their hands facilities for the con-

PHCENICIAN AND JEW 125

struction of such vessels as were necessary for the
conduct of the Yemen and Indian Ocean trade, and
that of the Persian Gulf.

Our story up to this point is simple. The
cordiality of the relations existing between Hiram
and Solomon and the nature of the obligations
under which the Phoenician nation rested to the
house of David for the tranquillising of Syria, on
which so largely depended the successful prosecu
tion of its trade with the further South and East as
well as for the settled state of Palestine, providing
a safe route to Egypt, led Hiram to make overtures
to Solomon for a joint participation in certain
expeditions in pursuit of the produce of the new
territory discovered shortly before, and at the same
time for securing those precious wares of Ophir
which were deemed essential to the completion and
adornment of the temple then in course of con
struction : for the house that Solomon built was
great, for great was his God above all gods (2
Chron. ii. 5).

To the prosecution of these enterprises the two
kings contributed both ships and money. The
question of transportation had first to be con
sidered, for the expeditions were not voyages of
discovery demanding vessels of light draft with
only accommodation for the crews and the neces
sary provisions. It was accordingly decided to
begin the construction of a new double fleet of seven
ships (Nat. Races, iii. 270) of the largest type.
Those were to be modelled after the pattern of the
large armed ships of Tharshish engaged in the trade
between Tyre and the Atlantic ports of Spain,
which were capable of weathering any storm and
carrying large and valuable cargoes. As neither

126 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

Phoenician or Jewish jurisdiction extended to the
Persian Gulf it was decided to use the two ports of
Eloth and Eziongeber on the Red Sea as dock
yards for the construction of the two fleets.
Solomon, taking the initiative, " made a navy of
Tharshish at Eziongeber, which is beside Eloth, on
the shore of the Red Sea, in the land of Edom.
And Hiram sent in the navy his servants, shipmen
that had knowledge of the sea, with the servants of
Solomon. And they came to Ophir, and fetched from
thence gold four hundred and twenty talents, and
brought it to King Solomon " (i Kings ix. 28). " For
the king's ships went to Tharshish with the servants
of Hiram : every three years once came the ships of
Tharshish bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes,
and peacocks " (2 Chron. ix. 21). " And the servants
also of Hiram and the servants of Solomon, which
brought gold from Ophir, brought algum trees and
precious stones " (2 Chron. ix. 10).

These accounts, it will be observed, differ some
what both with respect to the name of the destina
tion and the constituents of the cargoes. As a
result some writers have volunteered the opinion
that the co-partnership extended to the Mediter
ranean trade, but of this no evidence can be obtained
except such as may be derived from the name of the
type of craft employed in the expeditions or that
applied to the region for which the ships set out.

It is quite apparent that the expeditions did not
proceed to Spain, the western Tharshish, from a
Mediterranean port, for by reference to 2 Chronicles
xx. 36 it will be seen that the fleet of Jehoshaphat
which, it is expressly stated, 'sailed for this same
Tharshish, sailed likewise from the port of Ezion
geber on the Red Sea.

PHOENICIAN AND JEW 127

That the Ophir which supplied in such abund
ance the gold, ivory, apes, and peacocks of the text
(i Kings x. 22} was that of India and South Arabia
there can be no question. When, however, we ask
where was that Ophir which could be reached from
Eziongeber that provided silver in such abundance
that it became a drug in the Jewish markets and as
stones in the streets of Jerusalem (i Kings x. 27),
we are at once confronted by a problem that will
require very careful handling.

' Those who are acquainted with Asia/' says
Heeren in his Historical Research, " must be sur
prised at the quantity of silver which existed there
as early as the times of the Persian monarchy.
The tribute was collected in silver except in the
case of the Ethiopians and Indians, for silver,
though not so abundant as gold, was used for pur
poses of decoration. At the same time silver mines
were of much rarer occurrence in Asia than those
of gold, and the mountain districts where the metal
was found in greatest abundance is the western dis
trict of the Caucasus or the country of the Chalybees,
which is celebrated on this account by the author of
the Iliad, ii. 856, ' From Abybi remote whence comes
the silver ore/ The inhabitants of this district have
at all times engaged in mining, and many ages after,
when the Genoese were masters of the Black Sea, they
also opened silver mines of which traces still exist.

" Silver is also found in Siberia and in China or
South Asia, but the large annual importations of
the metal from Europe in consequence of the high
price it bore in the East sufficiently prove that it
was found there in small quantities. We may
therefore conclude with certainty that the greater
portion of the silver possessed of old by the Asiatic

128 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

nations was imported, and there can be no question
that the Phoenicians were the channel of impor
tation."

Testimony such as this from so reliable an
authority is extremely valuable. The Spanish
peninsula, being in this case clearly out of the
question when considered in connection with the
staple of the cargoes of these expeditions of Solomon
and Hiram, it will be necessary to carry our inves
tigation further afield if we would discover that
Ophir which produced this precious metal in such
abundance. As, however, the elucidation of so
complex a problem will necessarily occupy much
space it will be prudent to devote a chapter ex
clusively to it.

CHAPTER VI

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR

The Ophir of the Hebrews — Route pursued by Solomon and Hiram's
fleet — Evidence afforded by crew and cargo — Testimony of the
Scythians and Thracians — Evidences of Phoenician civilisation on
American mainland — Early civilisation of Central America not indi
genous — Votanic tradition and its significance — Nomenclature of
Pacific Islands as a clue — Polynesians of Eastern Mediterranean
origin.

THOUGH much has been written about the region
called Ophir, which was the ultimate destination
of the expeditions of Hiram and Solomon, the
amount of positive information is extremely small.
In this chapter an endeavour will be made to treat
the subject somewhat fully from an entirely new
point of view that offers, we believe, a complete
solution of the enigma.

The first historic reference to the name Ophir
is found in Genesis x. 29, which reads as follows :
" And Ophir and Havilah and Jobab ; all these were
sons of Joktan. And their dwelling was from
Mesha as thou goest unto Sephar a mount of the
east." This information is supplemented by
Josephus vi. 4, who says : rc Now Joktan one of
the sons of Heber had these sons, Ehnodad, Jaliph,
Asermoth, Jera, Adoram, Aziel, Desla, Abermail,
Sabeus, Ophir, Emilat, and Jobab, these inhabited
from Cophenand Indian River and parts adjoining it."

With this specific information respecting the
location of the territory inhabited by the descend
ants of Joktan, there is no difficulty in ascertaining

129

130 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

the position occupied by the region with which the
name Ophir in the Scripture narrative was originally
identified, for by reference to any atlas of ancient
geography it will be seen that the Cophen has its
rise in Bactriana and joins the river Indus just
south of Pencelaotis in India. The original settle
ment going by that name must clearly, therefore,
have embraced the territory lying between Bac
triana and the Indian Ocean.

From the Jewish point of view, with which we
are at present more particularly concerned, the
name Ophir may safely be viewed not as a par
ticular place but as the general name for the rich
southern countries lying on the African, Arabian,
and Indian coasts which found their common
centre of commercial exchange in the provinces of
Hydramaut and Yemen in Southern Arabia. This
view is by no means an arbitrary one. It will be
found to have no small support in a consideration of
what was said in earlier chapters on the channels
of commerce in connection with the caravan trade
of the Arabian Peninsula.

The distance from Yemen to Petra, the northern
emporium for Arabian staples from which the
caravans debouched to Jerusalem and Tyre, was
1260 geographical miles, and as the daily rate
of travelling for a caravan was 18 miles the
entire journey occupied seventy days. If allow
ance is made for the journey from Petra to Tyre or
Jerusalem with the necessary stoppages the return
journey from Tyre or Jerusalem to Yemen could
comfortably be made by caravan in from eight to
nine months (Hist. Res., i. 356).

The other route from South Arabia ran from
Hydramaut, the adjoining province to Yemen, by

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 131

a direct course through the desert to Gerrha on the
north-west coast of the Persian Gulf. This was
only a distance of 700 miles, and could be covered
at the same rate of travel in forty days, but as
Gerrha was much farther distant from Tyre or
Jerusalem than Petra, the total length of the journey
from either of the South Arabian provinces was to
some extent equalised, and the journey by either
route in consequence easily accomplished in the
time mentioned.

It should, therefore, be clear that it was not with
a view to a better control of the Yemen-Ophir trade
that these astute monarchs, Solomon and Hiram,
created the costly fleet of large armed ships of
Tharshish, for, according to the Scripture narra
tive (2 Chron. ix. 21), the fastest time in which the
vessels could make the return journey was three
years.

Ophir, then, as far as it relates to India, Arabia,
or Ethiopia is clearly out of the question. This
view receives the strongest confirmative support
in the significant fact that, according to the Scrip
ture narrative (2 Chron. ix. 20, 21), silver was a part
of the return cargoes which, as has been shown,
could not have been obtained in Southern Asia in
such quantities as to account for the extraordinary
reversal of the values of the precious metal as
obtained in Arabia.

According to Agatharchides (cf. Bochart, p. 139)
silver was so scarce in the Arabian Peninsula that
it was assessed at ten times the value of gold, which
was there in such abundance that the Midianites,
one of the carrying tribes that had grown exceed
ingly wealthy, were accustomed to make of gold
their own articles of personal adornment, even their

132 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

collars, and the chains of their camels were also
made of gold (Judges viii. 26).

Silver again during the Solomonic period became
as common as stones in Jerusalem. Clearly, then,
Ophir of the Scripture narrative must be looked for
in the farther East, and in a territory that was not
only capable of supplying silver in practically un
limited quantities, but of affording conclusive evi
dence of occupancy by the Jews and Phoenicians.

While we do not possess the same specific in
formation with respect to the naval operations of
the Phoenicians on the eastern that we do on the
western side, it by no means follows that movements
equal in importance were not in operation on the
Red Sea and Persian Gulf.

The control of the South Arabian markets could
not have been the sole object of the expeditions of
Hiram and Solomon, for if three years were neces
sarily consumed in these short coasting voyages of
not more than 2500 miles from Eziongeber to
Yemen and back, as this view suggests (2 Chron.
ix. 21), the cost of the ships, the expense of working
them, interest on capital invested over so long a
period, and the necessary deterioration of the
cargoes in such a climate would have much more
than counterbalanced any advantage gained by
sea transport. Moreover, the silver, on which the
Scripture narrative lays great emphasis, could not
have been obtained there.

On the other hand, it seems scarcely possible
that expeditions to so near a region as Yemen could
have awakened such enthusiasm in their prosecu
tion as to have taken Solomon and his court (in all
probability accompanied by Hiram) from the
security of their capital into the heart of a dis-

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 133

affected country to witness the departure of the
ships and their crews (2 Chron. viii. 17).

Although no information seems to have reached
the outside world relative to the proposed destina
tion of the fleets, there can be no doubt that Solo
mon and Hiram and those in command of the ex
peditions were in possession of information of a
very definite character, both with respect to the
destination and the route thither (i Kings ix. 27).
But this was clearly no part of their policy to
divulge. If, therefore, we desire a more intimate
knowledge respecting the destination of these fleets
we must look for it to some other and less direct
source.

Some light can without doubt be obtained by a
consideration of the constituents of the cargoes
carried by the ships on the return voyages, likewise
by a consideration of the class and nationality of
the men who manned the great ships of Tharshish
employed on these longer voyages, for, as we have
already shown, Phoenicia could never have supplied
a tithe of the population necessary to the equip
ment of their mercantile, manufacturing, and
colonial enterprises. The presence, therefore, of
this composite nationality may enable us to trace
the route pursued and the destination arrived at
with even more defmiteness than is possible by any
other method.

That portion of the Scythian nation which
certainly hired itself out as a mercenary force and
entered the service of the Phoenicians belonged to
the royal tribe who thought it derogatory to be
employed either in mercantile or agricultural pur
suits. According to Herodotus (iv. 5) the nation
claimed to be autochthonous and to be descended

134 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

from Targitaus, who lived 1500 B.C. on the banks
of the Dneiper. This account of their origin can
scarcely be received at its face value.

Nevertheless it is difficult to place the Scythians
in the category of nations, for the description of
them given by Hippocrates has led many writers
to suppose that they were of Mongolian extraction.
But this supposition cannot be reconciled with the
fact that all the Scythian deities had an apparent
Aryan origin, their language likewise supporting
the view that they were Aryans. Their highest
deity was Tabiti, the goddess of the hearth. Next
in importance came Papeus, the god of heaven, with
his wife, Apia, the earth, and after these Apollo,
Venus, Urania, Hercules, and Mars (Her. iv. 59).
It is advisable that the names of these deities be
remembered, because they play a very important
part in enabling us to trace the course pursued by
the ships composing the expeditions to the farther
East.

The whole Scythian nation was peculiarly tena
cious of its customs, and studiously avoided employ
ing foreign peoples. They not only killed two of
their kings for the adoption of foreign customs but,
on this account, erased their names from the tablets
of the nation. Some of the Scythian customs were
of the most extraordinary character, and provide
an infallible means of tracing the course of these
expeditions not only in the Pacific but on the
American Continent.

The Scythians always fought on horseback.
In the use of the bow and arrow they were the most
expert nation of antiquity. The foeman drank the
blood of the first enemy he slew in battle, believing
that the prowess of his adversary was in this way

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 135

transferred to himself. It was obligatory, too, that
the warrior should present the heads of the slain to
the king, otherwise he would not be permitted to
share in the booty. The heads thus secured were
scalped by making a circular incision round the
ears and shaking the skin loose from the skull ;
and he was accounted the most valiant warrior who
had the greatest number of these scalps hanging
from his saddle.

Among the Issedones, another branch of the
nation, when a man's father died the relations
brought cattle, and, having slaughtered them, they
cut up the flesh of the dead parent and, having
mingled all together, they prepared a banquet at
which the skull, which meantime had been cleansed
and gilded, presided, under the supposition that it
was the habitation of the spirit of the deceased
parent. Henceforth it was preserved as a sacred
memorial, annual sacrifices being performed to it
(Her. iv. 26).

The Scythians did not bathe the body in water,
but when they desired to become clean had recourse
to a unique substitute, which was the undoubted
origin of the Turkish bath. Throughout the region
occupied by them there grew a species of hemp of
the nettle tribe similar to that from which the
eastern hasheesh is extracted, and this they em
ployed in the production of their vapour bath.
Having thoroughly washed and dried the head,
they set up three pieces of wood leaning against
each other in the form of a triangle, round which
were wrapped woollen cloths closely joined together.
They then placed in the centre of the space so en
closed a vessel into which red-hot stones were thrown,
then, taking in their hands some seed of the hemp

136 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

plant, they crept under the woollen cloths, and,
scattering the seed upon the hot stones, at once
produced a steam bath and a hasheesh intoxication
whose intensity was regulated by the number of
stones and the quantity of seed used.

Another populous section of the nation, the
Budini, painted the body a deep blue and red,
especially in war, and the Neuri, who seem clearly
enough from their practice of totemism to have
been of Aryan extraction, had the reputation
among the Greeks of being magicians, because once
a year they assumed the form of the wolf, their
tribal token, after which they returned to their
normal state (Her. iv. 105). The Androphaghi,
who were Nomads and spoke a language peculiar
to themselves, were, like the Lystrigians of Sicily,
actual cannibals, and feasted on any hapless wretch
whom they could get into their power (Her. iv. 106).

In spite, however, of these racial peculiarities,
the Scythians as a people were held in the highest
esteem among the ancients. They practised a species
of literal communism, holding all things in common,
even their wives and children, these being made a
common charge on the community who cared for
their welfare. By Homer and Strabo they were
described as the justest of mankind, being more
sincere, frugal, and self-denying in their habits than
any other of the ancient peoples. They had like
wise invincible courage.

After the death of Scylas, who seems to have
been slain shortly before the visit of Herodotus to
Obja (Her. iv. 78), a great deterioration seems to
have taken place among the Scythians in conse
quence of their association with the outside world,
Phoenicia, on account of the wide range of its

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 137

operations, apparently being the predominating
cause, for large numbers of Scythians appear to
have been employed on the Phoenician fleets either
in the capacity of marines or seamen.

There has been considerable discussion as to
whether the Scythians were a small or a numerous
people, but the testimony both of Herodotus (i. 104)
and Strabo (B. I., ii. 28) is quite explicit. During
many centuries they seem indeed to have been one
of the most powerful nations in Southern Europe.
They invaded Media, where they gained a great
victory, after which they overran Asia, which they
held in complete subjection for twenty-eight years,
from 636 to 606 B.C.

According to the Scythian tradition (Her. iv. 10)
their kings were descended from Scythes, the son
of Hercules and Queen Hylea. As the story of this
association provides another valuable link in the
chain of evidence connecting the Eastern Medi
terranean with the Pacific we will briefly refer to it.

According to this story Hercules, after the re
storation to him of his lost mares by Queen Hylaea,
desired to return to Erythraia, his native land, and
Hylaea, at last consenting, asked whether, when
their three sons were grown up, she should establish
them in the land over which she ruled or send them
to him. Hercules is said to have replied : " When
you see the children arrived at the age of men you
can make no mistake if you follow this course.
Whoever is able to gird himself with this girdle and
bend the bow of Hercules retain him as an inhabi
tant of this country, but whoever is unable to fulfil
these tasks dismiss him." Then, having drawn out
the bow as a test of strength, he gave it to her,
likewise the belt. When the young men had

138 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

arrived at maturity Hylaea enforced what Hercules
had enjoined. Two of her sons, Agathrysis and
Gelonis, being unable to accomplish the feat, were
driven out of the country, but Scythes, having proved
himself equal to the task, remained and succeeded
his mother. The succeeding kings of the Scythians
were thus descended from Scythes the son of
Hercules and Hylaea (Her. iv. 10).

The Thracians, who occupied the territory ad
joining the Scythians, were not only of the same
Indo-European stock but likewise accustomed to
hire themselves out as mercenaries. They, too,
seem to have drifted into the employment of the
Phoenicians as seamen and marines. Famous as
swordsmen and javelin throwers, the Thracians were
one of the greatest nations in Southern Europe.
According to Herodotus (v. 3), if they had been
governed by one man and had at any time acted
in concert they would have been invincible. Like
the Scythians they had some peculiar customs,
which are noteworthy because of their having been
found in regions very remote from Thracia.

Among the Thracians tattooing was regarded as
a mark of noble birth. Again, in the equipment of
the mercenary forces the use of the sling was a
prominent feature. No fewer than two thousand
slingmen were employed by Xerxes in his campaigns.
Flint arrow heads were another distinguishing feature,
these being used not only in the chase but in war.

Before proceeding further there is still one point
to be noted which will be found of great value in
arriving at a final elucidation of our problem ; we
refer to the almost universal practice of naming
new abodes after former homes or religious beliefs
and experiences. We lay great stress on the evi-

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 139

dence of this custom, for it practically affords an
outline of the route pursued by the ships of Hiram
and Solomon.

The enterprise of the Phoenicians during the
period 1050 B.C. was so extraordinary that it seems
scarcely possible to overrate it. Tyre was then in
the ascendant and Phoenicia at the summit of its
glory, the business establishments of the nation
stretching not only from the shores of Norway and
Britain to Tyre but likewise from the Red Sea to
India and the Golden Chersonese.

What need was there, then, for the creation of a
new and double fleet of vessels of the largest tonnage
and the Tharshish model to pursue a course or engage
in a trade already prosecuted in a satisfactory
manner by caravan or ship ? Why employ the wise
men of Tyre in the navigation of a course with which
they were already intimately familiar ?

If we take up a map of the world we will probably
receive some valuable light as to the course pur
sued and the destination of the fleets of Hiram and
Solomon. By drawing a line from the ^Elantic
Gulf of the Red Sea to the Straits of Babelmandeb,
and from that point passing it round the coast of
Arabia into the Persian Gulf, thence continuing it
along the west side to the Bahrein Islands to the
mouth of the Euphrates, and thence down the east
side of India to Ceylon and the Golden Chersonese,
we have before us the well- authenticated track of
Phoenician sea commerce. But if we continue the
line to Java and Sumatra we will have reached the
native home of the peacock. Proceeding still
farther by Torres Straits we pass into the Pacific,
to the Caroline Islands, Tonga, Samoa, Rappa, and
Tahiti, thence to Easter Island, connecting Tahiti

140 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

with the coasts of America at Mexico and Peru.
By so doing we will have located a series of islands
and points on the American mainland which contain
not only substructions of the Phoenician type but
traditions for the presence of which no satisfactory
explanation has so far been offered. Moreover,
these give evidence of occupancy by a civilised
people of that curiously composite type which was
the very remarkable feature of the personnel of the
expeditions of Hiram and Solomon.

If we select the more northern route, connecting
Samoa and Tahiti with the American Continent,
and enter Mexico from the Pacific side, we are im
mediately confronted by evidence of an even more
startling nature. Here are to be seen buildings, of
a character so ancient that the date of their erection
cannot be even approximately arrived at, yet in
which the predominant features are wholly Phoe
nician. Here may be seen the wall referred to by
Renan, likewise the composite decoration contain
ing unmistakable traces of Greek, Egyptian, and
Assyrian types, and overlaid by that serpent sym
bolism which was peculiar to Phoenicia. Of all
these we have an impressive reminder in the first
foundations at Nachan, whose designation was
clearly enough derived from Nashon, the family
name of Solomon, the principal partner in these
joint expeditions.

After even a cursory examination of the evidence
afforded by these substructions the question may
well be asked, What navigating power of antiquity
but Phoenicia was capable of making such a voyage
as the discovery of America involved, or possessed
such a commercial and manufacturing association
with Greece, Egypt, and Assyria as would induce

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 141

it in other lands and among new surroundings to
reproduce these artistic types ?

It has been already shown that for long centuries
the Phoenicians were the only people who had a
continuous and uninterrupted traffic with the large
centres of civilisation in the East, in consequence of
which they carried to the shores and islands of the
Mediterranean, that there were subject to their
commercial enterprise, types that were not peculiarly
Phoenician, but the riper fruits of the older civilisa
tions. We would scarcely expect to find much
similarity between Greek and Egyptian art for the
reason that the intercourse between the two coun
tries, especially during the Greek formative period,
was too casual. But from our knowledge of the
very intimate character of the association that
existed between both of these nations and Baby
lonia and Phoenicia we are warranted in expecting
very clear evidence of the influence of all three on
Phoenician remains, especially when we remember
that the manufacturers of Phoenicia were mainly
employed through long centuries in catering for
these markets.

Now it is very significant of the source of the
inspiration which was at work in the production of
the types found in early American art and archi
tecture, that we find present in these remains traces
of that composite design that we would naturally
expect to find in Phoenician remains where the re
strictions of a local market and a peculiar need
were withdrawn and the artist and artisan had a
free hand to follow their own peculiar bias. Nor
will we ever be able to account for the conglomerate
types found in the civilisation of the New World
unless we can account for the presence of Phoenicia

142 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

there, because there was no other nation around
whose national life there revolved those conditions
out of which such types as are found there could
have been evolved. To suppose that such a com
bination of old world units as are found on the
Central American ruins are simply the result of the
evolution of an autochthonic people who never were
in touch with the old world centres of civilisation
is, on the face of it, absurd.

It is possible that the Old World may originally
have been peopled from the New ; but the facts in
our possession point in a wholly different direction.
It is to the Asiatic continent that we must look for
such evidence as exists for the origin of the civilisa
tion that from a very remote period inhabited the
central portions of America. Humboldt has pointed
out (Exam. Crit. ii. 68) that the monuments, methods
of computing time, systems of cosmogony, and many
other myths of America offer striking analogies with
the ideas of Eastern Asia, analogies which indicate
an ancient communication and are not simply the
result of that uniform condition in which all nations
are found in the dawn of civilisation. Prescott's
(Mexico, iii. 418) conclusions are equally to the
point. " The coincidences/' he says, " are suffi
ciently strong to authorise a belief that the civilisa
tion of Anahuac (the territory in which Nachan is
situated) was in some degree influenced by that of
Eastern Asia, and, secondly, that the discrepancies are
of such a nature as to carry back this communica
tion to a very early period, a period so remote that
the foreign influence has been too feeble to inter
fere materially with what may be regarded in its
essential features as an indigenous civilisation."

" Even after making every allowance/' says

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 143

Gallatin (Amer. Eth. Soc. Trans., i. 179), " I cannot
see any possible reason that should have prevented
those who, after the dispersion of mankind, moved
towards the east and north-east, from having
reached the extremities of Asia and passed over to
America within five hundred years after the Flood.
However small may have been the number of these
first emigrants, an equal number of years would
have been more than sufficient to occupy in their
own way every part of America/' " Indeed/'
remarks Naidullse, " between the men of the New
World and those of the Old there exists no essential
physical difference, the unity of the human race
standing out as the one great law dominating the
history of humanity."

In view of these facts it is somewhat startling to
find that the written records of the early civilised
nations of the American nation explicitly and
emphatically declare that their civilisation was not
indigenous but imported and of foreign origin. The
Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg, an authority second
to no other on the early history of the American
civilised states, says that he found in the native
documents referring to the Votanic period, translated
by him, that two strangers named Igh and Imox,
who hold the first place in the Izendal calendar,
came to the continent by ship from some foreign
land, and that Igh founded the first colony.

These expeditions of Igh and Imox, preceding
those of Votan, explain satisfactorily the source
through which the startling intelligence of the new
discoveries in the farther East reached the Persian
Gulf colonies. They also explain the transmission
of the news to Tyre with a view to securing vessels
of larger tonnage for the prosecution of the enter-

I44 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

prises which resulted in the commercial partnership
between Solomon and Hiram, and the building of
the two fleets at Eziongeber with a view to the
exploitation of the territory.

That this is no merely gratuitous assumption
will be made evident from a consideration of addi
tional facts which we will present later, for whatever
value we may attach to the details of these tradi
tions transmitted to us by the native records, there
can be no doubt that they established two general
propositions, namely, that there existed in the re
mote past in the Usumacinta region of Central
America a great and powerful empire of which
Nachan — the city of serpents — was the capital,
and, second, that there was a general belief among
the residents of that kingdom that its beginnings
and greatness were due to a hero or demi-god called
Votan, who, following in the footsteps of Igh and.
Imox, claimed to have come from Vitim or Chittim,
and that he arrived on the Pacific coasts accompanied
by seven ships about 1000 B.C., or just at the time
when the joint expeditions of Hiram and Solomon
proceeded from the head of the Red Sea to Ophir,
a destination that so far has not been satisfactorily
determined, although sufficiently distant to necessi
tate a voyage of three years.

It will be prudent, therefore, to keep these im
portant facts prominently before us and at the same
time to remember that while the expeditions were
under Jewish and Phoenician direction, they carried
crews and marine force of composite nationality,
for the strongest evidence of the presence of these
expeditions over any portion of the route laid down,
either in the Pacific Islands or on the American
Continent, will be found not in the traces of one

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 145

surviving type so much as in the presence of a
composite civilisation revealing the racial char
acteristics produced by an amalgamation of these
various peoples.

It would be contrary to the manifest teaching of
history to suppose that four such nations as those
of the Jews, Phoenicians, Scythians, and Thracians,
who at that period dominated Western Asia and
Eastern Europe, nations who possessed such pro
nouncedly racial characteristics, could even for a
short space of time conjointly occupy any virgin
territory without leaving behind them ineffaceable
traces of their presence. Much, therefore, may
reasonably be expected from a careful examination
of the evidences still remaining of their presence in
these regions.

That some very remarkable developments had
taken place in the farther East during this period
whose value to Phoenicia was great in consequence
of the loss of the territory on the Eastern Medi
terranean, through Greek aggression, is evident, for
the Phoenicians had just then made overtures to
the monarch of the adjoining kingdom of Israel for
joint commercial expeditions into that region. The
inducements must indeed have been of an extra
ordinary character since it led the Jews to partici
pate in enterprises contrary to all their antecedents.

At the same time it must be recollected that in
thus projecting these expeditions the Phoenicians
in very large measure only took more definite
possession of a previously well-established trade
that for centuries had been successfully handled
by other means. So far as the Arabian and Persian
Gulf, the Indian Ocean, and the Golden Chersonese
were concerned, it was not a voyage of discovery.

K

146 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

That the expeditions pushed into regions much more
distant than these is, however, apparent from the
three years consumed in the double voyage. Yet
it is evident that their course must have been in the
general direction of the Farther East, for the pea
cocks could only have come from Java or Sumatra.
Pushing at once, therefore, beyond Torres Straits
into the Pacific and proceeding to Samoa, we will
receive some information of a rather startling char
acter with respect to the course of these expeditions.

The native name of these islands is not Samoa,
but Samo, no other pronunciation of the word
ever being used by the natives of the group from
the time of their discovery by Bougainville. Now
this was the native name of Samos of the Sporades
on the coasts of Asia Minor (Pliny, v. 37), which was
one of the Phoenician colonies. The name Samo,
according to the same authority, means a mountain
height by the sea, and was, therefore, indicative
of the natural features of the island. Again, there
is a remarkable analogy, the name applying with
equal aptness to the Samo of the Pacific, which are
regularly denominated " high islands " by modern
navigators to distinguish them from the low islands
or coral atols by which they are surrounded for
hundreds of miles in every direction.

Again the principal island in the Samoan group
is named Upola, which it will be seen is the equiva
lent of the Scythian deity Apollo, and the chief
town on the island Apia, which was the name of
the Scythian deity, the Earth (Her. iv. 59), and like
wise the name of the Peloponnesus (Strabo, i. 493)
before the advent of Pelops, from which the Phoe
nicians shortly before had been driven by the
Hellenic invasion.

THE WHEREABOUTS OF OPHIR 147

If we now leave Samoa and proceed to the
Society group, which was apparently the next
stopping place of the fleets, we are at once con
fronted by evidence equally significant.

