Part 13 (1/2)

In return, Solomon opened to Hiram the route to the East by way of the Red Sea. Solomon, doubtless by the a.s.sistance of s.h.i.+pwrights furnished to him from Tyre, ”made a navy of s.h.i.+ps at Ezion-Geber, which is beside Eloth, on the sh.o.r.e of the Red Sea, in the land of Edom,”[14102] and the sailors of the two nations conjointly manned the s.h.i.+ps, and performed the voyage to Ophir, whence they brought gold, and ”great plenty of almug-trees,” and precious stones.[14103] The position of Ophir has been much disputed, but the balance of argument is in favour of the theory which places it in Arabia, on the south-eastern coast, a little outside the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb.[14104] It is possible that the fleet did not confine itself to trade with Ophir, but, once launched on the Indian Ocean, proceeded along the Atlantic coast to the Persian Gulf and the peninsula of Hindustan. Or Ophir may have been an Arab emporium for the Indian trade, and the merchants of Syria may have found there the Indian commodities, and the Indian woods,[14105] which they seem to have brought back with them to their own country. A most lucrative traffic was certainly established by the united efforts of the two kings; and if the lion's share of the profit fell to Solomon and the Hebrews,[14106]

still the Phoenicians and Hiram must have partic.i.p.ated to some considerable extent in the gains made, or the arrangement would not have continued.

It is thought that Hiram was engaged in one war of some importance.

Menander tells us, according to the present text of Josephus,[14107]

that the ”t.i.tyi” revolted from him, and refused any longer to pay him tribute, whereupon he made an expedition against them, and succeeded in compelling them to submit to his authority. As the ”t.i.tyi” are an unknown people, conjecture has been busy in suggesting other names,[14108] and critics are now of the opinion that the original word used by Menander was not ”t.i.tyi,” but ”Itykaei.” The ”Itykaei” are the people of Utica: and, if this emendation be accepted,[14109] we must regard Hiram as having had to crush a most important and dangerous rebellion. Utica, previously to the foundation of Carthage, was by far the most important of all the mid-African colonies, and her successful revolt would probably have meant to Tyre the loss of the greater portion, if not the whole, of those valuable settlements. A rival to her power would have sprung up in the West, which would have crippled her commerce in that quarter, and checked her colonising energy. She would have suffered thus early more than she did four hundred years later by the great development of the power of Carthage; would have lost a large portion of her prestige; and have entered on the period of her decline when she had but lately obtained a commanding position. Hiram's energy diverted these evils: he did not choose that his kingdom should be dismembered, if he could anyhow help it; and, offering a firm and strenuous opposition to the revolt, he succeeded in crus.h.i.+ng it, and maintaining the unity of the empire.

The brilliant reign of Hiram, which covered the s.p.a.ce of forty-three years, was not followed, like that of Solomon, by any immediate troubles, either foreign or domestic. He had given his people, either at home or abroad, constant employment; he had consulted their convenience in the enlargement of his capital; he had enriched them, and gratified their love of adventure, by his commercial enterprises; he had maintained their prestige by rivetting their yoke upon a subject state; he had probably pleased them by the temples and other public buildings with which he had adorned and beautified their city. Accordingly, he went down to the grave in peace; and not only so, but left his dynasty firmly established in power. His son, Baal-azar or Baleazar, who was thirty-six years of age, succeeded him, and held the throne for seven years, when he died a natural death.[14110] Abd-Ashtoreth (Abdastartus), the fourth monarch of the house, then ascended the throne, at the age of twenty, and reigned for nine years before any troubles broke out. Then, however, a time of disturbance supervened. Four of his foster-brothers conspired against Abd-Ashtoreth, and murdered him. The eldest of them seized the throne, and maintained himself upon it for twelve years, when Astartus, perhaps a son of Baal-azar, became king, and restored the line of Hiram. He, too, like his predecessor, reigned twelve years, when his brother, Aserymus, succeeded him. Aserymus, after ruling for nine years, was murdered by another brother, Pheles, who, in his turn, succ.u.mbed to a conspiracy headed by the High Priest, Eth-baal, or Ithobal.[14111]

Thus, while the period immediately following the death of Hiram was one of tranquillity, that which supervened on the death of Abd-Astartus, Hiram's grandson, was disturbed and unsettled. Three monarchs met with violent deaths within the s.p.a.ce of thirty-four years, and the reigning house was, at least, thrice changed during the same interval.