The name usually written Tahiti is the same
as Tahiti, the Scythian Vista (Her. iv. 59). The
native pronunciation of the word makes this quite
clear, for if we cut out or make mute the disputable
consonants " b " and " h " which distinguish the
words it will be found that both names spell and
sound Taiti, which, curiously enough, is the only
form in which the name is pronounced by the
natives of the Society group to-day, and is the same
as that reported by Bougainville on his discovery
of them (Ency. Brit., xxiii. 22). The first and
principal settlement erected on this group of islands,
situated like Apia at the main opening of the
lagoon, is Papeete, which is only a slightly
modified form of the name of the Scythian Jupiter
or father, Papeus ; while separated from Papeete
by a narrow strait lies the island of Mona, so
named from a portion of the Greek Peloponnesus
or Apia.

From a review of these data it would seem that
the Phoenicians pursued in the Pacific the same
policy as was followed in the Mediterranean by
establishing stations or colonies for the ships to
call at on these long voyages. Moreover, it seems
clear that these settlements were placed under the
care of reliable superintendents or governors, drawn
from the Scythians of the marine corps, for practi
cally all the names to which we have called atten
tion were clearly drawn from this source. Apart
from their association with the Phoenicians as marines
on their ships (Her. vii. 96) there are no historic

148 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

facts that will explain the presence of the Scythians
in the heart of the Pacific.

Here, then, in these Pacific Islands was found
people clearly of Eastern Mediterranean origin
whose skill in building and handling their primitive
craft won from Bougainville, on his discovery of
them, the name " les iles des navigateurs " — a
people so skilful in naval affairs that the unanimous
voice of the scientific world declares that they
penetrated to all the islands of the Pacific from
Hawaii to New Zealand and from Tonga to Tahiti ;
a people whose numeric skill, astronomical know
ledge, cosmogony, and religious system were plainly
Phoenician. Their traditions of the creation of the
first man and his wife from the red earth, of the
Flood, and of the sun being commanded to stand
still, along with their practices, circumcision, and
test of virginity, were clearly Jewish. Their tattoo
ing and spear and javelin throwing were as clearly
Thracian, as their nomenclature of islands and
towns, their cannibalism, their use of the bow and
arrow as a test of strength, and their worship of
the skulls of ancestors were peculiarly Scythian.
Moreover, their implements of war and their festivals
and games, as a means of training for the exigencies
of war, were the same as those of the nations of the
Eastern Mediterranean. It will, therefore, be seen
that we are in possession of a series of facts and a
clue leading to a solution of our enigma. The
presence in combination of four such races in mid-
Pacific as Jew, Phoenician, Scythian, and Thracian
cannot be accounted for unless through the instru
mentality of the historic expeditions of Hiram and
Solomon.

CHAPTER VII

HEBREW, PHOENICIAN, SCYTHIAN, AND THRACIAN
IN THE PACIFIC

Samoan traditions, beliefs, and usages — Their Phcenicio-Hebraic source
— Phoenician source of the Tahitian religious cult.

DESCRIBING the physical characteristics of the
Phoenician people in his scholarly work, The Story
of Phoenicia, Mr. George Rawlinson says : " They
were of a complexion intermediate between the
pale faces of the north and the swart inhabitants
of the south, having abundant hair, sometimes
curly but never woolly. They were about the
medium height and had features not unlike the
Aryans or Caucasians, but sometimes less refined
and regular, the nose broadish and inclined to be
hooked, the lips a little too full, and the frames
inclined to stoutness and massiveness, while both in
form and feature they resembled the Jews, who were
their near neighbours, and not infrequently inter
married with them/'

It would be impossible to spend even a short
time in Samoa without coming to realise how apt
such a description is when applied not only to the
Samoans but to all the more intimately related
portions of the Polynesian race. Each day's obser
vation of the people and their habits and customs
would only deepen the conviction of the observer

that he was in contact with a race whose traditions,

149

150 THE PHCENIC1ANS AND AMERICA

beliefs, and usages could only have been derived
from Phoenicio-Jewish sources.

The only point in Mr. Rawlinson's delineation
in which there is any weakness is the nose ; and
this is easily accounted for by a peculiar custom
which prevails universally in the islands of the
Central Pacific of manipulating the cartilages while
the child is still very young, so that the disfigure
ment of the " canoe nose," as they call it, of the
Semitic may be removed. This custom is so uni
versal that when omitted, even after long centuries
of isolation, as is sometimes done in the case of the
long sickness or death of a mother, the retention
of the nasal feature of the Semitic invariably earns
for the individual so disfigured the name of " Native
Jew."

Marriage, too, is hedged about with restrictions
which clearly are either derived from the Jewish
law of consanguinity or denned according to Phoe
nician, or, perhaps, to speak more correctly, Aryan
Totemism. Again, the intensely spiritual ideas of
the Deity possessed by the islanders and the marked
presence of the Totemic institutions afford further
evidence of a connection that at some remote
period must have existed between the regions of
the Central Pacific and the Eastern Mediterranean.

As would naturally be expected from the very
long period that has elapsed since the date of the
first settlements many other types of people are
found in the Pacific ; this, however, does not weaken
but rather strengthens the weight of such evidence
as has survived of the presence of the composite
nationality of the fleets of Hiram and Solomon
found in this region. There can be no question
that a high type of civilisation of apparently identical

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 151

origin prevailed at some possibly remote period
throughout Central Polynesia. No one who is
familiar with the Samoan language, comprised of
only sixteen letters, which are apparently the same
as carried by Cadmus into Greece (Her. v. 88), is
acquainted with the native usages or the stone
remains to be seen on Rappa, Easter, Ascension,
Gilbert, Marshall, Samoan, Hawaiian, and Society
Islands, can for a moment doubt its origin.

The relation of Strongs Island to this aspect of
our research is peculiarly interesting. At the en
trance to the main harbour are to be seen a quad
rangular tower and some stone-lined canals, while
on the adjacent island of Lele may be observed
cyclopean walls formed of very large and well-
squared stones. These walls are twelve feet thick,
and in them are vaults and secret passages, all the
work of a stone-building people. The startling
feature about this island, however, is not the
masonry so much as a native tradition, which says
" That an ancient city once stood round this harbour
which was occupied by a powerful people called
Anut, who had large vessels in which they made
long voyages, many moons being required in their
prosecution."

Turning eastward and entering Mexico at the
line already indicated we are at once confronted by
the presence of the composite nationality intensified
a thousandfold, for there we find not only the
evidence of a stone-building people, but architectural
remains which bear these conglomerate decorations
so peculiar to the bent of the Phoenician genius.
Here also are to be found some essential portions
of the Jewish Levitical code, the system of regal
succession in use among the Jews at the time of

152 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

Solomon, the nomadic life, steam bathing, scalping,
and cannibalism of the Scythians, the tattooing,
and the use of buckskins and moccasins, and the
lasso common to the Thracians (Her. vii. 75).

On the bronzes, also, are to be seen the winged
disc of Egypt and Phoenicia. More amazing still
is the calendar stone or Piedra de Agua, or water
stone, preserved in the walls of the cathedral in the
ancient and capital city of Mexico. As we have
before referred to this memorial nothing more need
be said, save that one may see at a glance that it
is a national monument of a seafaring people in the
form of a mariner's compass, to the invention or dis
covery of which they clearly enough seem to have
attributed the discovery of the New World.

We have already shown that of all the islands
constituting the group called Sporades that lie off
the coasts of Asia Minor, Samos, throughout an
tiquity, was most famous. Under the enlightened
though tyrannical rule of Polycrates it became the
chief of all the Hellenic cities, and was adorned with
some of the greatest public works ever executed by
the Greeks.

Samos was likewise the great naval emporium
of the Ionic fleet and the port from which Colacus
sailed on his memorable voyage in the first Greek
ship that penetrated beyond the pillars of Hercules
to the Phoenician port of Gades.

The transference of the name Samos or Samo of
the Sporades from the Mediterranean to the Pacific,
with the very unusual pronunciation of the word,
was no mere coincidence but a simple and natural
evolution of certain well-determined historic events.
In the long journey from Asiatic coasts to those of
the New World a harbour to which the ships could

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 153

run in times of stress, or at which repairs could be
made, or water and provisions secured, would be
absolutely necessary. In the Samoan group, then,
on the direct line of these voyages they discovered
a place affording the best natural harbours in the
Pacific. So in this sea, studded in every direction
with verdant palm and crowned coral atols, these
hardy pioneers of civilisation found a group of
islands whose lofty summits, densely wooded crests,
verdant foot-hills, and commodious natural harbours
reminded them of home. The perfumed zephyrs
that blew over Samoa were sweet as those of "Araby
the Blest." Its wooded shores were washed by seas
that rivalled in azure beauty the tideless Aegean,
and must have carried them in memory to the
Mediterranean, to Tyre, to Chittim, to Samos.
Need there be wonder, then, that some of those
disembarking here to form the nucleus of a colony
where the fleets might call on their outward or their
homeward journey, should name it after the fair
home on the Aegean from which they had been so
lately severed ?

The navigation of the Atlantic in the latitudes
parallel to Gades and the pillars of Hercules is of
a wholly different character from that of the Pacific
from Torres Straits to Samoa and the Pacific shores
of the American Continent. The Atlantic is a
stormy sea, offering no shelter, whereas the Pacific,
especially on the route of these voyages, is nowhere
so destitute of islands as to prevent it from being
regarded, like the Indian Ocean, as an inhabited
sea, a view, curiously enough, that is clearly in
consonance with the American Votanic tradition,
which correctly and beautifully describes this route
across the Pacific as the " island-strewn laguna de

154 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

terminos/' or island-strewn lake at the end of the
world (Nat. Races, iii. 45).

This description, moreover, makes it clear that
the tradition was founded on positive information
supplied by those who were familiar with the
navigation of the Pacific and with the islands which
studded its surface on the journey from Eziongeber
to Mexico. Reference has already been made to
Strabo's remarks relative to the Sidonian-Phcenician
skill in the use of arithmetic and astronomy in their
commerce and :n navigating their ships by night.
In his view this set them apart from all nations of
the ancient world. Now it is a rather interesting
fact that it is through the possession of this know
ledge that we are able to forge two of the links of
the chain of evidence that connects the Polynesians
with the Eastern Mediterranean.

Mr. William Ellis, for many years the repre
sentative of the London Missionary Society in the
Society Islands, writing of the state of society as
he found it there on his arrival, says in his pains
taking and scholarly work, Polynesian Research,
(vol. ii. 422), " The acquaintance of the Society
Islanders with, and their extensive use of, numbers
is surprising. They did not reckon by forties after
the manner of the Sandwich Islanders, but by a
declined method of calculation. They had no
higher numbers than millions ; they could, however,
by combinations, enumerate with facility tens,
hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, or hun
dreds of thousands of millions. The precision,
regularity, and extent of their numbers has often
astonished me, and how a people having, compara
tively speaking, but little necessity to use calcu
lation and being destitute of a knowledge of figures,

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 155

should have originated and matured such a system
is in itself wonderful, and appears more than any
other fact to favour the opinion that the islands
were peopled from a country whose inhabitants
were highly civilised."

The natives of most of these islands, adults and
children alike, appear to be remarkably fond of
figures and calculation, and receive the elements
of arithmetic with great facility and seeming delight,
and many of their numerals are precisely the same
as those used by the people of the Asiatic Islands
and also on the remote and populous island of
Madagascar.

This testimony, coming from an independent
and reliable source before the islands were invaded
by the outside world, is extremely valuable, be
cause it provides such information as is absolutely
necessary to the solution of our enigma. Mr.
Ellis's only object in reporting his observations, was
a desire to communicate to Christian communities
who had undertaken the financial responsibility of
this great work of uplifting the dark places of the
earth, correct information with respect to the
actual conditions that confronted those to whom
the active work was entrusted. It is necessary to
make this clear, as we shall have to rely much
on the report of Mr. Ellis in our further inves
tigation.

The astronomical correspondence between the
Society Islands and the Eastern Mediterranean is
even more striking. To the ancients, but especially
to the seafaring Phoenicians, some method of de
termining the season of safe navigation was im
perative, and this, as we have shown, they secured
by means of their astronomical observations. The

156 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

group of stars known to the Greeks as the Pleiades
was found to furnish just such an infallible guide as
they required ; the date of their rising and setting
agreeing respectively with the beginning and end of
the season during which navigation was found to be
safe. It is more than probable that the first obser
vation of the value of this group was made by the
Phoenicians, and that through them valuable astrono
mical and navigating knowledge was communicated
to the Egyptians and Jews. Josephus, in one of
his few references to astronomical phenomena, em
ploys the setting of the Pleiades to mark a date,
and the reference in Job xxxviii. 31 : " Canst thou
bind the cluster of the Pleiades or loose the bands
of Orion ? " has undoubted reference to the rise and
overflow of the Nile, which was heralded each year
by the heliacal rising of Sirius on the day of the
summer solstice. Mr. Ellis, in writing of the astro
nomical knowledge of the Society Islanders, calls
particular attention to the similarity of the names
of some of the stars and groups and the use to which
this knowledge was applied in the early centres of
civilisation in the old world and Polynesia, as in
dicating an early communication between these two
widely separated regions of the world. He says
(vol. iii. 167) : " The natives of the islands were
also accustomed in some degree to notice the appear
ance and position of the stars especially at sea.
These were their only guides when steering their
fragile barks across the deep. When setting out
on a voyage some particular star or constellation
was selected as their guide during the night. This
they called their aveia, and by this name they now
designate the compass, because it answers the same
purpose. The Pleiades were a favourite aveia, and

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 157

by this we now steered on the present voyage during
the night."

Interesting as the connection is, it does not by
any means exhaust the evidence available for proof
of a Mediterranean origin for the Polynesian.
Polynesians possessed two traditions of exclusively
Jewish and Phoenician origin associated with the
sun. These are recorded by Mr. Ellis as a portion
of the Tahitean folklore, which are so closely identical
in form with those of the sources from which they
were drawn, that it is impossible to conceive of them
reaching the islands of Central Polynesia except at
first hand from Phoenicia and Palestine ; and this
the more so that one of them refers to a historic
event of the first importance in Jewish history
which took place only 400 years before the date of
these expeditions.

In Joshua x. 12-14 it is written : " And Joshua
said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still
upon Gibeon ; and thou Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.
Aiid the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until
the people had avenged themselves upon their
enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher ?
So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and
hasted not to go down about a whole day. And
there was no day like that before or after it, that the
Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man ; for the
Lord fought for Israel/'

The Society Island tradition which corresponds to
this is, as might be expected after the lapse of nearly
thirty centuries, much garbled ; still, in its essential
features, its identity with the Jewish original is
most striking.

" One of the singular traditions respecting the
sun/' says Mr. Ellis (vol. iii. 170), " deserves special

158 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

attention from the analogy which it presents to a
fact recorded in Jewish history. It is related that
Mani, an ancient priest or chieftain, was building a
marae or temple which it was necessary to finish
before the close of day, but perceiving that the
sun was declining and that it was likely to sink
before it was finished, he seized it by its rays and
bound them by a cord to the marae or an adjacent
tree and then proceeded with his work till the
marae was completed, the sun remaining stationary
during the whole period/' Mr. Ellis adds : ' I
refrain from all comment on the singular tradition,
which was almost universally received over the
islands/' The other tradition is even more re
markable in that it is clearly identified with the
presence of both Jew and Phoenician in the Pacific
and is reproduced with more exactness. The
Jewish account is found in Genesis i. 16 and reads
as follows : " And God made two great lights, the
greater to rule the day and the lesser to rule by
night, he made stars also/' This view differed
wholly from that of the Phoenicians among whom
Baal was represented as the son of El and the
practical ruler of the world during the current cycle
with a solar aspect being actually identified with
the physical sun. Among the Phoenicians the myth
took a peculiar form, for from the pillars of Hercules
the world was supposed to end. The sun, plunging
nightly into the ocean flood with a hissing sound,
was believed to pass by some subterranean passage
to the place of his rising in the East.

If we compare these two traditions with that
of the Polynesians it will be seen that there is no
possible room for doubt as to the sources from which
they were received. Mr. Ellis says (vol. iii. 170) :

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 159

" With respect to the sun, which they formerly
called Ra and more recently Mahoma, some of the
traditions state that it was the offspring of the gods
and was an animated being, others that it was
made by the supreme deity Taaroa. The latter
supposed it to be a substance that resembled fire.
The people imagined that it sank every evening
into the sea and passed by some subterranean
passage from west to east, where it rose again from
the sea in the morning. In some of the islands
the expression for the setting sun is the falling of
the sun into the sea. They say that some people
in Bora-bora, the most westerly island in the group,
once heard the hissing sound occasioned by its
plunging into the ocean/'

These correspondences with the Jewish and
Phoenician traditions are sufficiently startling to
arrest the attention of the most casual inquirer
and make it clear that it will be profitable to prose
cute the study still further, for the observation and
knowledge of the heavenly bodies among the Poly
nesians was not confined to the sun and Pleiades ;
they steered by the Southern Cross as well as the
Pleiades.

According to the Scripture narrative the method
of computing time among the Jews was by genera
tions. For example Genesis v. says : ' This is the
book of the generation of Adam," and Genesis x. i,
" These are the generations of Shem." Among the
Phoenicians at the date of these expeditions time
was measured by the Solar Year, and the seasons of
agriculture and navigation, as we have shown, by
the rising and setting of the Pleiades, so that it is
interesting to find not one but both of these systems
in operation in the Society Islands where they were

160 THE PHGENICIANS AND AMERICA

first discovered. Says Mr. Ellis : " One method of
computing time in the Society Islands was by Uis
or generations, but the most general mode of calcu
lation was by the year which they called Matahiti,
and which consisted of twelve or thirteen lunar
months, by the tan or Matarii season or half-year, by
the month of thirty days or by the day and night
having a distinct name for each month and being
in general agreement about the length of the year.
Another method commenced the year at the month
of Apaapa or the middle of May and gave different
names to several of the months. The year was
divided into two seasons of Mata-rii or Pleiades.
The first was called Mata-rii-i-nia or Pleiades above.
It commenced when, in the evening, the stars
appeared on or near the horizon, and the half-year
during which immediately after sunset they were
seen above the horizon was called Mata-rii-i-nia.
The other season commenced when at sunset the
stars were invisible and continued until at that hour
they appeared above the horizon. This season they
called Mata-rii-i-raro or the Pleiades above/'

Let us now pass from the consideration of the
evidence which the astronomical knowledge of the
Society Islanders affords of the presence of the
Phoenician- Jewish expeditions in the Pacific and
see what evidence can be obtained of the presence
of the Scythians and Thracians who formed a
portion of the command and crews of the ships of
Hiram and Solomon.

While tattooing was strictly forbidden to the
Jews, it was common in the Mediterranean basin,
especially among the Illyrians of the Adriatic and
the Thracians. That it was a Canaanitish and
Phoenician custom is more than probable from the

PHCENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 161

injunctions against the practice given by Moses to
the Jews before their entry into the promised
land.

Dr. George Turner, for over twenty years the
representative of the London Missionary Society in
Samoa, and the author of Nineteen Years in Polynesia
and Samoa, two of the most valuable works existing
on the state of native society in that part of the
Pacific when it was first discovered by Europeans,
makes what is undoubtedly the right connection
with the custom of tattooing as he found it on his
arrival in Samoa when he says : " Herodotus
found among the Thracians that the barbarians
could be exceedingly foppish, for among them the
man that was not tattooed was not respected. It
was the same in Samoa, for until a man was tattooed
he was considered in his minority. He could not
think of marriage, and was constantly exposed to
taunt and ridicule as being poor and of low birth
and having no right to speak in the society of men.
When, however, he was tattooed he passed into his
majority and was entitled to all the respect and
privilege accorded to those of mature years. When,
therefore, a youth reached the age of sixteen he and
his friends were all anxiety that he should be
tattooed, and he was on the outlook for the tattoo
ing of some young chief with whom he might unite,
six or a dozen young men being tattooed at one time,
and for these four or five tattooers were employed."

The process was a long and painful one, and the
instruments employed were usually made from a
piece of human bone, the " os ilium/' " oblong in
shape and about an inch and a half long by two
inches broad, being cut on one side like a small
tooth comb and the other fastened to a piece of

L

162 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

cane, so that it looked like a small serrated adze.
In using the instrument they dipped it into a
mixture of candle nut ashes and matter, and,
tapping it with a small wooden mallet, it sank into
the skin, and in this, as among the Thracians, punc
tured the whole surface over which the tattooing
extended/'

In Samoa the greater part of the body from the
waist down to the knee was thus covered, variegated
here and there with regular strips of the untattooed
skin which, when well oiled, made the natives appear
in the distance as if they wore black silk knee
breeches, from which it will be seen that the tattoo
ing was of Thracian and not of Phoenician origin.

Tattooing attained its highest development as
a decorative art among the Marquesan islanders
and the Maoris of New Zealand. The practice,
however, both from the Totemic and the Thracian
point of view, was almost universal on the American
Continent from Alaska to Mexico, and was performed
as in Samoa by regular professors of the art, submis
sion to the process being demanded from the young
men as a sign of bravery (Nat. Races, ii. 733).

In the practice of embalming we have another
valuable means of establishing a correspondence
between the Eastern Mediterranean and the Pacific.
Among the Egyptians this practice was carried to
great perfection, not only human remains but those
of cats, crocodiles, and other sacred animals being
subjected to embalming. This was thought to in
dicate a high degree of civilisation, yet it is found
to have prevailed among the Polynesians (Poly. Res.,
i. 44), among the ancient Toltecs of Mexico, and, to
some extent, in the entire Pacific states of the
Continent (Nat. Races, ii. 603).

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 163

Equally remarkable is the evidence showing that
the cannibalism of the Polynesians and the early
American races was derived from the Mediterranean.
The Lsestrygians of Sicily were cannibals. Accord
ing to Strabo, iv. 5, to eat human flesh was a
Scythian custom. Herodotus gives a description of
it among the tribes (the Issedones, iv. 26) who ate
their own parents after sacrificing them, and the
Androphagi (iv. 106), who, like the Laestrygians of
Sicily, seem to have been indifferent who the victim
was. Like tattooing and embalming this horrible
practice was not confined to the insular Pacific, but
extended to the Pacific slopes of the American
Continent. The Aztecs especially being notorious,
like the Scythians, for their cannibalism.

There are other evidences of the presence of the
Scythians in the insular Pacific and America of a
most remarkable kind, to which it is desirable to
call attention. But before doing so it will be ad
visable to revert for a little to the subject of the
language of the Polynesians, for, viewed in connec
tion with the other correspondences, it seems as if
further research in this direction would lead to
far-reaching results.

Herodotus (i. 142), in speaking of the dialectical
differences to be found in the language used by the
peoples who occupied the territory from which the
Phoenicians were drawn by the Ionic Greeks, makes
this significant statement : " These people do not
all use the same language, but have four varieties
of dialect. Miletus, the first of these, lay to the
south, next came Myus and Prine, which were
situated in Caria and used the same dialect.
Ephesus, Colophon, Lebidus, Teos, Phocia, Clazo-
mene, cities in Lydia, did not agree with the language

164 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

spoken in Miletus, Myus, and Prine, but spoke a
dialect common to themselves. There still re
mained three Ionian cities, two of which inhabited
islands, Samos and Chios, and one, Erythrae, situated
on the Continent. The Chians and Erythrenes
used the same dialect, but the inhabitants of Samos
had one peculiar to themselves."

Here is the crux of the situation, for the prob
abilities are that by dovetailing this passage with
another from the same author (v. 58) some valu
able information will be obtained as to the source
from which the sixteen letters of the Polynesian
language were derived. Says Herodotus : " When
the Phoenicians who came with Cadmus settled in
this country they introduced the sixteen letters of
the Phoenician alphabet, which, in my opinion, were
not before known in Greece. At first they used the
characters which all the Phoenicians made use of,
but afterward, in process of time, together with the
sound they also changed the shape of the letters, and
as at that time the Ionian Greeks inhabited the
greater part of the country round about them, they,
having learned these letters from the Phoenicians,
changed them in a slight manner and made use of
them, and in making use of them designated them
Phoenician, as justice required they should, since it
was the Phoenicians who introduced them into
Greece."

Let us now return to a consideration of such
further evidence of the presence of the Scythian in
the Pacific. To one of these it is advisable to call
particular attention, for the usage is so significant of
the presence of that people " who were all equestrian
archers " (Her. iv. 46). " The King and his Con
sort/' says Mr. Ellis, " always appeared in public

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 165

seated on men's shoulders, and travelled in this
manner wherever they journeyed by land. The
bearers were generally stout athletic men, and their
persons, in consequence of the office to which they
were appointed, were considered sacred. Their
majesties thus elevated seemed to sit at ease and in
security, holding slightly by the head while their
feet hung down on the breasts of the bearers and
were clasped in his arms. They usually travelled
at a tolerably rapid pace, even as much as six miles
within an hour being covered. A number of these
bearers accompanied the royal pair, and when the
men who carried their majesties grew fatigued they
were relieved by others. The change from the
shoulders of one bearer to another was accomplished
with great dispatch, but as the King and his Consort
were forbidden on these occasions to allow their
feet to touch the ground when they required to
change, the men on whose shoulders they were
sitting made only a temporary halt, and the bearer
who was appointed to take them forward on their
journey stepped in front and, placing his hands on
his thighs, bent his head slightly forward, and when
he had assumed this position the royal riders, with
apparently but little effort, vaulted over the head
of the man on whose neck they had been riding,
and, alighting on the shoulders of his successor in
office, proceeded on the journey with the slightest
possible detention.

' ' The seat occupied by the rider was probably not
the most comfortable, yet it indicated the highest
dignity of the nation, none but the King and Queen
and occasionally their nearest relatives being per
mitted the distinction it exhibited, and there is
no doubt that it was viewed by them with com-

166 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

placency and satisfaction as a means of commanding
the respect of their subjects whenever they left
their hereditary districts. It is said that King
Pomare the Second was so possessed by this idea
that he once remarked that he was a greater man
than King George of England, because he only rode
a horse while he rode a man " (vol. iii. 102).

Still further evidence of the Scythians in Tahiti
is found in a custom to which Herodotus (iv. 26)
called attention as in use among the Issedones,
i.e. the preserving of the skulls of deceased an
cestors and of treating them as sacred memorials.
The custom was equally in use among the Tahitians
(Pol. Res., iii. 272), the skulls of ancestors being pre
served with the greatest care as the dwelling-places
of the spirits of the deceased who at death became
the guardian divinities of the family. Indeed on
the occasion of the marriage of any member of the
family these were brought to the Marae, or temple,
and placed on a piece of white cloth before the
contracting parties as witnesses to the assumption
of the marriage vows.

Again the usage of the Carian women (Her. i.
146) of Samos, who established a law and imposed
it on themselves with an oath, and transmitted it
to their daughters, that they would never eat with
their husbands because they had killed their
fathers, husbands, and children, and forced them to
become their wives was, to some extent, even in
spite of the adoption of Christianity, still operative
in Samoa and Tahiti. This custom has by some
writers been referred to as derived from the institutes
of Menu, which forbade a Brahmin to eat with his
wife (Pol. Res., i. 116), but the attempted allocation
of the custom to this source is clearly in error, for

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 167

we can establish no connection between India and
the Samoan and Society Islands, whereas we have
no difficulty, as we have shown, in making such a
connection between Samos of the Sporades and these
islands.

From these correspondences established between
the strange customs of the Eastern Mediterranean
and the Pacific, which are only a few of many
available, it will be seen that a very intimate and
continuous intercourse must have existed between
these distant regions for a considerable period, re
sulting in the importing of a mixed population
which made permanent settlements. There is to
be found among the islands of the Pacific not only
Thracian tattooing and Scythian cannibalism, eques
trianism, archery, and skull worship, but sling-men,
boxers, wrestlers, javelin -throwers, spearmen, the
whole being overshadowed by the prevailing influ
ence of Jewish religious tradition and Phoenician
naval skill, scientific knowledge, and religious
practice.

In order that the case may, however, be pre
sented in a manner that will remove all possible
doubt, let us look for a little at some of the early
Polynesian myths, which show how impossible it
is for us rationally to refer the origin of the race
to any other source than that to which we have
assigned it.

A tradition very generally received in Tahiti
when it was first discovered was that the first human
pair were made by the supreme deity Taaroa. They
said that after Taaroa had formed the world he
created man out of the araea, or red earth, which was
also the food of man until bread fruit was created.
The tradition goes on to say that one day Taaroa

168 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

called for the man by name, and when he came he
caused him to fall asleep, and that while he slept
he took out one of his ivi, or bones, and with it made
a woman, whom he gave to man to be his wife,
and that this pair became the progenitors of the
human race.

Now it is interesting to observe that this account
of the creation of the first human pair appeared to
the first of the missionaries arriving there to be so
clearly derived from the Mosaic sources that they
were at their wits' end to know how they came by it.

The singular fact about the tradition is, how
ever, that it explicitly states that the name of the
woman was Ivi, which is pronounced among them
as if written Eve.

Mr. Ellis, speaking of the singularity of these
facts, says : " It always appeared to me as a mere
recital of the Mosaic account of Creation which they
had learned from some European source, and I have
never placed any reliance on it, although they have
repeatedly told me that it was a tradition among
them before any foreigners arrived/' He then
adds : " Should, however, more careful and minute
inquiry confirm the truth of the declaration and
prove that the account was in existence among
them prior to their intercourse with Europeans, it
will be one of the most remarkable oral traditions
of the human race known/'

Fortunately enough we are not left in doubt as
to the reliability of the native tradition, for Mr.
Ellis is corroborated by Dr. George Turner, whom
we have already quoted. He says in his Samoa :
" The natives of Fakaofo or Bowditch Island
say that man had his origin in a small stone or
Fakaofo. The stone became changed into a man

PHCENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 169

called Vase-fanu. After a time he thought of
making a woman. This he did by collecting a
quantity of earth and forming an earth model on
the ground. He made a head, body, and legs of
earth, then took out a rib from his left side and
threw it inside the earth model, when suddenly the
earth became alive and up started a woman on her
feet. He called her Ivi (Eve) or rib. He took her
to be his wife and from them sprang the race of

men/'

Dr. Turner, who lived in Central Polynesia
before the arrival of Europeans, had no hesitation
in accepting the tradition as of native origin, and
says : "To this day the children play on the sands
making men, body, hands, feet and face and holes
for eyes/'

Now a comparison of the Tahitian and Bow-
ditch Island traditions with the Hebrew narrative
will make it clear that these traditions reached the
Pacific Islands from no other source than that of
the Jews, for in Genesis ii. we read : " And the
Lord God formed man out of the dust of the ground
and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and
man became a living soul. And the Lord God
caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept,
and he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh
instead thereof, and the rib which the Lord God had
taken from man, made he a woman and brought her
unto the man, and Adam said : This is now bone of
my bone and flesh of my flesh, she shall be called
Woman because she was taken from Man/' " And
Adam called his wife's name Eve because she was
the mother of all living " (Gen. iii. 20).

Having called attention to the evidences which
still exist of the presence of Thracian, Scythian,

170 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

and Jew in the Pacific, it will be profitable now to
look at the evidence which the region affords of its
occupancy by the Phoenicians, for after all it is
upon it rather than upon that supporting the
presence of any other of the nations that we must
rely for the final results of our investigation. Why ?
Because, as had been shown, Phoenicia was the only
navigating power of that period, and the only
nation capable of making either this voyage or
including such a combination of races in the under
taking. It is well, therefore, to bear in mind that
while the presence of these other various peoples at
such a distance from the Mediterranean basin is
interesting, indeed invaluable, as a means of proving
the correctness of our induction, still the existence
of Jew, Scythian, and Thracian could not in them
selves solve our problem unless it could be shown,
in the clearest possible manner, that after all Jew,
Scythian, and Thracian were only a minor premise
in the major proportion of the presence of Phoenicia
in the Pacific. The Phoenicians were a pre-emi
nently religious people, and in this respect, indeed,
only represented the general trend of the thought
of the Semitic race at large. The temple in each
community was the common centre round which
the life of the people revolved. The piety of the
inhabitants manifested itself, as a rule, in the
abundant and costly gifts with which they adorned
the temple. Much of this statement is equally true
of the Jews and the Egyptians, but, as it is neces
sary in a study of this nature to avoid generalities,
we will only emphasize those points in which the
Phoenicians were not in general agreement with
their neighbours, so that there may be no possibility
of error in our recognition of the characteristics of

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 171

the Phoenician belief and practice when we discover
them in Central America.

There are some phases of the Phoenician religious
cult that seem clearly enough to distinguish it from
all the other religious systems of antiquity. These
were an intensely spiritual conception of the duty,
which later degenerated into Polytheism with Tote-
mism and human sacrifice, and the cult of the Galli
or priest of Astarte, with which was associated a
boundless licentiousness.

' The essential feature of the Phoenician religion
and the people who hold it," says Professor Sayce,
" was at once impure and cruel. It reflected the
sensualism of nature. Intoxicated with the frenzy
of nature worship under the burning sky of the
East, the Canaanite destroyed his children, maimed
himself, or became the slave of consecrated lust.
Men and women sought to win the favour of Heaven
by sodomy and prostitution in the temple of Astarte.
This practice, indeed, was brought from Babylon
along with the sacrifice of the first born, and though
we may ascribe the origin of the latter to the Ac-
cadians, an Accadian text expressly stating that
sin may be expiated by the vicarious sacrifice of
the eldest son, yet the immorality practised in the
name of religion was the invention of the Semitic
race itself."

The principal seat of the Phoenician religious
prostitution was Apheca, near the sources of the
river Adonis in Lebanon. So fascinated were the
people with this mode of expressing their religious
conceptions, that the temple became enormously
rich.

Dr. Dollinger, than whom there is no greater
authority on the subject, gives a brief but vivid

i;2 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

account of the practice of religion in Phoenicia
during the reign of Ethbaal, which is so luminous
when read in connection with the statement of
Professor Sayce that we cannot do better than
quote it in extenso. The quotation is taken from
his Heidenthum and Judenthum (vol. i. 426). " In
early times Baal had been worshipped without an
image in Tyre and its Colonies, but for a long time
now his worship had grown into an idolatry of the
most wanton character directed by a numerous
priesthood, who had headquarters at Tyre ; his
statue rode upon bulls, for the bull was the symbol
of the creative power, and he was also represented
with branches of grapes and pomegranates in his
hands. As the people of Asia distinguished, properly
speaking, only two deities of nature, a male and a
female, so Baal was of an elemental and sidereal
character at once. As the former he was God of
the creative power, bringing all things into life, and
in particular God of Fire, but he was Sun God
besides, and as such to human lineaments he added
the Crown of Rays about his head peculiar to this
God. In the one quality as well as the other he
was represented at the same time as sovereign of
heaven and the earth impregnated by him. The
Canaanite Moloch was not essentially different from
Baal, but the same God in his terrible and destroy
ing aspects, the god of consuming fire, the burning
sun who smote the land with unfruitfulness and
pestilence, dries up the springs and begets poison
ous winds. When the Prophet Jeremiah (xxxii. 35)
says such as in the Valley of Ben Hinnom built
high places to Baal to lead their sons and daughters
through the fire of Moloch, and again, the Jews
had built high places to Baal to burn their children

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 173

by fire as a burnt-offering to Baal (Jer. xix. 5),
there is no mistaking the essential identity of the two.
Besides the incense consumed in his honour bulls
also were sacrificed to Baal, and probably horses too.
The Persians at least sacrificed the latter to the sun
god. But the principal sacrifice was children. This
horrible custom was grounded, in part, on the notion
that children were the dearest possession of parents,
and part, that as pure and innocent beings, they
were the offerings of atonement most likely to
assuage the anger of the deity, and again, that the
god of whose essence the generative powers of
nations was, had a just right to that which was
begotten of man, and to the surrender of the lives
of his children. The sacrifices were consumed by
fire, for the life given by the fire god he should also
take back by the flames which destroy life. The
Rabbinical description of the image of Moloch, that
it was a human figure with a bull's head and out
stretched arms, is confirmed by Diodorus in the
account which he gives of the Carthaginian Kronos
or Moloch. The image of metal was made hot by
a fire kindled within it and the children placed in
its arms, rolled from thence into the lap below.
Voluntary offerings on the part of parents were
essential to the success of the sacrifice, even the
first-born, nay, even the only child of the family
was given up. The parents stopping the cries of
the children by fondling and kissing them, for the
victim ought not to weep, and the sound of com
plaint was drowned by the din of flutes and drums ;
mothers, according to Plutarch, stood by without
tears or sobs, for if they wept or sobbed they lost
the honour of the act thereby, and the children,
notwithstanding, were sacrificed. Such sacrifices

174 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

took place either annually or on an appointed day,
or before great enterprises, or on the occasion of
public calamities to appease the wrath of the gods.

" Another form of Baal was Melkarth, the city
king, tutelary god of the city of Tyre, whose worship
was carried far and wide by the colonies proceeding
from the shores of the Mediterranean. This pro
tector of Tyre was the Phoenician Hercules to whom
we have before referred, and as god alike of sun
and fire a perpetual fire was kept on his altars ; he
was a race king and hero of the people's expeditions.

" In the Astarte of the Western Asiatics we recog
nise that great Nature Goddess standing by Baal's
side, regent of the stars, queen of heaven, and
goddess of the moon, the mother of life and goddess
of women's fecundity. Under the name of Astarte
she was guardian goddess of Sidon and not essen
tially different from Baaltis of Byblus and Urania
of Askalon. The Greeks and Romans sometimes
took her for Juno, as she was the supreme divinity
of the Asiatics, sometimes for Apaphrodite on ac
count of the licentious character of the worship sacred
to her. Her statue rode next to that of Baal in
a chariot drawn by lions, a precious stone placed on
her head illuminating the temple at night. She was
considered one with Derceto, who was honoured under
the form of a fish on the Phoenician coasts, a com
bined worship being offered to the goddess and Baal.

" In the court of the temple at Aplieka there were
sacred beasts in a tame state in great numbers and
also a pond containing holy fish, and priests and
temple ministers were present in such numbers that
Lucien counted above three hundred employed in
one sacrifice, but beside these were a number of flute
players, Galli and women frenzied with inspiration.

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 175

At the spring festival, called by some the ' Brand
Feast/ by others the ' Feast of Torches/ which
was attended by streams of visitors from every
country, huge trees were burned with their offerings
suspended on them. Even children were sacrificed ;
they were put into a leathern bag and thrown down
the whole height of the temple to the bottom with
the shocking expression that they were not children
but calves. In the foreground of the temple were
two gigantic Phalli, and to the exciting din of
drums, flutes, and inspired songs the Galli cut
themselves on the arms, and the effect of this act
and the music accompanying it was so strong upon
mere spectators that all their bodily and mental
powers were thrown into a tumult of excitement,
and they, too, seized by a desire to lacerate them
selves, inflicted wounds upon their bodies by means
of potsherds lying ready for the purpose. There
upon they ran through the city bleeding and received
from the inhabitants a woman's attire. Not chas
tity but barrenness was intended by this act, whereby
the Galli only desired to be like the goddess. The
relation which they henceforth occupied towards
women was regarded as a holy thing and was
generally tolerated/'

Under the Jewish kings Ahaziah and Jeroboam
and under Athaliah, the daughter of Jezebel, it was
for a period the state religion of Judah, and from the
proselytising efforts of these two queens and the re
lentless persecution which followed, the downfall of
Israel and Judah, which culminated in the captivity,
is distinctly attributed by the Hebrew historians
(2 Kings xvii. 16).

The temple dedicated to Melcarth or Hercules,
it may be mentioned, had this marked peculiarity

176 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

that, according to the best authorities, they were
without images, no women, dogs, or swine being
permitted to enter them under penalty of death.

Such was the religious system of Phoenicia,
which after the lapse of two thousand eight hundred
years is found faithfully reproduced in the Pacific.
The picture which Dr. George Turner and Mr.
William Ellis print of the religious traditions and
practices of the Samoan and Society Islands is
clearly Phoenician.

Mr. Ellis says : " They supposed in Tahiti that the
gods were powerful spiritual beings in some degree
acquainted with the affairs of the world and gener
ally governing them, yet never exercising anything
like benevolence towards even their most devoted
followers, but requiring homage and obedience with
constant offerings, denouncing their anger and dis
pensing destruction on all who either refused or
hesitated to comply. But while the people supposed
them to be spiritual beings they manufactured
images either as the representatives of their form
and emblem of their character, or as vehicles or
instruments through which their communications
might be made to the God and his will revealed to
them.

" Their idols were either rough unpolished logs of
the Aito or Casuarina tree, wrapped in numerous
folds of sacred cloth, rudely carved images or shape
less pieces covered with curiously-netted cenct of
finely-braided cocoanut husk and ornamented with
feathers. These varied in size, being six or eight feet
long, others not more than as many inches. These
were representatives of the Tiis. Into these they
supposed the gods entered at certain times or seasons,
or in answer to the prayers of the priest. During

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 177

the indwelling of the gods they supposed that even
the images were very powerful, but when the spirits
had departed, though they still remained among
their most sacred things, their extraordinary power
had disappeared.

' Their maraes or places of worship were open
places — a sort of arena in the form of a parallelo
gram formed by a stone wall 4 to 6 feet high,
and terminating at one end of the extremities in an
immense mass of stones of pyramidal form, less long
than broad. The inside of these singular enclosures
was usually large enough to contain some small
buildings to house the images and lodge the priests
and guardians. In some of the maraes the pyramid
that ended the enclosure was not less than 300 feet
long and 100 feet broad at the base, and 60 feet high,
but diminishing gradually from the base to the
summit.

" Ruins of such temples are found in every situa
tion ; on the summit of the hills at Maeva, where
Tanes Temple, nearly 120 feet square, enclosed with
high walls is still standing, almost entirely on the
extremity of a point of land projecting into the sea,
or, in the recesses of an extensive and overhanging
grove. The trees growing within the walls were con
sidered sacred, and the interwoven and umbrageous
branches frequently excluded the rays of the sun
so that the contrast between the bright glare of a
tropical day and the sombre gloom in the depths
of these groves was peculiarly striking. The fan
tastical contortions of the trunks and tortuous
branches of the aged trees, the plaintive and moan
ing sound of the wind passing through the leaves
of the casuarina trees often resembled the wild notes
of an aeolian harp, and the dark walls of the temple

M

178 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

with the grotesque and horrific appearance of the
idols combined to inspire extraordinary emotions
of superstitious terror, and nurture that deep feeling
of dread which characterised the worship of Tahiti's
sanguinary deities.

" The trees with which they surrounded these
maraes were the Tomam and the Aito or Casuarina,
the leaves of which moved by the wind produced a
whistling moan which they attributed to the gods.
These trees, like everything else within the enclosure
indicated by the trees, were sacred, and the fruit
could only be gathered and eaten by the priests.
There was seldom any habitation in the neighbour
hood, and, except on feast days and religious
ceremonies, there always reigned a solemn silence
that could not be broken even by the guardians
and priests who lived within the enclosure. No
body entered there no matter what the necessity,
and all kept the most religious silence when passing
near by, uncovering the body to the girdle a long
time before reaching it. Women could not enter the
maraes, and that upon pain of death, for the least
contact defiled the holiness of the place.

" The priests of the national temples were a dis
tinct class, the office of the priesthood being heredi
tary in all departments. In the family, according to
the patriarchal usage, the father was the priest,
and in the village or district the family of the priest
was sacred, and his office was held by one who was
also a chief. The king was sometimes priest of the
nation, and the highest sacerdotal dignity was often
possessed by a member of the reigning family.

"Animals, fruits, &c., were not the only articles
offered to the idols ; the most affecting part of the
sacrifice was the frequent immolation of human

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 179

victims, which in the technical language of the priests
were called fish. They were offered in seasons of
war, at great national festivals, during the illness of
rulers, and on the erection of temples. I have been
informed by several of the inhabitants of Maeva that
the foundation of some of the temples for the abode of
the gods were actually laid in human sacrifices.

" The only motives by which they were influenced
in their religious homage on service were, with few
exceptions, superstitious fear, revenge toward their
enemies, a desire to avert the dreadful consequences
of the anger of the gods, and secure their sanction
and aid in the commission of the grossest crimes.
Their worship consisted in proffering prayers, pre
senting offerings, and sacrificing victims. Their
ubus or prayers, though occasionally brief, were
often exceedingly long and protracted, containing
many repetitions, and appearing as if the suppliant
thought that he should be heard for his much
speaking " (i Kings xviii. 26).

Of the Areois Society, which, as we shall see as
we proceed, must unquestionably be identified with
the Galli or priests of Astarte, Mr. Ellis has been
compelled to write with great reservation. The
whole subject is indeed so repulsive that it would
under ordinary circumstances have been desirable
to have avoided all reference to it. The presence
of the Phoenician in the Pacific and on the Pacific
slopes of the American Continent can, however, be so
easily recognised by traces of the presence of the
strange cult in the two extremes of the Phoenician
sphere of influence that it is highly advisable to
hear what Mr. Ellis has to say on the subject.

" The Gods which presided over the two divi
sions of the Areois Society/' says he, " were monsters

180 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

of vice, and of course patronised every evil practice
perpetrated during the season of public festivity.
Many of the regulations of the society cannot be
made public without doing violence to every feeling
of propriety, but so far as it can consistently be done
it seems to be desirable to give some particulars.

" The two brother deities who were the pro
genitors of the society, the Kings of the Areois, lived
in celibacy and consequently had no descendants.
On this account, although they did not enjoin
celibacy on their followers, they prohibited their
having children. Hence one of the standing re
gulations of the institution was the murder of
children. On the initiation of the candidate he was
commanded to seize the cloth garment worn by the chief
woman present and by this act he became a member oj
the seventh class.

" Amusement was not the only purpose for which
these assemblies were convened. They included all
monstrous and prodigious things, as well as those
that were abominable, unutterable. In some of their
meetings they seem to have placed the imagination
on the rack to discover the worst pollutions of which
it was possible for man to be guilty, and to have
striven to outdo each other in the most revolting
practices. The mystery of iniquity and acts of
more than bestial degradation to which they were
at times addicted must remain in the darkness
to which even they sometimes feel it expedient to
consign them.

" The Areois were esteemed by the people as a
superior order of beings closely allied to the gods
and deriving from them sanction for their abomi
nations and their heartless murders. Their life was
a life of luxurious ease and lascivious indulgence

PHOENICIANS IN THE PACIFIC 181

and crime, and for them, it was believed, was re
served that Elysium which their mythology taught
them to believe was reserved for those pre-eminently
favoured by the gods."

Any comment on this somewhat bare outline of
the Tahitian religious cult is clearly unnecessary,
for the source from which it was derived is stamped
indelibly across its entire face. Even after the lapse
of three thousand years there is not in the history
of mankind another religious system to which its
origin could in reason be assigned. Phoenicia is so
plainly depicted that he who runs may read. We
have therefore in our possession one means effec
tive beyond all others of determining the route
followed by the joint fleets of Hiram and Solomon
on their voyages to Ophir.

CHAPTER VIII

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC

Problem of the unity of the human race — How related to the Biblical
account of the Creation — Ancient civilisation of Central and South
America — Problems which it suggests — Did the fleet of Solomon
and Hiram discover America ? — Asiatic origin of the first American
population — Was the Ophir of Solomon and Hiram's fleet the Pacific
slopes of the American Continent? — Testimony of native records of
Mexico and Central America — Humboldt's opinion — What may be
learnt from the constitution and structure of the native society of
Central America.

THE problem of the unity of the human race still
awaits solution by the anthropologist. So far the
preponderance of argument has been on the side of
those who represent the theory of various centres
of creation. Those, however, who uphold the
Biblical account of creation have by no means ex
hausted the arguments available for the establish
ment of their belief, for with a more intimate know
ledge of the various forms of uncivilised and civil
ised life existing on the American Continent when
it was first discovered by the Spaniards, it becomes
increasingly apparent that the solution of the enigma
is by no means so hopeless as has been generally
supposed.

The advocates of the Biblical account of creation
have been regarded by advanced anthropologists as
labouring under a somewhat serious disadvantage
in consequence of the fact that orthodoxy has

always taught that mankind has only existed on

182

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 183

the earth for the short period of six thousand years
— a period which seems much too short for the
evolution of man.

Great care must, however, be exercised in in
terpreting the Biblical account of creation. The
Scripture narratives nowhere teach that man at the
beginning issued from the hands of his Maker in
what has been described by the opposing school of
anthropology in a primitive or aboriginal condition.
On the contrary, they indicate that he was created
in a perfect, though not fully unfolded, condition,
in which there was a complete dovetailing of the
spiritual and mental faculties which made communi
cation between himself and the lower forms of
creation possible (Gen. ii. 19, and iii. i), and be
tween himself and his Creator not only possible but,
to some extent at least, habitual (Gen. ii. 16, and
iii. 8). Furthermore, that his endowment was not
wholly confined to the first generation of men (Gen.
iv. 6), but, to some extent, was possessed by suc
ceeding generations (Exod. xxxiii. ii ; i Sam. x. 2 ;
i Kings xvii. 2 ; Isa. vi. i ; Zee. ii. 5 ; John i. 6 ;
Acts vii. 2 and xix. 27 ; Rev. i. 12).

If, therefore, we adopt this view of Scriptural
teaching on the subject and admit that the fall of
mankind consisted in a rupture, more or less com
plete, of the dovetailing of the spiritual and mental
faculties as explicitly set forth in such passages as
those of Ezekiel xii. 2 and Matthew xiii. 14, then
we shall better understand what is meant by the
unity of the human race. As heirs to the deterio
rated physical attributes which for so many genera
tions have dominated the career of humanity, it is
inevitable that we should become less and less the
possessors of that glorious endowment which was

184 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

the crown and glory of the human race at the be
ginning. If the Scriptures teach anything concern
ing the fall of man it is this, for sin, or the Saxon
root from which the word was obtained, zin, in its
last analysis, means deficiency. That is to say, the
Scriptures teach that in consequence of the Fall
through unrighteousness and the tendency towards
this deficient condition, men had lost and were con
tinuing to lose faculty, and that as generations were
being swept down the stream of time they were
drifting ever farther from this first sublime state
until, after four thousand years, the movement had
acquired so much momentum that the divine in
tervention became absolutely necessary to the sal
vation of the human race. It is indeed impossible
to arrive at any intelligent understanding of the
Scriptural doctrines of the Fall and the Redemption
of mankind, or of the retention and use of the
supernormal faculties by some nations for a longer
period than others, as was clearly the case among
the Hebrews, and probably, as we will show by
quotation from the prophet Ezekiel, among the
Phoenicians, unless we take this view of the case.

Once we admit the doctrine of the transgression
of all of the progenitors of mankind from the high
estate in which they were created and the demoral
ising effects of unrighteousness on succeeding genera
tions, the story of the ancient civilisations of Central
and Southern America become at once an impressive
object lesson with respect to the state of human
society and the fate that confronted mankind at
the beginning of the Christian era. At the same
time it provides a working basis for our investi
gation, since it enables us to conceive of a time
when a portion of the human race were in possession

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 185

of faculties that were more legitimately developed
and admirably adapted to the exigencies of the period
in which they were exercised. This point is strik
ingly emphasized by Professor Heeren in his Asiatic
Research (p. 34). He says : " We should not there
fore doubt of what appears to us extraordinary,
because, judging from our own experience, it does
not seem probable, for this does not enable us to
decide what may have been possible under another
clime and other circumstances, for do not the Pyra
mids of Egypt, the wall of China, and the rock temple
of Elephantis stand out as it were in mockery of
that criticism that would arrogate to itself the
privilege of fixing boundaries to the capabilities of
congregated nations."

Professor Heeren's view is supported by the
history of the entire civilised portion of the human
race. Those who have cast aside the seductions of
unrighteousness and placed themselves wittingly
or unwittingly in alignment with the written or un
written law of righteousness have thereby attained
to a breadth of knowledge and a success in handling
the spiritual and material forces of nature that have
arrested the attention of all succeeding generations.
As nearly three thousand years have elapsed since
the expeditions sent by Solomon and Hiram from
Eziongeber on the Red Sea that led to the dis
covery and occupancy of America, it is well not to
expect too much in the way of absolute correspond
ence between the institutions of the Mediterranean
basin a thousand years before the Christian era and
those existing on the American Continent in A.D.
1500, when the arrival of the Spaniards opened the
way to a scientific examination of the problem as
to the source from which the population composed

i86 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

of uncivilised and civilised races inhabiting the New
World had been derived. During the long period
of isolation, changes in the state and constitution of
society that have probably no exact counterpart in
human history must have taken place.

Nor must we be surprised if we find that the
hybrid civilisation that blossomed from this strange
admixture of races confronts us with problems of
the most perplexing character. In this new terri
tory, when the original purposes of the expeditions
had been accomplished, the different races — Jew,
Phoenician, Scythian, and Thracian — by habits of
thought and speech would in large measure segregate
themselves and occupy territory where each race,
without let or hindrance, would live over again
its own national life in surroundings congenial to
its antecedents. There would, however, remain a
strong residue of each which, attracted by a com
mercial career, would unify around a common centre.
Now this was exactly the condition of affairs that
confronted mankind when the American Continent
was rediscovered by Europeans in the fifteenth
century of our era. The religious, scientific, artistic,
civil, commercial, and manufacturing state of the
civilised communities could then easily, despite the
long period of isolation, be related to an Eastern
Mediterranean basin origin. The religious and
material influence dominating the region was mainly
Phoenician, while the moral influence was unmis
takably Jewish.

Much surprise has been expressed that ancient
history should have provided so little information
with regard to the course pursued by the ships of
Hiram and Solomon, likewise their destination, but
when we consider the state of society at that period,

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 187

the limited means for the communication of infor
mation, and the jealous care that was exercised in
preserving intact knowledge of this very nature
from the rest of mankind, this is scarcely to be
wondered at. Nevertheless, the references of Plato,
Seneca, and Aristotle to the existence of a continent
hid in the western ocean makes it clear that the
knowledge of the discovery of America by the Jews
and Phoenicians was not confined to the leaders of
these nations. Indeed we are forced to conclude
that as history makes no reference to any other ex
peditions either of a national or an international
character setting out from the Mediterranean ports
for very many centuries after this date that the re
ferences of these classical authors must be under
stood as an echo reaching Greece from Thracian,
Scythian, Phoenician, or Jewish sources of the dis
covery of America by the fleets of Solomon and
Hiram.

But while we have no knowledge of any Medi
terranean expeditions to the American Continent
prior to the voyages of Columbus that are worthy
of serious consideration, we are none the less con
fronted by a statement in the Votanic tradition of
so extraordinary a character as to make it clear
that these early voyagers were in possession of suffi
cient astronomical and geographical knowledge to
warrant them in believing that a journey thither
from the western seas was not only possible, but one
which it was their intention should be undertaken
at a later date. Votan, the first culture hero, on
reaching the Atlantic coasts, where he erected his
first city of Nachan or Palenque, is reported to have
prophesied " that in a future age his brethren, white
men and bearded like himself, would arrive on

i88 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

these shores from the land where the sun rises and
come to rule the country/' Whether we may,
from his statement in the Votanic tradition, under
stand that the sphericity of the earth was known to
the Phoenicians, who will undertake to say ?

Humboldt (ii. 68), writing on the subject of the
populating of the American Continent, says : "It
appears most evident to me that the monuments,
methods of computing time, systems of cosmo
gony, and many myths of America, offer striking
analogies which indicate an ancient communication
and are not simply the result of that uniform con
dition in which all nations are found in the dawn of
civilisation/' an opinion that is abundantly sup
ported by the results of our research. For as easier
means of communication are sweeping the outlying
and hitherto less accessible portions of the world
into active contact with the great centres of popu
lation and culture, it becomes increasingly apparent
that the unity of the human race is the one great
law dominating the history of humanity, and that
any seeming infractions of this law have simply been
caused by our ignorance of the forces that have been
operating in the distribution of mankind.

The belief that America received its first popu
lation from Asia has long been held by reputable
scientists, and is based on a logical foundation. If
we discard the autochthonic theory of origin, it is
certainly to Asia, the reputed cradle of the human
race, that we must first look for proof of the migra
tion of races that would account for the peopling
of these distant regions. Till now there has been a
consensus of opinion among those who have most
carefully studied the subject that the first settle
ment of the American Continent is a problem which

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 189

can never be solved, an opinion that, in some
limited measure, is likely to prevail to the end of
time so far at least as this inquiry may effect the
so-called indigenous races of the extreme north
west territories. So little is known of the move
ments of the population which ultimately occupied
the extreme limits of the Asiatic continent to the
north and adjacent to the Alaskan boundaries that
we have no satisfactory working basis for an in
duction leading to a solution of the problem.

When, however, we come to a consideration of the
civilised races of Central America and the popula
tions that have sprung from them we are on much
surer ground. In an artificial state of society types
are produced that are easy of recognition when
found in territories far remote from those in which
the peculiar conditions evolving these types existed.
Now the results of later research, when placed pari
passu with certain well-ascertained movements in
Asia and Europe, make it clear that the early trend
of exploration, population, and commerce was not,
as is generally supposed, mainly westward, but,
radiating from a common centre in Babylonia, was
as aggressively active in other directions, especially
to the East, where the great centres of population are
still to be found.

It is not, however, with these movements that
we are at present concerned, but with those that
took place in the south and south-east and resulted
in the occupancy of the Indian and Arabian
peninsulas. The exploration of the territory that
lay to the farther East depended wholly on the
Phoenicians, who were a navigating people. Un
fortunately, direct testimony with regard both to
the direction and extent of their activities in this

igo THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

region is most fragmentary. But it sufficiently
confirms the testimony of the Hebrew historians
that the efforts of the Phoenicians were by no means
so entirely directed towards the development of the
western trade as has generally been supposed. In
consequence of information supplied by exploring
parties sent out from the Persian Gulf settlements,
Phoenicia and the neighbouring kingdom of Israel,
or at least the rulers of these adjacent territories,
who were at that time intimately associated in great
public works of mutual advantage, determined to
fit out some expeditions with a view to the joint
occupancy and exploitation of the territory.

The finding, therefore, of a people on the western
shores of America who claimed to have emigrated
from the Asiatic coasts need not, owing to the sup
posed difficulty of navigating the Pacific, occasion
surprise. The people who made this claim were not
rude tribes but settled nations in possession of a
highly organised civilisation with an Eastern Medi
terranean origin. In view of all this, the question
may well be asked if we have not at last found the
clue to the destination of the joint fleets of Solomon
and Hiram, Ophir, or, as it is sometimes called,
Tharshish. Was it not the voyage to this region
and return, which occupied three years ? Was
this not the unknown region from which silver was
brought in such abundance as to glut the markets
of Palestine ?

A careful examination of the civilisation of this
region clearly shows that it cannot be regarded
as indigenous. Humboldt says in his Venes de
Cordillons, when comparing the Mexican calendar
with that found in use among the Thibetans, Mongols,
and Chinese, that " all of them had their apparent

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 191

origin in the ordinary Babylonian Zodiac, from which
was drawn that with which we are familiar in its
Greek form."

Again the civil year of the civilised nations of
the Pacific slopes of the American Continent was
made up of 365 days, divided into eighteen months
of twenty days each and five supplementary or
intercalary days, each day of the month having a
distinct name. This, Humboldt gives strong leasons
for believing, was derived from the same source as
the Zodiac, which was made use of from the re
motest antiquity in India and Thibet. A calendar
that moreover equalled, if it did not surpass in
accuracy, the systems in use among contempor
aneous nations in Asia and Europe when America
was discovered by Columbus, points clearly to an
early communication between the two continents
of which history has apparently failed to preserve
any definite record.

Confronted as we are by perplexities of this
nature, it is extremely fortunate that we find the
native records of Mexico and Central America
entitled to much more respect than can be accorded
to the traditional lore of the general run of abo
riginal tribes in other portions of the world. This
native literature, in the opinion of Humboldt and
others, is wonderfully reliable, for it was the work
of native historians appointed by the various
governments who were accustomed to punish with
rigorous severity all attempts at falsification. Here
we find the names of persons and places and the
dates of events which enable us to trace not only
the basic facts in connection with this imported
civilisation, but the course of events from generation
to generation.