At length with Ithobal a more tranquil time was reached. Ithobal, or Eth-baal, was not only king, but also High Priest of Ashtoreth, and thus united the highest sacerdotal with the highest civil authority. He was a man of decision and energy, a worthy successor of Hiram, gifted like him with wide-reaching views, and ambitious of distinction. One of his first acts was to ally himself with Ahab, King of Israel, by giving him his daughter, Jezebel, in marriage,[14112] thus strengthening his land dominion, and renewing the old relations of friends.h.i.+p with the Hebrew people. Another act of vigour a.s.signed to him is the foundation of Botrys, on the Syrian coast, north of Gebal, perhaps a defensive movement against a.s.syria.[14113] Still more enterprising was his renewal of the African colonisation by his foundation of Auza in Numidia,[14114]

which became a city of some importance. Ithobal's reign lasted, we are told, thirty-two years. He was sixty-eight years of age at his death, and was succeeded by his son, who is called Badezor, probably a corruption of Balezor, or Baal-azar[14115]--the name given by Hiram to his son and successor. Of Badezor we know nothing, except that he reigned six years, and was succeeded by his son Matgen, perhaps Mattan,[14116] a youth of twenty-three.

With Matgen, or Mattan, whichever be the true form of the name, the internal history of Tyre becomes interesting. It appears that two parties already existed in the state, one aristocratic, and the other popular.[14117] Mattan, fearing the ascendancy of the popular party, married his daughter, Elisa, whom he intended for his successor, to her uncle and his own brother, Sicharbas, who was High Priest of Melkarth, and therefore possessed of considerable authority in his own person.

Having effected this marriage, and nominated Elisa to succeed him, Mattan died at the early age of thirty-two, after a reign of only nine years.[14118] Besides his daughter, he had left behind him a son, Pygmalion, who, at his decease, was but eight or nine years old. This child the democratic party contrived to get under their influence, proclaimed him king, young as he was, and placed him upon the throne.

Elisa and her husband retired into private life, and lived in peace for seven years, but Pygmalion, being then grown to manhood, was not content to leave them any longer unmolested. He murdered Sicharbas, and endeavoured to seize his riches. But the ex-Queen contrived to frustrate his design, and having possessed herself of a fleet of s.h.i.+ps, and taken on board the greater number of the n.o.bles, sailed away, with her husband's wealth untouched, to Cyprus first, and then to Africa.[14119]

Here, by agreement with the inhabitants, a site was obtained, and the famous settlement founded, which became known to the Greeks as ”Karchedon,” and to the Romans as ”Carthago,” or Carthage. Josephus places this event in the hundred and forty-fourth year after the building of the Temple of Solomon,[14120] or about B.C. 860. This date, however, is far from certain.

It appears to have been in the reign of Ithobal that the first contact took place between Phoenicia and a.s.syria. About B.C. 885, a powerful and warlike monarch, by name a.s.shur-n.a.z.ir-pal, mounted the throne of Nineveh, and shortly engaged in a series of wars towards the south, the east, the north, and the north-west.[14121] In the last-named direction he crossed the Euphrates at Carchemish (Jerablus), and, having overrun the country between that river and the Orontes, he proceeded to pa.s.s this latter stream also, and to carry his arms into the rich tract which lay between the Orontes and the Mediterranean. ”It was a tract,” says M. Maspero,[14122] ”opulent and thickly populated, at once full of industries and commercial; the metals, both precious and ordinary, gold, silver, copper, tin (?), iron, were abundant; traffic with Phoenicia supplied it with the purple dye, and with linen stuffs, with ebony and with sandal-wood. a.s.shur-n.a.z.ir-pal's attack seems to have surprised the chief of the Hitt.i.tes in a time of profound peace. Sangar, King of Carchemish, allowed the pa.s.sage of the Euphrates to take place without disputing it, and opened to the a.s.syrians the gates of his capital.