192 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

The best account that we possess of these native
records is that given by the Abbe Brasseur de
Bourbourg, whose familiarity with the Nahua and
Central American languages and his indefatigable
industry and erudition pre-eminently qualify him
for the task of unravelling the mysteries of American
primitive history. According to these records (Ency.
Brit., vol. i. 704) Votan, the first of the American
culture heroes, and his companions arrived on the
Pacific coasts of the continent in seven large ships
about the year 1000 B.C. Coasting along the shore
from California to Darien they found it occupied
by a barbarous people to whom they communicated
a knowledge of the Supreme Deity. All of these
histories assert that at the beginning the civilisation
was imported by strangers, who brought with them
not only a knowledge of the Supreme Deity but of
the sciences and the mechanical arts. In addition,
they introduced cotton and maize, cultivated
potatoes, plantains and other vegetables, taught
spinning, weaving, and dyeing, and this not from
vegetable products only but from the juice of the
murex. They also taught the mining of tin and
copper, and the amalgamation of these metals into
bronze, likewise the making of paper from the fibre
of the magney plant into sheets which, in some cases,
measured 120 feet in length by 6 feet in breadth and a
finger in thickness. On these were recorded historic
events, while sheets of lighter weight were used for
religious and decorative purposes.

Identified with this imported civilisation we find
Semitic totemism, which, so far as is known, was
never borrowed, phallicism, circumcision, tattooing,
scalping, steam bathing, lassooing, picture writing,
the system of intercalation, the use of quipus,

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 193

gymnasiums in which games like the Greek palastrae
were celebrated, and all the implements used in
the chase and in warfare common to the early Asiatic
and European nations.

Another evidence showing that the communi
cation which resulted in the first settlement of the
American Continent reached back to the date of
these historic expeditions, is the fact that founda
tions of the oldest towns are erected on massive
substructions which were characteristically peculiar
to the Syrian and Egyptian architects.

It is true that these ruins contain very different
types, which suggest a long and continuous residence
in these regions by a vast population, who may have
built them at different times, but those which are
most clearly identified with the earliest traditions
of the people are uniform in using the substruction
in their erection, in their decorative types, and in
the ability shown in the cutting and handling of
immense masses of masonry such as those at Nachan,
Mayapan, and other places to which tradition points
the cradles of the civilised races.

Admitting, then, that the problem of the peopling
of America still requires to be solved, it is clear that
any attempt to do so must necessarily resolve itself
into two divisions. First, what was the origin of
the uncivilised ? and, second, what was the origin
of the civilised nations ? If we accept the Votanic
tradition that the civilisation was an exotic, we are
naturally forced to a consideration of the enigma
whence emanated the barbarous people found on
the Pacific coasts by this culture hero.

To the first of these questions it is probable that
we will never be able to give a wholly satisfactory
answer, for we have no information with regard to

N

194 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

the date at which Igh and Imox arrived or to the
movements of those who may have accompanied
them and been the progenitors of these people.

The presence of some of these types, identified
in a peculiar manner with both the uncivilised and
the civilised races on the American Continent, can
only be accounted for by accepting the Votanic
tradition at its face value, and by believing what
we have already shown to be the case, that those
expeditions which brought and planted on the
Pacific slopes a ripened civilisation brought at the
same time a larger proportion of population that was
only a short way removed from the barbaric state.
These in the main did not amalgamate with, but
separated themselves from, the seats of civilisation,
and, returning to their old nomadic habits and
barbarous customs, overran the entire country and
ultimately, during the 2500 years of isolation that
elapsed from the date of the first settlement until
the continent was rediscovered by Columbus in
1492, occupied every portion of it from Mexico to
Alaska.

When, however, we come to a consideration of
the source from which the civilised nations derived
their origin we are on much surer ground. Some
of the types found among the civilised states of
America are so distinctive in their artificiality and
so closely identified with certain circumscribed
centres of culture in the Old World that they provide
an infallible means of determining the source from,
and the channel through which, they were derived.
The date which the American traditions provide
for the arrival of the emigrants who carried thither
this civilisation, moreover, corresponds exactly with
those historic movements of the foremost nations of

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 195

Asia at that period, the destination of which, when
identified with the traditions found on the Pacific
shores of America, supply every fact that is essential
to a complete solution of our enigma. It is a
curious and startling fact that the peculiar charac
teristics of the four nations which comprised the
personnel of the fleets of Hiram and Solomon can
be clearly traced to this region. These written
records emphatically state that Votan placed the
four nations in separate territories (Ency. Brit., i.
704), which probably enough corresponded to the
peculiar antecedents of the people. Furthermore,
they show that Nachan, or the city of the serpents,
the first city erected by the newcomers, is practically
synonymous with that of Nashon — the serpent — the
family name of the leading partner in these expedi
tions of which tribe or family Votan claimed to be
a member.

The claim that America was the destination of
the expeditions of Hiram and Solomon will, however,
be found as we proceed not to rest solely on these
strange and significant facts, but to be supported
by a mass of co-ordinate evidence of the most
startling and convincing character supplied by a
careful analysis of the constitution and structure
of the so-called native society found there. The
interrelation, too, of many of the customs on the
American Continent which originally marked off the
nations practising them from the rest of mankind,
make it apparent that the representatives of these
nations must for some considerable period after their
arrival have lived in amity.

According to the native documents referred to,
Votan, the first of the American legislators, is said
himself to have written a history of the race to which

196 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

he belonged. He claimed to be descended from the
same stock as Igh and Imox, and to have come from
a country which he called the land of Chi vim,
separated from the new continent, which he called
the land of Votan, by seas and lands which necessi
tated a long and perilous journey. Votan also
claimed to have proceeded by divine command to
America and there portioned out the land. On
one of those journeys which, as plenipotentiary, he
made from the land of Votan to the land of Chi vim,
which is clearly enough to be identified with the
Phoenician and Jewish Chittim on the Eastern
Mediterranean, he claimed to have visited the dwell
ings of the thirteen serpents, which were those of
the thirteen tribes of Israel who held the reptile in
special veneration. While there he saw a magnifi
cent temple in course of construction which, clearly
enough, was that being erected for Solomon by an
army of Jewish, Egyptian, and Phoenician work
men. He further states that, in the course of this
journey, he passed the ruins of an old building,
undoubtedly that of Babel in Borsippa, a suburb
of Babylon, which men had erected with a view to
reaching heaven, and which, according to the men
who lived in the neighbourhood, was the place
where God had given to each family its own peculiar
language.

On returning from the first of four voyages which
he claimed to have made from this land of Votan to
the land of Chivim, Votan said that he found some
portion of the first emigrants — in all probability
the Scythians, who, we have shown, tolerated the
presence of no foreign customs among themselves—
had fomented a rebellion and attempted to disrupt
his kingdom. In consequence, and with a view to

THE PROBLEM OF THE AZTEC 197

retaining his authority, he divided the people into four
sections, which corresponded with the four nations
which comprised the personnel of the fleets of Hiram
and Solomon, and placed them in territories corres
ponding to their peculiar traditions and antecedents.

According to the Quiche tradition, the first
emigrants came from the land of the setting sun,
and were white men taller and of larger build than
the present inhabitants of the region. They carried
the mechanical arts and the sciences to a high degree
of perfection. They were likewise pearl-fishers, and
used the juice of the murex as well as vegetable
juices in the manufacture of their dyes. They were
also well acquainted with the medicinal properties
of plants, and kept books for the purpose of record
ing their observations on the cause and progress of
disease. Their astronomical knowledge embraced
all those features peculiar to the nations of the
Eastern Mediterranean.

It is true, for reasons already stated, that the
attempt to show that the architecture of the Central
American States was directly derived from any Old
World type has not been successful. Yet the unique
method of employing immense substructions in the
erection of their buildings, likewise the curiously
composite character of their decorations, which
show clearly Phoenician, Assyrian, Egyptian, and
Grecian influence, combined with much that is indi
genous, gives such clear evidence of an Old World
origin as to leave little room as to the source from
which the initial impulse was derived.

It will be unnecessary, however, to pursue this
investigation further on these lines, for in our in
duction it will be found that the solution of the
problem of the origin of the Aztec depends solely

198 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

on the number, strength, and aptness of the corres
pondences which can be established between the
Mediterranean basin and the Pacific Islands, and
between the Mediterranean and the Pacific coasts of
the American Continent.

It will be prudent, therefore, to arrange these
correspondences under the various headings to
which they belong and allow the reader to draw his
own conclusions, which he will have the less difficulty
in doing in that the authorities quoted are, without
exception, first-class.

CHAPTER IX

THE ANCIENT AMERICAN CIVILISATION

Constituent parts of ancient American civilisation — The region described
— Maya and Nahua civilisations — Their identity of origin — Aztec as
the representative of Nahua civilisation— The foreign civiliser in
Mexico — Composite source of Pacific civilisation explained — The
part played by the Phoenicians.

As what has been said in the preceding pages
supports entirely the view of the scientific world
in regard to the antiquity of the American civilisa
tion, further amplification of the subject would be
superfluous. With a view, however, to clarifying
the problem, a few words relative to the constituent
parts of this ancient American civilisation may not
be inappropriate.

That portion of the Pacific States of America,
with which the development of this civilisation was
identified, stretches from north-west to south-east
along both shores of the continent between latitudes
23° and 11° north of the equator. Outside of these
limits few traces exist that are of much service in
the solution of our problem, but within them few
tribes lived who were not profoundly influenced and
improved by contact with the ancient American
civilisation. The central or Usumacinta region was
the most ancient home to which by monument,
tradition, or record this civilisation could be traced.
For many centuries prior to the Christian era it
was the seat of the Maya Kingdom of the Chans or
Serpents, whose capital was Nachan or Palenque,

199

200 THE PHCENIC1ANS AND AMERICA

to which reference has already been made. From
this centre, which embraced one of the most de
lightful and fertile regions of the New World, the
Votanic power gradually extended northward
towards Anahuac, whose people appear in the tra
ditional records either as physical or intellectual
Quinames or giants. It also penetrated eastward
into Yucatan, where the culture hero, Zamna,
appears as its reputed founder, with the Cocomes
and Itzas as his subjects. The mean temperature
of this region is about 60° F., so that the climate
may generally be described as similar to that of
Southern Europe. The soil originally was fertile,
although now, in consequence of the excessive
evaporation common to lofty plateaus exposed to
a tropical sun and the depletion of the forests since
the Spanish Conquest, which tends to reduce the
rainfall, many portions present a bare and parched
appearance.

The two great divisions under which, for con
venience sake, the civilisation which occupied this
territory was grouped, were called respectively the
Maya and the Nahua, the former of these repre
senting the Maya Quiche civilisation of Central
America and the latter the Toltec and Aztec civil
isations of America.

The Mayas are invariably represented as the most
ancient of these two divisions of this civilisation,
and to them is attributed the wonderful stone re
mains found at Nachan or Palenque, Uxmal, and
Copan with which the Votanic traditions are most
clearly and intimately identified. Nearly all the
knowledge we possess with respect to the institu
tions and people of the Maya empire has been de
rived from the traditions and records of the Nahua

ANCIENT AMERICAN CIVILISATION 201

nation, which in the earlier stages of its growth
seems to have been profoundly influenced by the
older civilisation. In some respects the Nahua
nation seems to have stood in much the same re
lation to the older Maya kingdom in the New World
that Carthage did to Phoenicia in the Old.

Owing to the meagre information relative to the
first movements of population, there is great diffi
culty in drawing divisional lines between two nations
mutually acting and reacting on each other as these
must have done during several centuries. And this
difficulty is increased when it is recollected that
these two nations and their subdivisions constitute
the central figure around which revolves practically
all that has been either observed or written on the
subject of the American civilisation by the few
travellers who came in personal contact with it.

The identity of origin in the Maya and Nahua
civilisations, however, does not rest on slender
foundations but on the religious, scientific, manu
facturing, commercial, and caravan systems. The
similarities that can be established between these
are so striking as to make it clear that there is both
good reason for and convenience in speaking of the
American civilisation only in connection with these
two main branches, the Maya the more ancient,
the Nahua the more modern and widespread. It
is true that in comparing these two branches of this
very ancient civilisation many points of difference
crop up. Yet they can be explained satisfactorily
by supposing that for some centuries prior to the
Spanish Conquest the two nations had been pro
gressing along independent lines. The language of
the two peoples especially shows little affinity,
though it is well not to attach too much importance

202 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

to evidence which language alone affords, more
especially in view of what has been said of the con
glomerate character of the fleets which brought
this civilisation to America.

The Nahua, which succeeded and overshadowed
the Maya civilisation, included both that of the
Toltecs and Aztecs, and also that now embraced
by the Mexican Republic north of Tehuantepec.
Modern writers always make the Aztecs the repre
sentatives of the Nahua civilisation, although the
limits of the Aztec empire, exclusive of their pos
sessions in Texcuco and Tlacopan, were only from
18° to 21° north of the equator on the Atlantic, and
from 14° to 19° on the Pacific, which would not
embrace the whole of the civilised states. This
choice of the Aztec as the representatives of the
Nahua civilisation is, however, quite fitting, for they
were certainly the most powerful branch, and what
we know of this people has furnished the material
for nine-tenths of all that has been written on the
general subject of the American civilisation. Ac
cordingly the name Aztec has been adopted as a
generic term.

Whether it is possible to distinguish between
Votan, who is always accorded the distinction of
being the original culture hero, and Quetzalcoatt,
Zamna, and Cuculcan, who are accredited with
having taught some portions of this region the
sciences and mechanical and fine arts, as well as a
knowledge of the Supreme Deity, it is hard to de
termine, since the career of these minor culture
heroes seem in all respects to have been identical
with that of Votan in Chiapas. Be that as it may,
it is clear that all of them claimed to belong to the
same race and to the same totem clan, for Quet-

ANCIENT AMERICAN CIVILISATION 203

zalcoatt in the native tongue means the royal or
feathered serpent, and the name Cocomes, worn by
the oldest line of kings and nobles in Yucatan to
which Zamna carried his civilisation, signifies, like
the name Chan applied to the companions and
followers of Votan, a serpent.

If, in view of what has been said, we admit that
there existed on the American Continent a body of
tradition worthy of the highest respect, one peculiar
circumstance regarding it, as Humboldt remarks,
demands serious consideration, viz., that in these
ancient records of the civilised American races we
find no less than three apparently independent and
remarkable traditions of the planting of a superior
civilisation among separate sections of the native
peoples on the western shores of the continent, and
that in each case they attributed this to the sudden
and mysterious appearance of persons who differed
from them in dress and nationality — Bohica among
the Mozca Indians, who occupy the plains of Bogota,
Manco Capuc, accompanied by his sister wife, Mama
Oello among the Peruvians, and Votan in Mexico.

The clearest and most circumstantial account
of the mysterious appearance of the foreign civiliser
is not, however, found in Bogota or Peru, but in
Mexico, where, as has been shown, he is sometimes
called Votan and sometimes Quetzalcoatt, Zamna,
or Cuculcan. Yet in every instance he is described
in the native records as a white man of commanding
appearance, with broad brow, wearing long flowing
robes, and designated a serpent. He gave to the
people good laws, taught them refinement of manners,
communicated to them a knowledge of the one true
God, and succeeded in dissuading them from the
horrible custom of human sacrifice.

204 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

But we are not wholly dependent on traditions
and native records for the solution of the perplexing
problem, whence emanated the population of the
Pacific Islands and the American Continent. Our
task is simplified by finding over the entire route
from Eziongeber to Mexico traces of the presence of
a somewhat advanced civilisation of the most ancient
character which corresponds in all essential features
with that found in the first centres of civilisation,
in Peru, Bogota, and Mexico. Furthermore, all of
these are pervaded by a common influence easily
recognisable as having emanated from the com
bined elements of Phoenicia in its religious, scien
tific, and material, and of Israel in its moral aspects,
but with which are interwoven still other elements
clearly derived from the semi-civilised nations of
the Eastern Mediterranean of that period. Now
their presence on the Pacific shores can only be
explained satisfactorily by believing that at some
very remote date, the four great nations of the
Mediterranean basin, the Jews, Phoenicians, Scy
thians, and Thracians, were by some peculiar com
bination of circumstances united in the prosecution
of some naval expedition which started from an
Asiatic port, and proceeding through the central
insular Pacific to the west coasts of the American
Continent, made these territories tributory to their
enterprises.

If we admit this presumption, then we are at
once forced to a consideration of the reliability of
the data on which we have founded in our research
with respect to the historic movements and the
similarity of the essential features of the early
Asiatic and European and the American civilisations.

Now we have been careful to show that the

ANCIENT AMERICAN CIVILISATION 205

authorities on which we have relied are of so reliable
a character that they leave practically nothing
further to be desired, so that when their testimony
is supplemented by still further information with
respect to the Pacific drawn from equally reliable
sources, we are in possession of a body of evidence
enabling us to account in a very practical way for
every complexity with which at the outset we found
the problem to be invested.

Moreover, the evidence satisfactorily explains
the enigma of the presence of the many racial types
and linguistic differences and usages found on the
Pacific slopes. For the changes that took place in
the evolution of society from the curiously composite
source that formed the elements of their first migra
tions were not always either in the same direction
or of the same intensity, and must, therefore, through
the twenty-five hundred years of complete isolation
have produced departures from the original types
of the most startling character which, with the
meagre information in our possession, it would be
unwise to attempt to follow.

But after making due allowances for the changes
that took place between the date of the first settle
ments on the Pacific Islands and the European re
discovery of America, there still remains sufficient
data to enable us to solve this perplexing enigma.

If the American Continent was discovered and
peopled by a nation that carried thither the advanced
civilisation with which the Mediterranean basin
was identified a thousand years before the Christian
era, then it is to the Phoenicians and to that nation
only that we must look either for its origin or its
intermediation. This view will be readily endorsed
after a consideration of the correspondences estab-

206 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

lished between the American and the Mediterranean
basin civilisation, which we now append, and of the
" Inductio per enumerationem simpliccm " sup
ported by the authorities which follow and on which
it is based.

These we believe represent the only rational
conclusions that can be drawn either from the situa
tion itself or from the data on which the research
is founded.

CHAPTER X

EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN AND AMERICAN
CIVILISATIONS COMPARED

Similarities as shown by commercial system, use of dyes, woollen and
cotton manufactures, precious metals, glass manufactures, pearl-
fishing, tanning, tattooing, implements of war, gymnasia, religion,
laws, &c.

DURING the heyday of its prosperity the carrying
trade of the ancient world was in the hands of
Phoenicia. The land trade of Tyre alone was of
the most extraordinary character. It extended to
Cappadocia and Armenia in the north, to Mesapo-
tamia, Assyria, Babylonia, and the Persian Gulf in
the east, to Palestine and Egypt in the west, and
to Central and Southern Arabia in the south. From
all these widely separated regions caravans, formed
of numerous bodies of armed merchants, plunged
into the heart of the continent and, penetrating
through inhospitable regions, brought back that
wealth of raw and manufactured material which was
necessary for the prosecution of their enterprises.

With the establishment of systematic trade
routes the caravansary or building for the accom
modation of the caravans at the various halting-
places sprang into existence. These caravansaries
were usually large quadrangular enclosures with a
well in the centre. They, however, possessed no
accommodation further than was supplied by a
row of single or double chambers where the traveller

207

208 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

was at liberty to take up his quarters for the night,
being left to provide for himself such further com
fort and food as might be necessary for himself and
his beast.

This system of commerce was not confined to
Asia and Africa, but, as we shall see later, extended
to America.

In ancient times the only place of resort for
merchants in Egypt was at Naucratis (Herod, ii.
109), so at Tlatelulco, an independent city in Mexico,
was situated the great commercial centre of the
civilised states of Anahuac. The merchants of this
city were not only a separate class of the population,
but so far as the higher grades were concerned pos
sessed the same privileges as the nobles. They also
had tribunals like those at Naucratis, to which alone
they were responsible for the regulation of matters
affecting trade and commerce. So powerful were
these merchants that they formed a commercial
corporation controlling the whole trade of the
country, the leading merchants of other cities only
being enrolled as subordinate members. As among
the early Asiatic nations so among the Nahuas
trade was mainly carried on by barter, no coined
money being used. Several convenient substitutes
were, however, found among the civilised peoples
of America to furnish a convenient medium of ex
change. Chief among these were nibs or grains of
cacao, which were known as Ratlachti. Another
was gold dust, which was kept in translucent quills.
Copper cut into small pieces like a T was much used,
and was the nearest approach to coinage, while tin
was not only mined, as among the Phoenicians,
but cut into pieces of determined size and weight
and circulated as money. Merchandise among the

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 209

Nahuas was likewise sold by count and measure,
both of length and capacity.

The principal markets were in the city of Mexico,
and at Tlatelulco. Thither, as Torquemada says,
flocked the workers in gold and jewellery, potters,
painters, shoemakers, huntsmen, fishermen, fruit
growers, and matmakers from the surrounding
regions to display their wares to possible purchasers,
who gathered there in such numbers that, according
to Las Casas, each of the two markets in the city of
Mexico could easily accommodate 200,000 persons,
and into that at Tlatelulco 60,000 persons crowded
daily. The general commerce of the country, while
finding an outlet at these markets as did the trade
of Ophir at Yemen and that of ancient Egypt at
Naucratis, was not confined to these distributing
centres, but, like that of Asia, extended over the
whole country, the outlying towns and districts
being brought, by means of caravans, into active
association with the central markets.

TRADING EXPEDITIONS

The absence of the horse and camel in Centra
America was not an insuperable obstacle to the pro
secution of an extensive export and import trade,
for regular carriers, trained in the same way as
camels in Asia, were found to provide an admirable
substitute. The burden apportioned to each duly
qualified carrier was from sixty to eighty pounds.
This was placed on the back and was supported by
a strap which passed round the forehead. Twelve
to fourteen miles a day were easily accomplished
by a carrier when so loaded.

Nor were the expeditions so equipped of a limited

o

210 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

character. Distant provinces were kept within the
range of operations of the merchant princes of
Tlatelulco, who sent out caravans periodically
either for commercial purposes or under the direc
tion of the king for political objects, when the mer
chants were armed soldiers in disguise. Such ex
peditions in America, as in Asia, were undertaken
by large numbers travelling in company for mutual
protection, one of the prominent members of the
expedition being selected as leader and directing
the movements of the whole caravan. On the route
the carriers, as in the regular Asiatic caravans,
marched in single file, a sharp look-out being kept
on the road and at camping-places for robbers who,
as in the older seats of civilisation, infested the
mountain passes.

Rulers of the various districts through which
the caravans periodically passed recognising, as in
Asia, the benefits which accrued to their territory
from an uninterrupted commercial communication,
constructed roads, built bridges, and erected at
regular intervals along the routes caravansaries
where the traveller could find rest and shelter.

CARAVAN SYSTEM

Among the ancient Maya nations a brisk com
merce existed, merchants traversing the country in
every direction. Yucatan did a large foreign trade
with Tobasco and Honduras, and imported from
these regions large quantities of the cacao.

The Nahua merchants were not less enterprising.
They crossed the entire isthmus of Tehuan tepee to
trade among the Mayas, while the Mayas, equally
familiar with the northern markets, kept up an

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 211

active exchange of commodities year in and year
out by means of caravans.

The caravan system of the merchants of Tlatelulco
was most extensive. When setting out the cara
vans usually pursued a south-easterly course to
the town of Tochtepec, near the banks of the Rio
Alvarado, which, like Damascus in Syria, seems to
have been the radiating point from which they split
up into sections, as the destination at which they
aimed might demand roads leading to Goazocoalco
or to the Miztec and Zapotec towns on the Pacific,
or to the more distant provinces that lay across the
isthmus of Tehuantepec.

The routes so used were usually well-defined,
but in order that no mistake might be made, maps,
as seems to have been customary on the Mediter
ranean (Herod., iii. 136, and v. 49), were regularly
used.

This custom of map-making seems to have ex
tended along the entire Pacific coast as far north as
the Columbia River, for Di Smet says that the
aboriginal tribes of that region were accustomed to
make maps of the country on bark and skins.
More remarkable still, they used the Phoenician or
Pole Star in the prosecution of their journeys by
night.

PURPLE DYE

There is probably no stronger evidence of the
presence of the Phoenician in the New World than
can be drawn from the use of dyes. In the pre
paration of dyes and paints derived from animal,
vegetable, and mineral substances the natives of
the Pacific Coast States were found to be in posses
sion of a skill much in advance of that existing

212 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

among contemporaneous European nations when
the continent was rediscovered by Columbus.

The remarkable fact in connection with this
branch of Nahua art is not that the people were
expert in the preparation and use of dyes, but that
those drawn from the juice of the murex held a
pre-eminent position, the inhabitants of the state
of Jalisco in Mexico and those of Nicaragua obtain
ing the much-prized purple from the murex or
purple fish that were found on the coast. Bailey
says that the dyeing among the natives was, more
over, as among the Phoenicians, done in the wool,
the material to be dyed being taken to the sea
shore where, after procuring a sufficient quantity
of shell-fish and extracting the colouring matter,
each thread was dipped in it separately and then
laid aside to dry.

WOOLLEN AND COTTON MANUFACTURE

But it was in the manufacture of woollen and
cotton stuffs that the people of the civilised Ameri
can states chiefly excelled. The natives of Jalisco
in Mexico were from the beginning celebrated for
the mantuas and blankets which issued from their
looms. But the art was by no means confined to
Mexico. Among the Mojave and Axua Indians
both weaving and dyeing were carried to a remark
able degree of excellence. The Navajos likewise
were famous for their blankets.

India, as we have shown by reference to Hero
dotus (iii. 106), was the native home of the cotton
plant, certain trees there bearing wool instead of
fruit. According to Theophrastus (Hist, of Plants,
iv. 9), this plant was carried from India to the

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 213

Bahrein Islands, presumably through Phoenician
intermediation, and it is a curious fact that the
American traditions distinctly attribute the intro
duction of cotton and maize into that country to
the culture hero Votan or his lieutenant and suc
cessor Quetzalcoatt, thus enabling us to determine
definitely the point from which the ships which
carried these first culture heroes set out.

The finer grades of cloth manufactured in the
civilised states of America in the early period were
invariably made of cotton or rabbit's hair and not
infrequently from both combined. The introduc
tion of spinning and weaving, like that of cotton
itself, was distinctly attributed to the first culture
heroes.

PRECIOUS METALS

The Phoenicians were not only the first syste
matic traders but the first miners and metallurgists.
The early Americans followed the same lines iden
tically. In the working of gold and silver they
specially distinguished themselves. Among the
Nahua nations the ornamental working of these
metals was carried to such perfection that the
Spaniards frankly acknowledged that the products
of their art not only surpassed that manufactured
in the civilised centres of Europe, but were of more
value than the precious metal from which they had
been manufactured.

The direction in which this branch of Aztec art
moved was in the main that of imitating natural
objects such as animals, birds, reptiles, and fishes,
and these with such consummate skill that mov
able heads, tongues, wings, and legs were common.
What amazed the Spaniards most, however, was

214 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

the skill of the Aztecs in casting the various parts
of an object in different metals, each distinct from
the other, yet forming without soldering a homo
geneous unit.

GLASS MANUFACTURE

The extent to which glass was manufactured (for
which Sidon was so famous) among the early civil
ised peoples of America is not known, but that they
had a knowledge of it seems certain. The Chevalier
Charnay, while prosecuting a mission on behalf of
the French Government, went to Zula, and while
superintending the excavation of mountains of
rubbish that for centuries had covered the relics
of the ancient Toltecs, found not only fragments of
pottery of all kinds but portions of a bottle made
of iridescent glass like that for which the Phoenicians
had been famous throughout antiquity.

PAPER

In the manufacture of paper we have further
remarkable evidence of the presence of the Eastern
Mediterranean nations in America.

The widespread use of papyrus throughout the
ancient world as a writing material is well known.
The process of manufacture among the ancients
seems to have been much the same as that still in
use among the South Sea islanders in the production
of tappa from the paper-mulberry tree.

This product both in America and in the Pacific
looked more like coarse parchment than paper, but
it sufficed for the purposes to which it was applied.
While mainly used in the Pacific as an article of

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 215

dress, it was in America chiefly utilised as a material
on which to paint the hieroglyphic records.

PEARL FISHING

One of the very valuable commodities obtained
by the Phoenicians from their Persian Gulf settle
ments was pearls.

The industry had a like importance among the
peoples of the Pacific states. The Yaquis Indians
were famous not only as miners but as pearl fishers,
pearls, turquoises, emeralds, coral, and gold being
the medium of exchange among them. In Potolan
the dresses of the nobles were embroidered with
figures of animals and birds formed of pearls. They
were also much in request among the Nahuas, where
strings of precious stones with pearl pendants were
worn round the neck.

TANNING

Tanning was an important industry among the
Phoenicians, though curiously enough the authori
ties are silent as to the processes used. The same,
however, is true with respect to this art among the
Central American nations. The leather so pro
duced was as a rule applied to the manufacture of
articles of dress, ornament, and armour, but it was
not infrequently used as parchment.

QUIPPAS

It has been said with a considerable show of
learning that the absence of the quippa, a system of
recording dates and events by means of knotted

216 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

cords, afforded irrefragable evidence that the popula
tion of America was not derived from any Old World
source. This objection is not, however, well founded,
for Herodotus (iv. 98) refers to the use of the in
strument in the exact form in which it is found among
the peoples of the civilised states of America.

This method of recording historic events and
the passage of time was not confined to the Asiatic
and American Continents but was employed for a
similar purpose by the Pacific Islanders. But the
most complete correspondence with the quippa of
Darius mentioned by Herodotus is that found in
Mexico. It is peculiarly interesting, because not
only is the form but the use to which it was applied
found to be identical in both places.

TATTOOING

This custom provides another remarkable cor
respondence between the peoples of the Eastern
Mediterranean and America. Tattooing was prac
tised almost universally from Alaska to Central
America, although the methods employed varied
according to locality.

In Yucatan and Nicaragua the tattooing was
effected by cutting the skin with stone lancets and
rubbing powdered charcoal into the wound, which
left an indelible mark. Stripes, serpents, and birds
were the favourite designs. In other parts of the
country fish-bones were employed to puncture the
surface. This practice was common to both the
Maya and the Nahua nations and engaged in by
regular professors of the art.

Body painting was universally practised among
the Maya nations as among the Scythian Budine

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 217

(Her. iv. 108), black and red being the colours most
in use. This custom was not confined to the
Mexican and Central American nations, but existed
throughout the entire Pacific States and among the
aboriginal tribes of North America.

That this barbarous custom, apparently of Asiatic
origin, was practised by all the ancient Maya races
there can be no question, for on the sculpture ruins
found in Chiapas, Honduras, and Yucatan promi
nence is given to it.

The Columbia River is not infrequently referred
to as the centre from which the custom radiated ;
but this opinion must clearly, in the light of our
research, not be received at its face value. The
sculptures at Nachan or Palenque, the seat of the
first population, show that, although the outline of
the human figure was drawn in various attitudes
and with great variety of dress ornaments and
insignia, the flattened forehead always prevailed,
making it apparent that the custom radiated from
this and not from a Columbian River centre.

This peculiar cranial form was considered by the
early Americans to be a mark of nobility. Like
tattooing it is highly probable that it had a totemic
origin, for, on close inspection, it will be observed
that the form sought to be reproduced was that of
the flat serpent head, thus indicating that head
flattening had its origin among the serpent branch
of the totemic cult to which Votan, the first culture
hero, claimed to belong.

No essential difference existed between the
various races in America in this usage.

The Chinooks of the Columbia River, as did the
Mayas, considered a straight line from the end of
the nose to the crown of the head a prime requisite

218 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

in facial beauty, to obtain which a process was set
in operation shortly after the child's birth. This
process usually consisted in placing the child on its
back on a piece of flat wood with the head slightly
raised by means of a block. Another piece of wood,
or preferably bark, was placed over the forehead
and fastened to that on which the child lay by means
of senet cords, which were tightened at intervals
until the head had assumed the desired form.
Among all of these peoples a round head was con
sidered a reproach.

IMPLEMENTS OF WAR, &c.

Those identified with the Mediterranean nations
were one and all found not only in the civilised but
among the uncivilised races of the American Con
tinent. One peculiar weapon clearly identified with
the Mediterranean was the curved throw-stick or
boomerang. Its antiquity is beyond question, for
among the subjects depicted on the tombs, the
Egyptian is frequently shown going into the marshes
in a boat accompanied by his children to spear the
hippopotamus or knock down birds with the curved
throw-stick. The bow and arrow were in general
use among the nations of America, while those of
Salvador and Nicaragua were so expert in the use
of the sling that game and even birds on the wing
were secured by it.

ARMIES

The armies of the American nations were li^e
those of the Asiatic nations, large, well drilled, and
fully equipped. They usually consisted of several

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 219

divisions numbering 8000 each, divided into regular
companies commanded by captains and furnished
with standards. In warfare the attack was made at
a distance with arrows, slings, and javelins, but in
the hand-to-hand fight which later ensued, dart,
spear, sword, and club were used. The arrows
throughout Mexico and Central America were winged
with two and sometimes three feathers and pointed,
as were the spears, with bronze, obsidian, or flint
points as on the Mediterranean.

GYMNASIA

Among the Mediterranean nations it was usual
to train in the gymnasium those fitted for a mili
tary career. This system also existed on the
Pacific Islands, and was likewise common among the
civilised nations of America. There the young men
were not only trained in those exercises best suited
to the development of bodily agility but to the use
of weapons of warfare.

TOTEMISM

As we have already shown, totemism on the
Mediterranean basin was a cult of Arian extraction
and common to the Egyptians, Phoenicians, Scy
thians, Greeks, and Romans, and to some limited
extent present among the Jews. It was a cardinal
feature of the religious cult of the Phoenicians, each
tribe or family being named after its own totem, an
animal, plant, or heavenly body, which was wor
shipped by it and regarded as its protecting divinity.
This practice also prevailed throughout Central
Polynesia and on the American Continent from

220 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Alaska to Mexico. Among the Samoans the child
at birth was supposed to be taken under the care
of some particular god or aitu. Several of these
were invoked in succession on the occasion, the one
which happened to be addressed as the child was
born being selected as the child's god for life. These
gods were supposed to make their appearance in
visible form, and the particular thing in which it
was believed to incarnate was to the individual an
object of religious veneration.

The forms in which these aitus were supposed
by the Samoans to incarnate were multitudinous,
embracing the eel, crab, shark, turtle, lizard, fish,
dog, owl, &c. If the individual found one of these
in which he supposed his particular god to incarnate
dead on the roadside, he immediately sat down
beside it and began to weep, beating his forehead
until the blood came, an act which was believed to
be pleasing to the deity. This belief, expressed in
almost identical form, prevailed, and, to some ex
tent, exists even still among the Zapotecs, a pre-
Toltec nation of Yucatan. Prior to confinement
the relatives of the woman assembled in the house
and commenced to draw on the floor figures of
different animals, rubbing out each figure as soon
as it was completed. This was continued until the
moment of birth, when the figure that remained on
the floor was selected as the child's tona or guardian
spirit, it being obligatory on the part of the child,
when it grew up, to procure one of the species which
the drawing represented and care for it, as it was
believed that not only the health but the life of the
individual was bound up with that of the totem.

The prevalence of totemism on the American
Continent was widespread. Among the North

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 221

American Indians the tribes when on the march
always camped together in separate totem clans.
Like the Scythian Neuri and the Phoenicians, these
clans believed that their ancestors sprang from the
totem and that at death they resumed the totem
form. This view certainly prevailed among the
Moqui Indians, who, believing that the ancestors
of their clans were respectively rattlesnakes, deer,
bear, &c., said that at death each man according to
his tribe became one of these animals. This belief
was not confined to any particular locality. Among
the northern Omalia Indians the dying clansman,
wrapped in a buffalo skin, with his clan totem
painted on his face, was invariably addressed by
his friends : ' You are going to the buffaloes ; be
brave, be strong/'

This was peculiarly a Phoenician belief, for
Cadmus, the son of Agenor, king of Phoenicia, the
founder of Thebes, who introduced the sixteen
letters of the Phoenician alphabet into Greece, was
accredited, along with his wife Hamonia, with having
been transformed at death into the totem form of
the serpent tribe to which they belonged.

TREE AND STONE WORSHIP

Among the Semites sacrifices were not originally
burned, nor was the god supposed to be seated aloft
but present in the bactellium, the bethel or sacred
stone or sacred tree, which among them served at
once as the later altar and the later idol. That
this form of belief was familiar to the Polynesians
is clear, for we have shown in our references to the
cult of the Areois in Tahiti that a species of tree
veneration existed there.

222 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

The belief had a corresponding place in the re
ligious systems of the early Americans, the Miztecs
and Zapotecs, two ancient branches of the Mayas
of Yucatan claiming that the ancestors of their
people sprang from two trees. The belief also pre
vailed in other parts of Central America and in
Mexico where cypresses and palms, generally in
groups of three within the temple enclosures, were
tended with great care and received gifts and offer
ings of incense.

Nor was the adoration confined to trees. The
worship of stones, more especially aerolites, is
equally well demonstrated. Quetzalcoatt, some
times identified with Votan, the culture hero, was
represented either by a black stone or several small
green ones. These were supposed to have fallen
from heaven and were adored in his service.

SUN WORSHIP

With these forms of belief Phallus-worship was
clearly identified in the Old World centres of civil
isation. Indeed in most mythologies the Sun, as
the principle of fire, the Moon, and the Earth were
always associated with this worship. These were
the parent principles, their obvious symbols being
the Phallus and the Kteis.

So widespread was the cult that it embraced not
only India, Egypt, and Phoenicia, but extended to
the Greek and Latin races. It was, however,
strictly forbidden to the Jews (Num. xxv. 3).
Its presence in the Pacific and America is very
apparent. The prevalence of sun worship, which
was always intimately connected with Phallicism,
would in itself go very far to prove its existence.

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 223

But we are not dependent on such evidence, for
Stephens and Catherwood, Squires and the Abbe
Brasseur de Bourbourg, all of whom were intimately
familiar with the monuments of Central America,
emphatically testify to the presence of the cult
among the peoples of the civilised states.

MOLOCH

According to Dr. Dollinger and other authorities
the image of Moloch among the Phoenicians was a
human figure with a bull's head and outstretched
arms. This image during periods of sacrifice was
made red-hot by means of a fire kindled within,
and the victims laid in its arms rolled into the fiery
furnace below, the din of flutes and drums drowning
their cries while they were being consumed. This
system of sacrifice was also found in identical form
among the ancient Maya races of Yucatan, especi
ally among the Itzas, one of the most ancient
branches of this nation. The chief idol of the Itzas
was Hubo, and, like the Phoenician Moloch, was
represented by a hollow metal figure, half human
and half brute, which in times of sacrifice was
heated by a fire kindled within. When sufficiently
hot the human victims were passed through an
opening between the shoulders into the fire below,
charged to implore the favour of the gods. Their
cries, as they were being roasted to death, were
drowned by the beating of drums, the blowing of
horns, and the shouts of the assembled friends,
who meanwhile danced around the image. The
correspondence does not, however, cease here, for
in the temple services of the Itzas to Hubo, as in

224 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

those of the Phoenicians to Hercules, women were
excluded under penalty of death.

In view of the mass of evidence which has been
advanced showing the striking similarities between
the Scythians, Thracians, and the Phoenicians of
the Mediterranean basin and the peoples occupying
the Pacific States of America it would be superfluous
to continue our investigation further.

We will now deal with the evidence proving the
presence of the Hebrews in the same territory.

MONOTHEISM

The one central feature distinguishing the
Hebrew religious system from that of the surround
ing nations was its Monotheism (2 Chron. vi. 18).
Around this great central concept the life of the
Israelite revolved. During the earlier and purer
period of the Phoenician history the monotheistic
idea seems also to have been prevalent, but we are
unable to say just when the departure from the
worship of one central divinity to that of his
personified attributes took place. From the message
of Hiram to Solomon (2 Chron. ii. n) there can be
no doubt that at the date of the joint expeditions
from Eziongeber it still held a prominent place in
the minds of the ruling and priestly classes.

The presence of such a belief among the early
inhabitants of the Pacific States can scarcely, there
fore, in view of what has already been said, be
considered remarkable. To these peoples the
highest invisible god was familiar under the name
of Teoth. The more advanced school of Mexican
cosmogony always ascribed the origin of this idea
to the ancient Toltecs, so that we may safely enough

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 225

assume that it was derived from the teachings of
the first culture hero. This school, it is asserted,
taught that all things had been created by one God,
invisible and omnipotent. That this monotheistic
idea was not confined to the earliest period is ap
parent, for all the writers who have treated the later
history of the American nations authoritatively
assure us that at the time when the Spaniards landed
on the continent there was not one that did not
recognise the existence of a supreme and absolute
Ruler of the universe.

It is quite true that this in itself would not
demonstrate the presence of the Hebrew in America,
nor is this fact, unsupported, offered as evidence of
it, but in connection with the data to be submitted
it will, we believe, demonstrate this fact beyond a
doubt. It will also be shown that the influence
behind this monotheistic idea must have been a
dominating one since it was sufficiently powerful
to have survived throughout long centuries of
isolation.

While all the early traditions of the human race
were held in common by the peoples who migrated
from the Mesopotamian plains, still among none of
them have they survived in the same pristine purity
as among the Hebrews.

If, therefore, we keep the Jewish text promi
nently before us we should have little difficulty in
determining the source from which corresponding
traditions found among the native races of the
Pacific States were derived, for in most instances
they will be found to follow the Hebrew text
almost verbatim et literatim.

The story of the creation of mankind follows the
Hebrew text much more closely in the Pacific than

p

226 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

it does on the American Continent. This is not
the case, however, with that of the Flood. Nearly
all the painted manuscripts found among the
Mexicans, the Tlascaltecs, Zapotecs, Meztecs, and
Michoacans invariably depict a man and woman
seated in a boat floating over a waste of waters.
According to the Mexican tradition only one man
and one woman escaped the catastrophe, and these
saved themselves in the hollow trunk of a cypress
tree, the name of the man being Cox Cox and that
of his wife Xochi quetzal. The ark, according to
this tradition, is said to have grounded on the Peak
of Coluacan, the Ararat of Mexico, where the man
and his wife multiplied and increased, their children
being all born dumb. This calamity was nullified
by the advent of a dove, which brought to them
tongues innumerable, so that only fifteen of the
descendants of Cox Cox could understand each
other, but these became the heads of families, and
from them were descended the Toltecs, Aztecs, and
Acolhua nations.

This Michoacan account more closely corres
ponds to the Hebrew text. In it Tezpi is credited
with having constructed a spacious vessel in which
he not only saved himself and his family but also
his children, together with several animals and grain
sufficient for their common support. The corres
pondence does not, however, cease here, for, accord
ing to this tradition, when the waters began to
subside, Tezpi sent out a vulture that it might re
turn when the dry land appeared and bring him
word. Finding abundant food in the carcases
floating in every direction the vulture did not return,
and Tezpi sent out other birds and, among them,
a species of humming-bird which, when the sun

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 227

began to cover the earth with verdure, came back
to Tezpi bearing leaves in its bill. This tradi
tion locates the spot where the vessel grounded in
the mountains of Cothnacan, and there, it is said,
Tezpi and his family disembarked.

The tradition most closely corresponding to the
Hebrew and Chaldaean story of the building of the
Tower of Babel is found in Mexico and is said to be
of pre-Toltec origin, from which we presume it is
necessary to associate it with the culture heroes.

According to this account Xelhua, a giant sur-
named the Architect, went to Cholula immediately
after the Flood and began the erection of an arti
ficial mountain as a memorial of thanksgiving to
the god Tlatoc, who had saved him and his family
from the devastation which had swept over the
land. The tradition goes on to say that the bricks
necessary for the erection of this structure were
made at Talamanalco at the foot of the Sierra de
Cocoth Mountains, and passed from hand to hand
along a file of men that stretched from the Kilns
to Cholula. As, however, the pyramid rose slowly
towards the heavens the jealousy and anger of the
gods was aroused, and they launched fire from the
clouds which killed so many of the builders that
the work was stopped.

Passing now to a consideration of further evi
dence found in the territory pointing to Hebraic
occupation we find traces of laws corresponding
in some measure to those that were identified in
an exclusive way with the Hebrews. Moreover, the
methods of inflicting the penalties attached to their
infraction were of such a character that it is im
possible to err in relating them to Hebraic sources.

We have already referred to the presence of the

228 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

rite of circumcision in the Pacific as forming part
of that cumulative evidence which enables us to
determine the route pursued by the expeditions of
Hiram and Solomon on their way to Ophir (i Kings
ix. 28). It is undoubtedly true that the practice
of circumcision is much better attested among the
later Nahuas and Aztecs than it is among the Mayas.
But the rite does not seem to have been in general
use among the Nahuas and Aztecs, which may be
explained by the very mixed constituents of the
imported civilisation. That it was practised, how
ever, in the early seats of civilisation is well attested
by Las Casas, Mendiota, and Brasseur de Bourbourg.

LEGAL SYSTEM

In order that the law among the Jews might be
applied with the strictest impartiality instructions
of the most rigorous character were given by Moses
to the judges (Deut. i. 17). The sense of justice
was also particularly keen among the Aztecs. One
of the most notable characteristics of their monarchs
was their efforts to secure justice. The need for it
was impressed upon the king in the most serious
manner at his coronation. The consequence was
that the Aztec laws were severe in the extreme.
No favouritism was shown, all alike, from the
highest to the lowest, being made amenable to them.

In order that they might be protected from
temptation to malfeasance the judges were ap
pointed to the position for life. None were eligible
who were not sober and upright. A judge who
was known to have been intoxicated was, on the
first occasion, severely reprimanded by his fellow
judges, but on a repetition of his offence his head

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 229

was shaved in public and he was deprived of his
office. If he was found guilty of making a false
report of the business transacted in his court to the
king, or convicted of taking a bribe or rendering
an unjust decision, he was promptly punished with
death.

In order that the administration of the law might
receive due weight it was surrounded with the
necessary pomp and circumstance. The two most
important tribunals of the Nahua nation were held in
the palace of the king, a large quadrangular building
enclosing two open courtyards, the largest of which
was used as a market-place over which a regular
judicial tribunal presided, and to which was carried
for adjustment all disputes that arose in the con
duct of the day's business. The smaller court was
situated in the interior of the palace, and was de
voted to the consideration of cases of a more com
plex character. In the court a fire was kept per
petually burning. Here the two principal tribunals
of the kingdom were situated. The highest of these
courts was on the right-hand of the palace as one
entered the gateway. In the interior was a throne
of gold studded with turquoises, emeralds, and other
precious stones, and on a stool which stood in front
of the throne were arranged a shield, or heavy
double-handed sword of justice, with a row of sharp
flints set along the edges, a bow with a quiver of
arrows, a skull surmounted with an emerald of
pyramidal shape, in which was inserted a plume
of feathers, and along with these precious stones
and other insignia of law and royalty. The walls
of the court, according to Prescott, were hung with
rare tapestries manufactured from the hair of
various animals of rich and varied colours and

230 THE PHCEN1CIANS AND AMERICA

lavishly embroidered with figures of birds and
flowers. This tribunal was called the Tribunal of
God.

The inferior tribunal called that of the king also
contained a throne but of lower height. It was
adorned with a canopy which bore the royal coat-of-
arms. In this court the ordinary business of the
king was transacted, and there he gave audiences.
When decisions were to be given in important cases,
or when it was necessary to impose sentence of
death, the court proceeded to the Tribunal of God.
In passing judgment there the king ascended the
throne, put on the golden tiara, which resembled a
half mitre, placed his right hand on the skull and
with his left hand held aloft the golden arrow,
which among the Nahuas served as a sceptre.

In another hall adjoining these two supreme
tribunals were held subsidiary courts. In the inner
and principal of the two divisions was a tribunal
presided over by eight judges, one-half of whom
were nobles and gentlemen and the other half
citizens. The outer division was occupied by a
higher court composed of four superior judges called
the Presidents of the Council, and between this
court and that presided over by the king was a
wicket so arranged that the judges could pass
through and refer to him all difficult cases (Deut.
i. 17).

Perjury in all these courts was punishable by
death, and not only was it expressly forbidden to
a judge to receive even the most trivial present
from the litigants, but the violation of this law was
accompanied by deposition from office and the in
fliction of other exceedingly rigorous punishments.

That this judicial system was derived from the

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 231

Hebrews there can be no question. The name
Hebrew is written in very legible character across
its face. It will, therefore, be profitable to examine
the Scripture narrative somewhat closely with a
view to seeing what light it sheds on the problem.

In Exodus xviii. 15 Moses, in explaining to his
father-in-law the reasons why he personally per
formed the onerous duties of judge to the people,
said that he did so solely on account of his familiarity
with the statutes of Jehovah and his desire to
communicate them to the people. The office was,
however, too arduous for one man to continue to
sustain without suitable support, and Jethro, solici
tous for the welfare of his son-in-law and not less so
for the honest administration of the law, counselled
Moses to alter his system and appoint a many-
centred Court of Appeal to adjust minor differences
and offences, and to confine his attention to the more
important ones in which it was necessary for him
to stand in the place of God to the people. That
this was the system in use among the Nahua nations
is apparent on the face of it.

The laws relating to gluttony, drunkenness, and
honour to parents were fundamental among the
Jews, and were clearly and explicitly stated, as were
the punishments attached to their infraction. As
these had no exact counterpart among the other
nations of the period it will be profitable to give
some attention to them, more especially as they
will be found to be identical with those in operation
among the Nahua nations of America.

In Deuteronomy v. 16 the Hebraic law reads,
" Honour thy father and thy mother, as the Lord
thy God hath commanded thee, that thy days may
be prolonged and that it may go well with thee in

232 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee."
This, again, is supplemented in Deuteronomy xxi.
1 8 with very stringent regulations as to the punish
ment of disobedience to parents, gluttony, and
drunkenness, and reads as follows : " If a man have
a stubborn and rebellious son which will not obey
the voice of his father or the voice of his mother,
and that when they have chastened him will not
hearken unto them, then shall his father and his
mother lay hold on him and bring him out unto
the elders of the city and unto the gate of his
place. And they shall say unto the elders of the
city : This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he
will not obey our voice, he is a glutton and a
drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone
him with stones till he die, so shalt thou put away
evil from among you and all Israel shall hear and
fear."

The counterpart of these laws is found among
the Nahua nations and were derived from the
Mayas. The son who raised his hand against his
father or mother not only suffered death, but his
children were debarred from inheriting the property
of their grandparents. The law of gluttony and
drunkenness was enforced with equal strictness.
The young man found drunk was conveyed to jail
and there beaten to death with clubs, while the
young woman who so disgraced herself and parents
according to a more literal interpretation of the
Jewish law was stoned to death.

The law of material evidence bulked very largely
in the Jewish code, and seems to have held a corres
ponding place in that of Egypt, as may be seen by
reference to Genesis xxxix. 13 and Exodus xxii. 4.
This law had a like prominence among the Maya

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 233

nations. It was deemed of great importance there
to take the thief while in actual possession of the
stolen property, while to secure judgment against
a man accused of rape it was necessary for the
prosecutrix to seize and produce in court some
portion of the offender's wearing apparel.

There is again the same startling similarity in
the Jewish and Aztec laws regarding theft. Among
the Jews it was required of a man that stole an ox
or a sheep and killed it that he return five oxen for
an ox and four sheep for a sheep, but in the event
of his having nothing then he was sold for his theft
and restitution made from the proceeds of the sale
(Exod. xxii. i). If, on the other hand, he stole
money or goods the thief was required to pay
double, or if the goods were found in his possession
alive, whether ox, ass, or sheep, he was required to
pay double (Exod. xxii. 9).

According to Ortega the petty thief among the
Aztecs was considered the slave of the person from
whom he had stolen, yet the injured party had the
privilege of refusing to accept the thhf as his slave,
and in such cases he was sold by the judge and the
complainant was reimbursed from the proceeds of
the sale. In cases where a compromise was effected
the thief was not only required to reimburse the
injured party for his loss, but to pay into the court
treasury an equal sum which was tantamount to
the Hebraic law of paying back double the amount
stolen.

The Levitical law regulating business trans
actions was not less stringent than that which
affected the public at large. According to Torque-
mada there was in each market-place a commercial
tribunal which seems to have been similar in its

234 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

purposes to that referred to by Herodotus (ii. 178)
as existing in Naucratis in northern Egypt. This
tribunal among the Nahuas was presided over by
twelve judges who regulated both measures and
prices. Guards under their authority constantly
patrolled the markets to prevent disorder, any
attempt at extortion or palming off inferior goods
on the purchaser, or taking advantage of the seller,
discovered by them being at once reported to the
judges, who not only punished severely all offenders,
but even inflicted the death penalty in flagrant cases.

Among the Hebrews both in the earlier and later
periods, as may be seen by reference to Genesis xx.
12 and 2 Samuel xiii. 13, marriage to a sister was
allowable provided the relationship was on the
father's side only. This custom, curiously enough,
prevailed also in the early American civilised states.
Among the Guatemalans the same permission was
given, provided only that the woman was sister by
a different father, no relationship on the mother's
side being recognised among them.

More curious still was the existence in the
civilised states of the Hebraic law which compelled
a man to marry his deceased brother's widow in the
event of there being no issue. The Hebraic law on
this point was very explicit : "If brethren dwell
together, and one of them die, and have no child,
the wife of the dead man shall not marry without
unto a stranger : her husband's brother shall go in
unto her and take her to him to wife, and perform
the duty of an husband's brother unto her, and the
first-born shall succeed to the name of his brother
who is dead, that his name be not put out of Israel "
(Deut. xxv. 5).

This law was not instituted for the protection of

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 235

the Hebrew people during the sojourn in the wilder
ness solely, but was a prominent feature of the
national polity during its entire career.

Among the early civilised American races this
law was also in operation.

This obligation to marry the childless widow it
will, however, be remembered was among the Hebrews
not confined to a surviving brother but extended
to the nearest surviving kinsman (Deut. xxv. 5).
The story of Ruth, the Moabitess, centres in the
application of this law, Boaz, the ultimate husband,
being unable to marry the young widow until the
claims of a nearer kinsman had been legally set
aside. A similar law existed among the ancient
Maya races of Central America. There a widow was
invariably married to the brother of the deceased
husband, and that even in the event of his having
a wife of his own living at the time, the widow being
considered the property of the dead man's family.
The analogy can be carried even further. The obli
gation to marry the widow there, as in Palestine,
was not confined to a surviving brother but ex
tended, as among the Hebrews, to the nearest sur
viving male relative on the husband's side.

Concubinage, it is needless to say, was common
among the Hebrews, not only in the earlier period but
in the most extraordinary form, during the reign of
Solomon who, according to i Kings xi. 3, had seven
hundred wives and three hundred concubines who
turned away his heart from the service of God.

Throughout the Mexican empire concubines were
not only permitted but regulated by law. Among
the Nahua nations concubines were divided into
three classes, nor was the usage confined to the
common people, but found the widest field for its

238 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

to i Chronicles xxiii. i and I Kings ii. 14, where it
will be seen that Solomon, the youngest son, was
chosen in place of Adonijah, the eldest.

During the period, likewise, the custom seems to
have been adopted of training the chosen heir for
the functions of the kingly office while the old
monarch was still alive.

There may be room for difference of opinion as
to the origin of such a system of government, but
if we follow the Scripture narrative there can be
no question that the system of government was the
outgrowth of two factors — first, the explicit instruc
tions of God to David that Solomon should succeed
him on the throne of Israel, and second, the solicitous
desire of David to carry out these instructions in
such a way that Solomon would be firmly established
on the throne before his demise. In i Chronicles
xxvih. 5 this is clearly set forth, for there David
says : "Of all my sons the Lord hath chosen
Solomon to sit upon the throne of the Kingdom of
the Lord over Israel/' a statement that receives
corroboration not only in the complaint of Adonijah
(i Kings ii. 14) that the kingdom was his and that
all Israel had set their faces on him that he should
reign over them, but in i Chronicles xxiii. i, where it
states explicitly that " When David was old and full
of days he made Solomon, his son, king over Israel."

Anointing and coronation among the Hebrews
seem in consequence of this departure to have been
two separate ceremonies among them. Not only
was Solomon anointed by Zadok the priest and
Nathan the prophet (i Kings i. 39) during the life
of David, when he temporarily took up the reins of
office, but a second time on his regular accession to
the throne on the death of his father (i Chron. xxix.

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 239

22). On the accession of the Hebrew monarch to
the throne it was, moreover, obligatory for the
princes of the royal house, the generals of the army,
the governors of the provinces, and all high in
authority to proceed to the royal palace and swear
allegiance to him, none of these being permitted,
under the most severe penalties, to absent himself
from the ceremony (i Chron. xxix. 24).

Among the Nahua nations the order of royal
succession as among the Hebrews was lineal and here
ditary. The reigning king, however, always retained
the right to select from among his sons the one whom
he thought best fitted to govern. In order, how
ever, that no mistake might be made in the selection
it was customary for the Nahua king, when he felt
that his end was drawing near, to place on the throne,
as David did Solomon, the son whom he had selected
in order to familiarise him with the routine of govern
ment under his personal direction. The chosen
heir, therefore, really began his reign from the date
of his appointment.

The ceremony of anointing among the Nahuas
likewise always preceded and was distinct from
that of coronation. The de facto king despatched
messengers throughout the kingdom when the old
monarch grew sick, summoning the nobles and
grandees of the kingdom to repair at once to the
capital and swear allegiance to him, no one being
permitted to absent himself under the most severe
penalties.

REMOVAL OF LANDMARKS

Removal of landmarks among the Hebrews was
a heinous offence. " Cursed be the man/' said the

240 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Hebraic law, " that removeth his neighbour's land
mark " (Deut. xxvii. 17). This law was equally
drastic in Central America, for in Mexico he who by
force took possession of another's land or removed
his neighbour's landmark was summarily put to
death.

SORCERY

Sorcery was forbidden to the Hebrews. " The
man or woman that hath a familiar spirit, or is
a wizard, shall surely be put to death : they shall
stone them with stones, their blood shall be upon
them" (Lev. xx. 27).

This law was also in effect in the civilised states
of America, for, according to Ximenes, the balam
or sorcerer in Guatemala was burned, and, according
to Torquemada, the same offence in Verapaz caused
the guilty party either to be beaten to death with
clubs or hanged.

SLAVERY

Among the Hebrews slavery seems to have been a
very mild institution amounting to little more than
a moderate subjection, which was not allowed to
interfere with the slave possessing sufficient time
in which to work for his own advantage and the
support of those dependent on him. Scripture
(Exod. xxi. 2 and Lev. xxv. 39) leaves no room
for doubt on this point. The case can, however, be
better understood by reference to the institution
during the reign of Solomon, when the assistance
to be secured from the subject people was ascer
tained by numbering all the strangers in the land,
and, as these were found to amount to 153,600,
they were apportioned to the work in three sections

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 241

of 51,800 each, who laboured one month in Lebanon
and were two months at home (i Kings v. 14).

These strangers were the Amorites, Hittites,
Perisites, and Jebusites left in the promised land after
its occupancy by the Hebrews on whom was levied
a tribute of bondservice. The Hebrews were exhorted
to treat these subject people with great considera
tion and to remember that they and their forefathers
had been bondservants in Egypt (Deut. xv. 12).

The Phoenicians were the great slave dealers of
the ancient world, and slavery among them was a
very different institution from what it was among
the Israelites. The population of Tyre, indeed, at
the period of its destruction by Alexander the Great
is said to have included some 30,000 of these unfor
tunates, whose average value of £3 per head was
assessed at little more than that of ordinary cattle.

In the ancient states of America slavery was
an institution of considerable importance. The
chief slave market seems to have been in Azapazalco.
Slavery was an immensely profitable business, for
the trades, with a view to advantageous sales, are
said to have fed and clothed those about to be ex
posed in the public markets, and to have encouraged
them to dance and look cheerful with a view to
securing good masters.