Lubarna, king of Kunulua, alarmed at the power of the enemy, and dreading the issue of a battle, came to terms with him, consenting to make over to him twenty talents of gold, a talent of silver, two hundred talents of tin, a hundred of iron, 2,000 oxen, 10,000 sheep, a thousand garments of wool or linen, together with furniture, arms, and slaves beyond all count. The country of Lukhuti resisted, and suffered the natural consequences--all the cities were sacked, and the prisoners crucified. After this exploit, a.s.shur-n.a.z.ir-pal occupied both the slopes of Mount Lebanon, and then descended to the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean.

Phoenicia did not await his arrival to do him homage: the kings of Tyre, Sidon, Gebal, and Arvad, 'which is in the midst of the sea,' sent him presents. The a.s.syrians employed their time in cutting down cedar trees in Lebanon and Ama.n.u.s, together with pines and cypresses, which they transported to Nineveh to be used in the construction of a temple to Ishtar.”

The period of the a.s.syrian subjection, which commenced with this attack on the part of a.s.shur-n.a.z.ir-pal, will be the subject of the next section. It only remains here briefly to recapitulate the salient points of Phoenician history under Tyre's first supremacy. In the first place, it was a time of increased daring and enterprise, in which colonies were planted upon the sh.o.r.es of the Atlantic Ocean, and trade extended to the remote south, the more remote north, and the still more remote north-east, to the Fortunate Islands, the Ca.s.siterides, and probably the Baltic. Secondly, it was a time when the colonies on the North African coast were reinforced, strengthened, and increased in number; when the Phoenician yoke was rivetted on that vast projection into the Mediterranean which divides that sea into two halves, and goes far to give the power possessing it entire command of the Mediterranean waters.

Thirdly, it was a time of extended commerce with the East, perhaps the only time when Phoenician merchant vessels were free to share in the trade of the Red Sea, to adventure themselves in the Indian Ocean, and to explore the distant coasts of Eastern Africa, Southern Arabia, Beloochistan, India and Ceylon. Fourthly, it was a time of artistic vigour and development, when Tyre herself a.s.sumed that aspect of splendour and magnificence which thenceforth characterised her until her destruction by Alexander, and when she so abounded in aesthetic energy and genius that she could afford to take the direction of an art movement in a neighbouring country, and to plant her ideas on that conspicuous hill which for more than a thousand years drew the eyes of men almost more than any other city of the East, and was only destroyed because she was felt by Rome to be a rival that she could not venture to spare. Finally, it was a time when internal dissensions, long existing, came to a head, and the state lost, through a sudden desertion, a considerable portion of its strength, which was transferred to a distant continent, and there steadily, if not rapidly, developed itself into a power, not antagonistic indeed, but still, by the necessity of its position, a rival power--a new commercial star, before which all other stars, whatever their brightness had been, paled and waned--a new factor in the polity of nations, whereof account had of necessity to be taken; a new trade-centre, which could not but supersede to a great extent all former trade-centres, and which, however unwillingly, as it rose, and advanced, and prospered, tended to dim, obscure, and eclipse the glories of its mother-city.

3. Phoenicia during the period of its subjection to a.s.syria (B.C.

877-635)

Phoenicia conquered by the a.s.syrians (about B.C. 877)-- Peaceful relations established (about B.C. 839)--Time of quiet and prosperity--Harsh measures of Tiglath-pileser II.

(about B.C. 740)--Revolt of Simyra--Revolt of Tyre under Elulaeus--Wars of Elulaeus with Shalmaneser IV. and with Sennacherib--Reign of Abdi-Milkut--His war with Esarhaddon-- Accession of Baal--His relations with Esarhaddon and a.s.shur- bani-pal--Revolt and reduction of Arvad, Hosah, and Accho-- Summary.