Slavery in Mexico was, as among the Hebrews,
little more than an obligation to render a certain
amount of personal service when this was demanded.
But it would seem that this could not be exacted
without allowing the slave a certain amount of time
in which to labour for his own advantage and the sup
port of those dependent on him. Slavery, however,
was not altogether of this patriarchal character
among the peoples of the civilised states of America,

Q

240 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Hebraic law, " that removeth his neighbour's land
mark " (Deut. xxvii. 17). This law was equally
drastic in Central America, for in Mexico he who by
force took possession of another's land or removed
his neighbour's landmark was summarily put to
death.

SORCERY

Sorcery was forbidden to the Hebrews. " The
man or woman that hath a familiar spirit, or is
a wizard, shall surely be put to death : they shall
stone them with stones, their blood shall be upon
them" (Lev. xx. 27).

This law was also in effect in the civilised states
of America, for, according to Ximenes, the balam
or sorcerer in Guatemala was burned, and, according
to Torquemada, the same offence in Verapaz caused
the guilty party either to be beaten to death with
clubs or hanged.

SLAVERY

Among the Hebrews slavery seems to have been a
very mild institution amounting to little more than
a moderate subjection, which was not allowed to
interfere with the slave possessing sufficient time
in which to work for his own advantage and the
support of those dependent on him. Scripture
(Exod. xxi. 2 and Lev. xxv. 39) leaves no room
for doubt on this point. The case can, however, be
better understood by reference to the institution
during the reign of Solomon, when the assistance
to be secured from the subject people was ascer
tained by numbering all the strangers in the land,
and, as these were found to amount to 153,600,
they were apportioned to the work in three sections

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 241

of 51,800 each, who laboured one month in Lebanon
and were two months at home (i Kings v. 14).

These strangers were the Amorites, Hittites,
Perisites, and Jebusites left in the promised land after
its occupancy by the Hebrews on whom was levied
a tribute of bondservice. The Hebrews were exhorted
to treat these subject people with great considera
tion and to remember that they and their forefathers
had been bondservants in Egypt (Deut. xv. 12).

The Phoenicians were the great slave dealers of
the ancient world, and slavery among them was a
very different institution from what it was among
the Israelites. The population of Tyre, indeed, at
the period of its destruction by Alexander the Great
is said to have included some 30,000 of these unfor
tunates, whose average value of £3 per head was
assessed at little more than that of ordinary cattle.

In the ancient states of America slavery was
an institution of considerable importance. The
chief slave market seems to have been in Azapazalco.
Slavery was an immensely profitable business, for
the trades, with a view to advantageous sales, are
said to have fed and clothed those about to be ex
posed in the public markets, and to have encouraged
them to dance and look cheerful with a view to
securing good masters.

Slavery in Mexico was, as among the Hebrews,
little more than an obligation to render a certain
amount of personal service when this was demanded.
But it would seem that this could not be exacted
without allowing the slave a certain amount of time
in which to labour for his own advantage and the sup
port of those dependent on him. Slavery, however,
was not altogether of this patriarchal character
among the peoples of the civilised states of America,

Q

242 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

for we learn from the ancient records that slaves
who were neither prisoners of war, deformed persons,
nor criminals were in some cases put to death in large
numbers. But this difference in the treatment of
slaves does not hinder but rather helps us to under
stand the source from which the American insti
tution was derived. It was neither Jewish nor
Phoenician but a conjunction of both.

MAN STEALING

Among the Jews man stealing was a capital
offence. The law on this point was explicit — " If
any man be found stealing away one of his brethren
of the children of Israel and making merchandise
of him and selling him, that thief shall die, and thou
shalt put away the evil from among you " (Deut.
xxiv. 7 ; Exod. xxi. 16). The parallel to this
law was found operative in the Central American
States, for, according to Las Casas, the crime of
kidnapping, while common in Guatemala, was pun
ished with great severity. He who sold a free native
into slavery was clubbed to death, while in Texcuco
the man who kidnapped a child and sold it into
slavery was hanged.

The redemption of slaves among the Jews was
explicitly provided for, perpetual bondage, unless
deliberately chosen by the slave, being forbidden
(Exod. xxi. 6) : " If a sojourner or stranger wax rich
by thee, and thy brother that dwelleth by him wax
poor, and sell himself unto the sojourner or stranger
by thee, or to the stock of the stranger's family :
after that he is sold he may be redeemed again ;
one of his brethren may redeem him " (Lev. xxv.
47). The humane provision for the redemption of

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 243

the slave was likewise provided for among the ancient
Mayas, for while, as in Palestine, it was permissible
for a father to sell himself or his children into slavery
when circumstances compelled, in Nicaragua the
slave so sold always retained the right of redemption.

CITIES OF REFUGE

The sanctuary or city of refuge which was in
the early ages peculiar to the Jews provides another
valuable correspondence with Central American
institutions. The Vanquech or place of worship
among the Californians, like the marae among the
Tahitians, was a large unroofed enclosure, and, like
it, not to be approached without reverence. Each
Vanquech was a city of refuge, and with rights of
sanctuary like those among the Society Islanders
that exceeded any ever granted in a Jewish or a
Christian community. Not only was the criminal
who entered the Vanquech safe, but even contact
with the sacred enclosure was deemed sufficient to
purge the criminal from his offence, so that he was
at liberty to return to his home.

In the face of such a list of correspondences as
have been given it is needless to continue this in
vestigation further, for while it is highly probable
that Chinese and Japanese junks, driven by storm
or swept by currents, may have reached the western
shores of America, and that the eastern sea-board
was visited at long intervals by Icelanders, Scandi
navians, Welsh, Irish, and Scotch, still it is clear
that it is not to such sources that we must look for
a solution of the problems that are presented by
the civilisation of the American Continent. These

244 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

visits were in the very nature of things accidental.
They were not the result of any concerted move
ment either of a national or of an international
character. Moreover, if the strangers who succeeded
in reaching either the eastern or western shores of
the continent had been spared they naturally would
have settled among the people and imparted know
ledge and ideas that in some form would have
moulded the thought of future generations. Still,
even with this admission, we would be without a
solution of our problem, because it is impossible
to suppose that this information or the physical
peculiarities so transmitted could have survived the
lapse of a few generations of intermarriage with the
strong aboriginal stock. Unless, therefore, we were
able to show that there was an importation of
emigrants in sufficient numbers and of a civilisation
superior to that existing there and capable of domi
nating the aboriginal population, our investigation
would have been fruitless.

Now the trend of our entire research has gone to
show that the discovery of America was not a mere
accident in the Phoenician career but a discovery
that was followed by aggressive colonisation in
conjunction with the Hebrews, and that these two
nations drew into their service still others of a semi-
civilised character, who went with them in the
capacity of seamen or marines. How long this
intercourse between Asiatic and American Conti
nents continued we have no means of determining
accurately, although there seems to be good reason
why it should not be limited to a period of less than
380 years, or from 1050 B.C., when the expeditions
of Solomon and Hiram took place, and 670 B.C.,
when Esdrah addon I, the youngest son of Senna-

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 245

cherib, performing the feat, never since attempted
by a civilised power, penetrated to the heart of
Africa and, capturing the cities of that desert-
guarded region, reduced the peninsula to the con
dition of an Assyrian province. This incident for
a period closed the navigation of the Persian Gulf
to the Phoenicians.

The great difficulty in arriving at a solution of
our problem has not been the lack of information
so much as a certain unwillingness to believe that
the men of past ages outran us in many direc
tions and were in possession of such knowledge and
such appliances as the navigation to and the dis
covery of the American Continent demanded. In
view of what has been submitted, however, it should,
we think, be apparent that neither the men, the
knowledge, the initiative, nor the resource were
lacking at that period to accomplish all that was
involved in the discovery of the American Continent.

For many years there has existed among in
vestigators of this problem a belief that it is one
that never can be solved, and, so far as dependence
on the information provided by the ancient monu
ments in the New World itself is concerned, there
can be no question that this is no erroneous belief,
the light which these monuments provided being
one-sided and incomplete. It is rather to the traces
of an advanced civilisation which, up to a compara
tively recent date, have survived among the people
themselves along the route of the voyages of Hiram
and Solomon that we must look.

We have, moreover, shown in the clearest pos
sible manner by means of existing traditions and
records found among the early civilised peoples of
America the destination to which these expeditions

246 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

of Solomon and Hiram were directed, and that the
remoteness of this region explains in a wholly
satisfactory manner the long period of time that
was spent on the return voyages. Moreover,
abundant evidence has been produced indicative
of the presence of all the nations comprising the
personnel of these expeditions over the entire course
pursued by the ships. We have, therefore, ex
plained in a rational way the causes which operated
to plant in the New World simultaneously, a some
what advanced civilisation, alongside a rude state
of society which we are accustomed to call abori
ginal or semi-civilised. How long, it will be asked,
did the Hebrew participation in these expeditions
last ? Fortunately, there does not seem to be
much difficulty in answering the question if the
Scripture narrative is followed and Archbishop
Usher's chronology adopted.

That a complete rupture in the cordial relations
that had for so many years existed between Israel
and Phoenicia followed the massacre of the priests
of Baal by Elijah (i Kings xviii. 40) is more than
probable, and under any circumstance could not
have survived the assassination of Jezebel the wife
of Ahab and the daughter of Ethbaal, King of Tyre
(2 Kings ix. 36), for the Hebrew writers inform us
in 2 Chronicles xx. 36 that Jehoshaphat attempted
to open up the eastern Tharshish trade on Jewish
account by building a special fleet of ships at
Eziongeber. This expedition, however, ended dis
astrously, and so far as we have any information
on the subject no other attempt in this direction was
ever made. This, therefore, would narrow down the
period of Jewish participation to the dates between
1050 B.C. and 897 B.C., or in all 157 years, quite

CIVILISATIONS COMPARED 247

sufficient time, however, through which to account
for the very pronounced Hebrew influence which we
found pervading the civilised Central American
States.

Nothing further now remains except to sum up
the evidence submitted, so that it may be presented
in a form easy of comprehension by the average
reader.

CHAPTER XI

CONCLUSION

List of some of the more apparent correspondences found to exist
between the people inhabiting the shores of the Eastern Mediter
ranean and those of Central America — Quotation of or reference to
authorities on which the argument is founded.

i. THE civilisation of the Aztecs, using the name
as a generic term, came from the eastern shores of
the Mediterranean.

AUTHORITIES. — Prescott, Mexico, iii. 418 ; Wilson,
Prehistoric Man, p. 615 ; Gallatin, Amer. Ethno. Society
Trans., i. 158 ; Humboldt, Exam. Crit., ii. 68 ; Nadullac,
Prehistoric America ; Bancroft, Nat. Races, v. 30.

2. Its intermediaries were the Hebrews and Phoe
nicians with whom were associated as seamen and
marines on the large armed ships of Tharshish
representatives of the two great nations of South
eastern Europe, the Thracians and Scythians, who
were accustomed to hire themselves out as mer
cenaries.

AUTHORITIES. — i Kings x. 22 ; Strabo, B. vii. ; Hero
dotus, vii. 96 ; Strabo, ii. 221 ; Herod., iv. 59 ; Ency.
Brit., xxiii. 22 ; Ellis, Poly. Res., iv. 431 ; Bancroft, Nat.
Races, iii. 165.

3. The expeditions which succeeded in planting
what is popularly known as the Aztec civilisation
on the American Continent were sent by Solomon
and Hiram. They sailed from Eziongeber on the

^Elantic Gulf of the Red Sea to a destination called

248

CONCLUSION 249

Ophir, whose location we have not so far succeeded
in determining satisfactorily.

AUTHORITIES. — i Kings x. 27 ; 2 Chron. viii. 17.

4. From the fact that these joint expeditions
of Solomon and Hiram occupied three years in
the prosecution of their voyages, and that they
brought back silver as the staple of their cargoes,
it is evident that Ophir of India or South Arabia
cannot be viewed as the destination for which the
ships set out, although Ophir of South Arabia or
India may reasonably enough be regarded as the
general direction pursued by the fleets. The diffi
culty in determining the actual destination of the
ships should, however, occasion no surprise, for,
after the displacement of the Phoenicians on the
Eastern Mediterranean by the Greeks, a century
and a half before the date of the expeditions that
sailed from Eziongeber, the Phoenicians adopted a
policy of secrecy as to the route and destination
of their more distant voyages, so that competing
nations might not invade valuable territory in their
possession.

AUTHORITIES. — Heeren, Asiat. Nations, i. 31 ; Josephus,
vi. 4 and vi. 147 ; Longmans' Classical Atlas, Map 7 ;
Heeren, Asiatic Research, iii. 320 and iii. 328 ; Rawlinson's
Story of Phoenicia, p. 60 ; Heeren, Phoenicia, ii. 315.

5. Light on this enigma may, however, be ob
tained by observing such traces as still exist of the
presence of the nations which formed the personnel
of these expeditions in distant regions, because the
Phoenicians were accustomed to establish along the
route of their more distant voyages, stations for
repairing and revictualling their ships and ports of
call, to which their vessels might run in times of

250 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

stress. These were placed under the direction of
responsible agents, who must necessarily have been
of Hebrew, Phoenician, Thracian, or Scythian
extraction.

AUTHORITIES. — Heeren, Asiatic Research, ii. 314, ii.
322, and iii. 328.

6. Following this method of procedure, we are
enabled to satisfactorily determine the route which
the vessels pursued, for in consequence of the well-
known integrity of the race and their association
with the Phoenicians as marines on their ships, a
Scythian would appear to have been selected as the
governor or superintendent of the Pacific colonies
erected on the Navigator and Society group of
islands. This conclusion is amply warranted by a
consideration of the following facts as well as those
already submitted.

(a) Tahiti, the principal island in the Society
group, is so named after Tabiti, the Scythian Vesta
or queen of heaven. The native pronunciation
emphasizes in a peculiar way this fact, for by elimi
nating the disputable consonants " b " and " h "
which distinguish the two names, both will be found
to spell and sound Taiti, which agrees with that
found in use among the natives of the Society
Islands when discovered by the navigator Bou
gainville.

(b) Papeete, the name of the chief town on the
principal island, is clearly derived from that of
Papeus, the Scythian Jupiter or father.

(c) The religious traditions of the Society
Islanders were clearly derived from Hebrew sources,
as may be seen in their story of the creation of the
first man and his wife, Eve, from the red earth and

CONCLUSION 251

their traditions of the flood, and of the sun being
commanded to stand still.

(d) While, however, the presence of the Scythian
and Jew can be thus clearly established, it is evident
that they occupied the islands in conjunction with
the Thracians and Phoenicians, for the tattooing
is clearly Thracian, and the religious system of the
Society Islanders is unmistakably that of Phoenicia,
as may be seen in their sacred groves and open-air
temples or marais and their human sacrifices, but
especially in a consideration of the Areois Society,
whose methods of initiation and practices were
identical with those of the Galli or priests of Astarte.

(e) The presence of the Phoenicians in the Society
Islands is, moreover, made evident by a comparison
of Strabo's description of the Sidonian-Phcenician's
skill in the use of numbers and astronomy with that
of the Society islanders given by Mr. Ellis in his
Polynesian Researches. Mr. Ellis calls attention to
the extraordinary skill of the Society islanders in
the use of numericals, and to the very significant
fact that their names of stars and groups and the
use to which they applied their knowledge of the
heavenly bodies was the same as that of the inhabi
tants of the eastern shores of the Mediterranean.

AUTHORITIES. — Herod., iv. 46 ; Strabo, B. vii. and vii. 8 ;
Ezek. xxviii. 16 ; Herod., vii. 96 ; Strabo, ii. 221 ; Herod.,
iv. 59 ; Taiti, Ency. Brit., xxiii. 22 ; Ellis, Poly. Res., iv. 431 ;
" Clay Eating," Ellis, Poly. Res., i. 115 ; Bancroft, Nat. Races,
iii. 165; " Creation Tradition/' Ellis, Poly. Res. ,i. 115; Samoa,
Dr. Turner, art. "Bowditch Island" ; Genesis ii. 9, ii. 20, and
iii. 20 ; "Flood Tradition," Ellis, Poly. Res., i. 114 and iii. 170 ;
Joshua x. 12 ; " Temples," Ellis, Poly. Res. ; Rawlinson's,
Story of Phoenicia, pp. 109 and 252 ; 2 Kings xviii. 4 ;
Stanley, Lectures on the Jewish Church, ii. 246 ; Renan,
Mission de Phenicie, p. 39 ; "Totemism," Sayce, Anct. Empires

252 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

of the East Phoenicia ; Bancroft, Nat. Races, iii. 281 ; Hero
dotus, iv. 59 ; Nat. Races, iii. 442 ; Ellis, Poly. Res., articles
" Temples " and " Gods " ; " Galli or Priests of Astarte,"
Story of Phoenicia, p. 116 ; Dr. Dollinger, Heidenthum,
p. 425 ; Nat. Races, iii. 508, and iii. 482 ; Strabo, xvi.
757 ; Poly. Research, ii. 422 and iii. 170 ; Story of Phoenicia,
p. 39 ; Ency. Brit., xviii. 804 ; Nat. Races, i. 274 ; Hastings'
Dictionary of the Bible, article " Pleiades " ; Poly. Res., iii.
167 ; Genesis i. 16 ; Story of Phoenicia, pp. 29 and 90 ;
Poly. Res., iii. 170 and i. 87 ; Ency. Brit., viii. 158 ; Poly.
Res., i. 401 ; Nat. Races, ii. 603.

The name Morea applied to an island separated
from Papeete, the principal town in the Society
group, by a narrow strait ten miles wide, is the same
as that of one of the principal districts of the Hellenic
Peninsula, colonised by the Scythians shortly before
this period. It is said to have received its name
in consequence of the contour of the shore line of the
peninsula resembling the form of a mulberry leaf.
If this explanation is correct then the name would be
equally applicable to Morea of the Society Islands.

AUTHORITIES. — Ency. Brit, and Naval Charts of the
Peloponnesus and Society Islands.

8. Samos of the Sporades, which lie off the coasts
of Asia Minor, was clearly the source of Samoa of
the Pacific. This conclusion is warranted by a
consideration of the following facts, among others :

(a) The native name of Samos of the Sporades,
according to Pliny, was not Samos but Samo, which
is also the native name of Samoa of the Pacific.
Although resident there for the major portion of
two years I do not recall a single exception to this
pronunciation of the name by a native Samoan in
any part of this group of islands.

(b) The name of the principal island in the

CONCLUSION 253

Samoan group is Upolo, the equivalent of Apollo,
the Scythian deity. The name of the principal
town — and since it faces the main entrance to the
lagoon the first town — is Apia, the same as that of
the Scythian deity, the earth, and the name of the
Peloponnesus before the displacement of the Scythians
by the Greeks under Pelops.

(c) The alphabet received from the Phoenicians
and introduced into Greece shortly before this
period by Cadmus, the son of Agenor, King of Phoe
nicia, consisted of sixteen letters, the same as the
Samoan. The language of the Samians of the
Sporades was a dialect of the Ionic peculiar to
themselves. We have, therefore, in the connection
what will probably be found to be a clue leading to
a solution of the perplexing enigma as to the source
from which the Polynesian language was derived.

(d) The natives of both islands were famous as
seamen. Samos of the Sporades was the head
quarters of the Ionian fleet, and the Samians,
shortly after the date of their expeditions, were the
first to lead the Greeks through the Pillars of Her
cules into the Atlantic. The Samoans of the Pacific
were named navigators by the discoverer Bougain
ville on account of their nautical skill. To the
Samoans, likewise, is accredited the distinction of
having peopled the Pacific Islands from Hawaii to
New Zealand.

(e) The name Samos or Samo, according to Pliny,
means a mountain height by the sea, and was there
fore descriptive of the physical features of the
island in the Mediterranean. The name is, however,
equally applicable to all the Pacific Samoan Islands,
for they are composed of what seamen frequenting

254 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

these regions call high islands to distinguish them
from the low coral attols by which they are sur
rounded for hundreds of miles in every direction.

AUTHORITIES. — Pliny, v. 37 ; Strabo, viii. 503 ; Smith's
Dictionary of the Bible, article " Samos " ; Heeren, Asiat.
Nations, p. 311 ; Ency. Brit., xvii. 279 ; Herodotus, iv. 59 ;
Strabo, i. 493 ; Herod., i. 142 ; Ratzel's History of Man
kind, article " Polynesians " ; Heeren, p. 309 ; Herod., v. 58 ;
Ency. Brit., vii. 279 ; Thucydides, i. 13 ; Herod., iv. 152.

9. In consequence of the international character
of the expeditions of Solomon and Hiram, the crews
of the joint fleets were undoubtedly picked men
from the Phoenician craft then in port, but as Phoe
nicia, from the very limited area of its territory,
could not have provided men in sufficient numbers
to supply the insistent demands made on its popu
lation by the various enterprises in which its
people were engaged, the difficulty clearly enough
seems to have been overcome by securing suitable
men from among the various seafaring nations
adjacent to their own coasts, with whom they had
friendly and commercial relations. And as the
Scythians and Thracians, at that time the greatest
nations in South-Eastern Europe, were seamen and
accustomed to hire themselves out as mercenaries,
it is reasonable, in view of what has been said, to
ascribe the tattooing of the Pacific Islands and
the American Continent to the Thracian and the
cannibalism to Scythian origin.

(a) This conclusion is, moreover, further war
ranted by a consideration of the fact that the
gymnastic system in use on the Mediterranean as
a means of training for the exigencies of war, as
well as all the implements used in its prosecution

CONCLUSION 255

(including bow and arrow, spear, javelin, dart,
falchion, sword, and sling, as well as the curved
throw-stick or boomerang used in the chase), are
found over the entire course pursued by the ships
on their voyages across the Pacific and on the
Pacific slopes of the American Continent.

AUTHORITIES. — Herod., v. 3; Strabo, B. i. ii. 28;
Xenophon, B. i. i. ; " Mercenaries/' Dr. Smith, Greek and
Roman Antiquities ; Herod., i. 171 ; Pausanius, iv. 8 ;
Herod., vii. 26 ; Thucydides, i. 121, vi. 25, and vii. 27 ;
Ency. Brit., vii. 720 ; Xenophon, vi. 2 ; Memorabilia, ix. 2 ;
Syffert's Diet, of Classical Antiquities, article "Mer
cenaries " ; Ency. Brit., ii. 502 ; Games, Ency. Brit., x. 63 ;
Homer, Iliad, xxiii. 710 ; Dr. Smith, Greek and Roman
Antiquities ; Poly. Res., i. 204, i. 208, i. 290-312 ; Dr.
Geo. Turner, Samoa • " Spear and Javelin/' Ellis, Poly. Res., i.
217 ; " Bowmen," Herod., iv. 9 and iv. 59 ; Poly. Res., iv. 431 ;
" Circumcision," Herod., ii. 104 ; John vii. 22 ; Dr. Geo.
Turner, Samoa, p. 81 ; Bancroft, Nat. Races, iii. 439 ; Ency.
Brit., v. 790 ; " Tattooing," Herod., v. 6 ; Rawlinson,
Story of Phoenicia, p. 88 ; Dr. Geo. Turner, Samoa, article
" Tattooing " ; Bancroft, Nat. Races, ii. 733 ; " Cannibalism,"
Strabo, iv. 5 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 88 ; Herod., iv. 26 and iv.
106 ; Strabo, B. vii. iii. 9 ; Ency. Brit., xvi. 210 ; Nat. Races,
iii. 316 and iii. 443 ; Ency. Brit., xvi. 168 ; Wait's Poly
nesia, vi. 158 ; Ellis, Poly. Res., i. 309 ; Dr. Turner, Nineteen
Years in Polynesia, p. 194 ; " Equestrian Archers," Herod., iv.
46 ; Poly. Res., iii. 102 and iii. 272 ; " Skulls of Ancestors,"
Herod., iv. 26 ; Poly. Res., iii. 272 ; " Wives do not eat
with Husbands," Herod., i. 146 ; Poly. Res., i. 116 ; Nineteen
Years in Polynesia ; " Marines and Seamen," Herod., vii. 96
and vii. 184 ; Strabo, ii. 221 and B. vii. ; Ezek. xxviii. 12.

10. Samoa was, on account of the archaic form
of its language as well as the traditions of the Pacific
Islanders, the source from which the population of
the Pacific Islands from Hawaii to New Zealand and
from Tonga to Tahiti was derived. We are there
fore in a position to account satisfactorily for the
origin of the Polynesian race and for its distribution,

256 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

and probably also for the source from which its
language was derived.

AUTHORITIES. — Ency. Brit., vii. 279 ; U. S. House
Executive Documents, No. 238 ; U. S. Blue Book on Samoa ;
International Ency., article " Samoa " ; Ency. Brit., xvii.
471 ; Herod., i. 142.

11. The date of the voyages of Votan of the
American tradition agree absolutely with those of
Solomon and Hiram, which proceeded in this general
direction, namely, about 1050 B.C.

AUTHORITIES. — Bancroft, Nat. Races, iii. 17, iii. 45, iii.
452 ; Ency. Brit., i. 704, xvi. 208 ; Nat. Races, v. 23 , v.
164 ; " Long flowing robesL" 2 Kings iv. 29 ; Herod., iv. 29 ;
2 Kings ix. i ; " Circum Africa," Herod., iv. 41 ; Heeren,
Asiat. Nat., ii. 317 ; Rawlinson, Story of Phoenicia, p. 179.

12. The American civilisation, its religious cult,
its traditional lore, its science, art, and manufacture,
its strange customs and usages found among the
civilised and uncivilised peoples were one and all
derived from the Eastern Mediterranean basin,
having been carried thither by those crews of
composite nationality and the marine corps which
formed the personnel of the fleets of Solomon and
Hiram. The religious traditions, and at least the
prominent features of the moral code, were derived
unquestionably from Jewish sources ; the scientific,
artistic, and manufacturing, as well as the com
mercial and caravan systems and the ruder phases
of the religious practices, including human sacrifices
and totemism, from Phoenician ; the tattooing from
Thracian, and interwoven with these the peculiar
masks of the Scythian in scalping, steam-bathing,
body painting, adoration of skulls of ancestors, &c.

AUTHORITIES. — Bancroft, Nat. Races., vols. i. and ii. ;
Ency. Brit., vii. 720 ; Boomerang, Ency. Brit., vii. 721 ;

CONCLUSION 257

Nat. Races, i. 541 ; " Bow, Arrow and Sling," Nat. Races, i.
696 ; Gymnasiums, vol. ii. 244 ; " Weaving and Dyeing,"
Heeren, Asiatic Res., i. 342 ; Story of Phoenicians, p. 285 ;
Nat. Races, i. 630, i. 698 ; " Cotton," Ency. Brit., xvi. 208 ;
Heeren, i. 38 ; Herod., iii. 106 ; Commerce and Caravan,
Heeren, i. 20 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 154 ; Herod., v. 52, ii.
177 ; Nat. Races, ii. 380, ii. 736 ; Maps and Routes, Herod.,
iii. 136, v. 49 ; Nat. Races, ii. 386, i. 274 ; " Pole Star,"
Ency. Brit., xviii. 804 ; Nat. Races, i. 274 ; " Pleiades,"
Hastings' Diet, of the Bible ; Nat. Races, ii. 755 ; Worship
of One True God, Gen. i. i ; i Kings viii. 27 ; I Tim.
i. 17 ; Nat. Races, iii. 55, iii. 183 ; Flood Tradition, Gen.
vi. 13 ; Nat. Races, iii. 65 ; Tower of Babel, Gen. xi.
2 ; Nat. Races, iii. 67 ; Honour to parents, Deut. v. 16,
xxi. 20 ; Nat. Races, ii. 461, ii. 463 ; Judges, Exod. xviii.
15 ; Deut. i. 17 ; Nat. Races, ii. 440, ii. 446 ; Law of
Evidence, Gen., xxxix. 12 ; Exod. xxii. 4 ; Nat. Races, ii. 656 ;
" Totemism," Sayce, Phoenicia, Nat. Races, i. 661 ; " Tree
Worship," Sayce, Phoenicia, Ency. Brit., xxi. 133 ; Nat.
Races, iii. 459 ; " Phallic Worship," Story of Phoenicia,
p. 112 ; Ency. Brit., xviii. 802 ; Nat. Races, iii. 501 ;
" Human Sacrifice," Dollinger, Heidenthum, i, 425 ; Dio-
dorus, Ency. Brit., xviii. 803 ; Nat. Races, iii. 482 ; Theft,
Exod. xxii. 1-7 ; Nat. Races, ii. 456, ii. 658 ; False weights,
Lev. xix. 35, Deut. xxv. 13 ; Nat. Races, ii. 664 ; Marriage
to deceased brother's widow, Deut. xxv. 5 ; Matt. xxii. 24 ;
Nat. Races, ii. 466 ; Widow property of deceased husband's
family, Deut. xxv. 5 ; Ruth iii. ii and iv. 10 ; Nat.
Races, ii. 466 ; Concubinage, Judges xix. i ; i Kings xi. 3 ;
Nat. Races, ii. 182, ii. 164 ; Adultery, Lev. xx. 10, John
viii. 4 ; Nat. Races, ii. 464, ii. 465, ii. 674 ; Incest, Deut.
xxvii. 20 ; Nat. Races, ii. 659 ; Law of Consanguinity,
Lev. xviii. 6, xx. ii ; Nat. Races, ii. 665 ; Royal Succes
sion, i Chron. xxiii. i ; i Kings ii. 14 ; i Chron. xxix. 23 ;
Nat. Races, ii. 140 ; Anointing and Coronation, i Kings i.
39 ; i Kings ix. 22 ; Nat. Races, ii. 144, ii. 422, ii. 641,
iii. 435 ; Removal of Landmarks, Deut. xxvii. 17 ; Nat.
Races, ii. 462-3 ; Sorcery, Lev. xx. 27 ; Nat. Races, ii.
659 ; " Slaves," Heeren, Asiatic Res., i. 367 ; Story of
Phoenicia, 240 ; i Kings ix. 20 ; 2 Chron. ii. 17 ; Deut.
xxiv. 7 ; Nat. Races, ii. 450, ii. 650 ; Redemption of Slaves,
Lev. xxv. 47 ; Nat. Races, ii. 650 ; Cities of Refuge, Num. iii.
167 ; " Head -Flattening," Nadullac, Prehistoric America,

R

258 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

p. 512 ; Dr. Geo. Turner, Nineteen Years in Polynesia, also
Samoa ; Nat. Races, i. 150 ; see also vols. i.-ii. and iv. ;
" Circumcision," Herod., ii. 104 ; John vii. 22 ; Ency.
Brit., v. 790 ; Nat. Races, ii. 278 ; " Glass Manufacture,"
Charnay, Ancient Cities of the New World • Nadullac,
Prehistoric America, p. 396 ; Heeren, Asiatic Nations, i.
345 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 283 ; " Bronze/' Ency. Brit., xvi.
213 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 285 ; Nat. Races, ii. 473, iv. 519,
iy- 557 ; Paper, Ency. Brit., xviii. 232 ; Nat. Races, ii. 307,
322, 334, 485 ; " Pearls and Pearl Fishing," Heeren, Asiatic
Res., p. 446 ; Nat. Races, i. 583, 584, ii. 481, ii. 732, ii. 850 ;
"Quippas," Herod., iv. 98 ; Lumholz, Unknown Mexico, ii. 128;
"Tanning," Nat. Races, ii. 486; " Boomerang," Ency. Brit.,
vii. 721 ; Nat. Races, i. 541 ; " Implement of War," Ency.
Brit., vii. 720 ; Nat. Races, ii. 742 ; " Flint Arrow Heads,"
Ency. Brit., ii. 554, vii. 720 ; Nat. Races, i. 342, 541, 627,
655 ; " Bow, Arrow and Sling," Ency. Brit., vii. 720, xvi.
211 ; Nat. Races, i. 626, 696 ; " Gymnasiums," Ency. Brit., x.
63 ; Dr. Smith, Dictionary of Greek and Roman A ntiquaries ;
Ellis, Poly. Res., i. 204 ; Nat. Races, ii. 244 ; " Weaving and
Dyeing," Heeren, i. 342 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 285 ; Nat.
Races, i. 502, 650, ii. 484, 486, 752 ; " Cotton," Theo-
phrastus, History of Plants, iv. 9 ; Herod., iii. 106 ; Heeren,
i. 38 ; Ency. Brit., xvi. 208 ; " Purple Dye," Heeren, i. 342 ;
Story of Phoenicia, p. 275 ; Nat. Races, i. 630, 698, ii. 486 ;
"Tattooing," Herod., v. 6; Story of Phoenicia, p. 88;
Dr. Geo. Turner, Samoa, Nat. Races, ii. 733 ; " Scalping,"
Herod., iv. 64 ; Turner, Samoa, Nat. Races, i. 269, 344, i.
357, 407, 582, 629 ; " Flaying," Herod., iv. 64 ; Nat. Races,
iii. 308, 355, iv. 420 ; " Nomads," Herod., iv. 46 ; Nat.
Races, i. 426 ; " Plucking out Eye of Victim," Ellis., Poly.
Res., i. 357 ; Nat. Races, i. 344 ; " Steam-Bathing," Herod.,
iv. 73 ; Nelson's Ency., art. " Hemp " ; Ency. Americana,
art. " Hemp " ; Dr. Geo. Turner, Samoa and Nineteen
Years in Polynesia, art. " Fine Mats " ; Nat. Races, i. 83,
202, 537, iii. 159; "Moccasins and Buskins," Herod. ,i. 155,
vii. 75; Nat. Races, vols. i., ii., iii.; "Lassoing," Herod.,
vii. 85.

13. Votan, the culture hero of the American
tradition, clearly avowed his origin when he affirmed
that he had made four voyages from Valum Votan,

CONCLUSION 259

the new country over which he ruled, to Valum
Chivim, his native land, and en route had visited
a place where men had erected a tower with a view
to reaching heaven, which the inhabitants had
informed him was the spot where the confusion of
tongues had taken place. From there he had
journeyed to the dwellings of the thirteen serpents,
where he had seen a magnificent temple in course
of construction. This was tantamount to saying :

(a) That he had returned to the Mediterranean
seaboard not by the Red Sea but by the Persian
Gulf, calling at the Phoenician ports or colonies
of Tylos and Arados in the Bahrein Islands at
the Bay of Gerrha, where he had bartered his
first cargo of silver for gold (i Kings ix. 28) and
repaired and revictualled the ships ; that while
the vessels were so employed, he had disembarked
and, crossing the gulf to the mouth of the Euphrates,
had ascended the river to Borsippa, one of the
suburbs of Babylon, where he visited the ruins of
the Tower of Babel ; that then he took the short
desert route to Jerusalem (passing en route the
treasure cities of Baalbek and Palmyra), where
he reported to the Israelitish king, the principal
partner in these joint expeditions.

(b) That, accompanied by King Solomon, he
had inspected the great temple then in course of
construction at Jerusalem under the direction of a
Phoenician architect called Hiram.

(c) That following the inspection of the temple
he, along with King Solomon, had made a tour of
the principal cities of the thirteen tribes of Israel.
The cognomen serpents used in the American
tradition being easily explained by the fact that the

260 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

reptile was not only the totem of Hiram and the
Phoenicians, but also in some measure, that of David
and Solomon, who belonged to the family of Nashon,
the serpent after whom Nachan or the City of the
Serpents, the first city on the American Continent,
was named.

AUTHORITIES. — "American Tradition," Ency. Brit., i. 704;
Nat. Races, iii. 45, 452 ; Nat. Races, v. 22 ; Ency. Brit., xvi.
208 ; Nat. Races, iii. 26, v. 164 ; " Long flowing Robes," Ency.
Brit., xvi. 208 ; Herod., i. 72 ; Nat. Races, iii. 269, v. 23 ;
2 Kings iv. 29 ; 2 Kings ix. i ; Navigation of Persian Gulf,
Strabo no ; Heeren, Phoenicia, \. 438, ii. 322, ii. 333, 676,
iii. 336 ; Maspero, Origin of the Phoenicians, vol. iv. ; Heeren,
Babylonians, p. 444 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 22 ; Tower of
Babel, Gen. xi. 1-9 ; Ency. Brit., iii. 178 ; Nat. Races, v.
27 ; Eziongeber, 2 Chron. ii. n, viii. 17 ; " Short Desert
Route," Heeren, Phoenicia, i. 369, iii. 113, iv. 356 ; i Kings
ix. 18 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 167 ; Scribner's, March 1908
(art. " Damascus") ; " Bagdad Railway," Heeren, Phoenicia,
i. 362 ; " Silver for Gold," Heeren, Asiat. Nat., i. 31, iii. 327 ;
i Kings ix. 28 ; i Kings x. 27 ; 2 Chron. viii. 18 ; Ency.
Brit., xvi. 276 ; Heeren, iv. 353 ; Baalbek and Palmyra,
i Kings ix. 18 ; 2 Chron. viii. 4 ; Heeren, Phoenicia, i. 364 ;
"Navigation of Euphrates," Heeren, Asiat. Nat., i. 364. i. 438 ;
Solomon at Eziongeber, 2 Chron. vii. 17 ; " Votan goes by
Divine Command to America," Nat. Races, iii. 452 and v. 159 ;
Temple at Jerusalem, i Chron. xxix. i, 2 Chron. ii. i, and
iii. i ; Hiram the Workman, i Kings vii. 31 ; 2 Chron. ii.
13 ; Army of Workmen, i Kings v. 13 ; i Kings ix. 21 ;
Eusebius, Praep. Evan., x. 77 ; " Totemism Serpents," Ency.
Brit., xxiii. 471 ; Nat. Races, iii. 45 ; Sayce, Ancient Empires
of the East, p. 200 ; Num. xxi. 8, 2 Kings xviii. 4 ; Nat.
Races, iii. 452.

14. That from Jerusalem Votan proceeded to Tyre
and made his report in duplicate to Hiram, Solomon's
partner in these joint expeditions, after which he
crossed over to his own home at Vitim or Chittim
on the island of Cyprus, then a Phoenician colony.

CONCLUSION 261

(a) This conduces to the belief that Votan, prior
to his being selected for the command of these ex
peditions which annexed the Pacific Islands and the
American Continent to Phoenicia, had been Governor
of Cyprus with headquarters at the town of Chittim,
and that as plenipotentiary to the American colony
he was succeeded in office by Hiram, the workman.
Hiram, on account of the invaluable services which
he had rendered to Phoenicia and Israel in the erec
tion of the temples at island Tyre and Jerusalem
and the palaces for Solomon at Jerusalem and
Lebanon, which cemented the friendship between
the two monarchs and led to these expeditions,
which had become so immensely profitable to both
nations, had, under the conferred name of Quetzal-
coatt — the royal or feathered serpent — been ap
pointed the personal representative of Solomon and
Hiram in the New World.

Accompanied by nineteen of his leading superin
tendents of works he, on his arrival, began the
systematic instruction of the inhabitants of this
new colony, called the land of Votan, in the know
ledge of the exact sciences and mechanical arts of
which throughout antiquity Phoenicia had been the
leading exponent.

(b) That Votan established in the new colony
a central government, gave to the people a code of
good laws, taught them a pure and humane religion,
and communicated to them a knowledge of the
Supreme Deity, the God of all Truth.

(c) Discovering, however, the impossibility of
creating a homogeneous people out of so many
racially discordant elements, he divided the land into
four sections, which corresponded to the peculiar

262 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

needs of the four nations which were represented
in the personnel of these expeditions — Hebrews,
Phoenicians, Scythians, and Thracians — and so
secured peace and a stable government.

AUTHORITIES. — Ency. Brit., i. 704 ; Nat. Races, iii. 451,
v. 23, v. 159, and v. 164 ; Ency. Brit., xvi. 208 ; I Kings
vii. 13 ; 2 Chron. ii. 13 ; " Serpent Symbolism," Sayce,
Phoenicia, Totemism, Nat. Races, iii. 240, iii. 451 ; Chittim,
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible ; Heeren, i. 305, ii. 311 ;
Herod., vii. 90 ; Cicero, De Finibus, iv. 20 ; Herod., i. 105 ;
Diod., v. 55 and v. 77 ; Ency. Brit., xi. 90 ; Nat. Races,
v. 159.

15. That the Scythian contingent, who tolerated
the presence of no foreign customs, were the mal
contents who fomented the insurrection against the
Votanic government, which necessitated the segre
gation of the various discordant racial elements.
That they in all probability, accompanied by their
conquerors the Thracians, separated themselves
from their more civilised neighbours and returned
to their semi-barbaric life on the new continent.
That the body painting, totemic, steam-bathing,
equestrian archers, the Scythians of South-Eastern
Europe ; the Phoenician commercial correspondents,
with the Thracian tattooers (both of whom were
accustomed to hire themselves out as mercenaries),
were the marines and in all probability a portion
of the crews manning the ships of these joint fleets;
and that these were the authors of those strange
customs of South-Eastern European origin found in
Samoa, Tahiti, the American Continent, and among
the Nomad equestrian archers of the New World.

AUTHORITIES. — Nat. Races, v. 159 ; Ency. Brit., i. 704 ;
"Scythians avoid use of Foreign Customs," Herod., iv. 76 ;
"Body Painting," Herod., iv., 108 ; Nat. Races, i. 426;

CONCLUSION 263

" Nomads," Herod., iv. 46 ; Nat. Races, i. 426 ; " Totemic,"
Ency. Brit., xxiii. 471 ; 2 Kings xviii. 4 ; Nat. Races, i. 66 1 ;
Herod., iv. 105 ; " Steam-Bathing," Herod., iv. 73; Nat.
Races, i. 83, i. 537, iii. 159 ; "Equestrian Archers," Herod.,
iv. 46 ; " Tattooing," Herod., v. 6 ; Nat. Races, i. 332, ii. 730 ;
" Seamen," Strabo, ii. 221 ; Strabo, B. vii.,Ezek. xxviii. 12 ;
Marines, vii. 96.

16. That the staple of the cargoes brought back
from America was mainly silver, but that calling
at Java, Sumatra, Ceylon, Tylos, and Arados or
other parts in Ophir of India or Arabia for barter
and repair, or for water and provisions, they dis
posed of this cargo of silver for gold and purchased
the remainder of the merchandise. That this re
mainder consisted of East Indian and Arabian
wares much in demand at Jerusalem and Tyre,
viz., ivory, apes, peacocks, algum trees, frankin
cense, spices, pearls, and precious stones, the pur
chase of which was rendered the easier, in that silver
in Arabia, according to Agatharchides, was ten
times the value of gold, which latter metal was
there in great abundance. While, according to
Heeren, possibly, bartered silver for gold, weight for
weight, had still an exchange value very much in
favour of silver, they were able by means of this
mixed cargo to pursue their usual policy of envelop
ing the destination of their more distant voyages
with a veil of mysterious and impenetrable secrecy.

AUTHORITIES. — i Kings x. 27 ; Nat. Races, ii. 474 ;
Ency. Brit., xvi. 216 ; Heeren, iii. 327 ; " Smelting at Mines,"
Rawlinson, Story of Phoenicia, p. 70 ; Barter silver for
gold, 2 Chron. viii. 18 ; Gold in Arabia, Judges viii. 24 ;
Heeren, Phoenicia, iv. 353 ; i Kings ix. 28 ; " Silver in Asia,"
Heeren, Asiatic Nations, i. 31 ; Peacocks, Ency. Brit.,
xviii. 443 ; Nelson's Ency. ; Heeren, Phoenicia, iv. 346 ;
" Frankincense and Spices/' Herod., i. 183 ; Herod., iii. 107 ;

264 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

Heeren, Phoenicia, iv. 346 ; " Precious Stones and Pearls,"
Heeren, iv. 346 ; " Commercial Jealousy of Assyrians," Ency.
Brit., iii. 192; " Policy of Secrecy," Rawlinson, Story of
Phoenicia, p. 60 ; Heeren, ii. 316, and ii. 326.

NAVIGATION AND DISCOVERY

AUTHORITIES. — Heeren, Phoenicia, ii. 320 and iii. 338 ;
Story of Phoenicia, pages 179 and 309 ; Xenophon,
(Eocon., vii. 4; Herod., iv. 41; Strabo, xvi. 759; "Ships
of Tharshish," Ragozin, Story of Assyia-, Perrot and
Chipiez, History of Phoenician Art ; " Torr's Ancient Ships,
1896," Cotterill and Little, Ships Ancient and Modern,
p. ii ; Ency. Brit., i. 709 and xviii. 804 ; Robert Louis
Stevenson's In South Seas, Scribner's Sons (see chart) ;
Alfred Brittain, History of North America, Ships of Columbus,
Dent & Co., London : Cook's Voyages, p. 9.

FINANCE

" Solomon's Wealth," Hastings' Dictionary cf the Bible,
iv. 566 ; M'Clintock and Strong, Cyclopedia Biblica, p. 837.

RELIGIOUS DECADENCE

AUTHORITIES. — 2 Kings xvii. 16 ; Ezek. xxvii. 6-18
and xxviii. 12 ; Story of Phoenicia, p. 108 ; Dr. Dollinger,
Heidenthum and Judenthum, i. 425 ; Ellis, Polynesian
Researches, section " Religion/' Nat. Races, iii. 442 and v.
23 ; Ency. Brit., xvi. 208.

PRACTICAL ABILITY OF PHOENICIANS

Rawlinson's Story of Phoenicia, pp. 38 and 346.

FOUNDATION OF GADES. EXPLORATION

Strabo, vol. i. 255 (B. iii. c. v. 5). — Concerning
the foundation of Gades, the Gaditanians report

CONCLUSION 265

that a certain oracle commanded the Tynans to
found a colony at the Pillars of Hercules. Those who
were sent out for the purpose of exploring, when
they had arrived at the Straits of Calpe, imagined
that the capes which form the straits were the
boundaries of the habitable world as well as of
the expedition of Hercules, and consequently were
what the oracle termed the Pillars. They landed
on the inside of the straits at a place where the city
of Exitani now stands. Here they offered sacrifices,
which, however, not being favourable, they returned.
After a time others were sent, who advanced about
1500 stadia beyond the straits to an island conse
crated to Hercules and lying opposite to Onoba,
a city of Iberia. Considering that here were the
Pillars, they sacrificed to the Gods, butthe sacrifices
being again unfavourable they returned home. In
the third voyage they reached Gades and founded
the temple in the eastern part of the island and the
city in the west. On this account some consider
the capes are the Pillars, others suppose Gades,
while others again believe they lie still farther
beyond Gades.

MOREA. MULBERRY LEAF

Strabo, vol. ii. 5 (B. viii. c. ii. i). — The Pelopon
nesus resembles in figure the leaf of a plane tree.
Its length and breadth are nearly equal, each about
1400 stadia.

Footnote. — For the same reason at a subsequent
period it obtained the name of Morea, in Greek
(Mogea), which signifies Mulberry, a species or
variety of which tree bears leaves divided into five

266 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

lobes, equal in number to the principal capes of
Peloponnesus. Vol. ii. (B. ii. c. i. 30) — To compare
the Peloponnesus to a plane leaf.

SAMOS OR SAMO

Strabo, ii. 168 (B. x. c. ii. 17). — The poet also
gives the name of Samos to Thracia, which we now
call Samo-thracia. He was probably acquainted
with the Ionian Islands, for he seems to have been
acquainted with the Ionian migration. He would
not otherwise have made a distinction between
islands of the same name, for in speaking of Samo-
thrace he makes the distinction sometimes by
epithet —

" On high above the summit of woody Samos the Thracian."

In the valley of Alessandro in Cephalonia there is
still a place called Samo.

Footnote 6. — Those are more entitled to credit
who say that the heights are called Sami and that
the island obtained its name from this circumstance.

PELOPONNESUS PRIOR TO PELOPS. APIA

Strabo, i. 492 (B. vii. c. vii. i). — Hecateus of
Miletus says of the Peloponnesus that before the
time of the Greeks it was inhabited by barbarians ;
perhaps even the whole of Greece was anciently a
settlement of barbarians, if we may judge from
former accounts. For Pelops brought colonists
from Phrygia into the Peloponnesus, which took his
name. Danaus, King of Argos, 1570 B.C., brought
colonists from Egypt, Orgopes, Cancones, Pelasgi,
Leleges, and other barbarous nations partitioned

CONCLUSION 267

among themselves the country on this side of the
isthmus.

Footnote 2. — The Peloponnesus which before the
arrival of Pelops was called Apia.

Note, T. C. J. — The Scythian invasion of South-
Eastern Europe took place about 1500 B.C., and
the probability, therefore, is that the Peloponnesus
received from them the name of Apia, so named
after their deity the earth.

ALPHABET

Lucian, Pharsalia, iii, 216. — The Phoenicians first
(if belief is given to report) ventured to represent
in rude characters " the voice destined to endure/'
Not yet had Memphis learned to unite the rushes of
the stream, and only animals engraved upon the
stones, both birds and wild beasts, kept in existence
the magic tongues.

Anthropology, E. B. Taylor, D.C.L., F.R.S., Apple-
ton & Co., p. 176. — Tacitus, in a passage in
his Annals, describing the origin of letters, says
that " The Egyptians first depicted thoughts of
the mind by figures of animals, which oldest
monuments of the human mind are to be seen
stamped on the rocks, so that the Egyptians are
the inventors of the letters which the Phoenician
navigators brought thence to Greece, obtaining the
glory as if they had discovered what really they had
borrowed/' This account may be substantially
true, but it does not give the Phoenicians credit
for the practical good sense which they certainly
showed, being strangers and not bound by the sacred
traditions of Egypt. No doubt the Phoenicians

268 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

or some of the Semitic nations, when they had
learned the Egyptian hieroglyphics, saw that the
picture signs mixed with the spelt words had be
come mere surplusage, and that all they really wanted
was a sign wherewith to write the sound of the word.
Thus was invented the so-called Phoenician alphabet.

Page 176. — Now what confirms the historic fact
that the Phoenicians had the alphabet first and that
the Greeks learned the art of writing from them is
that the Greeks actually borrowed the Phoenician
names of the letters.

The adoption of the alphabet was the great
movement by which mankind rose from barbarism
to civilisation.

CADMUS, SON OF AGENOR

Strabo, vol. i. 493 (B. vii. c. vii. 2), footnote 4.
— Cadmus, son of Agenor, King of Tyre, arrived
in Bceotia, 1550 B.C. The citadel of Thebes was
named after him.

CADMUS BRINGS LETTERS INTO GREECE

Pliny, vol. ii. 220 (B. vii. c. Ixvii.). — "I have
always been of the opinion that letters were of
Assyrian origin, but other writers, Gellius for in
stance, suppose that they were invented in Egypt by
Mercury. Others again will have it that they were
discovered by the Syrians and that Cadmus brought
from Phoenicia sixteen letters into Greece/' &c.

Note 49. — The account of the original introduc
tion of the alphabet into Greece, here given, was the
one generally adopted in his time. Most readers
will be aware that the actual invention of letters,

CONCLUSION 269

the share which the Egyptians and the Phoenicians
had in it, the identification of Cadmus and still
more of Mercury with any of the heroes or legis
lators of antiquity, of whom we have any correct
historical data, and the connection which the Greek
alphabet had with those of other nations, are among
the most vexed questions of literary discussion,
and are still far from being resolved with any degree
of certainty, &c., &c.

THRACIANS

Pliny, vol. i. 302 (B. iv. c. xviii.). — " Thrace now
follows, divided into fifty strategies or prefectures>
and to be reckoned among the most powerful
nations of Europe/'

OLYMPIAN GAMES

Pliny, vol. ii. 232 (B. vii. c. Ivii.). — Hercules
first instituted the athletic contests at Olympia.

Footnote 33. — The Isthmian games were origi
nally instituted by Sysiphus, King of Corinth ; after
having been interrupted for some time they were
re-established by Theseus, who celebrated them in
honour of Neptune.

Note 34. — The celebrated Olympic games. Dio-
dorus Siculus (B. iv. c. iii.), Pausanias, and other
ancient writers, as well as Pliny, ascribe their origin
to Hercules. Pausanias, however, says that some
supposed them to have been instituted by Jupiter.

TATTOOING

Pliny, vol. ii. 8 (B. vi. c. iv.). — We find here the
nations of the Genet ae, the Chalybes, the town of

270 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Cotyorum, the nations of the Tabareni, and the
Molossi who make marks upon their bodies.
Note 77. — Similar to what we call tattooing.

SCYTHIAN CANNIBALISM

Strabo, i. 461 (B. vii. c. iii. 17). — "Thus they
say it was through ignorance Homer and the
ancients omitted to speak of the Scythians and
their cruelty to strangers, whom they sacrificed,
devouring the flesh and afterwards made use of the
skulls as drinking-cups, for which reason the sea
was named the inhospitable."

CANNIBALISM AND HUMAN SACRIFICE

Strabo, vol. ii. 122 (B. vii. c. ii.). — We have al
ready stated that there are certain tribes of the
Scythians and indeed many other nations which
feed upon human flesh. This fact itself might
perhaps appear incredible did we not recollect that
in the very centre of the earth in Italy and Sicily
nations formerly existed with these monstrous pro
pensities, the Cyclopes and the Lystrygonians for
example ; also that very recently on the other side of
the Alps it was the custom to offer human sacrifices
after the manner of these nations, and the difference
is but small between sacrificing human beings and
eating them.

Pliny, vol. v. 426 (B. xxx. c. iii.). — At least in
the year of the city 657 Cneius Cornelius Lentulus
and P. Licinius Crassus, being consuls, a decree
forbidding human sacrifices was passed by the

CONCLUSION 271

Senate, from which period the celebration of these
horrid rites ceased in public and for some time
altogether.

HEAD-FLATTENING IN SAMOA

Samoa, Dr. Geo. Turner, p. 79. — During the first
two or three days the nurse bestows great attention
on the head of the child that it might be modified
and shaped after the notions of propriety and beauty.
The child was laid on its back and the head sur
rounded with three stones. One was placed close
to the crown of the head and one on either side.
The forehead was then pressed with the hand that
it might be flattened. The nose, too, was carefully
flattened out, " Canoe noses/' as they call them,
being blemishes in their estimation.

CITIES OF REFUGE IN SAMOA

Samoa, Dr. Geo. Turner, p. 64. — " In another
village in Upolu, Vave was incarnate in a pigeon
which was carefully kept and fed by the different
members of the family in town. But the special
residence of Vave there, was an old tree inland of
the village, which was a ' place of refuge ' for
murderers and other capital offenders. If that tree
was reached by the criminal he was safe, and the
avenger of blood could pursue no further but await
investigation and trial."

CASSITERIDES AND CONCEALING ROUTES

Strabo, vol. i. 262 (B. ii. c. v. i). — "The Cassi-
terides are ten in number and lie near each other

272 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

in the ocean towards the north from the haven of
the Artibari. One of them is desert, but the others
are inhabited by men in black cloaks, clad in tunics
reaching to the feet, girt about the breasts, and
walking with staves resembling the furies we see
in tragic representations. They subsist by their
cattle, leading for the most part a wandering life.
Of the metals they have tin and lead, which, with
skins, they barter for merchandise, for earthenware,
salt, and brazen vessels. Formerly the Phoenicians
alone carried on this traffic from Gades, concealing
the passage from everyone, and when the Romans
followed a certain shipmaster that they might find
the market, the shipmaster, from jealousy, pur
posely ran his vessel upon a shoal, leading on those
who followed him into the same destructive disaster.
He himself escaped by means of a fragment of the
ship, and received from the State the value of the
cargo he had lost/'

MARRIAGE OF DECEASED BROTHER'S WIFE
IN SAMOA

Samoa, Dr. Geo. Turner, p. 98. — " The brother
of a deceased husband considered himself entitled
to have his brother's wife and to be regarded by the
orphan children as their father. If he was already
married she would nevertheless live with him as a
second wife."

CONCUBINAGE

Page 96. — " When the newly married woman
took up her abode in the family of her husband she
was attended by a daughter of her brother, who was
in fact a concubine."

CONCLUSION 273

POLYGAMY

Page 96. — The marriage ceremony being such a
prolific source of festivity and profit to the chief and
his friends, the latter, whether he was disposed to
do it or not, often urged on another and another
repetition of what we have described. They took
the thing almost into their own hands, looked out
for a match in a rich family, and, if that family was
agreeable to it, the affair was pushed on whether
or not the daughter was disposed to it. She, too,
as a matter of etiquette, must be attended by her
complement of one or more young women. Accord
ing to this system a chief might have ten or a dozen
wives and concubines in a short time.

TOTEMISM IN THE NEW HEBRIDES

Samoa, Dr. Geo. Turner, p. 334. — Household
gods were supposed to be present in the shape of
stones, trees, fish, and fowl. These incarnations
were never eaten by their respective worshippers.
In oaths and imprecations they invoked punish
ment from the gods. Cannibalism was restricted to
bodies taken in war. Adultery and murder were
punished by death.

STEAM-BATHING IN TAHITI

Ellis' Polynesian Researches, vol. iii. 41. — The
natives had no method of using the warm bath, but
often seated the patient on a pile of heated stones
strewn over with green herbs and leaves, and kept
them covered with a thick cloth till the most profuse

s

274 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

perspiration was produced, something like that pro
duced by the fashionable vapour bath. In this
state, to our great astonishment, at the most critical
season of sickness, the patient would leave the heap
of stones and plunge into the sea, near which the
oven was usually located. Though the shock must
have been very great, they appear to sustain no
injury from the transition.

GOLD IN ARABIA

Pliny, vol. ii. 90 (B. vi. c. xxxii.). — The Sabaei
are the richest of all in the great abundance of spice-
bearing groves, the mines of gold, the streams for
irrigation, and the ample produce of honey and wax.

Footnote 20. — Arabia at present yields no gold
and very little silver. The Queen of Sheba is men
tioned as bringing gold to Solomon (i Kings x. 2
and 2 Chron. ix. i). Artemadorus and Diodorus
Siculus make mention on the Arabian Gulf of the
Sabae, the Alilaei, and the Gessandi, in whose terri
tories native gold was found. These last people,
who did not know its value, were in the habit of
bringing it to their neighbours the Sabaei, and ex
changing it for articles of copper and iron.

GOLD, EBONY, AND IVORY

Vol. iii. 108 (B. xii. c. viii.). — Virgil (B. ii. c. xi.)
has spoken in glowing terms of the ebony tree, one
of the few which are peculiar to India, and he further
informs us that it will grow in no other country.
Herodotus, however, has preferred to ascribe it to
Ethiopia, and states that the people of that country

CONCLUSION 275

were in the habit of paying to the King of Persia
every third year, by way of tribute, one hundred
billets of ebony wood together with a certain quan
tity of gold and ivory. Nor ought we here to omit
the fact, since the author has so stated it that the
Ethiopians were also in the habit of paying by way
of tribute twenty large elephants' teeth.

PETRA TO RHINOCOLURA IN PHOENICIA

Strabo, vol. iii. 211 (B. xvi. c. iv. 24). — Mer
chandise conveyed from Leuce, comes to Petra,
thence to Rhinocolura in Phoenicia near Egypt, and
thence to other nations. But at present the greater
part is transported by the Nile to Alexandria. It is
brought down from Arabia and India to Myus Her-
mus ; it is then conveyed on camels to the Thebais,
situated on a canal of the Nile and Alexandria.

TYLOS AND ARADOS

Southern Arabia, by Theodore Bent (Smith,
Elder & Co., 1900).

Page 20. — " Leaving the palm groves of the
Portuguese fortress behind us we re-entered the
desert to the south-west, and just beyond the village
of Ali we came across that which is the great curiosity
of Bahrein, to investigate which was our real object
in visiting the island, for there begins that vast sea
of sepulchral mounds, the great Necropolis of an
unknown race which extends far and wide across
the plain. The village of Ali forms, as it were, the
culminating point ; it lies just on the borders of the
dark groves, and there the mounds reach an eleva-

276 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

tion of fifty feet above the level of the desert and
some more circular heaps of stone. There are many
thousands of these tumuli extending over an area of
mounds in other parts of the island, and a few
solitary ones are to be found on the adjacent islets
on Moharik, Arad, and Sitrah.