The first contact of Phoenicia with a.s.syria took place, as above observed, in the reign of a.s.shur-n.a.z.ir-pal, about the year B.C. 877. The princ.i.p.al cities, on the approach of the great conquering monarch, with his mult.i.tudinous array of chariots, his clouds of horse, and his innumerable host of foot soldiers, made haste to submit themselves, sought to propitiate the invader by rich gifts, and accepted what they hoped might prove a nominal subjection. Arvad, which, as the most northern, was the most directly threatened, Gebal, Sidon, and even the comparatively remote Tyre, sent their several emba.s.sies, made their offerings, and became, in name at any rate, a.s.syrian dependencies. But the real subjection of this country was not effected at this time, nor without a struggle. a.s.shur-n.a.z.ir-pal's yoke lay lightly upon his va.s.sals, and during the remainder of his long reign--from B.C. 877 to B.C. 860--he seems to have desisted from military expeditions,[14123]

and to have exerted no pressure on the countries situated west of the Euphrates. It was not until the reign of his son and successor, Shalmaneser II., that the real conquest of Syria and Phoenicia was taken in hand, and pressed to a successful issue by a long series of hard-fought campaigns and b.l.o.o.d.y battles. From his sixth to his twenty-first year Shamaneser carried on an almost continuous war in Syria,[14124] where his adversaries were the monarchs of Damascus and Hamath, and ”the twelve kings beside the sea, above and below,”[14125]

one of whom is expressly declared to have been ”Mattan-Baal of Arvad.”[14126] It was not until the year B.C. 839 that this struggle was terminated by the submission of the monarchs engaged in it to their great adversary, and the firm establishment of a system of ”tribute and taxes.”[14127] The Phoenician towns agreed to pay annually to the a.s.syrian monarch a certain fixed sum in the precious metals, and further to make him presents from time to time of the best products of their country. Among these are mentioned ”skins of buffaloes, horns of buffaloes, clothing of wool and linen, violet wool, purple wool, strong wood, wood for weapons, skins of sheep, fleeces of s.h.i.+ning purple, and birds of heaven.”[14128]

The relations of Phoenicia towards the a.s.syrian monarchy continued to be absolutely peaceful for above a century. The cities retained their native monarchs, their laws and inst.i.tutions, their religion, and their entire internal administration. So long as they paid the fixed tribute, they appear not to have been interfered with in any way. It would seem that their trade prospered. a.s.syria had under her control the greater portion of those commercial routes across the continent of Asia,[14129]

which it was of the highest importance to Phoenicia to have open and free from peril. Her caravans could traverse them with increased security, now that they were safeguarded by a power whereof she was a dependency. She may even have obtained through a.s.syria access to regions which had been previously closed to her, as Media, and perhaps Persia.

At any rate Tyre seems to have been as flouris.h.i.+ng in the later times of the a.s.syrian dominion as at almost any other period. Isaiah, in denouncing woe upon her, towards the close of the dominion, shows us what she had been under it:--

Be silent (he says), ye inhabitants of the island, Which the merchants of Zidon, that pa.s.s over the sea, have replenished.

The corn of the Nile, on the broad waters, The harvest of the River, has been her revenue: She has been the mart of nations . . .

She was a joyful city, Her antiquity was of ancient days . . .

She was a city that dispensed crowns; Her merchants were princes, And her traffickers the honourable of the earth.[14130]

A change in the friendly feelings of the Phoenician cities towards a.s.syria first began after the rise of the Second or Lower a.s.syrian Empire, which was founded, about B.C. 745, by Tiglath-pileser II.[14131]

Tiglath-pileser, after a time of quiescence and decay, raised up a.s.syria to be once more a great conquering power, and energetically applied himself to the consolidation and unification of the empire. It was the a.s.syrian system, as it was the Roman, to absorb nations by slow degrees--to begin by offering protection and asking in return a moderate tribute; then to draw the bonds more close, to make fresh demands and enforce them; finally, to pick a quarrel, effect a conquest, and absorb the country, leaving it no vestige of independence. Tiglath-pileser began this process of absorption in Northern Syria about the year B.C.

740. He rearranged the population in the various towns, taking from some and giving to others,[14132] adding also in most cases an a.s.syrian element, appointing a.s.syrian governors,[14133] and requiring of the inhabitants ”the performance of service like the a.s.syrians.”[14134]