Complete uncertainty exists as to the origin of
these mounds and the people who constructed them,
but from classical references and the result of our
own work there can be no doubt that they are of
Phoenician origin. Herodotus, ii. 89, gives us a
tradition current in his time that the forefathers of
the Phoenician race came from these parts. The
Phoenicians themselves believed in it. It is their
own account of themselves, says Herodotus, and
Strabo (B. xvi. c. iii. 4) brings further testimony
to bear on the subject, stating that two of the
islands called Bahrein were called Tyros and Arados.
Pliny follows in the steps of Strabo, but calls the
islands Tylos instead of Tyros, which may be an
error in spelling or may be owing to the universal
confusion of R and L.

Ptolemy in his map places Gerrha, the mart of
the Indian trade and the starting-point for caravans,
on the great road across Arabia on the coast, just
opposite to those islands near where the town of
El Katif now is, and accepts Strabo and Pliny's
names for the Bahrein Islands, calling them Tharros,
Tylos, or Tyros and Arados. The fact is that all
information on the islands prior to Portuguese occu
pation comes from the Periplus of Nearchus. Era
tosthenes, a naval officer of Alexander, states that
the gulf was 10,000 stadia long from Cape Armoaum,
i.e. Hermuz to Teredon (Koweit) and the mouth of

CONCLUSION 277

the Euphrates. Androsthenes of Thasos, who was
of the company of Nearchus, made an independent
survey of the gulf close to the islands of Tylos and
Arados, which have temples like those of the Phoe
nicians, who were (the inhabitants told him) colonists,
had a town called Sidon or Sidolona in the gulf which
he visited, and on an island called Tyriri was shown
the tomb of Erythras, which he describes as an
elevated hillock covered with palms just like our
mounds, and Erythras was the king who gave his
name to the gulf. Justin accepts the migration
from the gulf as certain, and M. Ren an says : ' The
primitive abode of the Phoenicians must be placed
on the lower Euphrates in the centre of the great
commercial and maritime establishments of the
Persian Gulf/' As for the temples there are no
traces of them left, and this is also the case in
Syrian Phoenicia ; doubtless they were all built
of wood, which will account for their disap
pearance.

As we ourselves, during the course of our exca
vations, brought to light objects of distinctly Phoe
nician origin, there would appear to be no longer
any room for doubt that the mounds which lay
before us were a vast Necropolis of this mercantile
race. If so one of two suppositions must be correct,
either, firstly, that the Phoenicians originally lived
here before they migrated to the Mediterranean, and
that this was the land of Punt from which " Punic "
was derived, a land of palms from which the race
got the distorted Greek appellation of Phoenicia, or,
secondly, that these islands were looked upon by
them as a sacred spot for the burial of their dead,
as the Hindoos look upon the Ganges and the

278 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

Persians regard the shrines of Kerbila and Mished.
I am much more inclined to the former supposition,
judging from the mercantile importance of the
Bahrein Islands and the excellent school they must
have been for a race which was to penetrate to all
corners of the globe, to brave the dangers of the
open Atlantic, and to reach the shores of Britain
in their trading ventures, and if nomenclature goes
for anything, the name of Tyros and the still exist
ing name of Arad ought to confirm us in our
belief.

TYRE, ARADUS, AND SIDON FROM PERSIAN
GULF

Strabo, vol. iii. 187 (B. xvi. c. iii. 4). — On sailing
further there are other islands, Tyre and Aradus,
which have temples resembling those of the Phoe
nicians. The inhabitants of these islands say that
the inhabitants and cities bearing the same name as
those of the Phoenicians are their own colonies.
These islands are distant from Teredon ten days'
sail and from the promontory at the mouth of the
gulf at Macse one day's sail.

Footnote to above. — " Besides the islands Tyre
and Aradus, there existed, even at the time of
Alexander and near the present Cape Gherd, a city
called Sidon or Siddona which was visited by
Nearchus, as may be seen in his Periplus. The
Phoenician inhabitants of these places appear to
have afterward removed to the western side of the
Persian Gulf and to the Bahrein Islands, to which
they give the names Tylos or Tyre and Aradus.

CONCLUSION 279

The latter name still exists ; it was from this place
that the Phoenicians moved to establish themselves
on the shores of the Mediterranean, and transferred
the name Sidon, the ancient capital, and those of
Tyre and Aradus to the new cities which they there
founded. "

GERRHA AND TYLOS AND PEARL FISHERIES

Strabo, vol. iii. 186 (B. xvi. c. iii. 3). — Having
coasted along the shore of Arabia to the distance
of 2400 stadia, there lies in a deep gulf a city of the
name of Gerrha belonging to Chaldaean exiles from
Babylon, who inhabit the district in which salt is
found and who have houses constructed of salt.
As scales of salt, separated by the burning heat of
the sun, are constantly falling off, the houses are
sprinkled with water and the walls are thus kept
firmly together. This city is distant 200 stadia
from the sea. The merchants of Gerrha generally
carry the Arabian merchandise and aromatics by
land, but Aristobulus says, on the contrary, that
they frequently travel into Babylonia on rafts and
thence sail up the Euphrates to Thapsacus with their
cargoes, and afterwards carry them by land to all
parts of the country.

Pliny, vol. ii. 84 (B. vi. c. iii. 2). — Here we find
the city of Gerrha five miles in circumference with
towers built of square blocks of salt. Fifty miles
from the coast, lying in the region of Attene and
opposite to Gerrha, is the island of Tylos, as many
miles distant from the shore ; it is famous for the
vast number of its pearls and has a town of the
same name.

280 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

PALMYRA

Pliny, vol. i. 445 (B. v. c. ii.), Note 4. — It is so
called from the circumstance that Palmyra stood in
the midst of (a grove of palm trees) them. It was
built by King Solomon in an oasis of the desert in
the midst of palm groves from which it received
its Greek name, which was a translation of the
Hebrew " Tadmor," the city of palm trees. It
lay a considerable distance from the Euphrates. Its
site presents considerable ruins, but they are all of
the Roman period and greatly inferior to those of
Baalbek or Heliapolis.

CARAVAN ROUTE FROM YEMEN TO
AND GERRHA

Strabo, vol. iii. 191 (B. xvi. c. iv. 4). — Catabania
(Yemen) produces frankincense and Chatramotibes
(Hydramaut) myrrh there, and other aromatics are
the medium of exchange with the merchants.
Merchants arrive in seventy days at Minaea from
^Elana. ^Elana is a city on the other recess of the
Arabian Gulf, which is called ^Elanites, opposite
to Gerrha as we have before described it. The
Gerrhsei arrive in Hydramaut in forty days."

PHOENICIAN OR POLE STAR

Strabo, vol. i. 6 (B. i. c. vi.). — " Let no one blame
Homer's ignorance for being merely acquainted
with one ' Bear ' when there are two. It is pos
sible that the second was not considered a constel-

CONCLUSION 281

lation until the Phoenicians specially designated it,
and employing it in their navigation it became
known to the Greeks."

THE DIOSCURI (CASTOR AND POLLUX)

Strabo, vol. i. 76 (B. i. c. iii. 2). — " Castor and
Pollux, the guardians of the sea and deliverers of
sailors. The sovereignty of the seas exercised by
Minos and the navigation carried on by the Phoe
nicians is well known. A little after the period of
the Trojan War they had penetrated beyond the
Pillars of Hercules and founded cities on the African
coast/'

BRIDGE OVER THE ISTER OR DANUBE

Strabo, vol. i. 469 (B. viii. c. iii. 15). — " Near
the mouth of the Danube is the large island called
Pence. This the Bastarnae possessed and were
hence called Pencini. There are also other islands
much smaller, some above this and others nearer
the sea. The Danube has seven mouths ; the
largest is called the sacred mouth, the passage by
which to Pence is 120 stadia. At the lower end of
this island Darius made his bridge. It might like
wise have been constructed at the upper part.
This is the first mouth on the left-hand side as you
sail into the Black Sea."

QUIPPAS IN THE PACIFIC

Samoa, Dr. Geo. Turner, p. 302. — " Nui or
Netherlands Islands." " King Tapakea praised
Mano'o for bravery and called out to the onlookers

282 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

on the beach to mark Mano'o as victorious. The
marking was done by setting up a cocoanut leaf
and tying a knot on top of it. Tying a number of
knots on a piece of cord was also a common way
of writing and remembering things in the absence
of a written language among the South Sea
Islanders/'

TANNING

Pliny, vol. iii. 200 (B. xiii. c. xxxiv.). — In the
vicinity of Carthage is claimed more particularly
as the home of the Punic apple, though by some it
is called granatium. The skin, while the fruit is
still sour, is held in high esteem for tanning leather.

AMERICA

Nat. Races, vol. ii. 486, Nahuas. — " The skins
of animals killed by the Nahua hunters were tanned
both with and without hair by a process of which
the authorities say nothing, although universally
praising the results. The leather was used in some
cases as a sort of parchment, but oftener for articles
of dress, ornament, or armour."

CURVED THROW-STICK OR BOOMERANG

Pliny, vol. v. 47 (B. xxiv. c. Ixxii.). — " The tree
called ' aquefolia ' planted in town or country houses
is a preservative against sorceries and spells. The
blossom of it, according to Pythagoras, congeals
water, and a staff made of the wood, if when thrown
at any animal for want of strength in the party

CONCLUSION 283

throwing it, falls short of the mark, will roll back
again towards the thrower of its own accord, so
remarkable are the properties of this tree. The
smoke of the yew kills rats and mice/'

Note 82. — " One would be induced to think that
this story is derived from some vague account of
the properties of the boomerang. Although sup
posed by many to have been the invention of the
natives of Australia, representations of it are found
on the sculptures of Nineveh. It is not improbable
that Pythagoras may have heard of it from the
Magi during his travels in the East."

Vol. iii. 253 (B. viii. c. vii.), see footnote 42.

' The exercise with the boomerang, which was known

to the ancient Assyrians and has been borrowed in

modern times from the people of Australia, seems

to have been somewhat similar to this."

ARROW POISONING

Pliny, vol. iii. 97 (B. xi. c. cxv.). — The Scythians
dip their arrows in the poison of serpents and human
blood; against this frightful composition there is
no remedy, for with the slightest touch it is pro
ductive of instant death."

AMERICA

Nat. Races, vol. i. 436, Californians. — " Arrows
are occasionally poisoned by plunging them into a
liver which has previously been bitten by a rattle
snake."

Vol. i. 579. — " The Ceris, Jovas, and other
tribes smeared the points of their arrows with a

284 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

very deadly poison, but how it was applied it is
difficult to determine. Some travellers say that
the poison was taken from rattlesnakes and other
venomous reptiles, which by teasing were incited
to strike their fangs into the liver of a cow or deer
which was presented to them, after which it was
left to putrefy, and the arrows, being dipped into
the poisonous mass, were placed in the sun to dry,
but other writers again assert that the poison was
produced from a vegetable substance. The wound
inflicted by the point, however slight, is said to have
caused instant death."

POISONS

Nat. Races, vol. i. 762, — " Different varieties of
poisons have been described by writers and travellers.
Herrera speaks of one which he says was made of
certain green roots found along the coast, which
were burnt in earthen pipkins and mixed with a
species of black-ant ; to this composition were added
large spiders, some hairy caterpillars, the wings of
a bat, and the head and tail of a sea-fish called
tavorino, very venomous, besides toads, the tails
of snakes, and manzanillas.

" All these ingredients were set over a fire in an
open field and well boiled in pots by a slave till
they were reduced to a proper consistency. The
unfortunate slave who attended to the boiling
almost invariably died from the fumes. Another
poisonous composition is spoken of as having been
made of fourteen different ingredients and another
of twenty-five. One that killed in three days,
another in five, and another later, &c."

CONCLUSION 285

BURIAL OF SCYTHIAN KINGS

Herodotus, iv. 73. — " The body of the dead king
is laid in the grave prepared for it, stretched upon a
mattress, spears are fixed in the ground on either
side of the corpse, and beams are stretched across
above it to form a roof which is covered with a
thatch of osier twigs. In the open space around
the body of the king they burn one of his concu
bines, first strangling her, and also his cupbearer,
his cook, his groom, his lacquey, his messenger,
some of his horses, firstlings of all his possessions,
and some golden cups, for they use neither silver
nor brass. After this they set to work and raise
a vast mound above the grave, all of them vying
with each other and seeking to make it as tall as
possible/'

AMERICA

Prehistoric Races, Foster, Tabuer & Co., 1874.
" Greek Grave Mounds/' — " Another observer, Dr.
Clemens, states that in carrying on the horizontal
excavations at a distance of twelve or fifteen feet
were found numerous masses composed of charcoal
and burnt bones. On reaching the lower vault
from the top it was determined to enlarge it for the
accommodation of visitors, when ten more skeletons
were found.

These facts show that the principal occupant
of this mound, as indicated by its magnitude, was a
royal personage, and can we not draw the further
inference that many of his attendants were strangled
and others were sacrificed as a burnt offering ?
Have we not explanation, indeed, of many of these

286 THE PHCENICIANS AND AMERICA

facts in the ceremonies which attended the burial
of a Scythian king as described by the Father of
history."

PURPLE DYE

Pliny, ii. 44 (B. ix. c. Ixi.). — "There are two
kinds of fish that produce the purple colours ; the
elements in both are the same, the combinations
only are different. The smaller fish is that which
is called ' buccinum/ from its resemblance to the
conch by which the buccina or trumpet is pro
duced, and to this circumstance it owes its name ;
the opening of it is round. The other fish is known
as the purpura or purple, and has a grooved and
projecting muzzle, which, being tibulated on one
side, in the interior forms a passage for the tongue.
The buccinum attaches itself only to crags and is
gathered about rocky places.

" Purples have another name, that of pelagae ;
there are numerous kinds of them which differ only
in their elements and place of abode, &c."

COTTON

Strabo, vol. iii. 86 (B. xv. c. i. 23). — Aristobulus
says of the wool-bearing trees that the flower pod
contains a kernel which is taken out and the re
mainder is combed like wool.

COTTON ON ISLAND OF TYLOS

Pliny, vol. iii. 117 (B. xii. c. xxi.). — On an
elevated plateau on the island we find trees that bear

CONCLUSION 287

wool but of a different nature from those of Seres of
India, as in these trees the leaves bear nothing at
all, and indeed might very readily be taken for those
of the vine were it not that they are of smaller
size. They bear a kind of gourd about the size of
a quince which, when arrived at maturity, bursts
asunder and discloses a ball of down from which a
costly kind of linen cloth is made/'

Note 2 — Cottonei. — To this resemblance of its
fruit to the quince the cotton tree which is here
alluded to not improbably owes its modern name.

Pliny, vol. iii. 108 (B. xii. c. viii.). — Cotton
trees. " In describing the country of the Seres we
have already made mention of the wool-bearing
trees which it produces, and we have likewise
touched upon the extraordinary magnitude of the
trees of India/'

SIDONIAN ASTRONOMY AND ARITHMETIC

Strabo, vol. iii. 173 (B. xvi. c. ii. 24). — The
Sidonians are said by historians to excel in various
kinds of art, as the words of Homer (//. xxiii. 743)
also imply. Besides they cultivate science and
study astronomy and arithmetic, to which they were
led by the application of numbers and night sailing,
each of which branches of knowledge concerns the
merchant and the seaman. In the same manner
the Egyptians were led to the invention of geometry
by the mensuration of ground, which was required
in consequence of the Nile confounding, by its
overflow, the respective boundaries of the country.
It is thought that geometry was introduced into
Greece from Egypt and astronomy and arithmetic

288 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

from Phoenicia. At present the best opportunities
are afforded in these cities of acquiring a knowledge
of these and of all other branches of knowledge.

TIDES

Strabo, vol. i. 259 (B. iii. c. v. 8). — " I cannot
tell how it is that Posidonius, who describes the
Phoenicians as sagacious in other things, should have
attributed to them folly rather than shrewdness,
&c." This passage refers to observations on the
causes producing spring and neap tides.

VOYAGES OF EXPLORATION

Pliny, vol. i. 98 (B. ii. c. Ixvii.).— All of this
chapter refers to the exploration of the Asiatic and
European seas. " On the other side of Gades, pro
ceeding from the same western point, a great part
of the southern ocean along Mauritania has now
been navigated. Indeed the greater part of this
region, as well as of the East as far as the Arabian
Gulf, was surveyed in consequence of Alexander's
victories. When Caius Caesar, the son of Augustus,
had the conduct of affairs in that country it is said
that they found the remains of a Spanish vessel
that had been wrecked there. While the power of
Carthage was at its height Hanno published an ac
count of a voyage which he had made from Gades to
the extremities of Arabia (Hood, ii. 393). Hamilico
also was sent about the same time to explore the
remote parts of Europe. Besides we learn from
Cornelius Nepos that one Eudoxus, a contemporary

CONCLUSION 289

of his when he was flying from King Lathyrus, set
out from the Arabian Gulf and was carried as far
as Gades."

SPEEDY VOYAGES

Pliny, vol. iv. 136 (B. xix. c. i.). — "To think
that there is here a plant, flax, which brings Egypt
in close proximity to Italy, so much so in fact that
Gaberius and Balbillus, both of them prefects of
Egypt, made the passage to Alexandria from the
Straits of Sicily, the one in six days and the other
in five. It was only this last summer that Valerius
Marianus, a senator of Praetorian rank, reached
Alexandria from Puteoli in eight days and that too
with a very moderate breeze all the time. To think
that there is a plant which brings Gades near the
Pillars of Hercules within six days of Ostia, ' Nearer
Spain ' within three, the province of Gallia Narbo-
nensis within two, and Africa within one, this last
passage having been made by C. Flavius when
legate of Vibius Crispus, the proconsul, and that
too with little or no wind to favour the passage/'

KNOWLEDGE OF THE SPHERICITY OF THE EARTH

Strabo, vol. i. 78 (B. i. c. iii. 3). — " Again, having
discoursed on the advance of knowledge respecting
the geography of the inhabited earth between the
time of Alexander and the period when he was
writing, Erastosthenes goes into a description of
the figure of the earth, an account of which would
have been very suitable, but of the whole earth
which should certainly have been given too, but not
hi this disordered manner. He proceeds to tell us

T

290 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

that the earth is spheroidal, not however perfectly
so, inasmuch as it has certain irregularities. He
then enlarges on the successive changes in its form
occasioned by water, fire, earthquake, eruptions,
and the like, all of which is entirely out of place,
for the spheroidal form of the whole earth is the re
sult of the system of the universe, and the phenomena
which he mentions do not in the least change its
general form, such little matters being entirely lost
in the great mass of the earth/'

GADES AND ERYTHREA

Pliny, vol. i. 368 (B. iv. c. xxxvi.).— " At the
very commencement of Baetica and twenty-five miles
from the Straits of Gades is the island of Gades,
twelve miles long and three broad, as Polybius states
in his writings. At its nearest part it is 700 feet
distant from the mainland, while in the remaining
portion it is more than seven miles. Its circum
ference is fifteen miles. On the other side, which
looks towards Spain, at about one hundred paces
distant, is another long island three miles wide, on
which the original city of Gades stood. By Ephorus
and Philistides it is called Erythrea. It is called
Erythrea because the Tyrians, the original ancestors
of the Carthaginians, were said to have come from
the Erythrean or Red Sea. In the island Geryon is
by some thought to have dwelt, whose herds were
carried off by Hercules/'

TYRE. NAVIGATION AND DYEING

Strabo, vol. iii. 172 (B. xvi. c. ii. 25). — "Tyre is
wholly an island built in the same manner as Aradus.

CONCLUSION 291

It is joined to the continent by a mound which
Alexander raised when he besieged it. It has two
harbours, one close the other open, which is called
the Egyptian harbour. The houses here, it is said,
consist of many stories, of more even than Rome.
On the occasion, therefore, of an earthquake the
city was nearly demolished. It sustained great
injury when it was taken by Alexander, but it rose
above these misfortunes and recovered itself both
by the skill of the people in navigation, in which art
the Phoenicians in general have always excelled all
nations, and by their expertness in purple-dye manu
factures. The Tyrian murex from which dye is pro
cured is caught near the coast, and the Tyrians
have in great abundance other requisites for dyeing.
The great number of dyeworks renders the city un
pleasant as a place of residence, but the superior
skill of the people in the practice of this art is the
source of its wealth/'

SYSTEM OF INTERCALATION AND DIVISION OF
THE YEAR

Herodotus, ii. 4. — " But as concerns human effort
they agree with one another in the following account,
that the Egyptians were the first to discover the year
which they divided into twelve parts, and they say
that they made the discovery from the stars, and
so far I think that they act more wisely than the
Grecians, in that the Grecians insert an intercalary
month every year on account of the seasons,
whereas the Egyptians reckon twelve months of
thirty days each and add five days each year above
that number, and so with them the circle of the
seasons comes round to the same point/'

292 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

MEXICO

Nat. Races, vol. ii. 508. — "The civil year was
again divided into eighteen months and five days.
Each month had its particular name, but the five
extra days were only designated unlucky days/'

PHOENICIANS IN BRITAIN AND NORWAY,
1500-1200 B.C.

Prehistoric Times, Sir John Lubbock, Appleton
& Co., 1878, p. 73. — " We are therefore surely quite
justified in concluding that between 1500 B.C. and
1200 B.C. the Phoenicians were already acquainted
with the mineral fields of Spain and Britain, and
under these circumstances it is, I think, more than
probable that they pushed their explorations still
further in search of other shores as rich in mineral
wealth as ours. Indeed we must remember that
amber, so much valued in ancient times, could not
have been obtained from any nearer source than
the coasts of the German Ocean, &c." See what
follows for proof.

TYRE AND BRITAIN, 1200-1050 B.C.

Story of Phoenicia, Rawlinson, p. 164. — " But
there was one branch of their sea trade whereto they
clung with extreme tenacity, and which at a date
long subsequent to the seventh century they pre
vented even the Romans from sharing. This was
the trade for tin with the Scilly Islands and the
coasts of Cornwall already mentioned in an earlier
section, which was one of the main sources of Phoe-

CONCLUSION 293

nician wealth, tin being found in a few places only,
and being largely required for the hardening of
copper into bronze by almost all the races inside the
Pillars of Hercules with which the Phoenicians had
dealings. Tyre at the height of its greatness sent
her ships year by year through the stormy Atlantic
to the British Islands to fetch a commodity which
has largely flowed back to the country of its birth
as ingredients of the precious bronzes that are to
be seen in English collections."

PHOENICIAN EXPANSION IN 1050 B.C.

Manual of Anct. History, Rawlinson, Clarendon
Press, 1880, page 39. — "The commercial spirit of
the Phoenicians was largely displayed during this
period, which till its close was one of absolute
independence. The great monarchies of Egypt
and Assyria were comparatively speaking weak,
and the states between the Euphrates and the
African border, being free from external control,
were able to pursue their natural bent without
interference. Her commercial leanings early induced
Phoenicia to begin the practice of establishing
colonies, and the advantages which the system was
found to secure caused it to acquire a vast develop
ment. The coasts and islands of the Mediterranean
were rapidly covered with settlements, the Pillars
of Hercules were passed, and cities built on the shores
of the ocean. At the same time factories were
built on the Persian Gulf and conjointly with the
Israelites on the Red Sea. Phoenicia had at this time
no serious commercial rival, and the trade of the
world was in her hands/'

294 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

GALENA

Pliny, vol. vi. 3 (B. xxxiii. c. xxxi.). — " Silver
is never found but in shafts sunk in the ground,
there being no indications to raise hopes of its ex
istence, no shining sparkles as in the case of gold.
The earth in which it is found is sometimes red,
sometimes of an ashy hue. It is impossible, too,
to melt it except in combination with lead or with
Galena, this last being the name given to the vein
of lead that is mostly found running near the vein
of silver ore. When submitted, too, to the action of
fire part of the ore precipitates itself in the form
of lead, while the silver is left floating on the surface
like oil on water."

Prehistoric Times, Sir John Lubbock, Appleton
& Co., 1878, page 258. — " The powerful nations
of Central America were, however, in an age of
bronze while the N. Americans were in a condition
of which we find in Europe scant traces, namely,
in an age of copper. Silver is the only other metal
which has been found in the ancient tumuli, and
that but in very small quantities. It occurs in a
native form with the copper of Lake Superior,
whence in all probability it was derived. It does
not appear ever to have been smelted. From the
large quantities of Galena which is found in the
mounds, Squire and Davis are disposed to think that
lead must have been used to a certain extent by
the N. American tribes ; the metal itself, however,
has not yet I believe been found."

Nat. Races, Bancroft, vol. iv. 778. — " The only
metals found in the mounds are copper and silver,
the latter only in small quantities. A few gold

CONCLUSION 295

trinkets have been reported, but the evidence is
not conclusive that such were deposited by the
mound builders. Iron ore and Galena occur, but
no iron or lead."

Nat. Races, vol. iv. 779. — " Mr. Dickson speaks
confidently of gold, silver, copper, and Galena money
left by the mound builders."

Prehistoric Races of the U. S., J. W. Foster, LL.D.,
Triibner & Co., Lond. 1874, page 271. — " Lead,
though easily reduced, does not appear to have been
used to any considerable extent. Galena is fre
quently met with in the mounds as far south as the
Ohio River."

PHOENICIANS

Story of Phoenicia, Rawlinson, p. 163. — " The
silver mines of Southern Spain were rich in the ex
treme and the soil so abundant with the product
that even the lead was to a large extent alloyed
with it, and the amalgam was known to the Greeks
as a peculiar metal which they called Galena."

LASSOES

Herodotus, vii. 85. — " There is a certain nomadic
race called the Sarmatians, of Persian extraction and
language, who wear a dress fashioned between the
Persian and the Bactrian fashion ; they furnish
8000 horse, but they are not accustomed to carry
any arms, either brass or iron, except daggers ; they
use ropes of twisted thongs, trusting to these they
go to war. The mode of fighting of these men is
as follows : When they engage with the enemy they
throw out the ropes which have a noose at the end,

296 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

and whatever anyone catches, whether horse or
man, he drags to himself, and they that are entangled
in the coils are put to death. This is their mode
of fighting, and they are marshalled with the Per

sians/'

History of Mankind, Ratzel, vol. ii. 81. " The
Patagonians." — " The weapons of these nomads are
not the bow and arrow which elsewhere are in use
among rude pastoral races but the javelin, the
bolas, and the lasso, from which the bolas seems to
have arisen/'

International Encyclopedia, vol. xi. 10. " Lasso/'
— " A rope of hair, hemp, or hide from sixty to one
hundred feet long with a running noose at one end.
It is thrown mostly from horseback with a whirl
which takes the expanded noose over the horns or
legs of the animal to be captured, a snatch tightens
it and disables the quarry. It was in Mexico
and South America before their discovery by the
Spaniards, and is still used for catching wild cattle.
It is a favourite hunting equipment of the cowboys
of North- Western Texas and Mexico/'

Nat. Races, Pacific States, vol. i. 493. — " Through
out Arizona and New Mexico the bow and arrow is
the principal weapon both in war and in the chase,
to which are added by those accustomed to move on
horseback the shield and lance, with such also the
Mexican riata or lasso may occasionally be seen."

Note 58. — " The weapons of war were the spear
or lance, the bow, and the lasso."

Nat. Races, vol. i. 724. " The Mosquitos." — " Be
side the implements already referred to under fishing
and weapons may be mentioned the lasso, in the
use of which they are very expert."

CONCLUSION 297

TRADE WINDS

Nelson's Ency., vol. xii. 147. — " So called from
their steady course, are met with between the
latitudes of 7° to 29° north, and 3° to 20° south.
North of the equator these winds blow almost con
stantly from the north-east, while south of the
equator the prevailing direction is south-east. The
distribution of barometric pressure which brings
about the permanency of the trade winds is a belt
of comparatively high pressure from 30°° to 30'°
inches, which circles the globe at the tropics both
north and south of the equator, causing the north
east trades of the tropic of Cancer and the south
east trades of the tropic of Capricorn/'

Note, T. C. J. — Beyond these are the periodic
and variable winds, consequently the real perplexi
ties of navigation begin approximately at from
20° to 30° north and south of the equatorial line.

Ency. Brit., vol. xvi. 144. — " North and south
trade winds also prevail in the Pacific Ocean separ
ated by a region of calms, which would appear,
however, to be less clearly defined than in the
region of calms in the Atlantic/'

CHITTIM

Hist, of Phoenician Art, Perrot and Chipiez, vol.
ii. 92. — " This was the oldest and most important
of all the Phoenician settlements on the island of
Cyprus, and carried on the liveliest trade with the
continent and the interior of the island, and we find
that the Hebrew prophets applied it indiscriminately
to the whole of the western world, which they looked
upon as a dependency of Phoenicia/'

298 THE PHOENICIANS AND AMERICA

BETYLLIUM

Story of Phoenician Art, Perrot and Chipiez, vol.
i. 58. — " The worship of Betylae, which we encounter
in every country, reached by Phoenician influence,
may be traced to the same source. The word we
have used comes to us from the Greek, and they
took it with some slight alteration from the Semitic
group Beth-el, which means the house of God. This
was a generic term used to denote all sacred stones,
that is to say all stones credited with the possession
of any special and peculiar virtue. We are told
that some were aerolites, a circumstance which
greatly enhance their credit. "

HUMAN SACRIFICES

Hist, of Phoenician Art, Perrot and Chipiez, vol.
i. 76. Note i. — Philo of Byblius speaks of human
sacrifices as a rite peculiar to the Phoenician race
(Frg. Hist. Greece, vol. iii. 570).

FIJI : ORIGIN OF NAME

Ain-Fiji is the name of a large gushing spring
which supplies water to the Abana, one of the rivers
of Damascus. These Fiji Islands in the Pacific are
noted for their large gushing streams. These simi
larities in name, &c., have been referred to by Mr.
John Macgregor in his book The Rob Roy on the
Jordan, and the point has also been discussed by
Sir Arthur Gordon, Sir W. Des Voeux, Governor
of Fiji.

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